This was supposed to go out in July. Well here it is now.

Prediction
10,000 years from now archiologists will unearth Shaq O'Neil's skull and will be estatically puzzled over their discovery. What wonderful theories they will come up with.

BS-o-Meter Busted
Maybe it's my vantage point of working for a very large company for over 15 years without a career path for 10 of them (by design), but I have a harder time then ever with corporate BS. Recently my BS-o- meter got overloaded, short-circuited and the dial popped off while reading a letter to a very good computer career advice column (hi Bob!). For more fun, in your mind try to hear Casey Kasum reading the letter as long distance dedication.

"After 20 years at one company I was downsized several months ago. In the interim I have been working full time at my job search. Now it seems to be about to pay off. I am interviewing for an IT Director position... One of the co-founders of the company particularly enjoyed my personal branding statement: "My friends tell me I remind them of Houdini because he delighted audiences by making an elephant disappear. What I do is delight my customers by making their technology problems disappear. However, I don't deal in smoke and mirrors or illusions - I produce real results. What kinds of elephants would people in your industry like to see vanish?"

1) First of all, I can't believe this bozo has friends. It's probably just another lie for the resume.

2) I can't believe a founder of a company would hire someone so full of BS. Though to be honest I enjoyed his personal branding statement too, but not in the ways the applicant wanted. OK I believe a founder of a company might be impressed with that, not the founder of a successful company.

3) If someone said to me, "What elephants would people in your industry like to see disappear?" I'd respond "You!!!"

4) I haven't looked for a job in over 15 years, and don't plan to start anytime soon so I am happily out of touch with "personal branding statements". Someone ought to personally brand that guy on the ass with a big "A" for asswipe.

Chickenhawk
When the Iraq invasion started and our president told reporters he was "pumped", I could tell he was flashing back to his days of bravely keeping the skies, drug dealers, and roadhouses of Texas safe from Communists while others with non-wealthy fathers were screwing around dying in the jungles of Vietnam. Regarding the continued attacks on American soldiers by freshly liberated Iraqis, our president replied, "My answer is: Bring them on. We have the force necessary to deal with the situation". Yes, bring it on, we have more poor people to ship other there!

I realize that a president must sometimes have to send my friends and neighbors into harms way, but he should never be gleeful or cavalier about it. Even Reagan, the original modern day cowboy president, who was never a soldier but played one in the movies, acted somber when speaking about military actions. Dubya, like Reagan, has excellent image makers who design amazing impressive visuals around him, but Dubya needs Reagan caliber script writing, or maybe just Reagan caliber acting (and Ronnie didn't set the bar too high on that). On Friday July the 4th and Saturday the 5th, when I watched the fireworks here in America's birthplace and greatly enjoyed being an American, I made sure to think about my friends in Afghanistan and Iraq.

I'm done.

- Scoats