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What the Candidates are Running
An anonymous reader writes "
Linux Journal has an article about what the presidential candidates are running their web sites on. It also has some reference to the Republican vs. Democrat uptimes.
"
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Vote Linux, vote democrat!
Meh.
Seriously though, if the leader of the free world runs IIS, I'm scared. . .
You are not the customer.
What about the Green party? The Libertarians?
Where's my fair and balanced coverage?
This space for rent.
SIG:Slashdot: indymedia for nerds.
Does anyone really think the candidates know, or even care? 'Course they don't. They say "go make a web site" to some design/hosting company and that's that.
The Army reading list
The fact that this is reported is proof that democracy is very flawed in some of the basic assumptions. Not to single out geeks (and I admit, I looked at the article with some interest I suppose) but people just don't know how to select who to vote for. The mainstream picks their candidate based on likability and how attractive they are and whether they wear the right colored suit or seem smug. You can have a great set of policies that are very sound but wear the wrong tie and you'll lose a few million people. Candidates need to start standing on policy, not the junk that gets reported (OS, favorite food, hair color, etc.)
I hate liberals. If you are a liberal, do not reply.
It also has some reference to the Republican vs. Democrat uptimes. /.ed?
What about LinuxJournal uptimes? Shouldn't they be embarassed that after less than 20 commenst posted that their server is hoplessly
From the article:
Is there any significance to what Web server/platform combinations 2004 presidential candidates are using?
I'm glad this was posted to 'The Lighter Side'. However, that probably won't stop people from drawing ironclad conclusions from the data.
Hint: political candidates' performance is not linked to the performance of their webservers.
"Up next: inferring a person's religion based on his choice of toothpaste."
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
There was an interesting piece on NPR the other day about Howard Dean and how he's actually a technophone - doesn't like computers much. Ironic because his online fund raising is stellar. They said the most tech-savvy candidate is Lieberman, who can't do without his BlackBerry. Apparently Al Gore introduced Lieb to all the gadgets that let him keep in touch with people.
-Ster
Not one of these candidates knows WTF Apache is, let alone IIS.
:) but that is beside the point.
Sys Admins and Webmasters make those decisions and I'm betting the ones running the Democrat candidate websites have to worry about where they spend money. Thus they us OSS software.
Of course they are also running the better webserver
There is nothing inherently safe about liberty. That's why so many people died protecting it.
now without the mess.. ;)
lynx --dump --head http://www.site.com
[alk]
Third of the people on Slashdot are not Americans, another third are H1Bs and L1s located in America but cannot vote, and the last third of the readership are actual US citizens, but forgot to register to vote, since new Gnome came out that day.
Ask any of these guys this question:
What operating system does your web server run?
Do you think any of them could answer that question? I don't think this reflects the candidates, it reflects their IT staff.
While waiting for the article to crawl out from under the Slashdotting, here's an aside I thought was interesting: a recent article talking about Howard Dean's succesful use of the Internet for fundraising noted that perhaps the first candidate to use that method successfully was -- that Judge Roy Whatever in Alabama with the 10 Commandments statue in his courtroom.
Not someone I would have picked as a high-tech visionary, although he obviously is pretty shrewd about media manipulation.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
"GQ" is running an article on which designer ties each candidate is wearing, "Veneer Quarterly" has a sidebar on what color, and how many coats, of paint the candidates used on their houses, "Breakfast Meats Bi-Monthly" is leading with the in-depth feature "Bacon, Steak, or Sausage: The Candidates Decide," and the cover story of this month's "Limousine Owner's Gazette" tells us wa-a-a-y more than we need to know about the contenders' choice of Regular, Premium, or Ultra.
Gosh, with so much relevant information available to voters, it's easier than ever to make an informed decision!
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos.
The sad thing is, you've just committed a felony. Don't worry, the FBI will be there shortly.
that W can even spell IIS, no less explain what it is. Look at how much trouble he had with WMD.
A Fat Bald Man if he ran Linux? A few geeks would, nobody else would, not even if he were sent directly by God. Collectively, this country is an idiot.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
"I want people with Tux stickers on their cases, and I want people with Best Viewed Under IE 6.0 on their web pages. The Democratic party needs a big tent!"
"Up next: inferring a person's religion based on his choice of toothpaste."
I don't like the implication of this statement. I'm an Atheist, but I still brush.
What possible conclusions can you possibly draw from this? Most of the candidates probably don't even know they have a website. Somebody in their campaign hires a firm to stick up a website and they do. This has nothing to do with the polititcs of the candidates.
There has already been some buzz around Howard Dean making a potential guest appearance on Lessig's blog. He also seems seems to have some peripheral interest in and empathy for our positions (sorry for the very broad generalization here) on many issues that are important to the Slashdot crowd.
If he had shown up in this article as running Dean For America on IIS on 2K Server, I'd seriously have to reconsider his appeal as a potential geek candidate... And question his suitability as my representative on issues of privacy, open standards, intellectual property rights, etc.
Good work, Howard. I'm glad my contribution to your campaign didn't end up in Redmond as a license fee payment!
If you never make mistakes, it's probably because you're not doing anything.
I'm not so sure about Nader wanting to use modern computers at all. Those new hardrives could be "Unsafe at Any Speed" He's probably running that Commodore 64 that was recently updated with ethernet capability :o)
Eat a Chicken, You know you want to.
> As of this writing, November 5, 2003, the RNC has an uptime of 4.26 days (maximum of 39.04) and a 90-day moving average of 16.91. The DNC has an uptime of 445.02 days (also the maximum) and a 90-day moving average of 395.38 days.
...
>
> Draw your own conclusions.
uh, Republicans can't keep it up? but we've known that since Bob Dole started doing ED ads
At least the Communists have a clear choice: Arm & Hammer, surely.
The candidates hosting company may be running such and such, NOT the candidate! If you can point me to a candidate that set his/her site up on their own and did NOT use frontpage or office for it....I might vote for them.
If you can point me to a candidate that actually runs his/her website off of a homebrew box running linux or a bsd that he/she built themselves, I WILL vote for them.
Most likely they chose whatever they chose because it was the cheaper option offered by their "web host".
That being said what point would this have in choosing a candidate. They most likely have no clue anyhow.
:-( --- argh. Despair, I owe again.
Yes, these candidates made a conscious decision on what OS to run their web sites on. Yes, they know what they are running. Yes, they all know they even have websites.
:)
Quick, base your votes on this!
As to the "reporter" who thought this was a worthwhile test of a candidate, go back to the New York Times.
The Linux Journal is slashdotted?!?! A LINUX site is SLASHDOTTED?!?!? Oh, the horror. The HORROR! We're doomed, I tell you. DOOMED!
+1 Insightful, -1 Troll. What can I say, I'm an Insightful Troll.
Bash! For the Patriot Act. Bash!Bash! For the politcal term "partial birth abortion" which is not even medical terminology and can be construed in many different ways. Bash!Bash!Bash! For holding people without charges in Guantanamo Bay. Bash!Bash!Bash!Bash! So sue me.
-------------------------------------
Technically, we are beyond survival.
There's no conflict. Atheism is a religion just like the null string ("") is a string. :)
Greens: apache on linux
Libertarians: apache on freebsd
Communists: apache on linux
Socialists: apache on linux
Lest you want to draw unwarranted conclusions:
Halliburton: apache on linux
Tobacco.org: apache on freebsd
Whitehouse.gov: apache on linux
Oddly...
ATF: netscape on solaris
US Army: webstar on OSX
whitehouse.com: IIS on linux (so netcraft claims!!)
fun fun fun...
Linux Journal: Apache on Linux
Uptime: Down faster than a drunken cheerleader on prom night
George W Bush: IIS on Windows 2000
Uptime: Still going!
HTH HAND!
Dragging people kicking and screaming into reality since 1996.
But if they have an uptime of almost 400 days and are running Linux, it also means that they are still vulnerable to the ptrace vulnerability.
:-(
Not very smart
This (among other things) is why I support him. I know he has a slim chance of winning, but at least he's got the closest views to mine: money isn't everything, and we should do good for our fellow man at all levels. Those who fail to comply should be pushed to the bottom of the barrel where they belong. I mean honestly, how much effort does it take to dedicate some of your work or money to someone else's well being who actually needs it. You neocons seem to have no problem giving money to your cronies (who don't need it).
Un-news
"For those of you who haven't paid attention to history, it was roughly two years between Reagan's big tax cuts and when tax receipts increased."
It was less than a year between Reagan's big tax cuts and Reagan's big tax increases. Those were the single largest tax increase in US history, incidentally, though the end result of a massive cut (that completely failed to generate new revenue) and the massive increase (to restore the revenue without which the government would have been wiped out) was still a small decrease from the previous taxes.
"people gave more money to charity before taxation became so fscking oppressive in this country." Right, but did total social spending go up or down? Quick answer -- up. When the government fund homeless shelters, etc., they're more consistent than private donors, though of course both are good.
Enable 3D printed prosthetics!
The founding fathers only intended for rich white landowners to vote. They also assumed all of the voters would understand the issue and how the process works.
That isn't the case any more. Your average voter probably doesn't know the difference between a senator and a representative, doesn't know how the state legislature works, doesn't understand the electoral college, couldn't tell you what the majority whip does, or define the role of the speaker of the house. They couldn't name any of the cabinet postions. We don't let you drive a car without at least some knowledge. We have tests before you can do alot of things in this country, maybe voting should be one of them?
I do have some problems with it. First this is going to give a huge voting advantage to the rich. I would guess that a higher % of wealthy voters would pass this test versus poor voters. Even if you gave free classes to educate the voters a poor person is going to be less able to take the classes.
I think a real solution to the uneducated voter problem may simply to be better education in public schools. The government isn't that complex make it a required course for 5th graders, 8th graders, and 10th graders. Don't treat it like civics is treated now in schools. Make it a real class and a requirement to move on (you don't pass you repeat the grade). I think that would help more than anything else.
Jack Valenti and Orrin Hatch will be first up against the wall when the revolution comes.
Funding and support of the lowest levels of the economy is not charity. The social programs are not there because the government is benevolent. At best it is enlightened self-interest to help people who have been put out of work temporarily. We do not have a welfare economy any more. You get two years and that's it.
You give yourself a lot of credit for knowing all the answers to the problems of homelessness, poverty and addiction. I don't. We may have higher taxes than Sweeden, or there may be loopholes that let people stay on welfare indefinately. What I do know is that there's a big difference between knowing the answer and being the answer. If blowhard know-it-all's like yourself EVER showed up at the soup kitchens or shelters as volunteers, I'd have a lot more respect for your theories.
Death to Argument by Slogan!! (This post twice-encrypted with ROT-13. Replies not using same will be ignored)
The problem with your suggestion about charity is that people are not naturally very charitable. Even less so these days and it has nothing to do with taxes and more to do with the selfishness our culture and capitalism encourage. Americans have become like freakin' Pokemon collectors when it comes to money. They try to get as much as they can for themselves. The end result is corruption in every facet of society that deals with large amounts of money (government, corporations, churches, etc...).
Good luck trying to get the average joe to contribute to things they believe in. Most people can't be bothered to do much because there isn't enough time in the day. As it is, for myself I make a contribution to a local charity to provide Thanksgiving dinners for the homeless. But, I can't be arsed to do much more than that because I've got other things to worry about. I'd much rather have the funds automatically deducted from my paycheck so I don't even have to think about it. I care about my fellow man, but I haven't the time or energy to do anything about it. I would love to give more to people who need it, but I don't care for the work related charities like United Way or religious organizations. I much prefer a system with no "god" connection that is impersonal and impartial. the closest thing going it government. Well... at least until G.W. Chimpboy stole the office.
Taxes aren't the perfect solution, but they've provided me with plenty of needed services over my lifetime so I have no interest in seeing them go away. The fools who proclaim that they don't want to pay taxes are typically more interested in their own personal gain. But as soon as some public service deteriorates or disappears because of the lack of funding, they cry out wondering why this happened. I'll tell you why morons, there's no money to pay for it because your being an arse and putting it all into your own personal till.
Un-news
(If you cruise over to Larry Lessig's blogJohn Edwards is guest blogging on a variety of tech topics this week.)
We use a handful of open-source tools here at Campaign HQ. Why? Cost and reliability. The same reason you guys choose this stuff.
Oh... And our entire Web Team runs on Mac OS X. Contrary to one of the comments posted earlier, Senator Edwards made it clear during Tuesday's debate that he prefers his Mac.
I hope you folks have a chance to learn more about John Edwards.
This is incorrect.
n s.html for more information.
The positive belief that there is no god is one type of atheism, called "strong atheism". The other type is the simple lack of belief in any gods (called "weak atheism").
Agnostiscm is the belief that it is not possible to know or understand the nature of a god or gods. Thus, you can have agnostic atheists (it is impossible to understand the nature of a god and I lack a belief in any such entity) as well as agnostic theists (I believe that the universe was created by a god but its nature is unknowable).
See http://www.infidels.org/news/atheism/sn-definitio
Republican policies support companies like Microsoft.
Only the ones like GWB do. Libertarian-leaning Republicans are better in supporting more equitable deregulation and not the buddy-buddy shit we see in piss-poor attempts at free trade, for example.
Don't use people like GWB as a defense for Democrats, because it only cloud the truth: the two major political parties are pretty much a lost cause, unless they can find an honest way to reform themselves from within and run real canidates who aren't puppets for special interests and the party line.
They prevent the regulation of industries, which leads to monopolies
Regulations don't prevent monopolies, they reinforce them.
They support property rights over the freedoms of the individual
Property rights and individual freedom are one and the same.
Quite honestly, I'm very tired of people pointing blame at corporations, when the root problems are corporations merely playing the cards dealt to them by the government. Of course, corporations will sneak around the system...it's their job, and we should see this crap coming from miles away. People who want protectionist feel-good legislation to protect them from corporations are simply putting on the blindfold, pulling down their pants, and painting "get me know and get me good" on their chests. It always has been the case and always will be the case that the only person who can protect you from evil corrupt corporations is you.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
Together, we will drive the rats from the tundra.
Of course it matters what the definition of the word actually is. You only claim that the OED is irrelevant because it disproves your point.
Your claim about Paul and Mohammad is somewhat bizarre. Both catholics and protestants call themselves "christians" but there are certainly a lot of problems in Ireland, where they seem to have noticed their theological differences. I can see no reason to assume things would be different in the Middle East.
This is actually a debate I have had many times with many different theists. The typical response at this point is to repeat "Atheism is a religion", perhaps adding "La-la-la-la-la I can't hear you." Argument by assertion is typical of theists, who desperately wish that atheism was a religion so they could try to meet it on equal ground. Theists would like to be able to claim that atheism is solely a matter of belief no more valid then their own religion when instead it is simply an open-minded lack of belief in the absence of evidence.
If you decide to respond, please do so with something other than argument by assertion.
God forbid that the folks making 90k+ a year are already paying 65% of the current tax load should have to pay -MORE- of the tax load (and those making 55k+ are paying almost 83%).
Ignoring the fact that you fail to cite those numbers (since they appear accurate), it's a meaningless figure. What percentage of the total money made are made by the people? A more accurate figure is the percentage of income that is paid as taxes by this group.
Tax Foundation has a table with just such data (cited as from the IRS for 2001). Their numbers match yours (65% paid by the top 10% (92k+)). However, the top 10% also makes 43% of the total money. At 21.4%, they do have higher tax rates than the average (14.2%). However, this takes into account only federal income tax, not other federal taxes, such as payroll and estate taxes, and not any state or local taxes.
--------------------
% telnet www.lp.org 80
Trying 65.113.119.99...
Connected to www.lp.org.
Escape character is '^]'.
HEAD / HTTP/1.0
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Thu, 06 Nov 2003 19:58:32 GMT
Server: Apache/1.3.27 (Unix) PHP/4.2.3
X-Powered-By: PHP/4.2.3
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html
Connection closed by foreign host.
--------------------
% telnet www.greenparty.org 80
Trying 209.120.182.113...
Connected to www.greenparty.org.
Escape character is '^]'.
HEAD / HTTP/1.0
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Thu, 06 Nov 2003 19:58:42 GMT
Server: Apache/1.3.27 (Unix) (Red-Hat/Linux) mod_fastcgi/2.2.12 mod_perl/1.26 PHP/4.3.3 FrontPage/5.0.2 mod_ssl/2.8.12 OpenSSL/0.9.6b
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html
Connection closed by foreign host.
If your uptime is 445 days... you need to patch your kernel.
Microsoft aggravates my tourettes syndrome.
Green Party: Debian & Apache/mod_perl.
My desision is made.
There are no trolls. There are no trees out here.
First we find out that Bob Dole uses Viagra. Now we learn that Republican party both use Microsoft Windows and IIS. So we have one Republican who has trouble getting it up and the rest have trouble keeping it up.
> You give yourself a lot of credit for knowing all the answers to the
> problems of homelessness, poverty and addiction.
Addiction is something I don't care to discuss at the moment, but as for
homelessness and poverty, they are not a problem in this country.
Poverty? We have more people in the US dying of obesity than malnutrition.
How many political candidates have you seen announce they want do deal with
*that* problem? Homelessnes? We have more than one home per immediate
family; that's so far above the world average it's astonishing. Are there
homeless? Yeah, a handful. But there are much bigger problems. There are
more violent crimes every year than the total number of homeless people.
Heck, there are more fatal motorcycle accidents every year than the total
number of homeless people. Homelessness has a big emotional pull, but it's
not one of our larger problems.
Poverty we just plain don't *have*, period. Not for any definition of
"poverty" that would make any sense in most of the world. Poverty is when
the wrong amount of rain means none of the children in a fifty mile radius
get enough rice to eat this week, or when entertaining a visitor uses up
your quota of meat for a month. Poverty is when a significant percentage
of women die in childbirth due to a complete and total lack of any health
care, because they live a day's journey from the nearest proper first aid kit,
much less hospital. Poverty is when you don't personally know anybody who
has electrical power or running water. Half the world lives in poverty --
exactly zero of them are in the US. The poorest of our "poor" can get three
meals a day, if they're willing to accept handouts and hungry enough to eat
whatever food is set before them. The poorest of our "poor" live within
reasonable walking distance of public drinking fountains with potable water
available 360+ days a year. The poorest of our poor can walk into the
emergency room and be treated any time they have a real medical problem.
The treatment may not always be top quality, but they can get some form of
treatment. If they have to wait in line for eight hours (which would be
quite a lot in most US hospitals), that's *nothing* compared to what happens
where there's poverty; it can take eight hours to *get* to a hospital, *if*
you can find anyone with a car to drive you, and *then* they may just turn
you away altogether.
Don't even think about replying and telling me I don't know what I'm talking
about if you haven't even *been* to the third world. And if you only went to
one of the three largest cities in the country, that doesn't count.
Addiction, now that's a real problem we actually have. It's also another
thread.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.