So the glorious Air America is off to a nice start. I managed to listen to the first few minutes of Al Franken‘s first broadcast before Real Player crapped out (I guess the servers weren’t quite up for the initial rush), and have so far only heard bits of various shows. For some reason it seems like I mostly hear Randi Rhodes whenever I tune in, and usually she’s griping about the same stuff over and over again. I mean, she’s a really good griper and all, but I’d like to hear a little more variation in the griping.

I’m not that happy with the schedule since I’m 6 hours ahead of New York which means that The O’Franken Factor is splattered right across my early evening, the time of day when I’m busy with giving children dinner and baths and putting them to bed, but what the heck. I’m just totally jazzed to hear talk radio that is actually critical of the Bush-Cheney Axis of Fascism for a change.

Today is the first broadcast day for Air America, a new radio network with a radical concept: Instead of loudmouth right-wingers commanding the airwaves, let’s showcase some loudmouth leftists! I can only welcome this. They only have a few broadcast stations now, but there will be a live internet feed as well, which means even us overseas people will be able to listen to the likes of Al Franken and Janeane Garafalo skewering the Bush administration, etc.

Hooray!

It looks like some congressmen are taking seriously the threat to American democracy that is posed by non-voter-verifiable electronic voting machines! The Verified Voting campaign backs a bill, soon coming up before congress, that will require electronic voting machines to be retrofitted with a voter-verifiable paper system by November of this year! Now might be a good time to go there, and write or call your congressman to promote this important legislation!

The Swedish word slut simply means “end” in English. This means that you see this word everywhere: Ends of movies, ends of stories, etc.

My fortune on orkut today:

You have an unusal equipment for success, use it propery.

I wrote a while ago about the problems inherent in the various electronic voting systems being implemented throughout America. One of the main problems is the lack of a printed record, which would allow people to see and verifty that their vote was counted correctly, as well as allow for recounts in case of close results.

Manufacturers like Diebold have been strangely reluctant to include vote-printing options in their machines. At first they claimed technical incompetence (apparently, attaching a printer to a computer is a daunting task for Diebold), and then when they finally conceded that this technical miracle was possible, they put exorbitant prices on the printer add-ons.

Now comes the big surprise: As Robert X. Cringely describes in his column, the Diebold machines already have printers! The internal printers are required by law for end-of-day vote tallies at least. Modifying the systems to create user-verifiable printed records would require simple changes to the software, and minor enhancements to the computers’ casings to allow the printed receipts to be seen.

Fortunately for Diebold, the major media are still ignoring this story. Blah.

This is perhaps not a “word” in some sense, but rather a proper name of a store I’ve seen in Stockholm and an associated brand. I propose that the word “pukeberg” in English should be used to described the splatters of frozen vomit that can often be found on sidewalks near nightclub entrances in cold climates (e.g. Sweden).

Although it seems like the name of a device to help prevent you from passing gas, a farthinder is actually what we call a speed bump in English.

Not particularly new, but this hilarious audio cut-up of America’s greatest gas-bag has him hurling his venom at himself for a change. Incredibly funny for Limbaugh haters and lovers alike. I bet Rush would even like it himself, especially when he’s all hopped-up on goofballs.

Today’s funny Swedish word is fart. This means “movement” or “speed”. Fortunately for English-based humorists, this is used to build lots and lots of compound words seen in road signs, shop windows, etc. Stay tuned.