Bob Owens

I became aware of Bob Owens back when he ran the Confederate Yankee blog. His early days, if you will.

I never actually met him, but I did run into his brother in Las Vegas. His brother ran Phin's Blog (now defunct). "Phin" was a huckuva nice guy. But his brother Bob, the "Confederate Yankee," was the big time blog. Or it became big time in short order.

I'm sad I never did have the opportunity to meet him. I think I would have come away the better for it. But, it wasn't to be.

Bob apparently took his own life yesterday.



I don't know the circumstances. I do know that when the pain, whatever the cause, exceeds the clarity of thought, bad things happen.

I'm shocked about what has happened, and I hope the family will be able to recover from this devastating loss. I just wish Bob understood how many miss him.

To absent friends...

Beth Cleaver died yesterday. I'm heartbroken.

I don't know how many of you followed her old blog, "My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy," but it was always a must-read. She dropped it and continued on Facebook for the last several years.

She always spoke her mind, and always cared about her family, her friends, and, of course, her country.

I don't really know what to say. I do know that we need more people like Beth, not fewer.

Cancer sucks.

Avoiding Google's links penatlies

I haven't posted blogging tips in quite some time. One of the reasons is I haven't had anything new to offer. Well, that I got around to writing about.

Anyway, I ran across an article the other day about what Google has done to penalize Websites, particularly blogs, that are doing things that Google considers improper. The article is actually a couple of years old, but it does have some good information. I remember when Google started doing some of the things mentioned and the uproar it caused. However, Google's intent for this is, I believe, correct.

Some of the things that you shouldn't do include:

Link exchanges

Truth be told, I got away from that a long time ago. My links policy is, and for years has been "We don't do that." Here's the full policy.

Google came to this conclusion because it artificially raised a blogs' status. This little blog even benefitted from that. However, I began to get requests for link exchanges from, well, all kinds of blogs. Some were pretty much useless and were for the sole purpose of showing ads.

I finally decided that if someone was linking to me simply because I was linking to them, then my content wasn't something they'd normally link to. If they were legit, a link to my blog was actually a disservice to them. And, of course, the same was true from my end. So, my policy became I'll link to you if you want, whether or not I link back. And I won't promise to link to you. If I want to, I will, and if I don't I won't. Treat me the same way.

My reason wasn't exactly the same as Google's, but the result was the same. No link exchanges.

Don't do it.

Blog networks

Google doesn't like blog networks. They feel it artificially raises the members' status. And they're correct.

Some networks were created solely for the purpose of raising blog status. Some were for other reasons. I've participated in both.

A network for the sake of helping readers interested in certain topics easily find other blogs of interest is, I think, a good thing. But, those networks still do artificially raise the status of members. I understand Google's reasons for this. It's unfortunate (for interest networks, not links networks) but it's a reality.

There are 15 more items the article talks about. It's actually a pretty good read, despite being over two years old. Read it here.

So, is it .net or .com ???

If you've been following this little blog, waiting patiently for it to return, you may have noticed that the URL is now http://www.basilsblog.com instead of http://www.basilsblog.net

Or maybe you didn't notice.

Actually, it doesn't really matter. When this little blog launched, back during George W. Bush's first term in office, I didn't have my own domain name. I did shortly afterwards, and bought both the .net and .com domains. I intended to have one as the primary one, and have the other as a redirect URL. I also changed hosts around that time. During all that clutter -- I want go into all the how this happened and how that happened because then we'd be here all week -- it worked out that basilsblog.net ended up being the URL of the blog. I really meant to change to the .com URL, but one thing or another -- no actual valid reason -- meant it stayed with the .net domain.

Well, as part of my recent consolidation of all my domains under a single registrar, I decided to finally get it right, and go with the .com address.

I have an email address under the .net domain, and that still works, but a .com version works now, too. It's easy when everything's under one registrar and they make it easy to configure it like you want. Well, easier.

Anyway, it's now basilsblog.com -- not that it means anything. Because the .net still works, only now that is the one that redirects to the .com address.

It's good to know everything else in my life is in order that I can fret over silly stuff like this.

At IMAO: "How I spent my summer vacation"

Got a new post up at IMAO. It explains to the crew there why I haven't been around there lately.

Go read if you care. Here's the link.

Blogger vs WordPress vs WordPress.com

A while back, I moved this little blog from WordPress to Blogger. Which meant full circle.

We began here on Blogger in December, 2004. Moved to TypePad in early 2005, then to WordPress later that year. And, in 2009, back to Blogger.

So, how'd that whole moving back to Blogger from WordPress thing go?

Okay, I guess.

The main thing isn't the blogging platform. It's the blogging. I don't write as many posts as I used to, but that's got nothing to do with the platform. Let's ignore how much and what I write. Let's look at the blogging platforms: WordPress vs Blogger.

There are actually two flavors of WordPress: there is the traditional WordPress, which is run on a server you would run; then there is WordPress.com, which is hosted by WordPress.

Let's compare how the platforms stack up on a few topics.

Cost

Blogger and WordPress.com are free. You can't beat free. WordPress costs whatever your hosting service charges.

Advantage: Blogger, WordPress.com

Score: Blogger 1, WordPress.com 1, WordPress 0

No to domain names

If you don't care about the domain name, then Blogger and WordPress.com are free, while WordPress would require it. It's not WordPress that requires it; rather, WordPress needs to be hosted somewhere, and you'll have to come up with a domain name.

Let's use this blog's domain name, BasilsBlog.net, to illustrate the differences.

If I didn't care, I could use basils.blogspot.com at Blogger, and basilsblog.wordpress.com at WordPress.com. They're free. But, I have to furnish a domain name for WordPress, so I'd have to pay for BasilsBlog.net.

Advantage: Blogger, WordPress.com

Score: Blogger 2, WordPress.com 2, WordPress 0

Yes to domain names

Now, if I do want my own domain name, I have to buy one. I can do that through Blogger or WordPress.com, and some hosts include it in the sign-up costs, though some don't.

If I kept them separate, it's free to tie it to Blogger, as well as most hosting plans (WordPress), but it's $12.00 for WordPress.com.

Advantage: Blogger, WordPress

Score: Blogger 3, WordPress.com 2, WordPress 1

Ads

You may want to put ads on your blog. After all, that's income. But, WordPress.com won't let you put ads on your blog. They'll put some there, but they won't let you. I'm not criticizing: after all, they're not charging you for hosting, and their ads aren't obtrusive. But, when you compare blogging platforms, this matters.

Blogger lets you put ads. In fact, they encourage you to use Google's ad system.

WordPress doesn't care, and most hosts don't either.

WordPress.com, as we said, won't let you put ads on your blog.

Advantage: Blogger, WordPress

Score: Blogger 4, WordPress.com 2, WordPress 2

JavaScript

There are all kinds of plug-ins that you may want to use on your blog. It could be ads (covered above), it could be stats, it could be anything.

Blogger lets you add JavaScript code. Most WordPress hosts do too. But WordPress.com won't let you add JavaScript code your your Website.

Advantage: Blogger, WordPress

Score: Blogger 5, WordPress.com 2, WordPress 3

Themes

There are plenty of themes available for Blogger, WordPress, and WordPress.com, although you apply them in different ways.

Blogger has always been way behind on themes, both in number and quality, but in the last year, as improved greatly.

WordPress.com has been adding quality themes all along, and they all work well.

WordPress hosts will sometimes include some themes, but you often have to find them on search sites, download them, and upload them to your server.

Because of the different aspects involved -- quantity and quality -- we'll core this a couple of ways.

Quantity? WordPress has the most, then WordPress.com.

Advantage: WordPress

Quality? All of WordPress.com's are quality themes. WordPress has the same themes available, plus a log that are crappy. Blogger's are all good, and more easily customizable than WordPress or WordPress.com.

Advantage: WordPress.com and Blogger

Overall advantage? Even.

Score: Blogger 6, WordPress.com 3, WordPress 4

Comment spam

Spam is one of the biggest pains to any blogger. And WordPress has taken the lead on preventing spam, but Blogger is catching up.

WordPress and WordPress.com both use Akismet, which is a great spam blocker. It isn't perfect, but nothing is. It is very, very good, though.

Blogger added anti-spam code within the last year, and it's working very well.

Blogger has more options than do WordPress/WordPress.com when it comes to who can comment.

Advantage? Even.

Score: Blogger 7, WordPress.com 4, WordPress 5

Links

When you link to a blog, or when a blog links to you, it's often really nice for the link to show up automatically. These are TrackBacks, and are great. Unless it's TrackBack spam. That is, some blog someone set up for the explicit purpose of grabbing links.

WordPress/WordPress.com's automatic TrackBacks work great. Links show up quickly.

Blogger doesn't support TrackBacks, but uses Backlinks, which are powered by Google's search database.

Blogger will show links form sites that don't use TrackBacks, but they take longer to show up. And sometimes, they don't show up at all.

WordPress/WordPress.com's filter keeps most spam out, but it isn't perfect.

Advantage: WordPress.com, WordPress

Score: Blogger 7, WordPress.com 5, WordPress 6

Conclusion

The final scores are pretty close. And, this scoring assumes all of the topics are of equal weight. They probably aren't, but what's important to one person isn't as important to another person.

I awarded one point for each topic. You may want to award more points for one topic over another.

If you want free, and that's a deal-breaker, your options are Blogger or WordPress.com.

If you want to be able to have ads, or JavaScript, and that's a deal-breaker, your options are Blogger or WordPress.

Whatever you decide, keep in mind that each advantage comes with disadvantages. If you're undecided, try using Blogger AND WordPress.com. Yes, run two blogs for, say, a month, just to see how each works. I think you'll go with Blogger, but WordPress.com -- or WordPress -- would be a great choice.

That's right. There is no bad decision. Just better decisions.

Oh, look! Another idiot has a computer. Isn't that cute!

Every so often, you run across total nutcases on them Internets. Then, every so often, a nutcase runs across you.

Friday night, a little before 9 o'clock, a new comment appeared in the moderation queue. I was at a football game, so I gave it a quick look when the notification arrived. It was a long rambling thing that appeared to be from someone who was mixing his medications again. I decided it could wait until I got back from the game.

When I got back, a little after midnight (it was an away game), I looked in detail at the comment. And I discovered that my first impression was probably correct.

Probably. But not definitely. Because he might not have been mixing his meds. He may have never been properly diagnosed and never was taking the meds he so desperately needs.

Here is the post he left a comment on. The comment isn't there, but that's the post he wanted to leave me a message about. Go ahead and click it if you like. It's the one I wrote about a new spam feature that Google added to their Blogger platform. Let me sum up: Google added spam filters to Blogger, and it's about time. Yep, that pretty much sums it up.

Only, this clown seems to think that I'm running Google. Or their Blogger division. Or maybe the Spam Filter division. Or something. Who knows what he thinks.

Here's what he wrote:

You know, this is a lie. The spam filter is a farce. I'm usually a nice guy and easy to get along with, but this is a joke, an absolute joke.

Here's a link to what you claim isn't supposed to be happening:

http://www.blogger.com/comment-spam.g?blogID=21219785

Only Blogger can access this because it's my spam box. In in there are basically 365 spam comments from the same nutcase since Augusts 26th.

Some of them threaten my life.

It is NOT that much trouble to allow me to block IP addresses. I am an adult. I demand the capability to do this with idiots like this just as newspaper editors have the right not to publish a letter to the editor.

I am so very pissed about this. I received over 50 of these comments today alone!

I will hound you about this. I am nobody to you but I will run a campaign about this if you do not do something about this immediately.

Apply the golden rule,. What would YOU do if this were you?

I am so thoropughly frustrated about this.

Get with it.

Here's his Google/Blogger user profile page.

He's been blogging since July 2005 (that's almost as long as I have). And he still thinks it's a good idea to call someone a liar in the first sentence.

Then, he says the spam filter isn't working ... then tries to prove it by pointing to 365 items in his spam filter! Seems it worked 365 times, based on the information he provided.

Then, he says he's going to hound me unless I do something about the situation. Like I'm in charge of the spam filter, which, by the way, sucks because it works or something.

Anyway, you read what he wrote. And you have a link to his profile page. Which contains his email address, if you want to write him and offer encouragement or something.

Me? I'm going to grant his request. I will do something about the situation. I just posted his comment (which is in the spam queue) so everyone could see it. And see what an idiot he is. That ought to make him happy.

One final thought: based on what he wrote in the comment and the information on his profile page, I'm guessing that he voted for Obama. Because that's what idiots do. That and leave idiotic comments that the spam filters catch.

Speaking of a Right Wing Nut House...

Rick Moran didn't like the list that a bunch of conservative bloggers came up with, and said so. And called them the "Dumbest Conservative Bloggers."

What?

Okay, a little background. John Hawkins at Right Wing News asked conservative bloggers to list their choices for the 20 worst figures in American History. And to submit an unranked list. Just a list of 20 names. Then, he would take the separate lists and compile them into one list of the 25 Worst Figures In American History.

43 bloggers responded ... including me ... and Hawkins posted his list.

Now, let me restate how the voting went. Each list submitted was unranked. No one said "this person is worse than that person." Rather, they all said "these are the 20 worst." And, for each list that named a particular person, that person got one vote.

Here's the complied list, including the number of lists on which each person appeared:

23) Saul Alinsky (7)
23) Bill Clinton (7)
23) Hillary Clinton (7)
19) Michael Moore (7)
19) George Soros (8)
19) Alger Hiss (8)
19) Al Sharpton (8)
13) Al Gore (9)
13) Noam Chomsky (9)
13) Richard Nixon (9)
13) Jane Fonda (9)
13) Harry Reid (9)
13) Nancy Pelosi (9)
11) John Wilkes Booth (10)
11) Margaret Sanger (10)
9) Aldrich Ames (11)
9) Timothy McVeigh (11)
7) Ted Kennedy (14)
7) Lyndon Johnson (14)
5) Benedict Arnold (17)
5) Woodrow Wilson (17)
4) The Rosenbergs (19)
3) Franklin Delano Roosevelt (21)
2) Barack Obama (23)
1) Jimmy Carter (25)

Nowhere in the submissions did anyone say Jimmy Carter is worse than Barack Obama. Nor did anyone say Barack Obama is worse than Timothy McVeigh. What did happen is that 2 more people included Carter than Obama on their list of 20. And 12 more included Obama than McVeigh on their list. That's a slight difference. But an important difference.

I have no idea how anyone else approached this poll. But here's what I did: I thought of Americans that I thought were really bad people and wrote them on a list.

I did remove some people from the list as it was being built, because I thought, "this person is bad, but not as bad as that person." On a few, I went back and added the person back to the list.

This went on for a bit, and I still wasn't happy with my list.

Then, I decided to make it a somewhat representative list. You see, is a serial killer a worse person than a president that causes hundreds or thousands of deaths? Or, like Melissa Couthier wondered, "(who) was the dumbass who convinced people that DDT was worse than dying from malaria and by extension participated in the deaths of over 25 million African children? ... Also, is a dude who buried grandma and 20 bodies in the backyard more evil?"

Dr. Clouthier has a valid point. Me, personally? I think the DDT guy is worse, because good intentions don't excuse bad behavior. Good intentions count for something, but millions of dead people count more.

Anyway, back to my methodology. I decided to become more diverse in my list. I thought specifically about traitors, and came up with a few, including Aldrich Hazen Ames, Benedict Arnold, Julius Rosenberg, among others.

I figured killers needed to make the list. So, I included Theodore Robert Bundy, Edward Theodore Gein, Timothy James McVeigh, Howard Barton Unruh, among others.

My list included politicians (who have the ability to do more harm than the killers on my list ever did) such as Edward Moore Kennedy, Frank Forrester Church III, Barack Hussein Obama, among others.

Throw in George Soros, Roger Nash Baldwin, and a few others, and my list of 20 was done. And, no, it wasn't the list I wanted. But, it was probably as good as any list that someone like me could come up with. Besides, it was 6:44 PM, running up against a 7:00 PM deadline. So, I sorted the list alphabetically and clicked "send."

I think I under-represented the 19th century in my list. And probably the 18th century as well. But, it's done.

42 others responded, as I mentioned, John Hawkins compiled them, and posted the results.

Which ... after that brief introduction ... brings me back to my point.

Some, like Rick Moran, seem to have got their panties in a wad over it.

He takes the gang of 43 (who he calls "The Top 43 Dumbest Conservative Bloggers" ... which is funny; funny/ha-ha, not funny/strange):

And what did all that 10 Watt brainpower come up with? ... Absolutely astonishing. One mass murderer (McVeigh) and one assassin (Booth) made the list. No gangsters. No old west gunmen. Both Woodrow Wilson and FDR in the top 5 worst? If you’re going to penalize presidents so severely for having wrongheaded ideas about economic policy, why not include George Bush? Or the modern Republican party who never met a deficit they didn’t embrace as long is it was caused by tax cuts.

Let me say that I like Rick Moran. Actually, I've never met him. I've never corresponded to any degree with him (in fact, he didn't respond to a recent, unrelated-to-this-list query to him). I guess it would be more accurate to say I enjoy reading his blog. I don't always agree, but it's still a good read.

He left enough weasel-room with his "perhaps not all 43 of this list of conservative bloggers" statement at the top of his post -- though I really don't think he cares if the insult hits me or not.

The thing is, though, Moran criticized the 43 for having more list Obama than Dahmer. Then he turns around and, in a Top Five ranked listing, positions William Randolph Hearst as worse than Ted Bundy. Hearst didn't personally kill a bunch of people. And he was one of the few newspapermen to point out what Nazi Germany was doing to Jews. That's not to excuse the Father of Yellow Journalism from his sins. But criticizing Hawkins' list for having Obama but not Dahmer ... then saying Hearst was worse than Bundy? Moran is typing out of both sides of his keyboard.

Then, there's this:

Frankly, this is embarrassing. Putting the Clintons, Pelosi, Reid, Gore, Sharpton, and other contemporary Democrats ahead of someone like Nathan Bedford Forest who was at least partly responsible for creating the KKK after the Civil War and spent his spare nights riding around the countryside whipping, lynching, and burning at the stake innocent African Americans demonstrates an extraordinary ignorance of American history.

I suppose the fact that the Ku Klux Klan that did all the lynching in the 1900s is not the same Ku Klux Klan that Forrest founded, but a same-named organization, doesn't "demonstrate an extraordinary ignorance of American history."

I think Moran's going a little overboard in his criticism of the list. My list doesn't match the final list. Of the 20 names I submitted, 10 made the final 25, and 10 didn't. My list matches the final list by a range of 40-50%, depending on how you look at it (10/20, or 10/25).

And I'm not the only one who thinks that Moran is a little off the mark in his criticism. Paul Mitchell called Moran's post "stupid." However, Andrew Ian Dodge and William Teach both compare Moran's comments to Charles Johnson.

That's not a fair comparison. Johnson is who he always was. He was bat-sh*t crazy opposing Bush before September 11, went gung-ho pro-Bush for a bit, then settled back to where he started.

Moran isn't like that. I certainly believe he's not like that. I think he's honest in what he writes, and isn't bat-sh*t crazy. But I think he went overboard in what he wrote.

Having said that, the compiled list is flawed. After all, it left off 10 of my picks!

Google's Blogger platform finally adds spam detection

There are lots of good ... and great ... blogging platforms out there. I've tinkered with several. But, my favorites are (in alphabetical order) Blogger, TypePad/MovableType, and WordPress. I've used Blogger, TypePad, and WordPress (both flavors) for this little blog. They're all good.

WordPress has a free version (wordpress.com), with restrictions of advertising and JavaScript.

TypePad has a free version that's nothing more than a single-user Twitter feed. The paid (hosted) versions are actually very good.

Both WordPress and MovableType have versions you can host on your own Website. They are quite powerful.

Blogger offers many of the same features as the others, but is free. It doesn't have as many restrictions, but it's always fallen behind the pack in one area: spam prevention. And that's one very important area to me.

WordPress (all flavors) includes Akismet, one of the best spam protection processes. Not perfect, but very good.

TypePad/MovableType has much improved spam protection.

Now -- finally! -- Blogger has implemented spam protection.

Google's spam protection for Gmail works very well. Not perfect, but it's top-notch nonetheless. And, while I realize that email spam isn't the same thing as comment spam, I have been frustrated by Google's inability to implement comment spam filters on Blogger.

I'm glad it's finally available. Because the comment moderation process isn't really the best way to handle things. This will be a welcome addition to the list of features for Blogger. At least, it's one I've been awaiting for some time.

Why we blog

FITSNews blogger Will Folks says he's had an "an inappropriate physical relationship" with South Carolina Republican state representative Nikki Haley. What kicks this story up a notch is that Haley is the favorite in the Republican primary for governor of that state, with an 11-point lead in the latest polls.

Haley has denied the claim.

But ... have you seen Haley? She's another one of those hot Republican babes.

Which leads to my point. I'm going to share the real reason that men become bloggers: Hot Republican Babe Sex.

Yes, it's true. At least for conservatives. And, some liberals want Hot Republican Babe Sex, too.

You may be wanting to know how all this works. Well, here's the plan:

1. Start blog
2. ?
3. Hot Republican Babe Sex

I'm still working on that step two. Some people seem to have it figured out, though.

Too lazy to blog about being too tired to blog

I've been a lazy blogger lately. But I've also been a tired blogger lately. So much so that I haven't been a blogger at all lately.

Part of the problem is work. I don't blog about work, because it has nothing to do with this blog. Except when I'm tired. And I'm tired. And it's because of work.

Work has been tiring, because it's exhausting. Not physically. I sit behind a desk. Not a lot of physical work involved with answering the telephone, typing on a keyboard, or going from meeting to meeting.

But it can be exhausting. Mentally. And, exhaustion is exhaustion, whether mental or physical.

I've had all kinds of ideas about things, but have been too tired to write about them.

Like the latest New York bomber. I had an idea for a post based on that: he and his cohorts (yes, he has cohorts) would be like the Three Stooges -- named, maybe, Mohammed, Khalid, and Luay instead of Moe, Curly, and Larry -- and the Obama administration would be like the Keystone Kops.

Good start for a blog post, but I'm just too tired to actually think it through and decide if I want to write it as a story, or a video, or a story with pictures or what.

Because I've been too tired to blog.

And, I've been too lazy to blog about being too tired to blog.

Until now.

Now, I've just got to decide if I'm not as lazy as I've been, or if I'm not as tired as I've been.

Maybe after a nap.

Auto-tweeting blog posts

Many bloggers that also use Twitter will often tweet that they've posted something new at their blog. It's often in this format:

New blog post: Auto-tweeting blog posts http://goo.gl/fb/qY3Ed

but it can really be anything else.

Usually, it's close to this format

• a prefix
• the post title
• an excerpt
• a shortened link.

I skip the excerpt. In my example, I used:

• a prefix: New blog post
• the post title: Auto-tweeting blog posts
• an excerpt: omitted
• a shortened link: http://goo.gl/fb/qY3Ed

There are different ways to do this.

WordPress

WordPress blogs will often use Twitter Tools, Make Me Social, or any of a number of other WordPress plugins.

Which is all well and good if you're using WordPress. But even then, there could be issues. Some of these plugins use server and/or database resources, sometimes to the point of causing problems.

You know what would be great? A process to automatically tweet your new posts that work on any blogging platform.

Everybody (including WordPress)

I've got one. But there's a catch: it uses Feedburner. Now, if you use Feedburner, you're almost there. If not, you might want to look at using it for your blog's feeds. It requires a Google account, such as Gmail, to use.

The rest of this post assumes you are using the Feedburner service.

How to

First, go ahead an log on to Twitter. You'll need this later, and it'll speed things up if you are already logged on there.

Log on to Feedburner

Click your feed

Click on the "Publicize" tab


Select "Socialize"


Click "Add Twitter Account"


If prompted, clicked "Allow"


Determine if you want to post just the title, just the initial content from the body, or the title followed by content from the body. I chose "Title only"


You'll probably want to include a link. And you'll probably want to leave room for a retweet.

If you want a prefix (I use "New blog post:" while others use something else, such as "Blogged:" -- use whatever you want.


There are other options, but I don't use them. Use them if you like. If you don't understand them, leave the default settings for now.

Don't forget to activate the service


Now, when you write a new blog post, your blog updates Feedburner, and Feedburner updates Twitter. And, within a minute or so of your new blog post, a tweet shows up for it


And that's all there is to it.

Blogger Day At The Capitol ... and I wasn't invited

Richard Burkard shouldn't feel like the lone ranger. I wasn't invited, either.

Turns out that the Georgia legislature had "Blogger Day At The Capitol" (tip: The Blog Of Columbus, Georgia). Burkard wasn't invited. Me, neither. Of course, it would have been hard for me to take off work and make the drive to Atlanta. So, I stayed in Columbus, working at the salt mine, doing whatever it is that company I work for does.

Sure, it was for more political blogs with a focus on Georgia. So, I guess that it's not surprising that they left this little blog off their invite list. I do get into politics on occasion. Mostly saying how stupid Democrats are. But The Blog Of Columbus, Georgia does focus on Columbus, and politics in Columbus. And that's in Georgia. Barely. If the river shifted, Alabama's population would go up 250,000. But still...

I'm thinking the poker-playing reverend and I -- plus some other bloggers from the area -- should have our own get-together. There are plenty of bloggers in Columbus, Phenix City, and the Chattahoochee Valley.

We could have our own Blogger Day At The Capitol. In fact, we could hold two: one in Alabama and one in Georgia ... and not invite either state legislature.

Teh Blogger got teh Templates

Google has gone and made some updates to their blogging platform, Blogger.

You might know that Blogger, which is the platform we use here at this little blog, is owned by Google. I started up this little blog on teh Blogger back in 2004. I moved to TypePad for nearly a year, then to WordPress for nearly 4 years, then, last summer, moved back to Blogger.

They've added some cool features over the last 5 years. Recently, they added Pages, a welcome feature.

Now, they've added customizable templates. This is a lot more than the new template setup they added a few years ago. The new features? Here's how they describe some of them:

• 15 new, highly-customizable templates from our design team, split into four families: Simple, Picture Window, Awesome Inc, and Watermark
• One-, two-, and three-column layouts for each template, with complete control over the size and arrangement of the columns
• Hundreds of background images and patterns from iStockphoto, the leading microstock image marketplace

As cool as it is (and it is), there's a catch. It's in Draft. As in "Blogger in Draft." Which is where new features are tried out. Like a beta version. So, things could go wrong. But it does work. Well. Very well. I'm thinking it won't be that long before it rolls out to standard Blogger.

If you blog on teh Blogger, you might want to check it out. If you've been thinking about starting up your own blog, this might be the thing that convinces you to start.

I've not regretted moving back to teh Blogger from WordPress. And I'm still not regretting it even more.

Best movies? Again?

No, I'm not going to bore you with another series of posts about the best movies.

Rather, John Hawkins at Right Wing News, did a poll of conservative bloggers. I participated. They weren't ranked submissions, simply a top ten list, with each entry being one vote.

Anyway, here is the post of the results.

Of the ten movies I submitted, six were in the top twenty results:

• Casablanca (1942)
• The Godfather (1972)
• The Godfather Part II (1974)
• Patton (1969)
• The Princess Bride(1987)
• Star Wars (1977)

So, since you asked -- that was you asking, right? -- what were the other movies I suggested?

• The General (1927)
• The Magnificent Seven (1960)
• Stagecoach (1939)
• The Wizard of Oz (1939)

There was one movie from 1939 on Hawkins' list -- and yes, you know that film (read the poll) -- although I submitted two other films from 1939. And that was the oldest film on Hawkins' list. I offered one silent film: The General . It's a classic. And, if you can sit down and watch it, you'll love it. That's why it's my second-favorite movie of all time.

Oh, the IMAO crew (Frank J, SarahK, and Harvey) also participated in the poll.

Teh Blogger got teh Pages

It happened over two weeks ago, but if I spent my entire life only two weeks behind, I'd be way ahead of where I am now.

What I'm talking about is Pages. On teh Blogger.

Blogger is Google's blogging platform. (We won't discuss it's merits or shortcomings here; every platform, including the big one, WordPress, have shortcomings.)

One of the things about teh Blogger that was most frustrating to some (including to me) was it's lack of support for pages.

What I'm talking about are content pages that aren't part of a blog post. Like an About Me page. Or a Contact page. Things like that. It was either a blog post (that resided along with the other blog posts), or it was hosted elsewhere (probably Google Sites content).

But, earlier this month, teh Blogger announced that Pages was now a standard feature.

Since this little blog is running on teh Blogger platform, it's a big deal to me. I'm using Pages to list this little blog's policies (they were blog pages):

• Comment Policy
• Links Policy
• TrackBacks Policy
• Submissions Policy

I'm glad to see teh Google adding useful features to teh Blogger, rather than taking away functions. I've not regretted moving back to teh Blogger from WordPress. But, now I'm not regretting it more.

A visit from SOUTHCOM

Earlier this morning, I wrote a piece suggesting a way out of the GTMO issue for Obama.

I can now reveal that my plan is being analyzed, and may be implemented soon. The United States Southern Command has visited, and has looked the plan over, according to my Site Meter stats:



So, be looking for an announcement soon. Whether it will be one such as I suggested in this morning's post, or that they've moved me to GTMO, I can't say.

Obama nightmare

Hey, I got an idea for a post.


"Obama nightmare." Yeah, that's the ticket.


Excuse me. You can't say that.


Who are you?