Friday, September 30, 2005

All Your Bases are belong to Zero Wing

I know the fade is out, but I think I remember seeing it on a flying saucer animated GIF. It’s ironic that Fox News had a story on it 3 years ago.

"How are you gentlemen. All your base are belong to us !! You are on the way to destruction. You have no chance to survive make your time."



I found out this joke is already 5 yrs ago and has been solved 3 ago old as in it's stupid and everyone whom thought it came from aliens got confused & used by a popular inside joke gimmick! Sorry. It appeared in a whole bunch of magazines.


Title Screen of Genesis

The reason why Japanese games have had good English translation now is to avoid “All Your Base Are Belong to Us.” Most Japanese who weren’t fluid in the English language probably spoke this way. Mostly at the end of World War II, English became an influence and they learn by what music they download or text they can translate via Babel Fish otherwise it might sound like that one popular phrase from the intro of Zero Wing for Sega Genesis. That intro was recorded in the GENS emulator into AVI than down ported to animated GIF using Animation Shop 3.0 or something like that.

Monday, September 26, 2005

Gizmondo 2 Tech Specs | Now playing Dungeon Siege 2 whch is pretty good

I found some information about Gizmondo 2. It’s a Gizmondo with different design, but the GFX tech specs are the same. Gizmondo used 64 MB of RAM and an ARM 9 CPU at 400 MHz. The Gizmondo is a waste of money and has been delayed many, many times.



• 480x272 LCD
• 550 MHz ARM 10e CPU
• 128 MB of RAM
• SD card
• TV output
• Vibration
• 3.5 Ah Lithium-Ion
• Bluetooth/802.11
• 2 analog joysticks
• USB 2.0
• 2 Mega pixel camera built in
• Windows CE 5.0
• MP3/WMA/HE-AAC audio playback, MPEG-4/H.264/WMV video playback
• Coming out Summer 2006
• Backwards compatible with Gizmondo software (14 games in all)

According to some gaming forum, this new handheld will fade out the Gizmondo before launched here at the same price as PSP. Gizmondo might have a shorter life than the Sega Nomad!

Yesterday, I went to Best Buy. Unfortunately Best Buy didn’t carry RAM that’s slow enough for his laptop. We both think the motherboard uses a maximum of 512 MB of SDRAM which Best Buy didn’t carry. I was looking at the computer games and saw a whole shelf full of them. I had Dungeon Siege 2 for the majority of the time I was in there. Despite almost buying Battle of the Bulge and Patton DVDs and decided to leave with nothing. I looked around at the selection it had and bought Dungeon Siege 2 anyways. I asked for the DVD version of this game while he tried to convince me to buy Neverwinter Nights, but no.

Randy and I came back to my house to play PS2. The GFX are good considering PS2’s limited hardware. In Winning Eleven 7, I won the first game when Randy fouling me via shootout against Randy’s team winning that game. Then in the rematch between Brazil & Argentina he fouled me the same exact way and I kicked the ball, but he blocked it than scored a goal through my keeper who was tricked.

Afterwards, we played the first 2 levels in Halo 2 on Xbox. That was fun, but we weren’t very good. I kicked his butt in Dead or Alive 3. That was fun. Now if only women around here looked that good. (being sarcastic)

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Today, I’m playing Dungeon Siege 2. So far I was a merc for the enemy until I was taking prisoner of the opposite side. The creatures I was looking at were Orc-like anthropomorphic animal. Now, I’ve had been taking captive by the green elves and they’ve put a little death collar on me so I’m instantly dead if I won’t do the green elf’s bidding. The GUI looks the exact same as Dungeon Siege over three years ago. The controls are the exactly the same so the GFX engine was the only aspect which was improved. The character models are straight out of Dungeon Siege’s lower resolution characters. The backgrounds look better than before and Dungeon Siege is a world with no loading times during the game. I’m not sure but it may look better than Neverwinter Nights. NWN was state-of-the-art in GFX in 2002, but I don’t play it anymore. It’s gets old and there are other videogames which wanna be played. (being sarcastic again)

I guess I’m a semi-hardcore gamer. I find that talking about them is more fun than playing them. With exception of me playing Dungeon Siege today and 4 hours yesterday on PS2.

New games to add to list

1. Dungeon Siege 2 (©2005 Gas Powered Games)

Sunday, September 25, 2005

Farmer LAbor Party

FARMER-LABOR PARTY
ORGANIZATIONAL HISTORY

The first modern Farmer-Labor Party emerged in Minnesota in 1918. Economic dislocation caused by American entry into the war put agricultural prices and workers’ wages into imbalance with rapidly escalating retail prices during the war years, and farmers and workers sought to make common cause in the political sphere to redress their grievances.

A national Farmer-Labor Party emerged from the national Labor Party founded in Chicago in 1919.

The official organ of the Farmer-Labor Party was a newspaper published in Chicago called The New Majority. Editor of this paper was Robert Buck.

One important gathering that was a precursor to the establishment of a national Farmer-Labor Party was the Cooperative Congress, held in Chicago on Feb. 12, 1920. The gathering included participants from the cooperative movement, farmers organizations, trade unions, and the Plumb Plan League. The congress elected a 12 person All-American Farmer-Labor Cooperative Commission. The event was closely reported in the pages of The Liberator by Robert Minor.

In 1920 the Farmer-Labor Party of the United States ran Parley Parker Christensen for President of the United States. Christensen finished particularly strongly in Washington, netting over 77,000 votes in that state alone. In total, Christensen received over 265,000 votes from voters of the 19 states in which the Farmer-Labor Party was on the ballot.

[fn. Solon DeLeon and Nathan Fine (eds.), The American Labor Year Book, 1929. (NY: Rand School of Social Science, 1929), pg. 144.]

The demise of the Federated Farmer-Labor Party did not mean an end to the Farmer-Labor Party movement, however. The regular Farmer-Labor Party continued to exist at the state level, with state and local organizations in Minnesota, Colorado, Utah, Illinois, Kentucky, Montana, New York, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, Missouri, Washington, the Dakotas, and elsewhere.

This history is documented below.
1920
APRIL

“A Yankee Convention,” by Robert Minor. [April 1920] In this article from the pages of The Liberator, Communist Party leader Robert Minor expresses excitement over the growth of the cooperative movement in America, not so much for that trend’s ability to lead to the long-run liberation of the working class, but for its ability to bring together farmers and the urban working class in a common cause. Minor here reports on the Cooperative Congress, a national convention bringing together cooperative operators, farmers’ groups, labor unions, and the Plumb Plan League. Although the gathering formally banned the discussion of politics from its proceedings, Minor emphasizes the potential political importance of the cooperative system, particularly as a provisioner of striking workers. Includes several drawings by Minor of key participants of the gathering.


OCTOBER

“Radicalism in Amerca,” by Morris Hillquit. [October 15, 1920] This article by Socialist Party NEC member Morris Hillquit in the party’s official organ reviews the two new political organizations to emerge in post-war America—the Labor Party (which transformed itself to the Farmer-Labor Party) and the Communist Party. Hillquit states that the Labor Party began from a principled position, seeking fundamental change of capitalist society, but was quick to sacrifice principle for expedience on the campaign trail, destroying its working-class nature through a merger with the “nebulous aggregation of middle-class liberals known as the ’Committee of 48.’” To this amalgam was added the “purely imaginary forces of the farming community,” resulting in an eclectic mish-mash slated for quick political extinction. As for the Communist Party, Hillquit stated that while it was “desirable” to have “extreme” groups within the Socialist Party as a counterbalance to “any existing tendencies to opportunism,” in the current case the Left Wing’s position was not a “legitimate reaction” since the SPA had taken “the most advanced international socialist position” during and after the war. Instead, it was a “quixotic” attempt to duplicate the Bolshevik Revolution in the United States —and effort which had shattered by “endless internecine strife and successive splits” as soon as the negative program of opposition to the SPA leadership was replaced by the positive task of organization building. As a result, neither of the new political groups had made “any essential contribution” to American radicalism. “The Socialist Party still holds the leadership in radical politics in the United States,” Hillquit notes.


1922
MAY

“Theses on the United Front of Labor,” a confidential document adopted by the Central Executive Committee of the Communist Party of America at its session of May 29, 1922. A fascinating glimpse from the Comintern Archives at the thinking of the governing CEC of the Communist Party with respect to its United Front strategy. The majority of the American proletariat was not conscious of its distinct class interests, the document stated, and could gain awareness—and usefulness to the revolutionary movement —only through its daily struggle over wages, working conditions, etc. These struggles would expose reformist economic and political leaderships as enemies of the working class. While a broad united front might be constructed in the labor field through the amalgamation process, in the political sphere established parties claiming to represent the working class must be eliminated from positions of leadership. Practice would prove the superiority of the Workers Party’s tactics, slogans, aims, and leadership and a role of political leadership would consequently follow. The Communists must become a factor in any Labor Party to be formed in America. “We can achieve this end only if we anticipate the formation of such a party and now adopt a policy through which we will become established as a force in the political struggle of the workers...” Any party emerging from the Conference for Progressive Political Action would be retrograde due to its eclectic class compositon, however. This organization would dissipate working class power in “election campaigns fought on the basis of petty ameliorative reforms and of schemes for minor changes in the form of capitalist government.” Only a federative United Front Labor Party allowing the Workers Party’s continued existence “as a distinct organization with a disciplined, educated membership acting upon a program to give leadership to the struggles of the workers,” complete with “its full independence, its right of criticism, and its freedom of action” would be acceptable, according to these theses. Primary authorship of this document has been attributed to Max Bedacht.


OCTOBER

“For a Labor Party: Recent Revoltionary Changes in American Politics: A Statement by the Workers Party of America, Oct. 15, 1922,” by John Pepper. Full text of a rather long pamphlet published in this first edition by the Workers Party of America without authorship noted—two later editions attributed to the pen of John Pepper. The pamphlet argues that while most previous efforts have met with failure, the success of the Republican Party—originally a Third Party—in establishing itself proved that the Third Party tactic was viable. America as a nation was in the process of becoming ever more centralized and bureaucratized, tendencies favorable to the reshuffling of the political deck. A mass Labor Party was the answer—its long-term survival inexorably linked to actual union participation in the organization. The non-partisan “reward friends and punish enemies” orientation of Gompers’ AF of L was roundly criticized. Regardless of this line of the national trade union bureaucracy, State Federations of Labor around the country were standing up for a Labor Party and a national organization along those lines was in the offing.


NOVEMBER

“The Workers Party and the Labor Party,” by C.E. Ruthenberg. [Nov. 1922] Executive Secretary of the Workers Party of America C.E. Ruthenberg attempts to explain the relationship between the WPA and a forthcoming labor party—an institution which Ruthenberg was being inevitably brought into existence by the development of economic forces. This new party would be extremely positive, he argues, noting that if such a party was established and had “the support of millions of organized workers would be the greatest stride forward in the history of the American working class.” It was the task of the Communists to “stay with the masses in their struggles,” Ruthenberg indicates, and thus to participate fully in the labor party that was coming to be.There would be no liquidation of the Workers Party should any such labor party come about, however, for the educational and agitational role of the party would remain, akin to the role of the Trade Union Educational League in the unions—leading the working class and helping to transform the new party into a Communist party. Ruthenberg offers two slogans to summarize the task: “For a Labor Party!” and “For a stronger, more powerful, better disciplined Workers Party!”


1923
MAY

“Monster Political Convention of the Workers of America, Chicago, July 3, 1923.” Every Local Union, Central Body, Farm Organization, State, National, and International Body and Political Group Invited. A Chance at Last for Bringing About United Action of the Workers of Hand and Brain on the Political Field. [Circa May 1923] Convention call of the Farmer-Labor Party of the United States (J.G. Brown, Secretary) to a July 3, 1923 gathering in Chicago called for the purpose of “devising means for knitting together the many organizations in this country in such a manner as will enable the workers to really function politically.” While established national organizations were already invited, “the National Committee felt the rank and file should also be represented, and it was therefore voted to send credentials to all local and central labor and farm bodies in the United States and urge that delegates be sent to this most important convention.” Local organizations had simply to elect a delegate, have the President and Secretary sign and stamp the form, and return a duplicate slip by mail to the Farmer-Labor Party of the United States in Chicago.



“For a Labor Party: Addenda to the Second Edition, May 15, 1923,” by John Pepper. There were three editions of the pamphlet For a Labor Party produced over the course of 1922-23, the second and third of which added additional commentary reflecting the developing situation. This document collects the vast majority of changed material from the original October 15, 1922, document (available as a separate file). Pepper excoriates the action of the Socialist Party delegates to the December 1922 Cleveland gathering of the Conference for Progressive Political Action, blaming them for the failure of the gathering to launch the Labor Party anxiously sought by rank and file trade unionists and poor farmers. Instead, the gathering chose to temporize, barring the Workers Party from participation, passing a virtually meaningless and watered down middle class platform, and following the AF of L’s line of non-partisan political action ("rewarding friends and punishing enemies"). The decision of the Socialist Party not to agressively pursue an independent federated Labor Party was an act of premeditated treason against the working class, in Pepper’s view. It was left to the Farmer-Labor Party, which bolted the CPPA following it’s defeat of a proposal to form a Labor Party, to organize this new federative group and a call for a July 3, 1923, Convention to found a new party had been issued. This July 3 Convention would “represent hundreds of thousands, and will be the first real step to an organization of a mass party of the American working class,” Pepper asserts, adding that “the idea of a Labor Party is advancing, and it can no longer be stopped.”


JULY

“Statement of Principles of the Federated Farmer-Labor Party: A document of the National Convention establishing the FFLP held at Chicago, July 3-5, 1923.” During the 4th of July holiday in 1923 a conference was held in Chicago, conceived in large measure by the Workers Party of America as the vehicle for its united front efforts, which established the “Federated Farmer-Labor Party.” This document is a statement of political principles of this new organization, which united elements of the old state Farmer-Labor Parties with representatives of sundry workers’, farmers’, and radical political organizations under the de facto direction of the WPA. “Today the government of the United States is a government of, for, and by Wall Street and the Þnancial and industrial system it represents,” the document states. As a result “only one road lies open for the industrial workers and farmers to protect themselves against the exploitation and oppression of the Þnancial and industrial lords who rule this country—to organize a political party representing the interests of the industrial workers and farmers and enter into the political arena to wrest control of the government from the hands of the Þnancial and industrial masters who now rule in this country.”



“Organization Rules of the Federated Farmer-Labor Party: A document of the National Convention establishing the FFLP held at Chicago, July 3-5, 1923.” Constitution of the Federated Farmer-Labor Party approved by the founding convention of the organization. The group was to be directed between conventions by a National Executive Committee based upon proportional representation of affiliated organizations with a designated set-aside of 5 for the old Farmer-Labor Party. This National Executive Committee in turn was to elect a 7 member Executive Council, the National Secretary, and National Chairman of the organization. Dues were to be either on an at large ($1 per year) or per capita affiliation (1 cent per member per month) basis.


AUGUST

“The Farmers in the New Party,” by Hal M. Ware. [August 1923] While a great deal of analysis has been lavished upon the relationship between the Communist Party and the trade union movement during the Federated Farmer-Labor Party interlude of 1923-24, little effort has been spent on examining the relationship of the radical farmer movement to the new organization. This short article, written by the leading CP specialist in agricultural affairs of the first years of the 1920s, casts the relationship in a glowing light. Farmers were burdened by staggering debt, Ware says. He states they were ready to forge a coalition in a new political organization dedicated to addressing their specific needs, rather than continued reliance upon “farmer friends” in the legislative branch, with their “miserable patchwork legislation.”



“The Federated Farmer-Labor Party,” by William Z. Foster. [August 1923] This long day-by-day account of the founding convention of the Federated Farmer-Labor Party (July 3-5, 1923) was written in the immediate afterrmath of the gathering by William Z. Foster. This piece, published in the pages of the monthly magazine of the Trade Union Educational League, is gushingly upbeat and positive in its characterization of the founding convention: “Marked by a tremendous outburst of militancy and enthusiasm, it was a vibrant, thrilling, overwhelming demand by the rank and file of agricultural and industrial labor for the formation of a powerful political party of the toilers. Nobody who attended its sessions will ever forget them.” While Foster would very soon come to regard the WPA’s ideologically blinkered Farmer-Labor Party policy and TUEL’s subsequent loss of contacts and influence in the labor movement as the greatest of debacles—fuel for the factional war inside the Workers Party over the next several years—at this precise moment he was positively ebullient about the organization’s prospects, it’s founding marking a new epoch in American political history: “A mass party, led by militants, embodying the vital idea of a united political organization of workers and farmers, and operating in the midst of the present industrial and agricultural discontent, it is full of dynamic possibilities,” Foster declared. Foster dismissed the “supposed [old] Farmer-Labor Party bolt” as a “lie widely spread,” and he asserted that “the fact is that the most militant elements in the FLP, carrying with them the bulk of the organization, have declared for the new party.”


OCTOBER

“To All Labor Unions in Chicago: A Circular Letter Dated Oct. 31, 1923,” by Joseph Manley In the aftermath of the July 3-5, 1923 convention which established the Federated Farmer-Labor Party there was a great deal of acrimony directed at the Workers Party of America for their purported splitting of the farmer-labor movement. This letter to Chicago unions, signed by Joseph Manley (son-in-law of William Z. Foster and National Secretary of the FFLP) answered these charges. The body of this letter is actually a quoted letter stating the position of the Workers Party, signed by the Executive Secretary of that organization, C.E. Ruthenberg. Ruthenberg charges that it was the (old) Farmer-Labor Party of Fitzpatrick and the Chicago Federation which “got cold feet,” violated its previous understanding with the Workers Party, refused any further effort at mediation of differences, and which ultimately was ready to “sacrifice the labor party because Gompers threatened them.” The Workers Party was not at fault, Ruthenberg stated: “If there was any split at this convention it was not a split caused by the Workers Party. If there was a betrayal, it was not a betrayal by the Workers Party. The split and betrayal were the work of Fitzpatrick and the Farmer-Labor group.”


NOVEMBER

“Letter from C.E. Ruthenberg in Chicago to Morris Hillquit in New York, Nov. 3, 1923.” A cryptic note sent from the Executive Secretary of the Workers Party of the member to the leading light of the arch-rival Socialist Party of America. Ruthenberg notes that he will be in New York on Nov. 8, 1923, and that he seeks a conference with Hillquit to “talk with you” in regard to an invitation sent by the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party to labor political groups for a Nov. 15 conference in St. Paul. This conference was an attempt to “come to an agreement on the question of calling a national convention for the nomination of a presidential candidate and the adoption of a national platform.” Despite the hostility between the two organizations, this document affirms that there was at least informal discussion at the top level about the possibility of joint action with regards to the Farmer-Labor Party movement.



“Letter from C.E. Ruthenberg in Chicago to Osip Piatnitsky in Moscow, Nov. 19, 1923.” A lengthy and illuminating review of the Workers Party of America’s Farmer-Labor Party strategy as it rapidly evolved in the fall of 1923. Ruthenberg relates the decision of the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party to call a convention at St. Paul in May of 1924 for the purpose of joint nomination of a candidate for President of the United States and adoption of a joint program—thereby uniting the various state Farmer-Labor organizations, the Federated Farmer-Labor Party, and other labor and political groups into a single organization. Upon learning of this initiative, Ruthenberg states that the CEC immediately sent him to Minnesota, where he met for two days with Minnesota FLP officials working out the details for a November 15 pre-convention conference. Interestingly, Ruthenberg states that it was his initiative over “considerable objection” to extend an invitation to the pre-convention conference to Morris Hillquit of the Socialist Party in an effort to bring the SP and its popular cachet into the new united organization. Ruthenberg also related the decison of the CEC to declare a truce in the ranks of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union, which was racked by a severe struggle between the union administration of Sidney Hillman and a TUEL-based left opposition. Hillman and the ILGWU were to be key players in the forthcoming Farmer-Labor Party movement, Ruthenberg indicated, while Hillman had the incentive to play the public role of peacemaker, thus consolidating his position in any forthcoming amalgamation of the ILGWU with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers, believed by Ruthenberg to be in the offing in the not too distant future. This document demonstrates that volition in WPA action in the Farmer-Labor Party movement came from the party itself—that it did not blindly follow “orders from Moscow” on this matter but rather acted as it saw fit under the general line of the Comintern, providing information of its specific actions after the fact.



“Our Labor Party Policy,” by James P. Cannon and William Z. Foster. [Nov. 1923] The split of the Chicago Federation of Labor from the Federated Farmer-Labor Party Conference of July 3-5, 1923, came as a stunning blow to the Communist Party’s union-oriented activists—of which Bill Foster and Jim Cannon were in the first rank. That the New York-based Central Executive Committee attempted to spin the July Conference as a great triumph rather than an unmitigated debacle came as an insult to this Chicago-centric cohort. It was this matter that triggered a bitter factional war inside the Communist movement that lasted for the rest of the decade. This internal party document by Cannon and Foster is a salvo against the New York leadership of John Pepper and his co-thinkers. To split with the centrist progressive union movement “on the grounds that they are not good revolutionary militants is to reject the idea of alliance of the Communists with other elements in the labor movement, and to repudiate entirely the principle of the united front,” Cannon and Foster charge, adding that the result of the Federated Farmer-Labor Party blunder was sectarian isolation. “We have lost the issue of the united front labor party and are fighting now for our own labor party, the Federated. As a consequence our comrades are largely isolated, and face a united front of all other elements against them.” Convention delegates who voted for the new party and returned to their unions either recanted under the onslaught or were repudiated, Cannon and Foster state, noting “we captured the delegates for three days, but we did not capture their organizations for the FFLP. The claim that the FFLP is a mass party with approximately 600,000 members has absolutely no foundation in fact.”


DECEMBER

“Communist Party Pays for Farmer-Labor Party Convention,” by Emil Herman. [Dec. 1923] This unusual and valuable account by Socialist Party leader Emil Herman briefly details the Washington state convention of the Farmer-Labor Party, held in Everett over the weekend of Nov. 24-25, 1923. Herman states that “the Federated Farmer-Labor Party was born under the guidance and domination of the Workers Party” and that the WPA had lent the Farmer-Labor Party $500 to fund the mailing of its call for the Chicago FFLP founding convention, paid the expenses of some delegates to a pre-convention caucus meeting in St. Paul. Herman also stated that Washington FFLP Secretary John C. Kennedy had received dues payments from at-large members so infrequently that he was not even certain of the annual rate. The Washington state convention voted to “cooperate” rather than “affiliate” with the national FFLP, Herman said, adding that the FFLP was “truly an incongruous mass with aims leading in so many different directions that will end in division or dissolution —another object lesson in waste of time, energy, and money for the benefit of a few politicians...”


1924
JANUARY

“The Labor Party Campaign: An Excerpt from the Report of the Central Executive Committee to the Third National Convention of the Workers Party of America,” by C.E. Ruthenberg. [Jan. 1924] The Executive Secretary of the Workers Party of America reviews the organization’s activity for 1923 in the Farmer-Labor Party in this report to the 3rd Convention of the WPA. The failure of the WPA to have its delegates seated at the Dec. 1922 Cleveland Confrence of the Conference for Progressive Political Action combined with the FLP’s withdrawal from the CPPA over its failure to launch a new broad-based Labor Party spurred a move by the WPA to join forces with the existing (old) Farmer-Labor Party as its “united front” vehicle for joint political action, according to this account. With announced decision of the Socialist Party and LaFollette Progressive movement not to participate in the forthcoming July 3, 1923, Conference to establish an new “Federated Farmer-Labor Party,” the old FLP began to lose enthusiasm for the gathering, and a split with John Fitzpatrick of the Chicago Federation of Labor took place at the gathering. Ruthenberg is critical of the activity of the Chicago district of the WPA in the aftermath and attempts to document this group’s mistakes in contrast to the “correct guidance” of the Political Committee of the CEC of the Workers Party.


MAY

“St. Paul—June 17th,” by James P. Cannon. [May 1924] An article from the monthly magazine of the Trade Unional Educational League lauding the forthcoming June 17th Convention of the Farmer-Labor Party, scheduled for St. Paul, MN. The St. Paul gathering was held in parallel with a July 4, 1924 convention of the Conference for Progressive Political Action, scheduled for Cleveland, which the Socialist Party was not incidentally attempting to steer in the same direction that the Workers Party was attempting to take the FLP. Cannon’s article attempts to explain this dualism. The CPPA’s “‘sympathy’ for the idea of a labor party is a disguise to hide their actual allegiance to the capitalist parties,” he states, adding that the CPPA labor leaders are unable to form a working class party “because they do not have a working class point of view. They do not live like the workers and they do not think like the workers.” Only the St. Paul convention offered a forum for the participation of the militant working class rank and file, Cannon asserts.



“LaFollette and the Communists: The Statement of Robert LaFollette on Communist Participation in the Progressive Movement, May 26, 1924.”An open letter from the time of Sen. LaFollette’s independent campaign for President of the United States decrying Communist participation in the Farmer-Labor-Progressive movement. LaFollette, whose campaign was supported by the Socialist Party to the extent they did not run their own candidate in 1924, here calls the Communists the “mortal enemies of the Progressive movement and democratic ideals” and declares that “all Progressives should refuse to participate in any movement which makes common cause with any Communist organization”—meaning the forthcoming June 17, 1924, Farmer-Labor Party Convention to be held in St. Paul, MN.


JULY

“Workers and Farmers on the Mark,” by C.E. Ruthenberg. [July 1924] An account of the June 17-19, 1924, Convention of the Farmer-Labor Party, held in St. Paul, MN, by the head of the Workers Party of America. The convention, dominated by the WPA, was attended by over 500 delegates, who drew up a program and nominated candidates for President and Vice President of the United States (Duncan McDonald of Illinois and William Bouck of Washington, respectively). The body also elected a National Committee, which in turn elected a National Executive Committee, which included Alex Howat of Kansas as Chairman and Clarence Hathaway of Minnesota as Secretary.

Thursday, September 22, 2005

Bought Lunar 2 Eternal Blue Complete for PSX

Today, I’ve been playing Madden Football 2002 on my PS2. I scored five touchdowns for the Vikings against Green Bay with the score ending 35 – 27. That was a tough game. I had to use all my time outs in the last 30 seconds to get Randy Moss (line receiver) to catch the touch down pass. The game was satisfying with nothing to do. It’s football season you know. John Madden is as classic with his so/so acting the same lines over and over. I don’t believe that Madden 2004 could possibly be much improvement over Madden NFL 2002. The other PS2 football game is ESPN NFL 2K5 which is the last football game Visual Concepts will ever make since EA decided buy a 1 deal license in football.

I’m going to get a tour in Century College on Monday. That’s where I’m getting a computer diploma in and everyone works for Geek Squad at Best Buy. Geek Squad costs a fortune to have them come over to your house from what I’ve had heard. Everyone needs a diploma . I can start with 1 or 2 classes.



I found some Xbox 360 face plates. I believe that the best one is the wood model. MS probably got that from the Atari 2600. These were used for displaying consoles.

We were talking about how Europeans are getting really bad prices on their systems. It’s 20% more than ours. That’s why I have more videogames period. I paid less for them.

Yesterday I went to Toyriffic while looking around and bought Project Snowblind for $20. Lunar Eternal Blue Complete was in an encased cabinet for $69 so I bought that too. Lunar 2 came out 12 yrs ago on the Sega CD. That makes 42 PS games, 90 PS2 games, and 62 Xbox games.

After I play Rayman 2 Revolution he best platform game starring Rayman as of yet (very colorful and showed off the hardware) because the Dreamcast version of Rayman 2 looked and felt great. I’ll take a look what Lunar 2 looks like.

Point of View of Nintendo Revolution

I know I'm biased about this and I won't be when editing pages. Nintendo makes childish games except for the mature games. The controller sucks on Gamecube, but Nintendo fans often are ecstatic about Revolution /w the remote NES controller. I haven’t seen the games yet. No one has.

Some see Nintendo trying to pattern the most successful strategy used by the music industry against illegal music downloads. Since computers have been powerful enough to emulate past-generation home consoles and the Internet provided an easy, fast, and widely accessible distribution path for ROM images. The music industry's most successful method of reducing illegal music downloading has apparently been to offer consumers a way to download music legally for a small cost. If Nintendo is successful at utilizing this model, they may be able to reduce illegal ROM downloading and open up a new revenue stream.

. Yuji Naka, the designer of Sonic the Hedgehog at Sega, said in an interview with Famitsu, "It's also great that we'll be able to play Famicom (NES) and other games via download. I hope Sega games will be playable as well.”

Nintendo’s new system fully supports Non uniform rational B-spline used in CAD. It’s better than polygons because NURBS do more shadowing and colorization while using the same tech spec hardware.

Point of View of Playstation 3

Awesome. I love the more than simple PS3 controller. It's expensive though. So far PS3 is coming out in March. It has that same dual shock controller that I am comfortable with.

The estimated cost of producing a PS3 is US $483. The Cell microprocessor, the RSX Graphics processing unit, and the BD-ROM disc feeding drive cost $101. The report also notes that Microsoft may plan to disrupt the normal console business cycle by choosing to cut the price of the Xbox 360 at the same time the PS3 launches and supports 7 USB controllers.

PlayStation 3's hard disk drives will be preinstalled with the latest version of Linux, a free operating system.

Sony’s 3rd console will be fully compatible with PlayStation 2 and PlayStation games without emulation.

Point of Xbox 360

Has potential. Xbox 360 has more anticipation than Revolution in the US for sure. High definition graphics and Halo 3 have to do with it. Halo 3 won't come out until PS3 is launched. I am thinking about owning one in early December.

If Microsoft chooses to add HD-DVD it could make the Xbox 360 a more competitive multimedia device from a marketing perspective. Since HD DVD would not be standard across all models of the Xbox 360.

The Xbox 360 has the ability to support four Bluetooth controllers. The controller for the It is an improved version of the Type-S controller packaged with Xbox. MS says the controller works 25 hrs w/o being recharged.

Point of View of Playstation Portable

Without a touch screen it can't exceed to popularity of Dual Screen. The JPEG viewer, MP3 decoder shouldn't be in the conclusion why biased PSP owners say PSP is better. The bad battery life is shooting Sony in the foot. The UMD drive is sucking up tons of battery although that doesn't have to do with functionality and playability.

PSP is doing much better than Wonderspan Color, Game Gear, Game.com, Gizmondo, Neo Geo Pocket put together so I give it 3 cheers. Bo-Yah. PSP is the biggest Nintendo handheld competitor ever on the market.

Sony has stated that the PSP will be able to connect to the forthcoming PlayStation 3 for transfer of game saves and media to and from the PS3's hard drive,

The system's manual states that the PSP is capable of 3 to 6 hours of game play.

You can read my PSP review. It’s well written.

Point of View of Nintendo Dual Screen

Trying hard to see why Dual Screen is cool! It does have well designed games. GFX aren't as good as PSP, but there are times any 3D will do. Of course 3D games have been on videogame consoles since Doom came out on Super Nintendo. Nintendo hasn't brought out many 3D games other than Super Mario 64 yet! Nintendo is coming out with Metroid Prime Hunters and Nintendogs is 3D.



New games:

Lunar 2 Eternal Blue Complete (©2000 Game Arts)
Project Snowblind (©2005 Crystal Dynamics)

Thursday, September 15, 2005

Nintendo Controller unclassifed and it's a remote and analog expansion!

Today I am quitting Cisco and Visual Basic so I can go to another college and get educational help. I know that every college job I’m getting into is pain in the ass I am use too. There is general education at the University of Wisconsin River Falls I’m look at though. I’ll put on a happy face and act well. There’ll be a lot of goober type people there I bet. I’ve been working here in high school for hands on experience. I’m scared of college. There is also Century College in Minnesota which got good reviews by students who go there and make a career out of themselves. You never know what you’re going to get into. Personally, I thought I did once, but now I’m frustrated. I should still walk amongst people who are good at network technician stuff.

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us
My Desktop

With the biggest gaming headline this month happening when Satoru Iwata (Pres. of Nintendo) starting off the Tokyo Game Show by making a hour long speech showing the secretive Revolution controller at 8 PM tonight Wisconsin time! I have to be awake so it can be my next entry! I wish Nintendo would’ve made a controller that glows in the dark, but these lights would drain batteries in the controller (Nintendo loves longest battery life yea know). And remember after tonight Nintendo will never be the same! It’s the turning point in Nintendo history and therefore the final evolution of Nintendo. Let’s see if Nintendo has courage to show any of its software they were working on for the last 2 yrs or longer.

Go to IGN CUBE or Tokyo Game Show to see the new controller tonight.

No one knows....not even me. Hopefully Nintendo's got some talented people behind the controller. The only thing that Nintendo has against it is the Gamecube controller looks something Fisher Price would think of. Seriously.


Newest Winamp skin....it's an old skin.

The GCN controller looked nothing like the N64 controller so I seriously doubt Nintendo's new controller will look anything like the GCN controller. I doubt it'll even have a C-stick. Someone can't play a game with less buttons than the GCN controller for sure.

The gamecube controller plugs into the side of Revolution! That's so Nintendo can invent something off the wall while keeping the gcn functions unchanged. If Nintendo changed the way gcn games were played it might alienate casual gamers. The controller port will give Nintendo an excuse to keep manufacturing GCN controllers.

Evolution stages of Nintendo

First evolution – Nintendo started out as a card company in the 19th century
Second Evolution – Nintendo changed the company towards entertainment and makes Donkey Kong and Mario Bros on many platforms including Commodore and Atari 2600. Then it launches it’s first console and got the world’s attention.
Third Evolution – Nintendo launched the 16-bit successor to NES
Forth Evolution – Nintendo invented the analog stick for all consoles and went polygonal 3D
Fifth Evolution – Nintendo goes high resolution and uses mini-DVDs
Final Evolution – Nintendo creates state-of-the-art controller, believes graphics have reached a theoretical limit by not going high def gfx. Believes the future lies in the casual gamer market by kickin Revolution off with loads of mature and teen rated games. Normally licenses its popular franchises to 3rd party developers.

Funny that Nintendo is making marginal profit on Gamecube, GBA, and NDS while Sony and Microsoft are losing millions manufacturing their consoles and PSP and selling them at a lost in order to make profits in the very end. I don’t care, but that’s all you hear on gaming forums now-a-days along with more buttons are better. By request here’s the most powerful.

Short answer

1.) PS3 Entertainment System
2.) Xbox 360 Entertainment System
3.) Revolution Entertainment System

Long answer

1. PS3 has the Cell CPU 3.2 GHz, the RSX GPU (slightly slower than Geforce 7800) and 512MB of shared GDRAM3.
2. Xbox 360 has 64-bit PowerPC CPU with 4 cores each clocking at 3.2 GHz, a GPU similar to Radeon 9600 model and shared 512 MB of GDRAM3
3. Revolution is less powerful than X360.

I’m dreaming about owning an Xbox 360 in November purchasing some software for it as fast as now. The good games for it are Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion and Quake IV. ESIV is a RPG that shows off the hardware. Quake IV is a multiplayer first person shooter which should be in everyone’s collection. I want those two. The shooter Gears of War I’m unsure of. The racing videogame of choice is Project Gotham Racing 3 made by Bizarre Creations. That’s also the only good one at launch. Xbox 360 launch is November 25, 2005. I will review it once I own it.

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T H E R E V E A L I N G O F T H E N I N T E N D O R E V O L U T I O N C O N T R O L L E R

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[September 16 at 1:50 AM] I was sleeping when this was being done.

Shigeru Miyamoto (original Mario and Luigi designer) revealed the Bluetooth (IEEE 802.15.1) controller to the world tonight. Bluetooth 2.0 technology will transmit data at 2.1 Mbits/second at 2.45 GHz. The wireless controller contains a gyroscope within it allowing you to tilt the controller side to side or forward and backwards to simulate analog stick movement and can be held vertically or horizontally without the expansion. I was right it about it having less buttons. You can not play Gamecube games with this thing. The Revolution controller doesn’t look anything like the Gamecube controller. There was photoshop art on the gaming forums that showed NES-like controllers.



The Revolution controller has an expansion port on the bottom so that an analog stick device can be used with the left hand while holding the Revolution controller vertically.. I was hoping Nintendo would have an analog stick because the Xbox 360 and PS3 use them. Nintendo made it clear that four of these can be connected via Bluetooth. Good thing the rumor was wrong about touch screens on Revolution’s controller. Why would I be touching stuff on the controller I won’t be seeing on TV?


Excellent Photoshop analog controller example

Nintendo recently commented in a press statement that the controller expansion port could be compatible with conventional analog controllers and that wired 3rd party analog controllers will be plugged into the GCN controller ports on the Revolution



Nintendo used Super Mario Sunshine and Metroid Prime 2 Echoes as game demos to show the controller in action. And this close to launch Nintendo refused to show any next generation games.

The Revolution system has Gamecube controller ports with the ability to play GCN games coping Sony’s function playing PS1 software on PS2. Nintendo had backwards compatibly on their Dual Screen and Gameboy Advance handhelds so why not Revolution too?

The Revolution emulates NES, Super NES and N64 games by hardware acceleration. I can see how you can play NES games on Revolution via it’s Bluetooth controller by simply turning it horizontally.

Saturday, September 10, 2005

Where's my Buddy | bought Radiata Stories & Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne

Firstly, I didn’t go to the Minnesota State Fair and that bothered me. I wanted to see the horses, the cows, the farm machinery (which I don’t get a change to see up close cause I would be trespassing on farmers land, plus I see it in the fields. John Deere is my favorite tractor brand with John Deere green. JD stopped making personal lawn tractors 5 years ago. Expensive brand of tractor for sure. International Farm Machinery co. is the top underdog these days. International makes anything from school buses to big rigs to lawn mowers.

Secondly, I got enough courage to pull out my once $250 PSP and play Ridge Racer on it. If you hate expensive hardware collecting dust like I do than you’ll also feel strange playing it again.

I had to shovel dirt to fill the erosion by our really long driveway. I hate doing hard labor. Nerds like me doing dirty stuff but I was a good son and completed my part however. Then I watched Solaris on AMC. I stayed up all night listening Digitally Imported and post on that same gaming forum,

Then I feel like it’s going to be this generation all over again. I start out small with one console for a year than buy another console a year later and buy most of the $20 games. Been gaming for 8 years.

Twelve years ago at my cousin’s house the first videogame console we’ve played was Sega Genesis with Sonic trilogy and RiStar. I loved RiStar…..unbelievably clean and very colorful game. He didn’t care about the current consoles out. I went to his house once a month. My cousin is in the Navy now…..a world apart. Haven’t seen him for nearly 2 years. We all grow up and no longer see each other.

Great news! I drank my first (cheap) beer in years yesterday. It was a Budweiser Lite. A little mild for my taste, but it can’t be all that bad being the largest brewer in the USA. That was great. I can’t find my parents’ beer and will have to ask my dad to buy more, but he won’t. I doubt you can get drunk off Budweiser quickly cause it has as much alcohol as hard lemonade.

Wonders what my 21st birthday will be like? How many uncles will buy a 12 pack of Bud as a birthday present? Maybe all of them.

Then I listened to Digitally Imported via Winamp and work on Visual Basic meanwhile. I got high speed Internet and already downloaded a lot of shit including every single NES, SNES, and Genesis ROM I could think of that I wanted and burnt it on one DVD for storage. That way I don’t have to take up bandwidth downloading stuff.

I’ve been downloading a lot of abandonware lately including the Ultimas and the Might and Magics that came in RAR archives. I had to give the DOS program some conventional memory and a gig of extended memory. These games look so pixilated that it wouldn’t keep my interest. Probably why these games are abandoned. Origin (developer of Ultima) closed its doors last year. To see all my abandonware…look at the long videogame list on Ian’s Smashing Good Blog.

I did go to the videogame store and picked up a used copy of Atlus’s Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne for $40 and Square-Enix’s newest RPG, Radiata Stories for $50. My wallet is now empty. RPGs have a strange effect on me somehow. I can’t figure it out though. I don’t stay genre specific neither.

Randy won’t do something with me today! I drove over to see Bob in Baldwin, WI finding out he quit his job two Fridays ago. His phone number is also dead and he won’t answer his instant messenger. Wonders what I did to deserve this? I doubt his computer is problematic. There was no way to contact him so I stopped trying. Why should he visit me just so I feel good and not both of us? Something tells me he visits me because I want him too and he suddenly stopped caring.

Games to add to my collection

- Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne (2004 Atlus)
- Radiata Stories (2005 Tri-Ace)
- Nintendogs - Lab and Friends (2005 Nintendo)
- Phantom Dust (2004 Microsoft)

Monday, September 5, 2005

Knoppix 3.9 review + Download

Knoppix PC specs

Athlon XP at 1.8 GHz
386 MB of SDRAM
40 GB HDD
10x DVD-ROM
Floppy
Logitech USB mouse
Standard USB keyboard

Download Knoppix (710 MB ISO)

Knoppix will do everything you want Windows to do. People who use Internet and office suites might want to look at Knoppix. Knoppix has the most applications seen on CD ever. On load up the 2.6.x kernel loads the necessary drivers for you. This is called the boot up sequence. There are error messages, but the OS boots up anyways. This Linux doesn’t make a swap file on your HDD, but with decent PCs you really don’t need one. Knoppix 3.9 so far is the last Knoppix CD ISO available. Knoppix 4.0 and later started using a DVD and download was 3.5 GB. My satellite connection times out before I can get all of that data on my PC. I run Linux on a slow DVD-ROM so yours is probably faster. It runs KDE Desktop 3.4.0 which is pretty new considering the latest version is 3.4.2.

The default desktop wallpaper of an astronaut and the Earth in the background. The bad thing about Knoppix is it’s resolution is 1280x960 which is still better than the first Knoppix Knoppix has been stable since ver. 3.4 making v3.9 even more stable.

For compressing files Knoppix 3.9 has a right click menu with options to save to ZIP or TAR formats. USB thumb drives or USB HDD show up on the Desktop instantly unlike Knoppix 3.6 where I had to manually mount it myself. That’s an improvement.

The terminal responds much like Redhat Linux 8.0. Redhat 9.0 was the last Personal Linux distribution under Redhat who know makes Linux for servers. Knoppix 3.9 is two years newer than Redhat 9 and three years newer than Redhat 8.0. The performance issues you'll find with latest Linux will not be in Redhat no more.

Firefox loads web pages as fast as Firefox in Windows XP. MS Office 2003 is better than any Openoffice, but Openoffice would do everything a office suite should do. I downloaded OOo 2.0 beta 2 at noon today. I wrote this blog entry in Knoppix using OOo.

However I’ve been having trouble getting access to my Hard drive. It could just be that computer that is running Knoppix. I got around this by adding it to my email so I could edit it on Windows.

List of Programs

Web Browsers
Mozilla Firefox 1.0.4
Konquenor 3.4.0

Office Suites

Open Office 1.9.112

Software Development

Python 2.3.5
Kdevelop (crashed)

Editors

Joe (terminal notepad)
Kwrite 4.4 (GUI notepad)
Kate 2.4 (another GUI notepad)

Games

Chronoium (needs OpenGL acceleration)
Frozen Bubble
Galagia
Asteroids
GNU Chess (text Chess)
Kmajonhug (Chinese game of some sort)
Penguin FreeCell
Penguin Golf
Penguin Solitaire
Penguin Canfield
Gtens
Penguin Minesweeper
Katomic
Kbattleship
Ntetris
Enigma

Image Development

The Gimp 2.2.7
Kview 3.4
Knunkshow
KolourPaint 1.4

Internet

Gaim (MSN, Yahoo, IRC, ICQ, AIM)
Firefox 1.0.4
Ethernal (network IP node program)
KPPP dialup tool
Thunderbird 1.0.4 (email)
XIRC

Media

Aumix (sound card equalizer)
XMMS 2.3 - Looks like Winamp 2x. Plays mp3s, ogg, wav
Xine (with Xvid decoder) - requires plugin for WMA
Audacity (sound editor)
K3B (CD and DVD burning suite)

By default it doesn’t make the HDD writable which I guess prevents data saved on the Windows XP file system, NTFS. That can be solved by mounting the HDD

It's free and 696 MB what do you got to loose? It doesn't even mess around with your Windows file system unless you want to save something on your HDD using the desktop HDD1 drive.