Here’s an awesome rabbit hole for all you nerds: the Princeton University online lecture series. From discussions on the writings of Jane Austen and the presidency of John Adams to racial injustice in America and the art and science of the motorcycle, this site is full of material that will get you thinking.

What should be the standard for pursuing an impeachment article? Should Congress tie up Dennis Kucinich’s Article of Impeachment because it could affect the economy negatively, waste a great deal of time and money and create even more division between the major two parties? Or should Congress pursue impeachment regardless of the consequences if there appears to be enough evidence to formally make a charge that President George W. Bush has committed treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors?

Tuesday the House of Representatives voted 238 to 180, with nine Republicans voting ‘yea’, to send Congressman Kucinich’s Article of Impeachment to a Judiciary Committee hearing. This ‘introduction‘ isn’t quite the first step to removing the leader of the United States from office (this article may never make it out of committee), but it’s close and it’s certainly something that deserves to be on the front page of every newspaper in the country. Yet, for some reason, it isn’t.

Well, that didn’t take long. The folks over at Gizmodo have already set free the new iPhone 3G. This occurs seemingly just a few hours after some new owners actually got their iPhone’s activated. I’m not sure if this is a comment on the hacking skills of the folks at Gizmodo, the security Apple placed on the new iPhone, or a combination of the two.

I was one of the masses of people that had to have it the day it was released. I couldn’t help myself. It’s gadget porn at its best.

The Line

I ventured out to my local Apple store at 8am. I might have been there earlier had I not needed to drop my kids at their summer programs. For some reason, I was thinking the line would not be terribly long. I mistakenly thought that the demand would not be as high as the first iPhone. Wrong!

As I walked past the Apple store, the line snaked around the building and down a breezeway. I kept walking and walking to find the end. About 500 people later, I entered the line. Within minutes there was another 100 people in line behind me.

The guy right in front of me said he had just come from an AT&T store, but they only had 40 in stock and quickly sent everyone else away. I have a feeling Apple, rightfully, reserved the majority of iPhones for themselves. Way to stick it them Steve Jobs. In turn, they are sticking it to customers by charging us for texting now.

Some of the people that got in line around Arbor Day were leaving with their iPhones. One guy, walked all the way down the line holding his new iPhone 3G over his head. I can only guess that he had no idea how close he was to getting smacked. That’s practically taunting. But then again, he probably slept in his close on the curb in front of the Apple Store last night, so he can have his moment of happiness.

An hour later, the line had progressed but I was still not close enough to see the actual store. It would be quite some time before I was that close. Apple Store employees were working the line with a cooler full of SmartWater, which they were giving away for free to anyone in line. Nice move. They were also checking to make sure you had everything ready for the purchase: credit card, social security number, photo ID, etc.

Two hours later I was finally close enough to actually see the front of the Apple store. That was at least something. It made me feel like I was close, even though there were still a good 200 people in front of me. Conversation was mostly about the phone: does it cut and paste? No. Can you delete more than one email at a time now? Yes. Does it make you look sexier? Absolutely.

People were being escorted in the door in groups of 15-20. What was interesting, is that as the group was let in, all the Apple employees would cheer to welcome them into the store. Then, as people got their phone’s activated, they’d high five you as you walked out the door.

That was before the system went down.

Around 10:15am, the line stood still for almost 1 hour with no one being let in and no one coming out. No cheering, no high fiving. Around 11, they finally told us it was because the system was down. The Apple store must have been running Vista for the iPhone 3G launch.

Whereas before there was a small bulk of Apple Store employees working the line, they were all gone now. I think they were sensing frustration by us in line, so they hid inside. They didn’t come back out until after the system was booting back up. They probably didn’t want people to leave the line, so better not tell us until afterward that the system was overloaded.

That’s what happens when you are selling 500,000 new iPhones on launch day, offering a massive software update for the original iPhone, and the iTouch… and handling it all through iTunes — the uber Apple software product. Apple’s own little version of windows. You need to have the current version of iTunes to do anything.

The Apple Store employees told us it had to do with the West coast. With the time diffenrence, the Apple Store out west were opening and all those people were also trying to activate and upgrade. Smooth move, blame it “on the west.”

After awhile, the system must have come back up, because people were leaving with iPhones and more groups were being let in.

In the Store

Finally, a little after 12noon, I was in the store… in another line. Luckily this one was much shorter, about 8 people, but I kinda had it with lines at that point. But here’s my beef. There was no cheering for us. They cheered for the early groups, but not for us. I think even for them, the day was getting long.

A nice lady in an orange Apple shirt walked up to us and showed us a demo iPhone 3G and said, “You can play with it if you want.” I replied by saying, “Thanks, but I’ve been in line for almost 5 hours; I want to play with my own iPhone now.”

Gadget Porn

So now it was my turn. An Apple employee - a personal shopper - walked up and introduced himself. “Let’s get an iPhone in your hands,” he said.

I have to admit, they had been at it all day, dealing with a never ending line of customer, some of them probably frustrated at the wait in line and the system down time. Yes, they were no long cheering as people walked in, yet every employee inside the Apple Store seemed as happy and energetic as could be. Maybe the Apple Store employee are on the juice, Jose Conseco-style.

I picked out the version I wanted — 16GB, black — added in MobileMe subsciption and the purchase was done. It was quick and simple. Then I was handed off to another station to activate my new phone.

Surprise, the system was still down. The activation of the iPhone is nothing more than plugging it into iTunes. They were just doing it in-store before you could leave. So they attempted to do it once, and if it didn’t work, they sent you out the door and told you to do it at home.

So Apple sort of lied to us. They can be activated at home after all. Apple is sort of like President Bill Clinton — the more they lie to us, the more we love them. It’s some sort of masochistic relationship we have with them.

So, around 1:15, I was heading home an unactivated iPhone 3G.

iPhone Activation

What’s an iPhone that isn’t activated? A $299 brick. Until it’s activated, you can’t even use it as an iPod. So when I got home I plugged it into iTunes and… nothing. 10 minutes later, nothing. 10 minutes after that, nothing.

Anticipation turns into frustration as I contemplate the thought of having an iPhone that would be nothing more than a paperweight until the next day. Then, suddenly around 3:30PM, iTunes woke up and activated my iPhone.

Cherubs sang and rays of light bathed my weary soul from the skies above. I was now holding an actual working iPhone 3G. I could call people, txt and stuff. All things I could do from my old phone, actually, but this was cooler because Steve Jobs told us it’s cooler.

Up next… my review of the iPhone.

In 1971, Funkadelic released an album entitled Maggot Brain. Sadly, until yesterday, I’d never heard the title track and couldn’t have identified Eddie Hazel on a guitar legends poster. Today, I’m certain that Maggot Brain, put to tape in a single take, contains one of the greatest, most emotional guitar solos ever recorded.

What’s worse: the fact that a dubitably relevant Jesse Jackson recently said he wants to remove Senator Barack Obama’s genitals, that Jackson suggested the Democratic nominee is talking down to black people, or that he quickly backpedaled and meekly joined the media in the ongoing Great American Talkdown? Undoubtedly, it’s the last of these three.

Already a questionably relevant and relatively sinuous narcissist, Jackson had an opportunity to engage the American people and the media in a true discussion about Obama’s position on faith-based initiatives and the framing of his message to the community. Instead of addressing this matter openly, he weakly whispered his disagreement ‘off mic’ and, once another of his ignorant statements was brought to light, he failed to take the opportunity to do any leading.

If Obama is, in fact, talking down to black people by oversimplifying complex cultural phenomena (a matter of much debate; in fact, Michael Eric Dyson wrote an entire book on this idea following Bill Cosby’s much-televised personal responsibility comments), then the ridiculous way in which the idea was brought to the forefront should not overshadow the issue at hand. Yet Jackson has allowed his brutish murmurings to obfuscate a potentially relevant discussion, thereby continuing (assuming it began at some point) to patronize the community and enabling the media to do the same.

How so? Isn’t the suggestion that Jackson’s comments could hurt Obama’s campaign indicative of a belief that the American people, in general, and African-Americans, in particular, need to be talked down to? Certainly, the portion of Jackson’s comment regarding removing Senator Obama’s genitalia wouldn’t negatively affect Obama’s presidential campaign. Thus, the media is suggesting that Jackson’s talking down to black people comment could negatively affect Obama’s campaign. But isn’t the very asking of this question implying that people can not distinguish a single criticism (legitimate or otherwise) from complete disavowal, thereby suggesting that people’s inability to think critically requires they be talked down to if one wants to avoid negatively affecting an entire campaign via one whispered, critical remark?

What’s worse is that Jackson has further enhanced his history of waffling by joining this apparent Great American Talk Down. By saying that his support of Obama is “unequivocal”, Jackson is suggesting that he is either a hypocrite or that he too thinks the people can not distinguish criticism from dismissal. And yet, in the same breath, Jackson says that Obama’s emphasis must go beyond a message of personal responsibility and into one that “must address the structural crisis in America”.

Maybe this is yet another poor choice of words on Jackson’s part. It’s possible that he is merely a staunch, not unequivocal, supporter of Obama despite his criticism of the faith-based initiatives message. If this is the case, however, he needs to stop carrying the unequivocal support flag and actually become the leader the media has mistakenly claimed he’s been for years. This means calling Obama on the carpet when the mics are openly on and the cameras rolling.

Whether it be on Obama’s FISA stance or his faith-based initiatives discussion, Jackson, or some other more relevant leader, and the American people need to question all our leaders and understand that just as we can criticize the government and love our country, we can criticize potential presidential candidates and still support their candidacy.

I’m wondering why the U.S. is suddenly so interested in Zimbabwe when we had very little interest in Rwanda and Darfur, and have even less interest in Equatorial Guinea.

I’m wondering what the impact will be of Google and Yahoo adding search capabilities that enable users to look inside Flash files.

I’m wondering if Barack Obama’s suggested expansion of George Bush’s faith-based programs is about appealing to Christians come November, understanding that churches are better positioned to serve communities, or a bit of both.

I’m wondering why the number of stories about photographers being harassed by security guards and police officers continues to rise.

I’m wondering where Elton Brand and Baron Davis will end up now that they’ve opted out of their current NBA contracts.

This weekend I traveled up to Cleveland with my 8-year old son to see a Cleveland Indians game. While sitting there watching the Tribe get trounced by the Reds, I wondered if there will come a day when ballpark seats will need to be made 8-inches wider. I couldn’t help but notice how many people there were not just over-weight, but grossly so.

At what point will we stop encouraging people to loose weight overall and just start making everything bigger?

I will say though, that the irony was not lost on me seeing some rather obese women wearing Indians jersey’s that said “SIZEMORE” on the back.

Doubting the effectiveness of abstinence-only education, many states are rejecting the program that the Bush administration claims slows teen sexual activity. Not only is participation down 40 percent over two years, recent studies show that abstinence-only program participants have as many sexual partners as nonparticipants.

Wouldn’t a critical-thinking Congress see dwindling participation, lack of empirical evidence of any type of success, and studies demonstrating an actual lack of effectiveness as signals to not only reduce abstinence-only funding, but to abolish the entire program in favor of more comprehensive sex education? Or is Congress too focused on appearing to obey alleged Biblical teachings that it can’t wrap its collective minds around reality?

The Chinese government has fired twelve officials for dereliction of duty and misuse of supplies following the May Sichuan earthquake. How many United States government officials were sacked after their disastrous handling of Hurricane Katrina, a much smaller natural phenomenon?