tfl: The Flatiron Life

By my count there are now only 56 of Earth’s 193 nations are ruled by Absolute Monarch, Authoritarian, Military, or Communist Dictators, or Transition Governments (what Sid Meier’s would call Anarchy). Iraq was long rules under an Authoritarian, we kicked him out, and yesterday they joined the ranks of Republics.

Lewis wrote some good stuff on it. I am still awaiting to hear what the results were. There seemed to have been no more bombings than normal. I also heard that there was no voting in some Sunni areas. However, I would say the election went off well. This is mostly based on me not hearing the American media slamming the election.

Now that there has been an election we should help the Iraqis form a lasting constitution. Seeing how we have the oldest written one and our friends the Brits have the oldest unwritten one the Iraqis are in good hands. This constitution should insure the unalienable rights that have inspired the lasting nations of the world, but it should also be wholly Iraqi.

We should also make increasing efforts to train Iraqis for receiving their nation in full. I don;t think we should turn down any offer from other nations to train police and military forces as long there is some coordination (either from us or the new Iraqi government). The coordination is needed to insure that one whole force is created not hundreds of separate forces.

After this we should set a tangible target for leaving. I propose two target. One is public. If the Iraqi government asks us to leave we will. Second is private. If there are no insurgent attacks for X days we will begin to withdrawal with no fanfare. I don;t know what the X should be. Right now a week would be good. But a month might be acceptable, maybe longer.

I have always had a link to Hoosier Review under blogs on the right. However I don’t think I have ever said anything about it. Today I discovered that I am in the IU Blog Network! I had no idea.

HR is a good blog covering the world from an IUB centric perspective. HR was once famously called “Political Nerds with Computers.” I think that about says it all.

I received a homebrewing kit for my birthday from my mom. That was just before I was shipped out to Ohio so I did not have a chance brew. And then there was the holidays and adjusting to my new job.

Now, it is done! I just finished brewing my first batch. Now my little keg is tucked away in a dark corner for at least a week. I will let you know how it turns out.

Everyone should head over to The Land Of Alexander. It is a great site and is updated a heck of a lot more than this is!

I supported Gov. Daniels because he seemed like a good guy and my sister and brother-in-law were very supportive of him. But now I am asking what kind of Hoosier is this.

Daniels has made it a priority to make all of Indiana go on Daylight Saving Time (DST). He has been taken with the idiotic reasoning that it costs Indiana jobs. However the Indy Star had a hard time finding anyone that said it was the cause of job loss for Hoosiers.

In fact the Star found a business that has done what I thought individuals should do if it affects them so much. FedEx says that they adjust their operations by an hour so it matched the rest of the company. They go on a personal DST.

Most of what the star found was companies that have missed multi-state meetings the first weeks in and out of DST. This leads me to believe that the reason Indiana does not get jobs is not because we don?t change time zones, but because businesses here don’t use computers. Every company I have worked for has been multi-state (if not multi-national). All have used meeting scheduling software that ties into the email systems. The meeting times are translated into the time zone of the person who is invited. Another reason Hoosiers are probably missing meetings is because Hoosier’s tend to forget when DST is. If these companies would send out a memo that DST is starting or stopping in other parts of the country it would alleviate a lot of the confusion.

The Star found one trucking company that said they would not located in Indy again if they were starting out today, because the time difference costs them a lot. Apparently they have truckers who do not live in Indiana and this causes them to be late to Detroit. But if you did not live in Indiana and where delivering to someplace not in Indiana, isn’t it your own damn fault you are late. And again, I have to believe that their is software out there specifically for trucking companies that will give you the times of pickups and delivers in whatever the hell time zone you want. If there is not I encourage trucking companies to email trucking@tomaw.com and we will see about getting the work done.

I believe Gov. Daniels wants Indiana all on the same time and for all of Indiana to observe DST. This leads me to believe that he want to pull the 77 non-observant counties out of Easter Standard Time and put them in Central Time with the other 15 counties. It would be nice for me, making my family in Illiana and me on the same time. However I still think it is stupid.

All of Indiana should be on the same time that does not observe DST, and I don’t care much whether it is Eastern or Central Time. I believe this because I believe it for every state (at least those that primarily go North-South). DST is insanity.

Rally Hoosiers! Fight against the Man! Fight against Your Man Mitch!

Jacob over at 3TG noticed that Chicago is going to have a world’s fair of sorts this summer.

(BTW, I am Jacob at 3TG)

I have discovered a new ocean. I was reading a article from New Zealand about the tsunami threat there. NZ is part of the system that looks out for Pacific tsunamis, but they have a weak spot to the south from the Southern Ocean.

Have you ever heard of the Southern Ocean? I thought we only had the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and Arctic Oceans. According to the Wikipedea, the Southern Ocean is the body of water that encircles Antarctica. It is all the water south of 60 parallel south. This ocean was discovered, created, named, whatevered in 2000.

Also, Australia and New Zealand concider any water off thier south coasts as the Southern Ocean.