Not quite at the end of the debate and I think there's one major lesson to take away from this: neither of the candidates can follow the rules.

Rules they put in place.

Other lessons include:

They'd have so much more time to talk about their plans if they spent less time sniping and counter-sniping at one anther.

Tom Brokaw needs a big stick to keep the two candidates in line.

John McCain wants us to think that he's our friend.

Obama can be goaded into breaking the rules pretty easily.

Both candidates are damn good at not actually answering questions, no matter who asks them.

In the few bits of actual information these guys have talked about in the debate, they're both right as often as they're wrong. The real answers will be found in a synthesis and mix of their individual platforms.

No one in the audience looks even vaguely happy to be there.

*sigh* I don't know why I bother watching these. Only one left, though, so I may as well keep it up.

It's been an "interesting" few days in the financial markets.

Yesterday, the DOW dropped about 777 points. So far today, it's bounced back about half that.

Yesterday, the media went from being all "Rah! Rah! Huzzah! for not rushing the bill through without looking at it!" to "OMG! How could they not approve that! We're all gonna die!"

Ever few hours, there seems to be something new coming to light about this proposed bailout--be it accusations of partisan politics, finger pointing about who's fault it is the measure failed or, more rarely, some actual looking into what's actually in the damn bill.

These last few weeks have been filled with big deal news.

The biggest and most far-reaching, though, is the ongoing wrangling and hand wringing going on over the current state of U.S. (and therefore world) financial markets.

Make no mistake about it: things are bad and they'll probably get worse before they get better.

Anyone who looks at my personal balance sheet will know I'm no financial genius. But I do understand a thing or two about fear and power mongering. (Not so much from personal experience as from research and living through the past decade.)

People wonder why conspiracy theories thrive for so long.

The simple answer is "Because things keep happening to support them."

No matter how thoroughly the object of a conspiracy theory attempts to offer evidence to the contrary, all it takes is one action to start things all back up again.

Take, for example, these two stories that could suggest hostile and semi-covert (and definitely untoward) action by forces with a national government. Each one is from a different country but, oddly (possibly) deal with the issue of supposedly free speech and/or First Amendment protection.

One is conspiracy fodder due to things that could just be coincidence. In order to link it to the conspiracy-theory-at-large, there is some supposition that must go on. Mainly that the government statement as to what happened is an outright lie or fabrication. The really sad thing is, it's really easy to believe that it was, indeed, a government action to silence a voice of dissent.

Seems that half the people I know are down in Atlanta at Dragon*Con. It's where I'd be if there were any sensible way to make it happen.

Instead, I've been here in the office fighting with technology in order to get things done.

But, that means oXYGen Financial, Inc.'s site (a company, coincidentally, located right next to Atlanta) is live and we're all pretty happy with it. Still a couple of things to clean up on the back end, but all the important stuff is there. Kile and Ted have put together quite the nice little business idea... here's hoping it goes fantastically for them!

After work, it's off to shop for non-meat food for my cooking adventure on Saturday. Expect pictures and a run-down on Sunday.

Sunday, I've got nothing planned at all. Just a nice relaxing day.

And then Monday I'll probably be at work, plugging away on stuff again.

So, yeah, holiday weekend or no, not much changes.

I've talked about this before a number of people. But, now that the DNC is just about over and we're about to head into the RNC and then what should prove to be a crazy campaign season, I think it's important to point this out again.

It's no secret I'm not a Hillary Clinton fan. Most of my problem with her, though, are personal and, therefore, not worth talking about in a political forum. I think, that if she was the winner in a presidential election, she'd do a pretty darn good job. She's clever and forceful and would most certainly get things done.

Thing is, there's no way at all she could have won. In fact, even if she was the vice presidential pick, the Democrats would lose.

Anyone who's been paying attention to the state of the economy over the past decade or three has seen clearly what's illustrated in this wonderful cartoon.

Having a "Fiscal Conservative" in office should lead to lower deficits, right? So why hasn't it quite worked that way?

They keep using that word... I do not think it means, what they think it means.

It become more and more evident every day that our rights to privacy don't extend quite as far as they once seemed to.

Recently, there was some debate about whether it was legal for customs officials or TSA to demand you show them what's on your laptop, PDA or cell phone. The general consensus of the discussions I saw was "It shouldn't be."

Well, that question has been answered definitively by new DHS procedures.

US Border Agency Says It Can Seize Laptops

Travelers beware: U.S. agents now have the authority to seize and retain laptops indefinitely, according to a new policy detailed in documents issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

As part of border search policy, government agents are now authorized to seize electronic devices and inspect documents in them, the document states. The electronic devices might include laptops, cell phones, portable music players or storage devices such as portable hard drives.

Agents with U.S. Customs and Border Protection will also be allowed to translate and share documents with other government agencies.

So there it is, in black and white. Your electronic devices can be taken away from you for not reason whatsoever when you travel.

No? Well, neither does Congress. At least when it comes to the nation's IT spending.

Seems there's supposed to be a comprehensive report presented every year on how the various IT projects--system upgrades, application development, infrastructure installs, and the like--are going. In the last fourteen years, three of those reports have been produced.

Three out of fourteen.

And things move merrily along like there's nothing wrong.

We're talking about upwards of $25 billion worth of our money here... and no one knows exactly what it's being used for or how effectively it's being used.

Yet more disturbing, Machiavellian plans from the Bush administration have come to light.

To Provoke War, Cheney Considered Proposal To Dress Up Navy Seals As Iranians And Shoot At Them

Speaking at the Campus Progress journalism conference earlier this month, Seymour Hersh — a Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist for The New Yorker — revealed that Bush administration officials held a meeting recently in the Vice President’s office to discuss ways to provoke a war with Iran.

As if it's not bad enough that our leaders are trying to figure out ways to surreptitiously start trouble with yet another nation in the Middle East, the way they were going to go about this one really takes the cake: