Ambush

The above pictures are of Ranma sneaking up on Akane and surprising her (the first one is actually the setup to his surprising her, results are on the page after it - not shown here). This is a tactic Ranma uses quite often in the manga, on many characters(not just Akane), for varying reasons. Most of the time he does it is just to see their reaction, though he has used it in battle as well. No character can consistently prevent Ranma from sneaking up on them, the picture below is of Ranma sneaking up on Cologne.

As the manga progresses he tends to do this more often. This tactic is not used as often as I feel it should be in Ranma fanfiction. There are several fics I've seen where using this tactic would have been both in character and beneficial for Ranma to use but he did not. Fanfiction Ranma prefers frontal assault far more than his manga counterpart who will often use other means.

Ranma doesn't always stealthily approach or just show up faster than the person can react to, he and most of the cast use the much more common ambushing practice of concealing yourself until the opponent passes by. They use this for various purposes - surprise attack most common, information gathering less common but still done. This has varying degree's of success, for example, Gosunkugi's and Kodachi's attempts are not very successful. In fanfiction it is far more common for villains, rather than the protagonists, to use various ambush techniques, even though it would be in character and extremely useful.

Gender Genie

I recently found a website that uses an algorithm to determine a persons gender based on what words they use while writing. The site is here: Gender Genie. I played with it by putting posts from this here blog on it. It correctly got my gender around 70% of the time. Of course that means 30% of the time it did not. I find it interesting as to what words are considered more female/male. Going by that males are more likely to talk about objects/statements and females more likely to talk about people/personal opinions.

Hate, Hypocrisy, Racism and Terrorist allegations

There are many things that are occurring in this presidential race that really bother me. The racist remarks and the calling of Obama a terrorist, is one thing. I've heard quite a few racist remarks about Obama both about him being black and accusations of him being a Muslim. I dislike racist remarks in general, this is aggravated by having had people direct racist remarks and actions at me in the past (though I am of the technical majority in my country, I'm in/was in the local minority). Even had Obama been an actual Muslim, that should not effect peoples votes. Any US citizen, regardless of race or religion, should have the dream/opportunity to become president one day. Five year old's of Arabian decent should be able to dream of being president like any other US citizen.

The actions of the supporters also bother me. Saying things like kill him and racist slurs. Falling for out right lies. The extreme extent some of them are willing to go (both parties), such as McCain volunteer Ashley Todd's hoax about a large black man attacking her and carving the letter “B” into her cheek, the slashing of tires, the stealing yard signs (mine was stolen), keying of cars, etc. There is a lot of hate.

I've already mentioned the large number of attack ads in an earlier post, but there is more to say about them. They are very, very annoying. Had they been confined to the television I would be able to ignore most of them, but they aren't. I have received phone calls (I'm on the national do not call list but guess they don't care), emails (many, most full of lies), and junk mail (these are really offensive). They have anti-abortion ones with pictures of aborted fetus's, pictures of soldiers dying with comments like vote for Republicans don't let the terrorists win, and more (I'd mention some of the Democrat ones but they are not even close to being as offensive, at least the ones I received weren't). There is also the local/state election and issues on the ballet with a lot of junk mail, ads, and phone calls as well. This applies to both parties and all the issues on ballet, especially the issues.

Hypocrisy, there is quite a bit of it. I'm not going to list very much of it but some is how the Republicans have attacked Obama for being a supporter of ACORN. It's hypocrisy because McCain and the GOP have also been supporters of ACORN in the past and the actions done by people working for ACORN could have happened to any number of organizations. Same practices are used by Republican backed voter registration drives as well as for issues (I, a few months ago, signed a petition to get an issue on ballet that I did not really care about one way or another simply because the person said he was getting paid a dollar per signature and asked nicely - it is not an issue that actually made it onto the ballet though). It is a common practice done by voter registration drives to hire people to get signatures and the people they hire occasionally fabricate signatures, this could happen to any group who registers people.

I do not like how some people are portraying Obama's ties to Bill Ayers and calling him a terrorist because of them. Bill Ayers may have done some bombings in protest of a war but has also has gone on to do good and teach children. That Obama was on the same committee as him should not be held against him. If it is that McCain's ties to terrorists should be held against him as well. Most politicians can, it appears to me, be tied to terrorist in some way. Including the founding fathers of the USA. They were terrorists from the British point of view - one sides terrorist is another sides freedom fighter. I do not condone terrorists but some terrorists are not bad people and some do have worthy causes, though I'd much prefer they used non-violent means. Since Obama is being called a terrorist because of his ties to Ayers, I will now point out this article from the Huffington Post showing some of McCain's ties to terrorists:

A newsletter from 1984 provides more embarrassing evidence of John McCain's relationship with the U.S. Council on World Freedom, a group that was involved in funding militant anti-communists and espoused some anti-Semitic views.

McCain's face graces the front page of the group's "World Freedom Report," published on Dec. 15, 1984, a copy of which was obtained from the research library at the University of Kansas. The front page also features a reprint of an article McCain penned that same month for Reader's Digest.

In the early 1980s, McCain served on the advisory board of the Council on World Freedom, which funded and provided arms to what the Associated Press described as "ultra-right-wing death squads in Central America." The group also "aided rebels trying to overthrow the leftist government of Nicaragua," which landed it "in the middle of the Iran-Contra affair and in legal trouble with the Internal Revenue Service, which revoked the charitable organization's tax exemption."

When McCain's connection to the council received its first blast of press attention earlier this month, his campaign told Politico that McCain "disassociated himself" from the group in 1984 "when questions were raised about its activities."

But the group's tax filing in 1985, covering the previous year, lists McCain as a member of the advisory board. And in October 1985, a States News Service report placed McCain "at a Washington awards ceremony staged by the council."

Moreover, in 1986, McCain himself told the Phoenix New Times that his reason for leaving the group merely had to do with a lack of time.

Asked by the AP this year about McCain's alleged efforts to distance himself from the council in both 1984 and 1986 (when McCain had to ask to have his name removed from the group's stationary), founder John Singlaub said: "That's a surprise to me. ... I don't ever remember hearing about his resigning."

Though the group's founder also said it was possible that McCain had asked to resign and he hadn't heard about the "housekeeping" details, the Council's unearthed newsletter from late 1984 would seem to support Singlaub's -- and not McCain's -- memory of the events.

I find it interesting that several prominent republicans like Colin Powell are endorsing Obama. What I find even more interesting is that the actual terrorist, the ones the government has been trying to get for years, are according to the New Zealand Herald supporting McCain: Al Qaeda-linked website backs McCain as president or if you prefer an US paper; New York Times: The Endorsement From Hell. On the one hand Obama is being called a terrorist often enough, though to be fair McCain did do the honorable thing and tell his supporters that Obama is not a terrorist or a Muslim and it is not, as far as I know, McCain who is saying these things, the actual terrorist would prefer McCain to Obama.

Who I'm voting for

I wasn't planning on writing about my political leanings or about the on going presidential race. I don't mind talking about problems of my, and other, societies or social issues but generally prefer to not talk politics. The reason I prefer to not talk politics is because quite often no matter how well I argue my point the other person doesn't care or refuses to see my point of view (That I'm, IMO, not that good of a debater/socially reclusive also factors in).

I will be voting for Obama. I am voting for him because I agree with Obama's plans and voting record more than I do McCain's and think he would make the better president. Though I do not agree with him on everything, just a lot more than his opponent. I bring this up is in the vain and unlikely hope that you, the reader of this (provided you are a US citizen who can vote and is registered to do so), will decide to vote for Obama (the fact that I, a relative nobody, am endorsing Obama is extremely unlikely to sway anyone's vote).

Going by yard signs, like the one pictured above, my street appears to be voting for McCain. I doubt very much that most of the people on my street will be voting for McCain though. Reasons I think that is because people are stealing Obama signs, mine was stolen. The Obama local headquarters (not actually in my city, several miles away) has a very limited supply, only giving one per person, and has no bumper stickers or pins at all. The main reason though is because McCain supporters have been seen going door to door carrying the McCain signs with them to give to home owners. Really I don't think it matters much though since political signs are a minority. The really sad thing is the type of signs on the most houses front lawns are for sale signs, out numbering political signs 4-1.

Talk about voting

This year a large number of people who are registered to vote are expected to vote. The Board of Elections for my area expects an 80% turn out. They are completely not prepared for it, expecting many law suits. To lesson the impact of massive crowds they are allowing early voting this year. Which makes me wonder how many people will vote early and how long the lines will be for voters? During the primaries my voting place had a fairly large turnout and not enough voting machines. I had to wait over an hour and a half to vote and others had to wait even longer. I came during a time of day not expected to be as crowded, many people have to work on that day and can't come until after work so it becomes really crowded.

Personally I like that we are allowed to vote early now, but I still think that Election Day should be made into a national holiday so that more people can show up. People will still have to work, since many places do not give holiday's off and people can't afford to leave work to vote, but it would allow some people to vote that wouldn't otherwise. If not a federal holiday at least a state holiday. My state is kind of in need of a holiday, since there are no state holiday's for my state.

A lot of the voting practices really annoy me. The one that bothers me the most is that my county had purchased many electric voting machines (touch screens) spending somewhere between 21 million and 35 million (the exact amount is unknown to me since several different source's of information give different figures). They then spent an additional 14 million supposedly in training poll workers how to use them, mailing instructions in the use of them to voters, and related costs. The machines had many errors, particularly in my county, which resulted in many lawsuits (makers of the touch-screen voting machine's used in my area even acknowledged that the machines have a programming error that led to votes being dropped in the March primary). This cost the county and the state millions more dollars. The machines slowed down the voting process quite a bit, enough so that judges ordered polling places to stay open for hours longer than they were supposed to. For this election they are not using those voting machines, they are returning to the very basic, least error prone, cheapest means available - namely paper and a pencil where you just fill in the circle for who you want to vote for. What the hell are they now going to do with all those crappy voting machines they purchased that have no use? In case you were wondering prior to the electric voting machines they used the punch out cards that caused so much trouble in Florida, resulting in problems here as well (things like lawsuits, demand for recounts and hanging chads). I wonder what problems reverting back to paper is going to have, the most obvious one I see is that some places are not going to have enough ballots on hand.

I have voted in just about every election that I have been able to. Though I did miss two (that I know of), one because it truly did not matter to me - any of the candidates up for election would have been acceptable (mainly because it was for a replacement who will only be in office for a very short time before they have to run for office). The other time was because I did not know about it, they had a special election that had next to no publicity for one issue, this one angered me because I would have voted against it and many others would have as well had they known of it's existence.

The reason I vote is because I feel it is important to do so. It's the easiest means of effecting change in the government. Though I do admit that it sometimes feels like I'm voting for the lesser evil. Way too much corruption, particularly near me. The FBI/IRS has raided county offices. The local city government has made so many damn mistakes it's ridiculous, not going to go into that at this time, just think of the most incompetent things you can think of and it probably is worse than that.

While some people might argue that there is no point to vote, I don't agree. Look at how close the last presidential election was a few hundred people could have changed the results. Even if you think the person you'd like to win, will win if you vote or don't vote, remember they have to win electoral votes not just have the majority of votes. Meaning they need to win area by area not just overall. History shows this, since the person with the popular i.e. majority hasn't always one. For example, the 1876 election Samuel Tilden had the popular vote but Rutherford B. Hayes won the electoral college (could use the much more recent example but figure most people know that one and I want to point out that it has happened before).

5 tips for blogging that I do not follow

This post is in response to various books, blogs, and websites that give tips on blogging.

1. Stay on topic

I have read, in several places, that it is best to only have one topic for your blog and to stick to it. This is probably good advice; though I'm not very good at following this bit of advice. I could create multiple blogs for each topic that I want to write about but the thing is I am a lazy person and would rarely update each blog. I occasionally feel like writing stuff, but it is not generally on topic. I write when I feel like writing, on what I feel like writing about (more often on forums or as comments at other blogs/sites). I do use labels for navigation so if a person were interested in only on topic but not the others they could just hit that label. If I were to write multiple blogs the updates of the various blogs would be very irregular.

2. Keep it short 250 words or less

There are several reasons for this. People have short attention spans, long posts take much longer to compose, short posts are more memorable, etc. I'm not that good at this. I am a slow typist and look up additional information via books and the web (fact checking is good) so writing a blog post takes me awhile. I often want to write more, most things I can think about writing about can have a lot more written about them than I feel like writing. I do mean a lot. At least one of my blog posts, at one time not sure if it is on this blog or not (too lazy to look), is over 10 pages long (if put on open office/printed out) and a few others are/were nearly that long as well.

3. Update regularly

This makes sense, a regularly updated blog will have more readers, especially regular readers (the best type). I'm not that good at this either. Blogging is a hobby of sorts that I just do when I feel like it. I would like regular readers but I don't go online everyday, feel like writing something, and am not that good at scheduling a hobby.

4. Make friends and leave comments

There are several ways to promote a blog/get readers. I would like readers but I'm lazy. Submitting it to various search engines will get some readers, but not all that many. Most will come for just one post and never come back (one post on this blog receives something like 80% of the hits, according to statcounter, and that is not a well written or even very interesting post). If you write interesting, informative, thought provoking, somewhat opinionated, and well written (good grammar and spelling) posts it will keep readers coming back, but generally won't draw them to the site in the first place. To get real repeat readers, you have to advertise, draw them in. I'm not really that good at doing that. Submitting your blog to blog communities like Blog Carnival will draw readers. The best method though is to make good comments on other people's blogs and in forums. If your posts on various forums and their blogs are good they are likely to come to and make comments on your blog. Basically the point of this post is you have to network and make friends, which is not something I'm good at. I'm on a social networking site, care2, and have only a relative as a friend. I had tried other social networks like myspace but did not have any friends in them either. I generally comment anonymously on reviews and blogs and sometimes use one of my other aliases.

5. Link a lot
I've seen in various places that you should link a lot. This does make sense. If you write a post that relates to another post you've written it makes sense to link to it. After they read the one post they'll go to the other. Linking to other blogs and websites will cause people to back track to your site. The most important and best links though are to additional information and annotations. Having good sources and references for your post will give notability to your writing and cause the readers to view you as a good source of information. I occasionally do link to other sites but not that often and I rarely list my sources of information, though they are reliable. I do occasionally do so - for example if I state a percentage or statistic I will generally say where I obtained that information.

Usage of the word lost and 'clean' coal.

I seriously dislike statements that use the word lost or lose when they aren't applicable. For example, there is a ballot issue for the creation of a casino in my state, people who are pushing the issue are airing commercials that state that X-number of jobs would be lost if the issue doesn't pass. This is a lie, that is used fairly often. It could be argued that if this passes X-number of jobs will be created but it is impossible for those jobs to be lost since they do not exist yet. An opportunity for the creation of the jobs can be lost, but the jobs themselves can not be lost since they do not exist. This is not the only issue or way that lose and lost are used that annoy me or the only issue it is used this way on. Other issues, clean coal commercials, also claim that jobs will be lost if power plants using 'clean' coal aren't created. Not only do those jobs not exist at this time, hence can not be lost, since a demand for energy will still exist power generating plants will still be created, creating jobs. Though if coal powered plants are not created a different power source would be used like geothermal, solar, wind, water, and hydrogen - which are renewable. Though no power source is perfect, all have their advantages and disadvantages.

I also do not like the term clean coal because clean coal does not exist. When they say clean coal they are saying process's are used so that coal powered plants emit less environmentally harmful pollutants and more energy is produced from the same amount of coal (Carbon dioxide is stored under ground instead of released into the atmosphere, is one way the polluting is reduced). The plants are more environmentally friendly than existing coal plants but are far from clean. Strip mining, mountaintop removal, and underground coal mining (some means of harvesting coal) will still be amongst the dirtiest and most destructive ways of making energy and the so called clean power plants will still release harmful pollutants into the air, just a smaller number of them. Coal miners will continue getting lung cancer, dying via accidents, forests will still be stripped for coal, explosives will still blast poisons into the air, waterways will still have dangerous pollutants enter them from the process of getting the coal, etc., and coal, like oil, is also a fossil fuel with a limited supply and takes millions of years to form (though it is the most abundant fossil fuel available in the USA at this time). There are laws that try to limit the damage done, Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 is one, but pollution, health problems, and environmental problems will still be caused by 'clean' coal plants.

My opinion on 'clean' coal is that existing plants that use coal should take as many steps to reduce their environmental and health impact as possible but new plants should not be created that uses coal, rather cleaner and renewable power sources should be used. I do not suggest using anyone power source everywhere, multiple power sources should be used and which one is best for a given area might not be the best for a different area.

Again since this is at least in part a blog on Japan, here is some info on Japan and coal: Coal powered plants account for around 23% of Japan's energy consumption. Japan imports the majority of it's coal instead of mining it. The reason for this is it is cheaper to import than to mine locally. The amount Japan imports is roughly one quarter of all coal traded worldwide, according to statistics from the government and the International Energy Agency. Japan is very into 'clean' coal technology, leading the world in it's use and implementation. Japan is often trying out new technologies to increase coals efficiency, more so than most countries. Japan teaches other Asian countries how to use coal more efficiently and reduce pollution caused by it. Japan is also actively increasing the use of renewable power and attempting to reduce consumption of power. While this does reduce pollutants the main purpose of these actions are to cut costs and be more self reliant i.e. purchase less coal. The teaching other countries is not entirely from altruism, it's an attempt to lower the coal usage by those countries . The below quote on teaching other countries about coal usage, is from Japan Times.

Every year, Japan invites about 60 engineers and managers from the coal industry of seven Asian nations -- China, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and India -- to instruct them in the use of "clean coal technology," or CCT, which aims to improve the mineral's efficiency while reducing carbon dioxide emissions and pollution.