Finally a search engine that tops Google? Just Bing it.

  It looks like there is new search engine in town and the reviews have been very positive.  It’s called Bing and it looks to offer many improvements over the search results you get with Google.  For example, if you search for “California Pizza Kitchen”, it will firstly list their know official web site along with their phone number and a mapped list of the restaurants near you.  It also provides a few quick links to things like their menu, an online order form for take-out, and a phone number for reservations.  That just the tip of the iceberg, there is little video that explains more: http://www.decisionengine.com/Default.html

Here’s an excerpt from a CNET review…

I planned to write this story with the headline, "Bing isn't Better," but the new engine won me over.

The new game in search is parsing information and displaying it in the engine itself (see Wolfram Alpha for the extreme example of this). Both Google and Bing, and other search products, have areas where they will collate and format information for you, instead of just linking you to external pages where the data reside. Bing does an extremely good job at this in several popular areas -- like product reviews, movie listings, weather, travel, and stock prices.

While the service doesn't reveal all its riches at once, it rewards exploration and yields pleasant surprises to users who poke around.

Google keeps improving in the area of in-search collation and display as well, but Bing makes Google look complacent, and that's not good for Google. For the moment, Bing's on top in this game. Try this search engine. I do not think you will regret it.

- http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10251432-2.html

It looks like their taking the approach of not just returning results based on your exact search query but also using some artificial intelligence to provides additional information that could just be exactly what you were searching for to begin with.  Really slick actually and I look forward to testing it out myself when it launches on June 1st.

Here are just a few other neat things it can do:

• Need a flight status?  Search for airline name and flight number (“United 279”).  You’ll get the flight info and even the gate number.
• Want to know the NBA or MLB scores?  Just search for “NBA” or “MLB” or “Atlanta Braves”.
• Want a stock quote?  Search it’s symbol (“CSCO” or “stock GM”)

Sarah Palin. The new George W Bush?

Click the image above for an interesting video.  Hint: George W. Bush the reformer.

America First? Sarah Palin believes in Alaska First.

I find it very odd that Sarah Palin was chosen by McCain to be his VP candidate since he is running on the motto “Country First”.  Besides the fast that she was already under investigation by her own state for unethically abusing the power of her position, her husband belongs to the radical political group Alaska Independence Party (AIP).  Sarah Palin is a strong supporter of this group, but she is not an official member because that would, of course, not bode well for her political career.   And one of this groups main agenda’s is to have Alaska secede from the United States, the same country Sarah Palin is now attempting to become the Vice President of.  Does that not strike anyone as a little peculiar?

John McCain may believe in putting his country first but Sarah Palin certainly does not.  Her motto is “Alaska First – Alaska Always”.

Meet Sarah Palin’s radical right-wing pals

Below is a video of Sarah Palin addressing the AIP at their 2008 convention where she tells them “Keep up the good work”.

Why Fox News is not real news.

I used to watch Fox News a long time ago.  At that time I don’t know if I was just too naive to notice how they were “reporting” the news or maybe it just was not as agenda driven as it has obviously become.  Today Fox News is basically a publicity firm for the Republican party.  There is nothing inherently wrong with the Republican party or the Democratic party for that matter.  The parties were started off with good intentions and were just a way to generalized some different beliefs in how our government should govern, particularly in the foreign policy area.  But over time, there have been constant changes and divergence of what it means to be Democrat or Republican and in the world today it would seem that the primary differences between the 2 parties are that Republicans generally feel that government should be less involved in our lives by having less regulation and government programs for the less fortunate, thus promoting the capitalist idea that each should “make” it on their own while assuming everyone in the US has an equal path to success whereas the Democrats seem to believe in a more socialist approach to assuring that all citizens are able to or at least given a better opportunity to achieve a better way of life for themselves and future generations of their family.  Of course there will never be 100% equal distribution of wealth and power, but it should not be the other extreme either which is having a very small group of ultra wealthy and powerful families ruling over a very large percentage of working class families that, by the terms of our Constitution,  should have the same rights and ability to prosper in our nation.

But what has happened is that there is a large group if individuals in this country that want to keep wealth and power to themselves in order to maintain that elite status over the populous working class.  It’s human nature to want to do good for oneself, but greed is something that will lead some to perform some absolutely sinister acts.  And unfortunately these groups of people have adopted the Republican party as their tool to try to sustain their agenda because the nature of the Republican supporters tend to be made up of individuals that lean towards the more selfish side when it comes to financial gain and overall class status.

And here is the beef I have with Fox News.  It seems that their agenda is to strongly promote the Republican parties because that parties policies generally make it easier for the upper class to maintain their status and wealth accumulation at the expense of the average American citizen.  All while purporting to be a real news agency and being “fair and balanced”.  Fair and balanced is so far from the truth but it’s outright laughable when they say it with a straight face seconds after referring to the Republican party as “we” and “us”.  They don’t even hide their bias that well.

So, is any “news” organization that has a strong political agenda really a valid source for news?  I mean, after all do we American citizens want to be able to make up our own minds on issues and how this country should be run or do we want to be pawns for a for a few people’s game of have’s vs. have-not’s?

Now you may ask, why do I think Fox news is the one with an agenda and not “the other guys”?  Well, we’ve all heard the saying “where there’s smoke, there’s fire” and that’s generally true.  So if Fox News is always claiming that “the other guys” are just “liberal mainstream media” but 95% of the world is saying that Fox News is just trying to promote their political agenda, who would you tend to believe?  Unless the other 95% of the world is in collusion against Fox News, then there is something seriously wrong with the claims by Fox.  And I have never witnessed a group of news personalities so overtly make known their political agenda as the Fox News guys.   So clearly not unbiased.  So for me, I’ll get my news from multiple other sources and if any of them seem to be underhandedly promoting a self-serving agenda then I will not be tuning in, and nor should you.

Links worth visiting:

Fox News reports knowingly wrong information

Fox News "news" lies and deceit revealed

Insight from a Fox employee

How to solve the mortgage mess

What is the best solution to the "mortgage crisis" and "credit freeze"

My solution to this mess? The government should buy these mortgages for 70% of their current outstanding principle balance (the bank will resume the loan at a later time to be able to recover the remaining 30%. The details will be discussed later in a document I’m writing), rework the terms if it’s possible for the current owner to pay back the full amount. If the owner is unable to afford the re-worked terms, foreclose on them and sell the house at its 2002 valuations. The government would then force the ex-owner to pay back any uncovered debt over a period of 10-12 years. The 30% that the bank lost can either be taken as a write-off, with the ex-owner paying capital gains taxes on that, or the bank can set repayment terms with the ex-owner. This way, the responsible taxpayers are not footing the bill and those that played the game and lost will have learned a lesson. And home prices will return to normal quicker due to the new “comps” that are selling for 2002 prices.

The effect of this will be that:

• The banks will have new liquidity to start lending responsibly this time.
• The “homeowners” who really can’t afford their homes will return to renting while the renters waiting on the sidelines will start buying all the homes that have been foreclosed on because they will be at levels that they are expecting home prices to return to. This includes many homes which are now leaving neighborhoods in shambles.
• Realtors will start working again showing the homes that are available at reasonable prices.
• The home prices will stabilize much faster than by bailing people out.
• The government will get all their money back with interest.
• The government will not be rewarding the ones that were fiscally irresponsible by punishing those who were, which is what they want to do now.

National debt so high, clock can’t keep up!

Bill Clinton speaking about the economy then and now