Pictorial Political Shrillness

2 Political Junkies: ABSOLUT CORRUPTION.

We couldn't have said it better ourselves.

Welcome to the Hackocracy

The New Republic Online (free temp sub req.) posts a terrific story, Welcome to the Hackocracy, which details their take on the 15 worst hacks in the Bush Administration. Yes, it's even worse than you had imagined. People with literally no qualifications to lead the departments they are running. A guy who started out supplying Altoids to Bush and keeping Jenna out of trouble who is now running an agency. The head of the National Park Service who thinks his #1 priority is more development in the national parks and more snowmobiles in Yellowstone. The head of the Consumer Product Safety Commission who isn't interested in banning unsafe products. The utterly incompetent heads of the Small Business Administration and the regional head of FEMA for the Pacific Northwest. Political hacks with padded resumes galore. In short, fifteen more people that prove that it's all about the cronyism and corruption in Bushland.

At least Clinton put people into jobs that were actually qualified for them, and that believed in the missions of the agencies they were running. This crowd, as with the entire Republican approach to governing, is only interested in looting the federal government and the American people for themselves and their corporate masters.

Al Gore on the Threat to American Democracy

Here is the transcript for a brilliant speech given by Al Gore today on the factors that have all but strangled democracy in America. Well worth reading. Wish this guy was president instead of Dubya the Doofus.

Macworld and Me

Today appears to be "Dori Smith Day" over at Macworld. First, there's Reader widgets revealed, the follow-up piece to my Whip Up a Widget article. Several people created their own and sent them in, so check 'em out. It's fun knowing that I helped bring about this outburst of creativity.

Second is my most recent feature: The best blogging tools for the Mac. It's a quick look at TypePad, Movable Type, Blogspot, Blogger, and WordPress. Next month will mark the 6^th anniversary of this weblog; this article marks the first time I've ever been paid to write something about weblogs (and it sure ain't from lack of trying!). For extra fun, check out the Macworld Forums and watch me get screamed at for not having an infinite word count (aka "why didn't you include my favorite blogging tool?").

And finally, yes, we've said that we're never going to do podcasts here, but that doesn't mean we won't guest on other people's podcasts. I helped out on Macworld Podcast #10 (9.6MB/20 minutes), in which I talked about the above feature. You can get more info about the show here.

NewsGator buys NetNewsWire

There's a NewsGator press release: NewsGator Technologies Acquires NetNewsWire.

"After hearing so many NetNewsWire users ask for synchronization – not just between copies of NetNewsWire, but with their PDAs, with newsreaders on Windows, with a browser-based service – we thought about how to make this happen, and found that NewsGator had the technology already in place," said Brent Simmons, co-founder and partner of Ranchero Software. "But they didn’t have a Mac client! So it was a perfect fit, and we couldn’t be more excited."

Congrats to Brent and Sheila, and we'll be keeping an eye out for what becomes of MarsEdit.