Comments for Shamus Writes

Comment on Cartooned, Part 2 by Stuicide

Stuicide — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:36:41 +0000

Wow, the resemblance is uncanny!

Great job Dem.

Comment on xkcd - A Better Plan by Stuicide

Stuicide — Mon, 12 May 2008 15:32:56 +0000

What a great idea!

Comment on xkcd - A Better Plan by Mari Adkins

Mari Adkins — Mon, 12 May 2008 14:04:45 +0000

I hear that.

Comment on Another Hacker by Mandie

Mandie — Sun, 11 May 2008 07:00:13 +0000

Uhm, I don’t know if this is a related issue or something completely different – but I can’t get my passwords to work on any of the protected sites I’m on or to get to the admin section of mandm . . . and I’m pretty sure I’m typing them correctly. I haven’t said anything b/c I know the whole ordeal with the hacker is stressful and time consuming, but it’s been a while so I thought I’d let you know.

Comment on Cartooned, Part 2 by Mandie

Mandie — Sun, 11 May 2008 06:54:32 +0000

LOL it looks great.

Comment on Cartooned, Part 2 by jenny

jenny — Sat, 10 May 2008 15:08:58 +0000

I love it!

Comment on Cartooned, Part 2 by MrCorey

MrCorey — Sat, 10 May 2008 03:31:00 +0000

Much better than I would have done of myself for sure

Comment on Cartooned by MrCorey

MrCorey — Sat, 10 May 2008 01:41:48 +0000

...and the result is?...

Comment on April Fool’s Day by Foolster41

Foolster41 — Mon, 05 May 2008 04:18:31 +0000

I have the same attitude. actually, The day’s my birthday (thus foolster41 (4/1=April 1st)

Comment on Essential Plugins for WordPress 2.5 by Simon

Simon — Thu, 01 May 2008 18:50:01 +0000

Hey Jim,
Very nice thanks for the fast answer – and as a matter of fact it seems to be working!;)
Happy thoughts

Comment on Essential Plugins for WordPress 2.5 by Jim

Jim — Thu, 01 May 2008 18:34:59 +0000

re: Simon – Yes, Subscribe to Comments is compatible with WP 2.5. I’ve been using right through every upgrade with no hitches.

Comment on Essential Plugins for WordPress 2.5 by Simon

Simon — Thu, 01 May 2008 18:31:49 +0000

Hey there, nice list of plugins. I think I’ll adopt the absolute comments! However, I’ve come here because of the susbcribe to comments. On the official site it doesn’t say anything about 2.5 compability. So is it working seamlessly then? Thanks for your help!:)

Comment on We Need Better Leaders by mark

mark — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:55:39 +0000

Now this is interesting Jim, because I would have jumped on the “corruption” bandwagon a la Mike over blaming such an incident on PoMo’s “absolute subjectivity” (my term) directly.

I’m quite a fan of PoMo generically, so long as it’s not the “absolute subjective” variety; that is, infused with a chunk of objectivity. At the same time I wholly reject “absolute objectivity” of Modernism. A nice mix has always been (a) reality (b) safest for society.

It’s tough because the US (and france!) were built upon “truth in the hands of (defined by) the masses.” I like that and hate it at the same time. But truth-per-the-masses is entirely different than truth in the hands of the leadership, which ends up being a dictatorship, which is what you’re fussin’ over (local dictatorships of judges/authorities).

Localized crap-leadership occurs:
1) When the masses don’t (a) understand the consequences of their dumb choices or (b) are too far removed from the authorities to properly judge them. In the words of Jessica Hagy of indexed.blogspot.com fame: “I don’t know any of the political candidates any more than I know any one of the Desperate Housewives.” Government as Fiction anyone? ;)
2) When one of the masses (who has an absolute-subjective perspective) gets into leadership, can we expect him to be ‘fair’? No, He’ll see as he has always seen, like the masses have taught him. But get this, he is now an enemy of the masses, though a product of it: Present Concern.

Seriously, Plato was right when he said democracies degenerate into dictatorships by their pride.

Now, I don’t want absolute subjectivity (especially in the hands of leadership, as just stated) nor absolute objectivity (which can never exist in the masses unless they’re all dumb together: likely). I just want sanity. It is likely that we all want some base-level objectivity (though what do we do with those who can’t define it, or communicate it, yet they still have voting power?), but that ultimately doesn’t matter if no one is hearing us, if leadership won’t have it, if the masses can’t understand it. This is the trouble with all heirarchical structures: lost in translation, and the trouble with a diseducated society valuing only their own decadence.

Please, can we have an educated society? Think of it.. America was NOT founded upon education-for-all. That was a 100year+ afterthought.

Comment on Another Hacker by Jim

Jim — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 15:05:47 +0000

re: SeismicMike – Apache 2.2.8, PHP 5.2.5, MySQL 5.0.45 on a Linux box. Thing is, though, it’s not a server vulnerability the hacker exploited but a WordPress one. Granted, I’m updated now, so the vulnerability has subsequently been patched, but still – he got in the back door and messed things up a bit. I’m hoping to have the rest of the site back online by this weekend.

Comment on We Need Better Leaders by Jim

Jim — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 15:03:24 +0000

I’m frustrated by just how little truth is valued in American culture these days. People would rather redefine everything in terms of what makes them feel good rather than what is actually true. It’s these BLAM! postmodernists with their ideas that there is no such thing as truth, that everything is a narrative to be interpreted from one’s own viewpoint and perspective. Mark, I’m afraid you’re right that those of us who despise this approach to truth end up keeping our mouths shut far too often.