Hillary Worked on WalMart Board of Directors

Media outcry has recently revealed a darker side of Hillary Clinton. During her husband’s run as governor of Arkansas, Senator Clinton worked on the WalMart Board of Directors. During President Clinton’s run for the White House in 1992, a chief donator to the campaign was Mr. Sam Walton. With the White House is her eyes, Hillary Clinton is stearing clear of mentioning her ties to WalMart due to a recent Democratic campaign against WalMart’s employee benefits programs (they are non-existent). The liberal news media is currently up in arms over the ordeal. The question is: Why didn’t everyone already know this? She worked on the board between 1986 and 1992, up until her hubby won the White House seat. Is Hillary going to take John Kerry’s place as a severely disgruntled flip-flop? The Village Voice recently deconstructed “Wal-Mart’s First Lady.” It’s funny though, that WalMart is currently selling a book on their website interestingly called “Can She Be Stopped?: Hillary Clinton Will Be the Next President of the United States Unless…” I see a fair amount of backstabbing in the near future…

Hoarding and Collaboration: the Struggle over Intellectual Property

Today, Microsoft announced that it received its 5000th U.S. Patent. As the article explains, Microsoft’s intellectual property strategy is fairly defensive. As much as I tend to hate Microsoft, they could be worse; there are quite a few companies with much more aggressive policies. Take over 1600 record labels, represented by the Recording Industry Association of America, for example. As we all know, the RIAA and its associates have recurrently pursued aggressive lawsuits against copyright violators. It’s also common knowledge that quite a few people are less than pleased with the RIAA.

While companies and consumers seem locked in a never-ending battle over the freedom of data, the intellectual property struggle is producing a much more subtle, though arguably more profound, effect on technological innovation. Wired.com recently published a nice, though predictably uninformative, article on innovation in the era of copyrights and patents.

Walmart Begins Annexation of the Blogosphere

Walmart has begun its systematic takeover of the blogosphere. In retaliation for current government and public attacks against the company, Walmart is beginning to hire current employees and embedded bloggers to do their dirty-work; they are feeding Walmart propaganda into the blog world. Recently, a state-legislated bill was announced that would force Walmart to increase spending on employee health insurance. Walmart currently encourages employees to seek public health benefits and welfare programs, instead of using the company’s programs. Brian Pickrell, a paid Walmart crony and frequent blogger, was posting in spades pro-Walmart messages attacking the bill: “All across the country, newspaper editorial boards — no great friends of business — are ripping the bills…” The New York Times ran the article this morning, giving an inside look into the invasion of the blog world:

Several sentences in Mr. Pickrell’s Jan. 20 posting — and others from different days — are identical to those written by an employee at one of Wal-Mart’s public relations firms and distributed by e-mail to bloggers.

Under assault as never before, Wal-Mart is increasingly looking beyond the mainstream media and working directly with bloggers, feeding them exclusive nuggets of news, suggesting topics for postings and even inviting them to visit its corporate headquarters.

Catching Up, or Dragging our Feet?, the Fate of Broadband in America

In the last six months the U.S. has been playing catch-up with the rest of the world; from going green to better cell phones, it seems like America might finally be catching up.

There is at least one area, however, where the U.S. hasn’t even begun to modernize. Broadband internet speeds in the United States max out at a rather lethargic 6 megabytes per second, compared to about 100 megs per second in England, and up to 250 megs per second in Japan and other parts of Asia.

But why is the U.S. so behind, and what does that mean for the future of broadband in America?

Zero to 60 in Four Soybeans…

CBS reports that a group of 5 former dropouts have built a soybean-fueled car that goes from zero to sixty in 4 seconds; pretty damn impressive.

They also speculate on why nobody has managed this feat yet:

“We made this work,” says Hauger. “We’re not geniuses. So why aren’t they doing it?”

Kosi thinks he knows why. The answer, he says, is the big oil companies.

“They’re making billions upon billions of dollars,” he says. “And when this car sells, that’ll go down — to low billions upon billions.”

In His First Televised Interview in Quite Some Time, President Bush Explains Himself

Today, President Bush met with Elizabeth Vargas for an interview that aired on World News Tonight on ABC. In his first television interview in quite a long time, President Bush explains his position on the controversial DP World ports deal, reiterates his anti-oil sentiment, “…including changing how we drive cars, getting unhooked from oil,” and even explains his exact stance on abortion with his three exceptions: “rape, incest, and the life of the mother.” The President states that unemployment rates are at 4.7%, which is one of the lowest rates in history and that the economy is at a healthy level. With the nation’s polls leaving the President at a low 37% approval rate, what are some ways he, and his cabinet, can bring that rating up?

Is It Too Soon?

Oliver Stone is currently in the process of shooting a feature-length motion picture, “World Trade Center”, inspired by the events of September 11, 2001. The movie will tell the gripping story of the last two survivors pulled from the wreckage of the former World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan. Nicholas Cage will play Sergeant John McLoughlin and Michael Pena will be playing the role of William J. Jimeno. These real-life Port Authority officers are working very close with the production crew, directors and actors, making sure every detail is exact to that day, as they are the best witnesses to their story. Universal Pictures has already filmed “Flight 93“, a movie (directed by Paul Greengas, director of “Bloody Sunday” and “The Bourne Supremacy”) about the events on the ill-fated flight 93 that departed from Newark International Airport on September 11th and crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. “Flight 93″ will be released in April 2006. Adam Sandler is set to play a grieving man who lost his family on 9/11 in “Reign O’er Me.” Another film, “102 Minutes” will be released in 2007 as an adaptation of the book by New York Times reporter Jim Dwyer, that “recreates the moments between the first plane’s crash into the World Trade Center and the second tower’s collapse.” Since Hollywood is coming out in full force on the topic, the question on everyone’s mind is: Is it too soon for a major motion picture depicting the disaster that is still painfully fresh in our minds? We all remember the exact emotion we felt when we first realized the magnitude of the tragedy on that day. We can all remember where we were when we saw it on the news, heard it on the radio, or heard the announcement over a public address system. Can we possibly stand reliving that day, with every detail, a mere five years later?

Is Bush Going Green?

Extreme Liberals will argue “NO!” and Green Conservatives are putting all their hopes behind the question: “Is President Bush going green?” There is a trend developing in the right wing; more and more self-proclaimed Conservatives are personally experimenting with the ideas of sustainability and “green” infrastructure. Arnold Schwartznegger and George Pataki, governors of California and New York (both Republicans), are putting tax dollars where their mouth is; they are dedicating more and more of their budgets to renewable energy initiatives and development. California is planning the United States’ first Hydrogen Highway and New York is pushing to become the center for Hydrogen Fuel research at its multiple General Motors research facilities.

The Death of Privacy in America…

Everybody’s talking about privacy: the U.S. Government, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and even a handful of nanotechnology firms. And, while privacy advocates would have us believe that it’s already too late to stop our government, some of us are scratching our heads and wondering what to think. Could current trends end privacy as we know it? What does nanotechnology mean for the future of privacy?

Downloaders Play with Their Food

Wired News reports that the United Nations new game, Food Force, has quickly become one of the most popular downloads on the internet.  The game, which unlike most new games features no violence, centers around the operations of the emergency food program.  Certainly an interesting follow up to the likes of Live 8 and One.org.