A Political Glimpse from Ireland

Some Predictions I Made for 2008 in 2007

I don’t know how many people have heard about this site but it is useful for sending yourself reminders in the future. It is called futureme.org and I often use it when there are things I would like my older self to remember. Here goes:

Dear Crian

Here are the predictions you made in 2007 for 2008, lets see if they are right:

1. Open Source will continue to grow as stated in IBM’s future predictions but I think more average people will come to know the term as lets face it, 50,000 brains are better than one or even 50.

2. Gaming Sales will increase steadily with more and more average people playing games. The PS3’s sales with catch up with the XBOX360 but Nintendo will stain reign supreme.

3. A private equity firm will inject billions of dollars into AMD to help them compete with Intel a bit better in the CPU and GPU market.

4. More people will sign up to Gmail as I have done with Microsoft realizing that Windows Live and Hotmail are a dying product which they will slowly reduce their efforts in respectively.

5. The Big 4 Accounting firms will continue to be hit with scandals this year as more people realize that they are too large for their own good and they go with the small-medium sized firms.

6. The increasing inflation in China reaches a breaking point and the Chinese stock market crashes with millions of people losing money around the world. The government does not have an explanation and the people of China become angry, companies start pulling out of China and move to more stable democractic economies.

7. Vietnam and South Korea prove to be what investors need, stable fast growing economies with a talented population. Both of these countries will prosper as the Chinese economy falters.

8. Hillary Clinton is elected the first female president of the United States along with Barrack Obama her vice-president. Many of the political initiatives started by the Bush Administration are reversed however the Supreme Court still fights for the conservative view of life.

9. The American economy makes a resurgence in the 4th quarter of 2008 with many analysts optimistic about the new change in presidency. Growth rate of 2% predicted for November and December.

10. People around the world continue to automate with the ideas of the “internet fridge” and other such devices not so foreign anymore. The automated home networked computer system becomes more common place.

Moving To Korea

Hi everyone, I didn’t manage to make my daily post yesterday because I have some news, I am leaving to South Korea this week Saturday for at least a year maybe more depending on how I like it. The decision is not as quick as it sounds but has been in the pipe line for a while given my lack of success here in Ireland trying to earn decent money. I am often reminded of my dad who tells me all the time: “It is good to know how the other half lives.” I think that embodies my curiosity of Asia to a degree but I am not stopping blogging by any stretch of the imagination just a little slow down for the next two weeks. For the next two weeks, Big Blue will be in charge of this blog, moderating comments and doing anything else that he see’s as necessary. I trust him completely and I know he will do his best with his tight schedule to keep this site moving forward.

I expect to be back to full time blogging by September the 14th but will be posting periodically during this time period. I have really enjoyed the last couple months discussing the issues of the day with all of you, but I am extremely glad I won’t be missing Senator Obama’s speech on Thursday . I will be living in the Korean city of Incheon however I am not a city person as I have said in previous posts and hope to relocate somewhere to the country once I am settled. Good luck to everyone for the next two weeks, I will be back to my pro-Obama, liberal and sometimes badly argued posts in September:

Not The Prettiest Picture Of Incheon

Politics Is Like A Piano

I was going to write another politically orientated post tonight but given that it is approaching 1am, I decided to post my first piece of music. I don’t think this will be a regular thing but a change every now and then keeps life exciting. Is politics like a piano? The way I see it, the piano is one of the very few instruments that can convey a complex melodic and harmonic interplay. This interplay is analogous, in a way, for the relations between Democrats and Republicans. Anyway I don’t want to delve to deeply into this idea, here is my favorite piece: Schubert Impromptu Op. 90 No. 3 by Krystian Zimerman:

John McCain In His Own Words

This is only my second foray into the creation of YouTube videos, but I think it does a pretty good job of demonstrating the shallowness of John McCain’s political philosophy, and just how out of step he is with the rest of the country.

A New Direction

I have spent most of today trying to find a better way to preview comments on this blog. The current plugin I have installed works but it is not aesthetically pleasing nor does it function  the way I want it to. Part of the problem is the theme I use which has caused some conflicts in the past when I try to add and remove some plugin’s. I am tempted to switch to HaloScan which Gayle uses at the Dragon Lady’s Den as that would remove some of the complication but I am not sure if they support self-hosted Wordpress.

Anyway, today I would like to announce a partnership, I will be cross-posting some of my content to the Left Anchor and will be creating some original content for that site, as time provides. Big Blue (BB), the blogger behind the Left Anchor will also be doing the same thing for this site. What we hope this will do is provide greater content for both sites while also helping increase readership and the spectrum of discussion at both blogs.

BB has worked on some political campaigns in the past and has a far more expansive knowledge of politics; his site already provides comprehensive analysis of the election while keeping the content easily accessible to a wide variety of people. If you have not already done so, please do pass by The Left Anchor because I can promise you, that you will be pleasantly surprised: