EckerNet.Com

If there really is a just and loving God, Mary Jo Kopechne just got issued a ball gag, a blowtorch, a pair of pliers, and a day pass to Hell.

– Marko

Here\’s a scam that bloggers may want to be aware of.  Many bloggers own their domain but may very well be tempted by a scam like this, especially new bloggers. The domain appraisal scam used to be a big back in 2005/2006 but I hadn\’t heard much about it since. Turns out it\’s back!

Here\’s how it works, you receive an email (sharrisgo@gmail.com) like this.

We are interested to buy your domain name ECKERNET.COM and offer to buy it from you for 75% of the appraised market value.

As of now we accept appraisals from either one of the following leading appraisal companies:

fleos.com
sedo.com

If you already have an appraisal please forward it to us.

As soon as we have received your appraisal we will send you our payment (we use paypal for amounts less than $2,000 and escrow.com for amounts above $2,000) as well as further instructions on how to complete the transfer of the domain name.

We appreciate your business,

Yours truly,

Steven Harris

You think, \”Heh!! Someone is willing to pay me for a domain I really don\’t use that much anyway?? Or at least not enough where I couldn\’t find another one just as easily?? SURE!\” So you charge off to get your domain appraised.

What you find out is you have to pay for domain appraisals, but you figure why not, it\’s only $20 or whatever.

You send your appraisal into Mr. Dipshit (aka Steven Harris or whatever name they\’re using today) and you never hear another word. Basically he/she/it (probably it) either works for the domain appraiser or is a paid affiliate. All they want it to generate more domain appraisal business, since domain appraisal is a bullshit fabricated industry anyway.

So be aware that this scam is back, and from the looks of it they are alphabetically spamming domain owners, not necessarily from this same email addy/name combination but the text of the email is similiar.

And now you know, and knowing is half the battle….the other half involves blood, lots of it.

I\’ve waited several days for our local libby left to generate the necessary mouth-frothing outrage to comment on a recent revelation about one of our DC politicians.  I didn\’t want to miss it, it was going to be great.  And it was a topic I KNEW they were interested in.  After all, they\’ve already covered this topic.

Last fall, the local loony echochamber stirred themselves into a virtual shitstorm because Senator Norm Coleman was getting cheap rent from a pollster!!  The downward spiral into near orgasmic glee that they might have a scandal to pin on Coleman was epic.  Surely the fact that another DC politician has been found to be doing the same thing would be of interest and would renew the drooling self-gratification??

Apparently not….so far it\’s been only silence.  It\’s couldn\’t be because this time it involves Rahm Emanuel, Obama\’s Chief of Staff, could it??? Surely their ethical integrity is intact yeah??

Except while Coleman at least paid rent and utilities, Emanuel was living rent free.  If you want to make the argument that they are benefiting because of their position, you have to condemn both.  If you want to make the argument that a politician living with a pollster for their party, you have to condemn them both.  If you want to write long tiresome rants declaring the abject horror of such an act, you have to condemn them both.

Instead I\’ve seen total silence from the same liberal bloggers who so enthusiastically berated Coleman.  Another example that it\’s not the ethical violation they are really worried about.  Our local left, practices selective ethics.  Meaning that ethical rules only apply to Republicans and/or conservatives and function primarily as a way to score partisan points rather than truly pursue ethical behavior by our elected officials.

[Crossposted at True North]

Under new executive orders by His Holiness President Obama, all bloggers are required to use the words \”Hope\” and \”Change\” no less than 38 times in all posts.

I had sort of figured as a private enterprise I shouldn\’t be subject to such rules but then I figured I probably shouldn\’t pick a fight with a guy who walks on water and farts rainbows.  However, since this blog is a half-assed effort at punditry, EckerNet will hold ourselves to 18 uses.

I Hope© this fulfills the wishes of our Glorious Leader, and may Obama have mercy on my soul.

Hope Change Hope Change Hope Change Hope Change Hope Change Hope Change Hope Change Hope Change

Learned Foot at KAR has begun his annual \”Year In Review\” series of posts.  As an enjoyable series….for us at least.  Apparently he hates it….which really makes it all the more enjoyable for the rest of us.

And apparently at some point Foot got me drunk and made me promise to pay him in beer if he\’d do a 2008 series.  So I\’m paying for it, you read it!

Here\’s January.

It looks like the Fairness Doctrine is back in the news.  People are predicting that if Obama is elected, combined with a Democrat-controlled Congress, they will attempt to use the Fairness Doctrine to silence any opposition.  To be fair the Obama campaign is already well known from trying to shut down and silence anyone that criticizes them.

Signs of what the new environment will be like for the right are already evident:

• When the National Rifle Association recently released television and radio ads in Pennsylvania targeting Obama\’s history of anti-gun votes, the Obama campaign\’s general counsel fired off bullying letters to stations that ran the spots, implying that they may have violated public-interest obligations.

• When the 527 group, the American Issues Project, came out with a commercial linking Obama to former Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers, the campaign (unsuccessfully) complained to the Department of Justice that AIP had broken campaign finance laws, and managed to spook some stations away from the ad.

• When two different conservative writers looking into Obama\’s background appeared on Chicago\’s WGN-AM Radio, the campaign\’s \”action wire\” energized its activists to bombard the station with rage-filled phone calls and e-mails, making the program more difficult to conduct.

So with Obama as President and the Democrats holding a potential super majority in Congress is it possible for the Fairness Doctrine to return and silence any critics?  As with any controversial issue, there are people on both sides of the issue, and there are lots of peripheral issues on this one.

I tend to agree with Glenn Reynolds that this could also backfire on Democrats.

If they bring back the Fairness Doctrine, I think I\’ll start an organization to flood the FCC with complaints whenever there\’s media bias from any of the big networks. Then we\’ll follow up and see how they respond . . . Given the way the news has been reported this year, the Fairness Doctrine could easily backfire on the Dems.

You wouldn\’t even need an official organization.  A distributed network of people connected by something as simply as a wiki or a forum would be easily capable of overwhelming number of complaints.  And as Glenn points out, given the typical coverage it would not be difficult to find plenty of legitimate complaints.

Of course, there are others, such as Vodkapundit, that feel that exactly this sort of online organization is at risk as well.

If (when?) Obama is elected, by my estimation there’s an at least even chance that the newly-reconstructed FCC will reverse course and attempt to apply the New Fairness Doctrine to blogs.

Although I think Glenn\’s viewpoint applies here as well.  This type of standard could be applied to the Huffington Post, Daily Kos, Democratic Underground, etc.  And it wouldn\’t even require much organization to make that happen as well.

Plus I question the ability of the FCC to accomplish what Vodkapundit suggests.  The very nature of the Internet prevents it and any attempts to do so would quickly resemble the Great Firewall of China.  Sure sites like EckerNet.Com would currently be vulnerable, since my server is located in the US.  However, it would not be a huge effort to host it outside the US.  As porn, hacking and software pirating sites have demonstrated, this makes shutting them down, or even censoring them extremely difficult.

And given the increasing popularity of online news sites, aggregators, blogs, etc the public backlash is likely to be worse than the effect of the online content to begin with.

There are plenty of reasons to be nervous about an Obama Presidency, I\’m not sure this is one of them.

[Crossposted at True North]

Ok…maybe not me, but these other women….oh just watch the damn video.

[hattip to Hawkins]

Virtually every time I talk with a certain MN State Senator, he tells me that I shouldn\’t curse as much on this blog as \”there are children reading\”. I frequently blow off such advice because I write how I speak and……well, my verbal \”filter\” has been broken since birth and I\’m sorely lacking in moral fiber. Plus what child is going to have even a passing interest in what some prematurely crotchety old man has to say on politics?? There are much more interesting things on the web for kids to look at….like porn.

However, I mention this only because despite all her assertions that I should tone down my language, one of the right-o-sphere\’s more profane and least politically correct bloggers, has just won CPAC\’s Blogger of the Year award. Now if I have a target audience at all, it\’s probably conservative political wonks. This just proves profanity wins.

Such as it is, I resolve to not clean up my language, despite the clearly misguided advice of some.

Oh and congrats to Ace on the award.

Bogus Gold is back….for real this time….or so he claims.

So check it out.  Bogus Gold, now with 100% less absence, 63% less impotence and 38% more irrelevance.

UPDATE : It worked….the Substance ad is now airing in Iowa.

Spreading the word….because frankly it about sums up my feelings on the matter:

Dear Friends,

I am writing to ask for your help.

All of us know the long odds faced by Fred Thompson in his efforts to win the GOP nomination for president. I\’m sure you are all aware that Fred has undertaken pretty much of a do or die bus tour of Iowa in order to finish strongly in the Caucuses on January 3.

Many of you have already taken steps to support the Thompson campaign in a tangible way by placing fundraising widgets on your sidebar and writing about the campaign. In this way, each of us alone has done whatever we can to support Fred in his efforts.

But at this, the 11th hour of the campaign in Iowa, I think it would be a very effective fundraising tool if as many of us as possible were to participate in an old-fashioned Blogburst, writing a post asking readers to donate to the campaign while embedding a fundraising widget in the post for convenience.

I propose Thursday, December 27 for the Blogburst. If you have an email list, I would urge you to ask your subscribers to donate. If you know of other bloggers who support Fred, please forward this email and ask them to participate as well.

Not expecting a \”money bomb\” but even a few tens of thousands of dollars would help, I\’m sure. Given the number of readers represented in the blogs listed here (where I got all of your email addresses) and your cooperation, I feel confident we can give a real shot in the arm to the campaign.

I don\’t think any of us believe that our endorsement of Thompson alone means that much in the long run. But working together, uniting for one day and speaking with one voice, I think we could make a significant impact on Fred\’s chances in Iowa. After all, when the candidate you support rolls the dice as Fred has, the least we can do is back his play to the best of our ability.

No need to respond to this email. Just do it.

Merry Christmas,

Rick Moran
Right Wing Nuthouse
If you are a blogger who supports Fred, please participate in this Blogburst. If you know of a blogger who supports Fred, I urge you to contact them and ask them to participate.

For me, it comes down to this. If Fred isn\’t nominated, I doubt very much that I will show up at the polls next November. Not to punish the party but simply because there is no one in the race who would be representing my views or who I could in good conscience, support for president.

This is why despite his long shot status, every effort must be made to help Fred Thompson continue the campaign by contributing to his efforts in Iowa. I\’m going to give on Thursday and I hope you do too.

Contribute if you can, otherwise help spread the word…

[H/T : RWN]