Truth, Justice, and the American way

Name Change

I have decided to rename my blog to “Truth, Justice, and the American way.” Why? To borrow from a certain novelist, it has to be said: the world is perishing from an orgy of irrationality, injustice, and Anti-Americanism. While the title was inspired by Superman's character, the change was motivated by the media treatment of the “prisoner abuse" scandal. When American papers publish fake “atrocity” photos and delight in American deaths, the world is desperate need of intellectual heroes who can fight evil ideas with the same dedication, invulnerability, and moral certainty as Superman fought bad guys.

This is from Ayn Rand's 1967 essay "The Wreckage of the Consensus":

A country at war often resorts to smearing its enemy by spreading atrocity stories--a practice which a free, civilized country need not and should not resort to. A civilized country, with a free press, can let the facts speak for themselves. But what is the moral-intellectual state of a country that spreads smears and atrocity stories about itself...?

Buy My Shirts!

"Galt's Pledge" Ash Grey T-Shirt $14.99

Jr. Raglan $17.99

"My Philosophy" Baseball Jersey $16.99

New MT Version

I have updated the Movable Type install for this blog to 3.0. Let me know if everything is working ok. I'll set it up to require TypeKey registration once the final version is released and I have the kinks in the templates worked out. I am still offering free blogging from my domain, but I may have to switch to another blog because of the licensing changes for Movable Type.

I also signed up for an account with Gmail, Google's new email service that offers 1GB of storage space. The storage space is certainly handy, though I miss some of the features Hotmail's advanced features. My new email address is heroic at gmail.com

Google Ads

As you may have noticed, I have added Google Ads to my blog. I earn a few cents for each click, so please consider sponsoring my site :-) (Note: the ads seem to be showing only intermittently due to low click-through rates. Feel free to remedy this!)

Blog Icons

If you want blog icons like the ones you see on the left of this page, I have a collection of 100+ here.

Free Blogs/Email Accounts

I am offering free blogs/email at rationalmind.net, objectivismonline.net, or heroicdesigns.com. If you want one, contact me with a subdomain, username, and password.

New Chat Applet

I�ve decided to replace my server-side Java chat with a PHP/Java applet interface to connect to the #AynRand IRC channel. Actually, it will allow you connect to any IRC server you want.

New Photos Up

New at my gallery: photos from this week's trip to San Antonio and some photos from my ski trip that I finally got on PhotoCD.

Spring Break!

I will be on vacation all week. I won't be getting my usual email, but you can reach me at [email protected]

New Objectivist Community!

Do you want to take a leading role in America�s intellectual renaissance? Are you interesting in participating in an active Objectivist community on the web? Would you like to exchange ideas in a forum that does not tolerate irrationality?

To provide all this and more, ObjectivismOnline.net has been created to bring together the vast resources on Objectivism that are scattered all across the Internet into one integrated marketplace. We believe that the Internet is a key tool to spread the ideas of Objectivism, and would like to invite you to join us. ObjectivismOnline.net has many features that make it the best marketplace for Objectivist ideas on the Internet today:

• A meta-blog combining original content, commentary on latest news and events, links to great articles on the web, and announcements about new Objectivist events, essays, books, and more!
• Our forum, now in existence for over a year, brings the opportunity for extensive dialogue with Objectivist intellectuals all across the world on topics such as metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, politics, art, science, and more! Our forum recently broke the 3,000 posts mark and has over 185 registered members.
• An essay section which serves as a resource for Objectivist ideas from all the branch of philosophy as well as other essays of philosophical interest. We currently have 35 essays and would like to greatly increase that with your submissions.
• A chat room specifically for our users. We plan to use this chat room for informal chats as well as moderated discussions on various philosophical and informal topics!
• Our web links section brings together Objectivism-related resources from all corners of the web. With 112 current links and more on the way, you can find a vast resource of ideas currently being spread!
• Additional features include: a movie/music/book reviews section, photo and art galleries, and fliers for Objectivism clubs! Soon, we will be adding an in-depth marketplace where you can find reviews on a variety of products through amazon.com ranging from books to music to DVD�s and much more!

Email Troubles

Due my recent hosting problems, I've discovered that my david (at) rationalmind.net address has lost a ton of email. If you've sent me anything during the last week(s) and I didn't reply, please send it again, and CC it to capt_david (at) hotmail.com just in case. Hopefully, things should be back to normal soon.

Where did my site go?

The good news is that my website surpassed 5 GB of traffic 2/3 into the month.  According to my webhost, this should be enough for a "high 5-digit" number of visitors.  According to my own calculations, if each visit consumes 50K of bandwith, I should be good for approximately 100,000 hits/month.  So, passing 5GB halfway into the month means that I was getting about 150,000 hits/month.  I say was because the bad news is that my host shut down my site when I went over the 5GB bandwith limit, and becuase of my technical arrangement, I was not able to purchare more. 

Normally, I could just switch to a backup server, but my site happened to go down at the same time that I was putting together a new computer, so I can't access any of my files either.  So, I'm out of luck until the 12th, when my monthly quota is reset (or so I hope).  Till then, I'll be sitting on my ancient Pentium 233 (with MMX!) Mandrake Linux pc and checking the FedEx tracking website every 5 minutes to see when all the components for my new computer will arrive.  Or maybe I'll actually go spend some time outside.

Thanks, Comment Spammers

Not funny. I am also one of the top results for the Paris Hilton video, photos of women's privates, and Arabic peep shows. I have never mentioned any of these topics on my blog (before now that is), but after various unsavory characters spammed my referrer list, search engines associated my websites with these sundry websites. Fortunately, the referrer list works both ways � I�m now one of the top capitalists on the web.

I need your help!

I�m currently trying to choose a template for ObjectivismOnline, and I would like your help in picking one from among the finalists. Please go to here and select one of the templates from the �Template Chooser� on the bottom of the left side. I�ve listed my favorite ones in the poll below. Please vote on your favorite one or send me a message if you like another - there are 53 to choose from. (Note: many of these currently don't work in IE, so you may want to try a different browser.)
Thanks!

Free Web Hosting!

1&1 is giving away three years of free web hosting. I've been using it for three months now (it runs this site) and I'm very happy with it. As amazing as it sounds, there's no catch. The offer expires on the 21st, so sign up today!

Website Updates...

I've been working on converting my website to a content management system that I can easily deploy on other sites. If you're familiar with PHP, you can download my first hack at it here. The interesting stuff is in cms.php and .htaccess. (File compressed with WinRar.) I used the CMS to generate this mobile/AvantGo version of my homepage.

Art Gallery Updates

I�ve updated my art gallery with several new artists, including a new pin-up section and a number of artists from Quent Cordair fine art, who kindly allowed me to feature them. I made the gallery from my collection of 1600 paintings and drawings, the bulk of which come from the Art Renewal Center. (More art links.) You can also browse my photo album and the originals.

My Blog is Back!

Check out "The Racism of 'Diversity'" a great editorial by Peter Schwartz starring Texas A&M's president Robert Gates. Gates sent out a university-wide email announcing that
race will not be used as a factor in admissions. I applaud the announcement, but wonder why he promoties other racist policies, such as hiring a new diversity czar. The contradiction becomes readily apparent at Texas A&M's "community plan," where the administration's goals are plainly visible:

Google

In the first 15 days of November, I had 1008 unique search engine hits from Google, contributing to most of my 38,181 hits and 4,258 visits. Here are the top 8 queries:

1. 
   
2. jewish racism
   
3. cultural misunderstanding
   
4. html compression
   
5. george bush award for excellence in public service
   
6. middle east terrorism
   
7. victorian morality
   
8. arguments for fox hunting
   
9. prostitution and religion
   

Updates

I realized that my JavaScript quote include had some debug code that broke it. It should now work. In fact, you can see it in action @ Keenan�s new blog AbsoluteReason.com

You can still submit your favorite quotes to my database. I�ve only gotten one good quote and a few dozen insults so far. I get the distinct impression that most of my readers absolutely loath my views, which is somewhat puzzling. Don�t you people have an anti-war or Howard Dean rally to attend? I think this may be explained by the 80/20 rule.

MT-Blacklist

If you have a Movable Type blog, there is a high probability that you have been hit with a recent deluge of comment spam. To keep those spammers out, I highly recommend MT-Blacklist as a simple and effective solution. I understand that spammers are actively avoiding even trying to post to blogs with this plugin in order to avoid being blacklisted (the plugin can share your blacklist with other enabled blogs.)

(If you are hosting a Movable Type blog at one of my domains, and have ever given me your MT password, your blogs have already been immunized and deloused.)

New Photo Album

I'm spending the day creating a new gallery for my photo album. With 3,200 images taking up 880MB of space, this is truly a monumental task. You can keep track of my progress here.
Update: My new album is finished! What do you think of the theme?

New Essays

It's been a few months since I added any essays to my site, so it's time for a new one: "Creativity, the Man-Made and the Metaphysically Given" (Let me know if you have a better title for it.) I also added my essay on sex. I wrote it several months ago, but was never satisfied with the results. (Though the conservatives at Texags seemed to like it.) However after 6000 words, I�ve gotten so sick of the topic that I slapped on a �work in progress� and uploaded it.

I�ve been lazy about writing essays lately � mostly because my blog allows me to jot down my thoughts without the formality of writing a self-contained and structured theme. It doesn�t help that I�m taking a full load of classes and working. However, I�ve almost finished my first round of exams, and will try to write a few editorials before the next deluge of class work hits.

If you haven't done so recently, check out the spiffy new look of the ObjectivismOnline forum.

Office 2003

So I finally installed Microsoft Office 2003. I disliked the new interface at first, but after a few days, it�s grown on me. I can�t say there is anything objectively better about all the new icons � more like the latest fad in UI design. You can be sure that in a few months, all the new software will be sportin� the new �shiny� icons. What Windows really needs, is SVG icon support. There aren�t that many new features I found all that useful, except SPAM filtering and the new Outlook 2003 layout, which is very neat with two monitors. Unfortunately, my server-side SPAM filter thinks all mail from Outlook 2003 is forged.

In related news, it seems that spammers are either using my account to send spam or faking my return address in their spam, so I�ve been getting hundreds of bounced emails and �unsubscribe requests� daily for the last few weeks. I�m not sure what I can do about the forged return address, but for now, I�ve disabled my wildcard email addresses so that only [email protected] will receive email. Whatever the case, it�s clear that my domain was singled out by spammer(s).

Do you like the layout of my website? Would you like to get a blog of your own, or to upgrade an existing one? If so, you can use my template and/or domain names for your own website. If your website is dedicated to promoting ideas I support, I might just help you for free, and if not, a little motivation should the trick. One Objectivist club is already using my template, and I haven't heard too many complaints so far.

You will find some new links among the blogs on the right. They are all good reading -- sometimes informative, usually right, and always interesting. Let me know about any other websites you'd like to recommend.

If you're a regular reader of my blog, you know that I got a job last week. There�s a very good chance that my boss/coworkers visit this site, so I�ll do my best to refrain from slandering any of them -- not that I have any cause to. Actually, my mom reads my blog whenever I don�t answer the phone, and if I don�t moderate my comments for her, I doubt I would for anyone else. (Don�t worry mom, last week�s hangover was the first time in a long while � I can�t afford that much alcohol very often.)
Anyway, I will be doing hardcore .Net programming at work, and extending and applying what I learn at home as well. My homepage, which was originally created in plain html, converted to php, then converted to asp, then converted to .Net, and finally converted back to php, will probably be converted to VB.net and then C# as I apply my new knowledge to this site. Although I find LAMP to be a better solution in many cases, .Net offers power and features that are unmatched by any other solution. (If you�re interested in a comparison of the two, check out Microsoft�s take on MSDN. Although the disadvantages of .Net are mysteriously left out, the superiority of .Net as a platform is made very clear.)
In any case, I am looking for potential projects that I can use as a learning experience for .Net. If you would are looking for someone to design your interactive non-profit website, let me know, and I might do it gratis.

The Joys of Blogging

Going along with the theme of my previous post, I would like to review the progress of this blog, and perhaps inspire some of my readers to start their own (and feed my already super-sized ego.) I started blogging 16 months ago to improve my writing, thinking, and web-design skills. 595 entries later, the blog has been far more successful than I expected. My literary abilities still need much improvement, but there have been many tangible results. Traffic has grown from nil to 2155 unique hits and 5364 visits this August. Google and Blogshares count 75 and 44 links to my homepage, respectively. When the value of incoming links is measured, my site is in the 644th place (with .0082% marketshare) among the Blogshares top-valued blogs, placing it in the top 1% of blogs by any standard. The success of my homepage has inspired me to start several other sites, and several people to start their own blogs, some of which may soon outpace mine in traffic. Many of my sites are growing at near-exponential rates, which makes me excited for the future and worried about how much it will cost me to host everything.

Although I blog primarily for myself, I appreciate all the tips and comments I get. My fall schedule will allow me little time to read the news and surf the blogosphere, so I�ll be even more dependent on your submissions. To help my marketing efforts and test my new polling script, please let me know how you came across my site.

I've added more great artists to my art gallery. Most of my new stuff comes from ArtRenewal, but they have many thousands of artists, so it can be hard to find the best artists if you don�t know what to look for. I�m going to look for some Victorian, Impressionist, and Renaissance pieces next, so it doesn�t look like I�m just mirroring their collection (which I�m tempted to do!) My logs show that my collection has been very popular with a certain gay bodybuilding forum � so check out my art gallery� four out of five gay bodybuilders like it!

Please bear with me...

I'm currently migrating my server to Linux and this blog to Movable Type. Most of the site has been converted from asp/.Net to php already, but I'm migrating the remnants (including the asp blog and the access comment database) to run on Linux. Sorry Bill, it's been a bumpy ride and I decided to move on. If speed is any indication, the server performance of my wimpy 233Mhz ADVX Linux server is comparable to my 1.2Ghz XP/IIS desktop. (Update: The new MT blog is under way.)

Btw, someone emailed me to ask what CMS and scripting language this website runs on. I counted four scripting languages and three databases: asp, .Net, perl, php and MySQL, access, and XML, respectively. I wouldn't dare accuse anyone of writing such a Frankenstein monstrosity, so I offer my learning experience in each language as my excuse. Speaking of php, it's extremely intuitive and pleasant to code, unlike the bulky and dated asp. (Don't get me started on jsp!)

Note: If the above didn't any sense, don't worry, I'll be back to bashing peaceniks and other assorted lefties as soon as the operation is complete.

Please excuse the recent site

Please excuse the recent site outages. My Linksys router is betraying me, so I might be moving my site to a *real* server soon.

In other news, six monkeys typing on a typerwriter produce a real mess!

..faculty and students in the university's media program left a computer in the monkey enclosure at Paignton Zoo in southwest England, home to six Sulawesi crested macaques. At first, said Phillips, "the lead male got a stone and started bashing the hell out of it. "Another thing they were interested in was in defecating and urinating all over the keyboard," added Phillips, who runs the university's Institute of Digital Arts and Technologies.

New Blog

Check out the new blog features....hopefully this will work...

New Style

But if you want to see my old one, you can switch back...and forth.

Update: for what is likely going to be a brief time, my homepage is VALID XHTML 1.0

Update #2: I've created a cool new table-free all-CSS layout.

(Update: CSS layouts are great and all, but I've decided to stick to tables for now.)

The anti-war protesters: what are they for?

I've written a new essay: The anti-war protesters: what are they for?
(shorter version:)

"A recent incident at University of Texas is indicative of the nature of the pacifists opposing a war with Iraq. After the student government of the University of Texas passed a resolution condemning a U.S. attack on Iraq, the Young Conservatives attempted a debate with the "Campus Coalition for Peace and Justice." However, as CNN reported, "Most listeners in the audience seemed to agree with the Campus Coalition, or at least people on that side seemed more vocal about their feelings. When an antiwar advocate began heckling a student in the pro-war camp, other supporters of the President's policies stood up, and a fistfight almost broke out." One can easily imagine what "more vocal" means when reverse-translated through the filter of CNN's liberal bias. Apparently, the "peace protesters" are not so peaceful. All over the world, they have been rioting against "aggression." What is the true nature of the anti-war sentiment in America then? Much insight about the nature of the "anti-war" protest can be found in their "Statement of Conscience," which has been endorsed by thousands of professors and students across America."

More Updates...

There's a few more essays on my essay page, including one on Divine Inspiration and Religious Guilt

Oh, and check out this list of 451 (and growing) proofs for God.

New Sub-Site

I am working on a new sub site for my website. Here is a clue:

Webcam

Since the server is running from my desktop now, the webcam is once again online.

New Website Layout!

I finally fixed that annoying inner frame!

Link of the day: Caffeinated Soap!

New Domain!

I got a new domain today:rationalmind.net and a new email: [email protected]

Hopefully, this will be my home on the web for the next few years!

QOTD

Finished converting my Quote page to XML and set it up to accept parameters.

Random Quote
Daily Quote
All Quotes
Instructions
XML Source
Update: Added "XML Edit" feature

QOTD

My first ASP do .Net conversion is the random quote generator you see above. What do you think? I've added 80+ quotes so far...
Also, I realized that this page was competely unreadable to low-res visitors. I changed it to support resolutions down to 640x480, though I hate it when people setup their screen so that you have to scroll two pages to see the next sentence...