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From Yahoo News: Clinton lends herself $6.4M as Obama’s lead grows

Obama was 184.5 delegates shy of the 2,025 needed to secure the Democratic nomination, his campaign finally steadying after missteps fiercely exploited by the never-say-die Clinton.

I was a little puzzled by this half a delegate thing.  It turns this “brilliant” idea is a way of allowing more people to attend the convention without increasing the number of votes.  This is done primarily for U.S. Territories and the group Democrats Abroad.

It’s another strange quirk in the Democratic Primary process that’s really only come to light now that every vote is important.

From the Huffington Post: Clinton Adds a Half Delegate

The Democrats Abroad, a group sanctioned by the national party, has confounded delegate counters, graphic artists and political journalists since it awarded Clinton 1.5 delegates from its global primary last week. How do you explain that Clinton has 1,276.5 delegates?

Explain no more. Clinton picked up a half superdelegate on Wednesday, increasing her overall total to 1,277.

The anomaly happened because the Democrats Abroad will send 22 delegates to the Democratic National Convention, each with a half vote. The system is designed to enable the group to send more people to the convention, without inflating its voting power.

UPDATE: The DNC is going to seat all Michigan and Florida delegates but they only get half a vote.  So, if a Michigan superdelegate endorses a candidate, it’s only worth half.

The Flying Pig Marathon in Cincinnati was this past Sunday.  I didn’t run, but I did make it out to cheer my sister who was running the half marathon.

Runners heading up Gilbert, away from Downtown.  Taken with my iPhone.

UPDATE: I just saw this story and I can’t believe it happened!
From Cincinnati.com: Pig goes off-road: Leaders led astray in half marathon

The confusion prevented last year’s winner, T.J. Lentz, from having a chance to defend his title. Lentz was in second place when he followed his bicycle guide straight through the intersection at Gilbert Avenue and Elsinore Place in Mount Adams, near mile 11 of the 13.1-mile race. The course, however, turned to the right at Elsinore Place.

The picture above was actually at the intersection that the bicycle guide missed.  He continued down this rode instead of turning right and heading down Reading.  I must have just missed it because I saw the leader go by as I was walking up Reading towards Gilbert.

Greiwe was running in third place when he approached Gilbert and Elsinore. He and his cyclist attempted to turn correctly onto Elsinore, but a police officer there directed them and the two runners behind Greiwe to go straight on Gilbert.

“We ran all the way to Plum Street, and I realized I was well off the course,” Greiwe said. “I turned to him and said, ‘Can you just get me to the finish line?’ “

And that’s how Greiwe – after running down Vine Street and through traffic on Third Street – found himself scaling a fence behind the finish line Sunday, hustling his way to a fourth-place finish while running through the finish line in reverse. The fifth-place runner, Jeffrey Hicks was running in the correct direction at the same time.

So, do you actually get credit for coming in third if you’ve gotten off the course, scaled a fence, and crossed the finish line in reverse?

The iPhone is a phone of firsts for me.  It’s the first phone that I’ve used to usefully surf the web, the first phone to watch movies with, and the first phone where I actually enjoy using the camera.

My iPhone is always on me, the picture quality is good, and you don’t have to click through a ton of menus to get to the camera function. Last week, I posted a few pictures that I had taken of some Spring flowers in Cincinnati. Greg Schmigel of Annapolis made a nice comment on them and asked me to check out his website, justwhatisee.com.

All I can say is wow!

Greg is a talented photographer, and the fact that he does it all with his iPhone is even more amazing.  The iPhone is a true camera bringing both strengths and weaknesses.  But like any tool in the hands of an artist, beautiful things can be made.

I’ve been interested in featuring unique websites like Greg’s and he was kind enough to answer a few questions that I had about his iPhone photography.  I’ve interspersed a selection of Greg’s photos with his answers.

All photos copyright Greg Schmigel.  Used with permission.

Website Feature: just what i see: iPhone photography

Q. What’s your background?  Are you a professional photographer?

I consider myself an amateur, and I like to keep it that way.  It gives me the desire to continually shoot better and more creative shots.   I’m self taught, in the traditional sense.  I finished college at the University of Maryland with a degree in Radio, Television and Film.

Q. What got you started taking iPhone photos?

I used to shoot with a Canon 40 D and a pocket-sized Leica D Lux-3, but since I purchased my iPhone, the big guys have been collecting a bit of dust.  As you can see from some of my photographs, I love to shoot street photography.  The iPhone, because of it’s size and discretion, gives me so many more opportunities to capture interesting moments that I might miss with a big rig.

Q. How many photos do you think you’ve taken with the iPhone?

I haven’t counted them all, and there are times when I scroll through old albums in iPhoto and I don’t even remember shooting the picture.  Honestly, I would say I have shot a few thousand, maybe 3,000.  I’m on my second iPhone…thank god for warranties!

Q. When you take pictures of people do they know what you’re doing?  Your candid photos of people are great!

Sometimes they do.  If I want to try and get a portrait-style shot, I will ask them.   They are usually so intrigued by the iPhone that they forget that I am actually snapping their image. 

But, most of the time, my shots are unannounced.  I love to capture the raw and candid imagery of people on the street.

Q. What’s your favorite thing to take pictures of?

If you visit my site, you will see that I am a city lover.  I can spend hours shooting just about anything you would find in the city.  People, signage, graffiti, found objects…just about anything except myself.

Q. Any hints for taking good iPhone pictures?

Always keep your iPhone camera feature on…always keep a wall charger in your pocket.  Just capture what you find interesting.  I’m not much for special lighting or special gear.  I just like to capture what I see, and share it with the world.

Q. How well do the pictures print out?

The iPhone is a 2MP camera, so you can actually get a nice 4X6 or 5X7 print out of it. 
That’s usually the first question gallery owners will ask.  “Well, how do you plan to present your images?”  They can look great in an oversized mattes.

Q. Any Pet Peeves about the iPhone camera?

The battery life.  Constant shooting on will last me a few hours, if I stay away from checking my e-mail.  Oh, and if I stay away from making calls.  Did I mention the iPhone makes phone calls, too? 

Q. What improvements would you like to see in future iPhone cameras?

Hopefully  Apple will move to more megapixels.  Maybe a 3, at the least.  But other than that, I am happy with it.  It’s kind of like shooting with an old plastic point and shoot.  The camera itself doesn’t have a ton of features.  The camera doesn’t “make” the shot…it leaves it up to the shooter to get more creative and find the shot.

From NYTimes.com: Clinton Spurns “Elite” Economists on Gas Tax

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Sunday dismissed the “elite opinion” of economists who criticized her gas tax proposal, using a term that has dogged rival Barack Obama in recent weeks.

“I’m not going to put my lot in with economists,” Clinton said when asked to name an economist who backed her proposal.

Hillary is using the tried and true Bush tactic of ignoring and labeling people that disagree with you.  Bush calls you “unpatriotic”.  Hillary calls you “elitist”.

Unfortunately, there are no quick fixes for the economy, no matter what a politician promisies you.

From AP.com: ALL BUSINESS: Don’t count on gas tax cut lowering prices

That’s because the idea proposed by presidential candidates John McCain and Hillary Clinton to ease the federal gas tax would strip the U.S. government of about $10 billion for roadway and transportation projects.

And the plan doesn’t even guarantee that lower taxes will lead to lower gas prices. Just the opposite might happen if the tax holiday spurs more demand for gas at a time when supply is already constricted.

The gas tax is fixed at 18.4 cents/gallon.  We can cut this 18.4 cents and the next week the price could rise 18.4 cents and we’d be back in the same place and then we’d be short 10 billion to fix roads.  I mean gas has risen over 30 cents in the last couple of weeks

We’d all like to see cheaper gas, but a gas tax holiday doesn’t solve the fundamental problems we have and is just a political ploy.  The gas tax pays to repair our crumbling infrastructure and actually employees people in the road construction industry.

From AHN: Former Model Angie Everhart Arrested For DUI

Getting arrested for DUI is not terribly unusual for celebrities, but it turns out that there’s a little more to this story.  It turns out that Angie Everhart, the 38 year old former SI Swimsuit Model, was recently dumped by Joe Pesci.  Yeah, Joe Pesci.  It seems that he ended their nine month old engagement and has moved on to another girl.  The only good news for Angie is that this probably as low as you can possibly go.  It’s all up from here!

From NYTimes.com: Blu-ray: The Future Has Been Delayed

The end of the format wars clearly did little to boost Blu-ray’s prospects. Like others, Mr. Rubin said the much cheaper upconverting standard DVD players are winning consumers’ hearts and wallets.

Sony may have assumed with HD DVD dying that it had won the format war.  But, what Sony needs to realize is that the war isn’t over yet.  Now, it’s a battle against upconverted DVDs, Internet downloads, Cable and Satellite TV.  If they were smart, they’d aggressively push down the cost of the Blu-ray players to get as many customers to adopt this format as quickly and make money on movie sales later.  Right now, customers are just waiting and in the meanwhile trying the other alternatives.

I found out recently that the Xbox 360 upconverts DVD’s and while not HD quality, it’s still acceptable to watch. 

I noticed in the post The Truth About the Spinning Dancer, the animated GIF of the dancer spins significantly slower in Safari 3.1.1 vs. Firefox 2.0.14 running Mac OSX 10.5.2.  This is with a fresh launch of each program and only the page showing.  At first I thought it was the computer that I use at work, the original MacPro 2.0 Dual G5, but it’s the same on my home computer a MacPro Intel Quad Core.

CPU usage is actually about 30% more for Safari vs. Firefox while the animation seems to be about six times faster for Firefox.

Scrolling the image off of the screen reduced CPU usage by 50% in Firefox.  While in Safari, scrolling the image off screen reduced CPU usage to nearly zero.

From WashingtonPost.com: When the Cat’s Away, Neurosis Is on Display

One of Walsh’s occasional readers is Davis, who heard about the site a few months ago. The cartoonist calls the work “an inspired thing to do” and wishes to thank Walsh for enabling him to see another side of “Garfield.”

Garfield Minus Garfield is one of my favorite daily reads!