Germany's McHale's Navy

This cracked me up. There's so many possible captions it boggles the mind.

Fascism on the rise

Cheney's SS are Dicks too

While I find the article interesting and the arrest of this man an affront to all things American, I'm not surprised. I wish I were shocked. The Patriot Act at it's only logical conclusion. Also, what interested me more than the article though was the comments that were left by the readers.

It amazes me how any political discussion always turns to the topic of
religion. Why? My theory is that because religion, like politics,
concerns a set of rules that people think they should live by.

First off, let me just say, there is no way I can, or should ever consider
trying to, dictate someone's personal morality to them. If it follows the one rule
that it doesn't infringe on my freedom, do what you feel is right. People
should live the best way they know how. Maybe the rules they pick are the
best for them. Just don't preach tome about how I should live my life.
That's where both religion and politics fail miserably. The only
difference between the two is that religion is a personal matter and should
be left as that (thank you President Jefferson). Politics involves
creating laws that everyone must live by and because of that needs to be a
matter of public record and scrutiny. Political issues like this need to
be exposed, debated, and hashed over again and again and again. We should
exercise our freedoms, lest we lose them. People should also STFU about
religion, plain and simple. Unfortunately, people will continue to argue
about who's right and who's wrong out of two very human emotions: arrogance and fear.

Roll Tape...

I have a hobby that doesn't involve worrying about the state of politics in any way shape or form. I enjoy editing films (and making music, but that's a different story.). Of course with no one beating my door down to edit their footage (which is what you'd call "good"), it means I have to shoot footage as well.

I have graduated past the Windows movie maker stage, but I feel I may have reached my very limited potential. I hope that's because of pedestrian equipment and no training whatsoever. I'm in a bit of a conundrum. To get to the "next level" of my hobby, it's going to take a rather substantial investment. The camera that I'd like to have is almost $2,000 on it's own. Let's be honest, the camera I'd REALLY like to have is probably about $5,000 with all its HD and cinematic featurey goodness. Then the editing computer/software will total over $3500.00 if I get the good stuff. The question is, is it worth spending that much money on a hobby? Is there any potential for it to ever pay itself back? Does that even matter?

On the one hand it fills a creative need. I enjoy it, and I feel like I'm accomplishing something when I finish a project. Of course, I can continue with my current setup and still get fairly quality home movies. Which honestly, is the reason I started messing around with editing. It's not like I don't have kids to think about and all the ways they can find to spend my money. I guess I could take the medium route and take a class and play it by ear from there. I don't know...I just wanted to write it out to help me reason this out. So if you've read this far...you must be bored.

Why did I hit "Publish"? Cause I'm a narcissist. Bweeeeeeeeee!