Hello Happy Pitbulls

A great advertisement for Sirius

George Takei's "blog" has a great account of his experience on the Howard Stern show as an announcer for the first week of broadcasting on Sirius, which is a nice tribute to Howard's attacks on things which actually are indecent.  Now that Congress is considering regulating satellite radio, the show is interesting to me again (although secretly I admit to being entertained by the rest of the obscenities).

I'm loving this...

According to this site you can "help the government by making your search public."  The mission statement gets even better:

Our Mission

Whether you are a normal searcher, someone trying to download illegal material, a terrorist looking to build a bomb, or just hunting porn, we at Patriot Search welcome you!

Our mission is to provide the best possible search engine to you while at the same time, making sure the government is informed should you search for something obscure, illegal, or unpatriotic.

Instead of letting the government waste tax money by going through complicated procedures to get user and search data from Yahoo, MSN, Ask Jeeves or Google, users of Patriot Search make sure their queries end up right where they belong – in the databases of the government and its various agencies.

Why not just use Google, Yahoo, or other search engines?

Other search engines often do not share your data immediately upon government request, thereby endangering the safety of your country and the well-being of you and your family. In a specific recent case, only 4 out of 5 search engines allowed the government to see "private" user data!

Only at Patriot Search can you be certain that you're helping the government the way you are supposed to – as a patriotic, obedient, and honest citizen.

I'm scared to search for anything now.  Then I had to start thinking about the stuff I HAVE been searching for.  Well, I have a Google toolbar, so my search records will be public record soon.

My response: http://www.anonymizer.com/

Join the Revolution!

Say what you will about him, you have to admit Howard Stern really made a splash this week as he plunged into the new world of satellite radio this week.  I have been waiting for over a year for his Sirius debut and it's been just hysterical.  George Takei, the recently out Mr. Sulu of Star Trek fame, has been sitting in on the show all week and is apparently the new "voice" of the Howard Stern show.  What an amazing addition!  I am surprised out naturally he was able to work into the tight pace of the show.

I am relieved that it hasn't gone totally over the top as far as the obscenity factor.  I guess some of it is gratuitous obscenity, just because they can say it now - but I think Howard has been fairly restrained.  It shows how smart he really is.

Anyhow, I'm loving Sirius, and the fact that I can catch the show at night during the replay.  We have to get the satellite antenna up on the roof of the house.  I think that will help our reception a bit.

I am outraged!!!

We're watching the episode of South Park where Cartman tries to crap out of his mouth.  The moment the crap comes out, a card comes up stating that the scene was edited for our protection.  Nice.  Where are we going?  Backwards?

It's not reform. It's crap.

Watching news stories about Warren Beatty and Annette Benning being turned away from a Governator rally for Arnold's propositions is eye opening.  Free speech, right?

We're totally SIRIUS

Let the Revolution begin!  We have SIRIUS!

Yes, it's true.  We have joined the satellite army.  The driving force?  Howard 100 News.

As I've mentioned before, we're big fans of Howard Stern.  Not because of the naked girls, drunk Scores strippers, or fart humor (although the farts are funny), but because of the unbelievable savvy that goes into making the show, and making an entire network come to life.  Howard Stern is the true champion of First Amendment rights, and his political views and his reaction to the religious rights takeover of the Federal Government are fascinating.  Don't kid yourself, this is a really smart guy. 

I get a lot of shit from work people that only know him from the E! channel and from hearsay, but have not listened to the show.  It's hard for me to articulate the parts I love about the show, but it's hard for me to get out of my car at 7:00 and walk in to work, so I have to get the recap at the end of the day from Mike.

So -- as I was saying, we got our Starmate Replay Sirius radio on Thursday night, and we're all hooked up.  I wasn't able to listen to Howard 100 news until this morning.  At 3:00 am, I woke up and turned it on.  I was laughing in my sleep all night long. 

I'm sure there will be more on this in days to come.  I've been hard pressed for a blog entry with all the crap going on in my life.

Give the People What they Want: Shock and Awe?

I have said this before: I cry at commercials, I cry at American Idol, I cry at Animal Precinct, and now I cry at the State of the Union Address. The president has a great script writer, and clearly the right people with purple fingers were invited.

I think Jeff Jarvis said this best on his blog :
The shortest State of the Union post

: I like what he says about Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine, and Palestine and freedom.

I do not like what he says about gay marriage, stem cells, and abortion.

I have no idea who's right about Social Security.

: Who could not be touched by the mother of a son killed fighting for freedom hugs the daughter of a man who died for freedom in Iraq.

UPDATE:
I'm not saying that I've jumped on the Bush Bandwagon. Exactly the opposite. What happened tonight is that the great scriptwriter preyed on the emotions of the american people to garner support for a president who bet on the success of the Iraqi elections. Prepare for another 4 years of propaganda. I do, however, like the idea of freedom throughout the world, but I am not seeing enough going on to prevent the atrocities going on in Sudan, and to address human rights issues right here at home, to think this president will bring that freedom.

Michael Powell Is Resigning from the FCC

I heard about this Friday morning, unfortunately not in time to hear Howard Stern's comments about his resignation. I did find some comments from Jeff Jarvis on his site .

I am still catching up my reading this weekend. I wonder if this resignation has anything to do with Michael Powell's incompetence, or whether it's his knack for turning a quiet office into one of great controversy, or for issuing fines over a million dollars based on the complains of a handful of people. It will be interesting to see what happens. I did see a comment on Jeff Jarvis' site speculating (in jest, no doubt) that Powell resigned to accept an executive position at Sirius. Yeah, right!

The FCC is "Kneecapping the First Amendment"

Howard Stern had a guest on his show today who has been doing Freedom of Information Act requests from the FCC to get more information on some of the indecency filings making headlines in recent months. Turns out million dollar fines can be based on the complaints of 3 people.

Jeff Jarvis was a guest on Howard's show today. He was talking about blogging and how you can actually make money off of being a blogger (not that I know anything about it!). There's a pretty funny account of the conversation here.

Apparently there are some new guidelines for indecency which were released in a memo issued by Viacom. Jeff Jarvis wrote about it here. Howard wants to get fired for telling someone to "go to hell."

I'm ready for Sirius.

ClearChannel stations gave away boob-jobs for Xmas

The company that is out to get Howard Stern is certainly unaware of its own double standard. Some ClearChannel stations had a "Breast Christmas Ever" contest to give away fake boobs to listeners. Nice.

What's wrong with this picture?