Aren Cambre's Blog

The Texas GOP recently rolled out a new web site at http://www.texasgop.org/.

If you surf it, you’ll see asp file extensions. For example: http://www.texasgop.org/inner.asp?z=6

That means the Texas GOP’s runs its brand new site on a kludge CMS!

“Woah, Aren, isn’t that severe?”

No.

ASP’s most recent version is from 1999.

Microsoft replaced it with ASP.Net 1.0 in January 2002. ASP.Net is now on 3.5, and 4.0 is around the corner.

Vendors still delivering classic ASP code in November 2009 have colossally failed to invest or innovate and may be incompetent.

When I review products, those still on ASP start out such a disadvantage that they’ll probably never make the selection.

What is up with the Texas GOP? How did it get hoodwinked into a kludge CMS?

…and it’s right!

New imagery of my front yard, probably from October 2008:

Those are all Republicans.

Google also knows my across-the-street neighbors’ opinions about my signs. Look where they faced their signs. (Hint: Google camera’s straight-on view means they’re not facing drivers!)

Silly liberals!

See the whole scene for yourself. Pan around to see my neighbors.

Consumer Reports shows its liberal hubris in Apple rejection of the Google Voice app slammed by advocates. The mag now faults Apple for not adopting a competitor’s proprietary technology!

Wow, CR, if business and technology is as easy armchair quarterbacking, why aren’t you in the business?

Mark my words: a public option health care plan will someday be the only plan.

Don’t put any faith in today’s Democrat promises. With a few votes and a sympathetic president, future liberals can (and will) alter public option’s scope. With impunity. That is government’s track record:

• Social Security expands: At inception, a 1% tax on the first $3,000 of income funded the system. By 1940, it paid $35 million of benefits. Now it’s a 6.2% tax on the first $102,000 of income and pays $650 billion of benefits. (source)
• Income tax expands: In 1913, when the Sixteenth Amendment was ratified, the income tax was 1% of all earnings over $3,000. Now it is between 10% and 35%, depending on your bracket. (source)
• Even the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation expands: “When the PBGC was created in 1974, Democrats running Congress assured everyone there was no taxpayer risk because the agency would be funded by fees from pension plans, as well as by the assets of plans the company takes over.” “Now the PBGC has a $33.5 billion deficit,” and this is before it is about to take on much of Delphi’s pension, a politically-motivated, union face-saving “second biggest pension bailout in PBGC history.” (source)
• How about those automaker loans? What started in 2008 as large loans is now a giant taxpayer giveaway that just won’t end.

I could fill a whole blog post with expansionism.

Even with current Democrat promises, public option probably starts out with a massive tax subsidy and forced lower payments than what private insurers can negotiate (a la Medicare). It will creep like St. Augustine grass and gradually smother all other options. Future expansionists will just seal this fate.

Don’t get me wrong: the current system is flawed. And Obama is right about a lot of its flaws. But as an expansionist liberal, anything he prescribes is quackery.

Per Frontburner:

…it’s certainly a deterrent for me to walk down one side of the street when I see twenty yards in front of me a gang of menacing-looking thugs approaching from the opposite direction.  I’m most likely to cross the street and avoid the possible confrontation.  … However, if I were told as I walked down that sidewalk (with no thugs in sight) that some number of years after I have walked down the sidewalk, a group of thugs might be called together (after much legal wrangling and automatic appeals, etc.) and might possible menace me for having had the audacity to walk down that sidewalk on their side of the street — I probably wouldn’t be deterred.

This argument applies to any punishment far removed from the crime, including Texas’s silly “Driver Responsibility” fees. They have no deterrent effect, and they are not paying for a service.

This is simply a way that liberals and too many Republicans hide new taxes.

Kim Jong Il, twit extraordinaire

When you’re out of options, you do crazy stuff.

Does this explain North Korea’s missile diplomacy? They backed up implied threats against Hawaii only with mid-range missiles?

Is North Korea angering its best friend? I can’t believe China appreciates pointless destabilizing provocation of its neighbors and trading partners.

I don’t see a logical end. Sure, North Korea’s threats usually rocket past any logical end, but this is a new color of nuttyness.

Is North Korea having an internal struggle? Can freedom-loving nations capitalize on it? Has the media investigated this?

The Texas GOP’s extreme social stances are a losing strategy for two reasons.

1: They are paradoxically liberal. If we fully legislated the Texas GOP platform’s social stances, we would make the government the moral compass, usurping the proper role of the church and individual wisdom. (It’s as if we want to reverse the Protestant Reformation, but that’s an issue for another blog post!)

2: They turn away mainstream conservatives and moderates. This is proven by two polls:

First is a recent Gallup Poll. It finds that conservatives are the largest single voting bloc. But they are neither a majority nor “very conservative”:

Second is a Pew survey, interpreted by Texas Monthly editor Paul Burka to show that the Republican party “hemorrhaging” voters. Indeed, party affiliation is:

• 36% independent
• 35% Democrat
• 23% Republican

If the Republican Party was the mainstream conservative party, it would have more affiliates than Democrats.

But no: the Republican party is hemorrhaging voters because of its extreme social stances. Per the Pew survey: “[independents] more closely parallel the views of Democrats … on the most divisive core beliefs on social values, religion and national security.”

Juxtaposing these surveys, an inescapable conclusion: Extreme conservatism, especially extreme social conservatism, is a losing strategy.

Any winning strategy for Republican domination must not alienate moderates; we can’t win without them.

I am a Republican. I am pro-life. I believe that every abortion is a tragedy. High abortion rates speaks poorly on how society values fragile lives.

I believe abortions should never substitute for effective birth control, and I support banning those abortions. I respect individual privacy, but human life is sacrosanct. Stopping life is not a casual matter.

That’s my limit; I support no further restrictions. That means I would not seek to prevent abortions that:

• Protect the mother from serious medical risk or death.
• Terminate pregnancies from non-consensual sex.
• Terminate pregnancies with fetuses with conditions incompatible with life.

You may ask, “So do you want all these people to have abortions?” If the pregnancy endangers the mother’s life and abortion can help, yes, save the mom. If the fetus cannot possibly survive, there’s no life to be preserved, so the mom should have the right to avoid pregnancy’s risks and costs if she chooses.

The nonconsensual sex part is tough. In an earlier post, I commented on the perception of men telling women what to do with their bodies. I hope and pray rape victims will keep their babies, but I don’t wish to force societal or collective judgment on rape victims. Rape-induced pregnancy introduces too many moral traps to have a decisive argument.

Abortion is a tragedy. There is no excuse for casual abortions, but I do not see a rational case for a total abortion ban.

An interesting Gallup poll on abortion was released today. Pro-life Americans surged recently. I think it’s a reaction to our recent abortion-friendly ideology shift.

I found two things more interesting.

First is how only 22% want a total abortion ban:

This starkly contrasts with the Texas Republican Party platform, which calls for no abortion whatsoever.

The second interesting part is the stances of women and men:

They’re hardly different: within 5 points either way.

Pro-choicers complain that men are telling women what to do with their bodies. In other words, they say men cannot regulate female-specific issues. Sorry, but the numbers show women and men have roughly equivalent positions! If you substituted male legislatures with female legislatures, you would get the same results.

This week I formed Limitless Technologies LLC.

I’m not rushing into long term plans: computer and information technology consulting need little physical capital, so I can use a “pay as you go” system for now.

I have two objectives.

First, the obvious one: As a separate legal entity, Limitless Technologies LLC bears almost all liabilities for all actions performed through it, protecting me and my family from financial harm.

Second, I have political aspirations. The citizen politician ideal is a myth for ordinary citizens like me, mostly because you can’t make up for lost wages and benefits while campaigning. That’s a huge dent for families, especially in a time-consuming competitive race. I need to develop an asset pool and a more flexible income stream that can bridge me through a leave of absence from my main job.

This is the closest I have come to publicly annoucing a run for office. Don’t worry: we don’t see it happening in 2010!

I titled this “back in business” because I used to co-own Scarsdale Computers, Inc. in the late ’90s. Supposedly I was the brains to back up the sales acumen of the other guy, but I really couldn’t contribute much. My IT knowledge dropped off a cliff past computer hardware and desktop OSes back then.