Today is the day Google Reader officially dies

I never used Google Reader much, relying instead on add-ons to get the job done  or just bookmarking the feeds directly. However, by coincidence my RSS reader of choice  — Sage for Firefox — also quit working after the latest Firefox upgrade. I switched to Bamboo Feed Reader and that seems to work pretty well — I haven’t had any complaints, other than slowing up the startup of Firefox a bit (although that could be a result of the latest version of Firefox — wouldn’t be the first time a new version came with a drop in performance).

No matter what you eventually do, you probably want to head over to Google Reader while you still can and export your OPML file. This will make it much easier to make the switch to a new reader. Otherwise, you’ll have to add your feeds one by one to your new reader. If you list is massive (like mine) that could be a time-consuming and tedious task.

And of course, I can’t talk about RSS without bringing up the Progressive News Must-Read Superfeed. That will get you quite a few good sources in one feed, which is a real timesaver.

[photo via Wikimedia Commons]

Stories to Watch: 2/29/12

Kind of dreary around here. Of course, about a third of the nation is under one huge storm cloud. Seriously, look at the map. Now here's the news...


Rick Santorum's Google problem becomes less of a problem.


The unfortunate Rep. Steve King of Iowa isn't a big fan of Griswold v. Connecticut. States have the right to ban contraceptives -- because that's some sort of massive blow for freedom. Or something. The guy never makes any damned sense to me.


An Illinois congressional candidate is a neo-nazi who believes the Holocaust never happened. Naturally, Art Jones is running as a Republican.


There are mosques everywhere -- run!


Contrary to what you might have heard, Mitt Romney does have at least one rightwing nutjob supporter.


Rush Limbaugh is a jackass. No wonder even Republicans hate him.


Here's a fun game: Rick Santorum or Ayatollah Khamenei?


In delegate math, Mitt Romney's narrow win of Santorum may be a tie. Also at that link, "roughly 10%" of the primary voters were Democrats and Santorum "won the most liberal and most conservative voting blocs in the state, while Romney had the edge with everyone else." Sounds like Operation Hilarity impacted in a big way and Rick's numbers are artificially inflated by mischief. Almost pulled it off guys and you still gave Mittens a black eye. Helluva job.


Finally, a big win for Obama's foreign policy in North Korea.

Related articles

• Mitt Romney Edges Out Rick Santorum In Michigan, Admits His Wealthy Image Hurts His Campaign (perezhilton.com)
• Mitt Romney spent $4.3 million to split Michigan's delegates with Rick Santorum (dailykos.com)
• Santorum Campaign: Michigan Primary Is A Tie (mediaite.com)
• US election 2012: Mitt Romney accuses Rick Santorum of 'dirty tricks' (telegraph.co.uk)

Stories to Watch: 2/14/12

Been a hectic few days, but things are finally starting to settle down. At least, I hope so. Now here's the news...


After the birth control controversy, President Obama suffers no backlash from Catholic voters. GOP pander fail.


Mitt Romney's view of the auto bailout veers off into incoherence.


Google recognizes same sex couples with its Valentine's Day doodle and destroys the holiday forever.


After all the brouhaha over Mitt Romney's tax documents, it seems the fact that Santorum hasn't released his has been overlooked.


Obama beats everyone.


Satorum doesn't think anyone should have contraception coverage.


Mittens may not be able to count on Michigan.


Finally, Herman Cain won't appear on Dancing with the Stars. Try to contain your grief.

Related articles

• Inevitability Fading: Poll Numbers Now Show Trouble for Romney in Michigan (swampland.time.com)
• Mitt Romney attacks 'crony capitalism' of Obama's auto bailout (guardian.co.uk)
• US politics live: Rick Santorum's surge threatens Mitt Romney (guardian.co.uk)
• Romney's Offensive Against Santorum Will Be Weak But Well-Funded (huffingtonpost.com)

Stories to Watch: 11/16/11

The Herman Cain fiasco is starting to die down, so I pulled the Google feed for him from the Superfeed. Instead, I've added "Wisconsin Recall," which is now officially under way. I'm also working on a Twitter Newsroom, because Twitter is a great way to catch news for ongoing events like election nights, debates, breaking news, etc. So keep an eye out for that. It should be up as early as tonight. No promises there, though.


Speaking of recall target Gov. Scott Walker, he's unveiled his new jobs plan -- abstinence-only education. And people wonder why we'd want to recall this clown.


In bad news for Walker on the recall front, a new poll shows a majority support it. This is a change from previous polls, which showed the larger percentages opposing a recall, but with most voting against Walker anyway. Confusing, I know, but that's the way they panned out.


Oh, and just how good is twitter for following developing stories? This good.


The Secret Service searched the Occupy DC encampment for a man who's suspected of taking potshots at the White House. Authorities went through "searching for a so-called terrorist who shot at the White House, with no warrant, they went into everybody’s tents," said one protester. While there's no reason why Occupy DCers should be above suspicion in a case like this, anyone should find warrantless searches of personal property disturbing.


And, of course, the search of Occupy DC came up empty. The mentally ill suspect, Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez, was finally arrested at a hotel in Pennsylvania.


On the campaign bus with Herman Cain.


Some Republicans are starting to get the crazy idea that most of their party's presidential candidates are dumber than sacks of doorknobs.


Finally, House Republicans' hearing on a doomed anti-piracy bill was a disgusting, embarrassing sham. "[Google's copyright lawyer] was the only witness invited who opposed the legislation," reports Politico, "causing critics to charge that the hearing was stacked." The Soviets had fairer show trials.

Related articles

• White House Shooting Suspect Arrested (abcnews.go.com)
• Majority Say Walker Should Be Recalled (politicalwire.com)
• Wisconsin's Walker takes on critics as recall effort begins - Reuters (reuters.com)
• Small Business Owner On Why Walker Must Go (npr.org)

Stories to Watch: 10/27/11

Finally got around to trying an alternative to kneading bread dough today. It's pretty easy, kind of like the way you work pizza dough. Takes a while though -- more than two hours. Still, most of that time it's just sitting in a bowl, so -- physically speaking -- it's a lot easier. I've got the dough in the fridge and I'll rise it and bake it tomorrow. We'll see how that goes. Now here's the news...


Google's Politics & Elections Blog has a post up comparing searches for the Occupy movement and the Tea Party. Bottom line; search traffic for Occupy Wall Street is 66% higher than the Tea Party's traffic ever was.


Another interesting trend in search traffic from the Google report: "Despite big leads in polls and search traffic for Occupy Wall Street, it is almost in a dead heat with the Tea Party for the volume of news coverage. Using Advanced Search in Google News we found that between October 7 and last week, Occupy Wall Street only barely bests the Tea Party when we examine the number of news pieces covering each movement: 29,000 to 22,000." While I don't have any doubt that the 'baggers are over-covered, terms like "Tea Party-backed Senator" and "Rep. X, a Tea Party favorite" probably have a lot to do with those numbers. Wait until we have a few "Occupy Wall Street" senators and representatives to talk about and we'll see if those stats change.


Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, perhaps realizing that calling a police riot "a generally peaceful resolution" to the Occupy Oakland protest was absurd bullshit, issues a second statement saying she stands with the 99%. Mitt "The Weathervane" Romney would be proud.


Boehner says he has "great concerns" that the president is overstepping his constitutional authority to deal with student loans and mortgages without congress. But those concerns aren't so great that he'd take Obama to court and risk being proven as wrong as he obviously is.


Mark this as the moment the Rick Perry campaign began to wind down.


Bad news for the GOP; the economy is recovering much faster than expected. Going to have to sabotage that right pronto.


This is censorship taken to a whole other level; North Korea basically exiles citizens working in Libya, so they won't come home and spread tales of revolution and freedom.


Finally, even millionaires want higher taxes on millionaires. In other words, Republicans are "defending" people who don't want to be defended.

Related articles

• Google Data: 'Occupy Wall Street' Now Tops 'Tea Party' In Recent Searches (mediaite.com)
• Occupy Wall Street Beats Tea Party in Searches on Google (mashable.com)
• Occupy Wall Street already has at least as much support as tea party (dailykos.com)
• Why Occupy Wall Street is not just a leftwing Tea Party | Ana Marie Cox (guardian.co.uk)

News Roundup for 8/3/11

Mamma Santorum's special homemade jelly

-Headline of the Day-
"Santorum To Give Out Free Jelly At Ames."

Religious nutbag Rick Santorum plans to play up his downhome folksiness to midwesterners by handing out jelly to Iowans. This strikes me as unwise.

See, Rick's already got a bit of a google problem. If you google up "Santorum," less than family-friendly results come up.

Given the nature of those results and the existence of a certain kind of special jelly that sounds like it's named after Kentucky, one would think that Rick would avoid attaching his name to "jelly" in the google machine. Seriously, it just seems to be going in the entirely wrong direction.

Given this development, I feel confident in making a brash and bold prediction: Rick Santorum will never be president. And he was so close, too. (Talking Points Memo)


-But don't compare them to terrorists!-



Click to embiggen

(Sherffius)


-Bonus HotD-
"O'Reilly Blames Women's Health Care 'Breast Feeding Stuff' For High Unemployment."

It doesn't have to make sense, it's Bill O'Reilly. (ThinkProgress)

Stories to Watch: 7/28/11

Google News keeps changing the URLs to their RSS feeds. It's pissing me off. Stop it, Google. Now here's the news...


The vote on Boehner's debt limit plan has been delayed -- meaning he hasn't got the votes yet. I'm hearing a lot of people saying they don't doubt it'll get through the House, but none of these people bother to explain how, exactly.


In related news, Michele Bachmann demonstrates why she has a reputation for being not so awfully bright.


And par for the course, House Republicans have no backup plan for a scenario where the Senate fails to pass Boehner's plan -- a near certainty, even if he can manage to get his own chamber to clear it.


Apparently, there are two Rick Perrys: one who's for tentherism and one for federalism. They ought to get together and debate each other.


At this point, I'd imagine people on both sides of the aisle wish that Sarah Palin would just shut the hell up.


Rupert's phone-hacking mess just keeps getting worse -- and more appalling.


Seeing that you can't please anyone on the debt limit debate, Mittens Romney is avoiding it altogether. That there's your "courageous leadership."


Finally, if you missed The Daily Show last night, go catch up.

Related articles

• Ari Melber: Media Blows Debt Crisis Coverage With Balance Bias (huffingtonpost.com)
• Romney facing greater scrutiny over silence on Boehner plan (thehill.com)
• Sarah Palin Uses Big Word, Astonishes Nation (slog.thestranger.com)
• Debt Ceiling Drama Rages On And Bachmann Hits Back At Pawlenty: Your Day In Politics (VIDEO) (huffingtonpost.com)

Stories to Watch: 5/14/11

Well, that was fun. The blogs still aren't 100%, but I'm going to go ahead and start using them again anyway. Google says they're restoring lost posts and, at this point, I'm still waiting. If they don't come back, I'll just copy and repost from my Tumblr blog -- which I'm extremely happy to have right now. I'll give it until Sunday night. Now here's the news...


***
Conservative blogger Ann Althouse assumes the obvious -- that the Google Blogger outage was all about her. "You know, I'm beginning to suspect that there's some behind-the-scenes campaign to report my blog as abusive," she wrote. "People who hate/fear the Althouse blog could make a loud noise to Google."

Yeah Ann, you're freakin' terrifying.

Normal people check Blogger Status and the Blogger Help Forum when their blog is acting screwy. I did this right away and, while I wasn't happy with what I learned there, I wasn't left to make up paranoid scenarios to explain my problems.

Abnormal people assume it's a liberal plot and take to the blogosphere to express their outrage and engage in paranoid speculation.


***
Ron Paul, having learned absolutely nothing from the crapstorm his son went through for the same thing, says he wouldn't have voted for the Civil Rights Act.


Even worse, Paul calls for the abolishment of FEMA, saying the emergency agency only exists to bail out people who "do dumb things" -- like live on coasts or areas that may flood. Here's a fun game for Ron Paul: name the disaster-proof area of the United States. Hell, go ahead and name the disaster-proof area of the world. I'll be right here when you come up with an answer. Until then, we can only assume that Ron Paul believes that living on Earth is a "dumb thing" to do. There are times when Ron Paul just seems to be a pleasant, but eccentric, old guy. It pays to be reminded that he's really a jerk.


Obama caves on offshore drilling. Expect gas prices to move down zero points as a result.


London is invaded by parakeets. No, really.


Shirley Sherrod, who you might remember as the victim of a baseless Brietbart smear campaign, is back at the USDA.


Yet another poll shows that Republican voters would rather have someone else than any of the current 2012 presidential candidates.


Finally, could Rep. Tammy Baldwin become the first openly lesbian US Senator? With the retirement of Wisconsin Senator Herb Kohl, there's a chance. Depending on who she's up against and whether the current anti-GOP momentum carries, it could really happen. She'd make a fine choice.

Related articles

• Ron Paul Announces Presidential Run (birdflu666.wordpress.com)
• Ron Paul Would Have Voted Against the Civil Rights Act (themoderatevoice.com)
• Ron Paul. He's Crossed Off My List. Sheesh What A Boob. (fellowshipofminds.wordpress.com)
• Ron Paul Announces His Third Presidential Campaign (laist.com)

Stories to Watch: 2/24/11

Hey, Google has a recipe search now. Pretty cool. Now here's the news...


That didn't take long. The Wisconsin AFL-CIO already has an ad featuring Scott Walker's phone call with "David Koch."


This shows that, far from being the "prank" the media has tried to put it across as, the phone call is a real problem that brings up substantive issues. And it's not going away any time soon.


Rolling Stone reports that the Army tried to pull Jedi mind tricks on Senators. This is bad, bad news and the second scandal among top military brass the magazine has exposed.


Kaddifi still clings to power. It seems to be an ever thinner reed, though. And yeah, I spell that differently every time I write his name.


Coverage of the issues behind Scott Walker's battle with unions is dominated by "Economic nonsense" being "reported as fact," says investigative journalist David Cay Johnston. Long story short, the coverage of the issue has been ridiculously simplistic and way too accepting of Walker's mumbo-jumbo. As a result, it's been all wrong.


Some crazy leftie organization claims the GOP's budget plans are a recipe for economic disaster. Who are these wild-eye commies? Goldman Sachs.


Finally, 22% of Americans believe the healthcare law has already been repealed. 26% don't know for sure. This is actually really bad news for Tea Party types, since it means everyone's tired of the issue and have wandered off.