Farewell, Rick Perry Campaign. We hardly knew ye.

Last Night: Governor Rick Perry


1992: Admiral Stockdale

Phillies announcer Harry Kalas dead at 73

I am sure he is thankful that he lived to see them win the World Series again. May he rest in peace.

Paul Harvey says "Good day!" for the last time

I was only an AM Radio Boffin for a few years of my life, but one of the regular joys of the airwaves was the daily news program by Paul Harvey. In a world where "If it bleeds, it leads" was the watchword of reporting, he was unafraid to also report happy and uplifting news. And he always had a cheerful take on life. Now, he has passed away, and we are poorer as a nation for it.

Biscuit Houdini Chesner: 1995 - 2008

You will be sorely missed. You brought much joy and love to our lives.

R.I.P. Tony Snow

I never really got over his choosing to leave the media to become White House Press Secretary, but I always respected Tony Snow as a journalist and one of the forces at FoxNews that kept it truly balances and fair. When he left, I stopped watching because the network became what its detractors charged it as being - pure partisan news. Now, he has died of cancer at 53. Please be praying for comfort and peace for his family.

R.I.P. George Carlin

I was never a big fan, but understand the importance of his work. And learning of him later in life thru younger comedians, I have been amazed at his kind and generous spirit. The world will miss George Carlin. And I suspect several generations of comedy will mourn a mentor and a role model.

Carlin, who had a history of heart trouble, went into St. John's Medical Center in Santa Monica on Sunday afternoon complaining of chest pain and died later that evening, said his publicist, Jeff Abraham. He had performed as recently as last weekend at the Orleans Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas.

Carlin constantly pushed the envelope with his jokes, particularly with the "Seven Words" routine. When he uttered all seven at a show in Milwaukee in 1972, he was arrested for disturbing the peace.

The Collapse of the OLPC

As Mod-bloggers are aware, I have been a fan of the OLPC concept and was a buyer into their Get-One-Give-One program. I also posted a scathing review of the actual laptop I received. The hardware was good, but the software was almost unusable. Since then, I have tried out the laptop several other times for "productive" uses and have found the software that ships with the unit to be buggy, slow, and hard-to-use even for simple tasks. The best software has been software I loaded outside the Sugar interface and ran from the command-line. I am now officially an OLPC skeptic. But I kept hope alive in that I am not the target audience - third-world children are - so it is possible I simply am trying to use a screw driver to hammer in a nail.

But it appears I am not alone. There have been a myriad of defections from the project, most governments are going with competitors like the Asus EeePC and Intel ClassmatePC, and Nicolas Negroponte is now pushing the OLPC toward a slimmed-down version of Windows XP... this after rejecting an offer of a free MacOS X because it was "not open enough."

The OLPC was a noble undertaking and has spawned a whole new ecosystem of "lightweight laptops", but it is time to face reality: the OLPC is dying and will not rise from its ashes.

R.I.P Charleton Heston

May the star of both The Ten Commandments and Planet of the Apes rest in peace. He was a great talent, and from the little I know of him, a good man.

Wiliam F Buckley dead at 82

A moment of silence, please, to mark the passing away of William F Buckley. The true maverick Conservative icon and intellectual died today in his Conecticut home. One wonders if Mod-Blog - a place where we try to see both sides of the issues - would have been possible without such a champion of the Right to balance the voices on the Left before the rise of Rush Limbaugh, Talk Radio, and the Internet.

In Memoriam: "Pastor A"

A number of Mod-Blog readers are former attenders of my church, so it seems appropriate to post this note here. We got notice yesterday afternoon that the former senior pastor of my church, Pastor A, died at 2 AM on 10/22. Pastor A - a man of booming voice, imposing presence, and unshakeable faith - lead the church I now attend for 37 years and was a vital part of every parishioners life. He is in many ways my idea of what God must be like in power, in goodness, and in sometimes being a little scary. He will be sorely missed, even as we celebrate his being welcomed into Glory by Christ.

If anyone is interested, calling hours will be next Monday, October 29, at Abriola Parkview Funeral Home and the memorial service that evening at 7:00 pm at Christian Heritage School. He is survived by his wife, Mrs. A, and many children and grandchildren.