“Earlier this week, fellow Fool Rick Munarriz wrote about Google CEO Eric Schmidt accepting a seat on Apple’s (Nasdaq: AAPL) board. Rick suggested that Schmidt’s move was about making life miserable for Microsoft. I’ve got a different idea,” Jack Uldrich writes for The Motley Fool.
“In the short term, I think it’s more about Apple landing a spot for its iTunes digital media service on Google’s toolbar, and Google finding new ways to leverage its advertising network. In the longer term, though the picture begins to get cloudy, I have a sneaking suspicion that video content will play an increasing role in the two companies’ future relationship,” Uldrich writes. “Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I see a link here, in the person of former Vice President Al Gore.”
“A board member at Apple and “special advisor” to Google, Gore recently turned Hollywood star with a leading role in the global-warming documentary An Inconvenient Truth. In addition to his political and environment interests, Gore is also the founder and owner of Current TV, a current-affairs TV channel that shows user-generated programs,” Uldrich writes. “I find Gore’s roles at Apple, Google, and Current TV particularly interesting.”
Uldrich writes, “It could be true that Google, Apple, and Current TV won’t do anything together to rival television — but color me skeptical. For one thing, Gore was also at the Edinburgh event, where he said that he hopes his new channel will reach 50 million people by 2010. A little help from Google and Apple could only help to meet such an ambitious goal… If Google does have plans to eventually rival TV, I’d simply encourage the company to be more candid about them. But then again, showing its hand so early might be just the sort of strategy that Al Gore would advise Google against.”
Full article here.
You know, because “Current TV” is soooo very successful and Al Gore’s strategic advice is soooo tremendously valuable – almost as much as Naomi Wolf’s.
The usual late-August Apple news lull seems to have caused a particularly virulent strain of daftness this year.
We think Apple put Google’s CEO on the board because Steve thought it made the boardroom table visually balanced from his perspective: four per side. Having four guys sitting on one side and just three on the other was driving him absolutely crazy! It’s really that simple.
Plus, as anybody knows, 8 is better than 7: the 8 spokes of the Dharmachakra, the 8 dynamics of life, tarot card No. 8 means “strength,” turn an 8 sideways and you have ∞, Carl Yastrzemski’s retired number, 8 maids a-milking, etc.
Related articles:
Google CEO on Apple’s board opens up many possibilities, including outdueling Microsoft – August 31, 2006
Re: Google CEO elected to Apple Computer’s Board of Directors – August 30, 2006
Dvorak: Does Apple’s board addtion of Google’s Schmidt portend Apple-Sun merger? – August 30, 2006
Apple and Google cozy up to make Microsoft jealous – August 30, 2006
Google CEO to help shape Apple’s future – August 30, 2006
Google CEO Dr. Eric Schmidt joins Apple’s Board of Directors – August 29, 2006
“liberals would wage this war with intelligence and aggression. “
Funny because liberals are usually neither Intelligent nor Agressive.
“Fox is one of the only news outlets that shows both sides of the story.”
Holy shit that might have been the best laugh of the day for me. Good one.
MacZealot, did 9-11 happen on Clinton’s watch? No, it didn’t. I’d say that’s a big one right there. Listen, terrorists have been wanting to bomb this country for some time now, mainly because of our fingers in the Middle East pie, which I think has been necessary by the way. As for who stirred the hornets nest, though, it can be argued that Republicans with their oil agenda’s would be the guys with the stick, and to that end they would be the most responsible for 9-11. But really, laying blame can be argued with both sides having points till the cows come home. I’m a big enough guy to not blame Bush for 9-11. The blame you want to lay on Clinton is even less tangible. Since we both want what’s best for this country, let’s focus on what’s being done since 9-11 to make these terrorists an inconsequential aspect of this world.
Our response to 9-11 has been absolutely terrible. About the only thing the Neo-Cons did right was invade Afghanistan, but unfortunately they diverted their attention from that to the point of even making the one thing they did correct a failure. Their response has been a disgrace for the many reasons I’ve already pointed out. I could cut and paste if you want.
Ah Sam, thanks for the link. How did you know I wanted to convert to Islam? You silly little monkey, you entertain me.
HawHawHaw,
Yeah, FDR got us through WWII. He was a LIBERAL you ungrateful unpatriotic American.
The liberals of 40 years ago and earlier were a lot different then you sniveling little gstank, daviduh, effwierd freaks. Gstank-what news source do you think is “fair and balanced”? I can only imagine your news source. Fox News rocks. ABC NY talk radio rocks. Air America Commie blows chunks.
G-Spank:
Your are right! If Bill Clinton had acted like FDR and conscripted you to fight overseas we would all now be sipping tea on our front porches and discussing the finer points of gardening. In fact, if Clinton was like Harry S. Truman, he would have nuked Iraq and Iran into the Stone Age. Yeah, back in the day, we had some tough Democrats. See what you’ve done, you made me feel nostalgic for the good ol’ days when Democrats actually had balls.
Oh yea?
Well, I’d rather have a bottle in front of me, than a frontal lobotomy.
There. Take that.
Maczealot…
Whereas you make me nostalgic for an era when Republicans had brains.
Which is probably the key difference between the two sides: the usage of intelligent caution – the Democrat position – as opposed to the use of reckless courage by proxy.
It’s easy to have ‘balls’ when you’re sending someone else’s sons and daughters to fight on your behalf in a war based on a litany of falsehoods and mis/disinformation. It’s actually more difficult to sit on your hands, examine the intelligence and develop a proportionate response.
Be aware that the invasion of Iraq has left Afghanistan on the verge of becoming a failed ‘narco-state’ with opium production up by over 150% in Helmand province (the district where US forces were recently supplemented by UK personnel) and up 62% in the country overall. The money generated by opium production – itself a necessity in a country where nothing much grows and with precious little economic development – is being used to finance insurgency with the potential for a “tribute” also being paid to Al Qua’ida.
Concentrating – for a concerted period – on central Asia should have been the primary focus of the US response to 9/11. North Africa has more than enough hard-ass intelligence services as does Islamic South-East Asia (Malaysia, Indonesia, etc.).
Afghanistan, by contrast, has been a graveyard for every military force since Alexander The Great – it’s rocky, hostile country that is impossible to sanitise without concentrated, intensive, fully-focussed commitment. But, instead of delivering that commitment, this administration took its eye off the ball and elected to engage in a war that would result in an “extensive” (as the antonym of “intensive”) deployment of US troops.
The result has been disastrous: Afghanistan has not been stabilised and is in danger of collapse whilst Karzai is not so much the President of the country as the Mayor of Kabul. In addition, Iraq is barely stable and occasionally appears to teeter on the edge of civil war as over 45,000 civilians have been killed since the 1st January 2003 (not to mention the 2600 US service deaths and 20,000+ casualties).
So the legacy of this administration at this time looks like it will be a failed opportunity to create a stable Afghanistan and an expensive (in term of blood and money) and unnecessary war in Iraq.
Please note I did not say unwarranted; Saddam was a murderous psychopath and any long-term foreign policy would have been to encourage his removal or the removal of whichever of his sons would have succeeded him had he died. However, part of being an intelligent leader is choosing not just where to fight your battles, but also when to fight them: Saddam was confined politically, militarily and economically, he was going nowhere – in short, it was a fight that could have (indeed, should have) waited for another day.
Democrat Presidents Kennedy and Johnson got us into the Viet Nam War mess and never did the job right resulting in a defeat for the U.S.
Democrat President Kennedy bungled, wimped out on the Bay of Pigs fiasco and failed to get rid of Castro.
Democrat President Carter bungled, wimped out on the Iran hostage situation and showed to the Muslim world that the U.S. could be weak if it had a weak President. (Jimmy Carter should rank in the bottom 4 of U.S. Presidents.)
Democrat President Clinton had several opportunities to rid the world of Bin Laden and did not take them because of his Monica-related weaknesses.
So, yeah, there have been lots of Democrat Presidents that screwed things up for America.
What G-Spank (and Jimbo von Muhhamed and others) doesn´t realize or understand is that the radical Muslims are not against George Bush per se, they are against everyone that is not a member of their religion.
If you are not believer in the Islamic religion, you are an infidel, you are a dog, you are to be killed.
G-spank thinks that once George Bush is not re-elected (tip to G-Spank he can´t be re-elected) that the Muslim war on the western (Christian, Jewish) world will go away. That the Muslims are mad at George Bush (cause Al Gore should have been President) and that if the western world would just convince the Muslims that lots of liberal Democrats hate George Bush, too, the Muslim war machine won´t include liberal democrats in their death and destruction terrorist threats and actions.
G-Spank – the Muslim war machine would just as soon kill you as look at you…unless you are a Muslim.
The third World War started a while back and one must choose a side – are you for the Muslims destroying the western world so that they impose their form of religious dictatorila Muslim mind control (think Talibahn, think Ayatollah in Iran) or are you for freedom of thought, creatvity and will of the people?
G-Spank – The Muslims get a chuckle out of your hate for the President of the United States, it is just fuel for their war machine.
I imagine if you would have been around during WWII and FDR that you would be espousing the greatness of Hitler and how FDR was slaughtering millions of innocent civilians.
Choose your side G-Spank. Muslim hate or western Democracy (with all its imperfections) and freedom of expression and thought (I dare you to go on a Muslim web site and say negative things about their rulers….don´t leave your name and address. Ka-boom!).
Mondale:
Let’s analyze your military strategy. Hmm, it seems that wherever your avowed enemy is located that your goal is to… run away… not attack… hide behind a skirt. Ya know, sometimes your enemies just don’t want to cooperate and fight on your terms. I know that this seems difficult for you to understand, but it’s true and absolutely predictable.
Personally, I think that our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan have not achieved desired objectives (stable democratic governments), but since I don’t have the ear of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or access to specific military and political information what does my opinion matter anyhow?
The $54,000 question is. “What to do now?” Apparently, the first response from people like you is “Don’t invade Afghanistan or Iraq.” Since we can’t employ Apple’s Time Machine and reverse history, I suppose that your ludicrous strategy is impossible to implement. Since we are in Afghanistan and Iraq, what do you think we should do now? Here are your three options: Stay the course and hope for the best, amp up the war and hope for the best, or run away and hope for the best. Which is your decision?
I know what G-Spank would say, “Nuke the bastards like Harry S, Truman then send me and Mondale in to mop up the remaining resistance like FDR would have done.”
Randy Deems:
Thanks for pointing out that it was the Democrats who were on watch during the Viet Nam War. But the Democrats were also on watch prior to and during World War I (i.e. Woodrow Wilson, Democrat), World Ward II (i.e. FDR and Harry S. Truman, Democrats – both of them), Korean War (i.e. Harry S. Truman, Democrat), and, as you mentioned, the war in Viet Nam (JFK and Johnson, Democrats – both of them). I suppose that war mongering Democrats are responsible for more death and destruction that George Bush.
“The liberals of 40 years ago and earlier were a lot different”
FDR interred 120,000 Japanese Americans for no better reason than they were of Japanese descent.
Now Bush inters several hundred terrorist suspects, where if not actually found fighting there was some reason to believe they were up to no good and today’s liberals condemn it.
Bring back FDR. He wouldn’t be a pussy about this.
From your comments that FDR did good work, I believe you’re saying you’d be fine with interring all Muslim Americans provided a liberal president did it?
P.S. FDR was wrong to inter Japanese Americans.
I also like the quote, usually wrongly attributed to Churchill, but no matter who said it, and exactly how it’s phrased it rings true anyway.
If you’re not a liberal when you’re 20, you have no heart. If you’re not a conservative by the time you’re 40, you have no brain.
“G-Spank – … I imagine if you would have been around during WWII and FDR that you would be espousing the greatness of Hitler and how FDR was slaughtering millions of innocent civilians.”
Good analogy. Fortunately the American system is set up to protect G-Spank so that he can have these views.
“Saddam was confined politically, militarily and economically, he was going nowhere – in short, it was a fight that could have (indeed, should have) waited for another day.”
So, Mondale, at least you agree on principle that invading Iraq was perfectly acceptable. The only issue you have is the exact time of day to invade, not the motive to invade. That’s not much of argument when you take the “moral high ground” of criticizing George Bush.
If the Democrats and liberal Republicans voted to suspend funding for the war in Iraq and Afghanistan today this might force Bush to retreat. Yet, neither the Democrats nor liberal Republicans have the balls to do this, much less support out troops.
In the end, people such as you say much, do little; and you wonder why you receive so little respect.
G-spank thinks that once George Bush is not re-elected (tip to G-Spank he can´t be re-elected) that the Muslim war on the western (Christian, Jewish) world will go away.
More proof that when you don’t have a good argument you insert words into your opponents mouth that can argue with. Robert, you really are silly.
Democrat President Kennedy bungled, wimped out on the Bay of Pigs fiasco and failed to get rid of Castro.
The bay of pigs very well could have resulted in multiple nuclear strikes on American soil. Would that have been better? Maybe you wouldn’t exist!
HawHawHaw,
I didn’t say how FDR handled the Japanese was right. If I were alive back then I would have been against that, because I stand up for what I believe in, even in times of war. I know that’s weird to many of you.
Maczealot,
Afghanistan was the correct move (easy to see that), and Iraq was completely stupid (that was easy to see too). Now that we’re in this mess, what are we to do? Good friggin’ question. I guess the first thing would be to get these Neo Cons out of office. They’ve proved beyond a doubt that they are incompetent. Iraq is another Vietnam, and I doubt we will be able to see it through to stability regardless of any of your propositions, but my info comes from the ground there. GWB really got us into it, didn’t he? But let’s be real, GWB is just a face – it’s a whole posse that is in power behind him.
“I didn’t say how FDR handled the Japanese was right. “
You said he got us through WWII and that I was ungrateful for what he did, which includes interring those Japanese Americans.
My point is simply that what you call a “Liberal” from that age is a whole lot different from a liberal today.
“I stand up for what I believe in, even in times of war. I know that’s weird to many of you.”
Not weird at all. In his own strange way George Bush is standing up for what he believes in, as are Al Qaeda, as are apparently you.
So we just established that standing up for what you believe in isn’t much of a measure of anything.
“The bay of pigs very well could have resulted in multiple nuclear strikes on American soil. Would that have been better? Maybe you wouldn’t exist!”
Sure. Kennedy did the right thing facing down the Soviets. FDR did the right thing in facing down the Nazis. The USA is doing the right thing today facing down Islamic Extremists.
Note that I ignore motivation for it: GW’s motivation seems to be because GOD told him to do it. Strangely enough, that’s Osama Bin Ladin’s claim too.
G-Spank;
I see, the ONLY military and naval strategy for the war in Iraq and Afghanistan that you can imagine is to remove some Republicans from office. It’s obvious that you have no military and naval strategy for the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.
You know, your master plan of winning the war removing current office holders might work if Bin Laden was president and the Taliban had a majority in Congress, otherwise I really don’t see how the terrorists are going to capitulate with more Democrats spouting nonsense.
Seriously, without a clear and defensible Democratic strategy to fight terrorism why should anyone vote for a Democrat?
“I really don’t see how the terrorists are going to capitulate with more Democrats spouting nonsense.”
They’ll give up the minute G-Spank and all other Americans convert to Islam.
The solution’s quite simple really, just take a pen to the constitution, cross out that pesky Freedom of Religion clause and write in that the official state religion is Isalam and we’re done.
P.S If that happens, the government will find out why the second amendment’s there. My wife will be reaching for her rifle before she ever puts on a veil.
1. Don’t support the Republican administration in any way form or fashion, this makes you look like a warmonger.
2. Don’t vote against spending for the war either, this makes you look like a gutless coward. This may also make you look like a hypocrite, but that’s OK. The Democratic Party supports hypocrisy, it is just fearful of being called cowardly.
3. When anyone asks, “How will you fight terrorism?” look them straight in the eyes and say, “Not like now!” or “Better!” or “Different!” Stupid, ambiguous, and ridiculous answers often baffle or daze the questioner and they will walk away.
4. Pontificate loudly your opposition to current actions, this give the appearance of moral authority. The louder you speak, the more moral authority people may think you have.
5. Criticize vigorously your opponent’s efforts, this gives the illusion that you actually have an alternate or better strategy when you don’t.
6. When you eventually do have a strategy on paper that comes under criticism say, “That was last week’s plan, we have a better one today somewhere, and an even better one next month.” Always promise something better even if you haven’t a clue what the hell your talking about. Keep ‘em guessing! Confuse them. Make them feel stupid. This is the Kerry strategy and it would have worked if the election were not stolen by the secret Republican cabal.
7. Always, always, always repeat this mantra. Learn it, memorize it, teach it to your children.
Seriously, without a clear and defensible Democratic strategy to fight terrorism why should anyone vote for a Democrat?
Ok, Bush totally screws up and puts this country in effectively a no-win situation in Iraq. Since the situation he put us in is so screwed up, using your logic it means we must keep with his plan? That makes no sense.
It’s like having a retarded kid trying to put a puzzle together. There’s a normal person that is saying “let me try”, but you won’t let them, because you don’t hear any definite plan from the normal kid.
Anyway, I gotta go to the beach and forget about this stuff. Have a good Labor Day.
Gstank,
Bush has not screwed anything up. You are the retarded kid. Get a clue you bastard.
8. Go to the beach.
9. Forget about it.
G-Spank, you are correct, we “don’t hear any definite plan” from Democrats.
This means one of four things about Democrats:
1. Democrats have no plan, thus you are unprepared to lead
2. Democrats can’t think of a plan, thus you are too stupid to lead.
3. Democrats are unwilling to plan, thus have no moral authority to lead.
4. Democrats actually approve of the current plan, but just won’t admit it, thus are simply hypocritical and cynical.
“You are the retarded kid. Get a clue”
There’s nothing wrong with being young and idealistic provided it’s a step on the way to being older and realistic.
G-Spank: “Ok, Bush totally screws up and puts this country in effectively a no-win situation in Iraq.”
G-Spank – we won that war – Saddam gone, sons dead, democratic govt. installed, no worries of the country of Saddam Iraq terrorizing its neighbors.
We won G-Spank.
(Plus we have troops on both sides of Iran. Don´t think that causes heartburn for your nuke Israel Mullah buddies?
It´s your friends the “Islam is a religion of peace”) Muslims that have problems not killing each other in Iraq.
In Iraq Muslims are killing Muslims.
They sure as heck aren´t fighting the coalition forces over there. Other than the ones the coalition troops go after.
P.S. Today they captured the #2 Al-Queda guy in Iraq. I know, Sad news for you G-Spank. What´s Al-Queda doing in Iraq? Killing Muslims.
What´s Al-Queda´s goal in Iraq- turing Iraq into Talibahn 2.
Good news, right G-spank?
I am still waiting for any Democrat to offer a solution to the Muslims killing Muslims in Iraq problem.
“Democrat to offer a solution to the Muslims killing Muslims in Iraq problem.”
The traditional solution seems to be:
1. Pick your favorite Muslims
2. Give them weapons.