Pres Press

I listened to the president's press conference. The entire boring event. It must be awful to be a whitehouse correspondent these days. I can't say I have ever heard Bush give a direct honest answer to any question. But here is what I got.
To gasoline prices he said there's nothing he can do about them. Well that's right. He's already done all he can to induce oil producing countries to curb production and stress the industry. I don't know if pump prices have increased in Europe as much as in America. That would be interesting.
Social sercurity reform is dying under Bush's proposals. Nobody want's to trust their money to brokers. Who could blame. And this thing about reducing benefits on a sliding scale is not going to get anywhere. The truth is the whole thing (SOS) is flawed in it's original conception and should have been properly funded to start, or fixed in the 50s. Now it's going to take some serious economic restructing to support it's future.

Adaven

Spelling

I was trying out the new Microsoft search engine and I think it is a good alternative to google and yahoo. I use them all, even Ask Jeeves, cause they all come up with different links for any search phrase. Now being as self interested as anyone I typed adaven into Ms search and was surprised to fine this blog the second entry after a real estate outfit. I have tried this with yahoo and google and found it on the n*the page maybe. What does this say about Ms search? Maybe it's engine crawls more blogs than the others? Maybe it is less commercial in it's search criteria? I don't know but it is interesting to consider how there search sites really work. And really, who would actually type a word like adaven into a search engine.
Oh, I was going to write about spelling. My mother made me learn multiplication tables and later to touch type (kinda), but she gave up in making me learn to spell well. So I consider the spell checker to be the greatest invention since the zipper.
Well, clicking on the ms search link to this blog I looked back to some of the previous posts and noticed a few errors in spelling and grammar. I generally spell check these posts with the blogger spell checker so I'm going to say perfection costs a lot more than free. As for grammar, it is a blog, and I can use the language however I want.
Now I am going to run the spell checker on this post and see what it reports.

Ok it found six spelling errors in common words. Interestingly it choked on blog and blogger?

A rerun found two more errors. You may find more but the point is. Previous posts may contain spelling errors, so may future posts, don't worry , your brain will figure it out.

Adaven

Random observations

The new Pope is a place holder. The conclave clearly didn't want to allow any radical thought to upset the status quo, which is a conservative interpretation of the doctrine that John Paul II upheld. There will be nothing new from the Vatican for a while and it it too bad as the church could do much more good for the world with a progressive agenda.

Iran is being seen as a gold mind by European countries who are investing there big time. US santions there are not supported by other countries and it seems that economic forces will better lead this country to a western type of government than any military threat. Iran is a big and potentially rich country so it might be better to invite them in to the western economy than try to hold them back.

Adaven

The Pope is dead the Church is well.

Pope John-Paul II was more than a man. He was an institution. Kind of a living Icon. And He was one smart dude. Using 20th century tech He reached out to the world and kept the church an equal to any world power. Traveling everywhere, His message of peace was heard but sadly ignored.
It is said He helped to topple the Berlin wall and communism but I think economics had more to do with it. While His techniques were today, His philosophy was conservative and very yesterday.

He was a great man but it's not rude to think that the Vatican may be relieved to feel that a more progressive Pope might take the helm.

Let's face it, the Catholic Church has problems. It has lost followers in America and other western nations due to it's conservative teachings, but is still doing well in developing nations. But these nations are developing at a rapid rate and if Rome wants to keep it's role it is going to have to change it's tune.

The conclave is going to be an interesting place.

Adaven