What Caught My Eye Today

2012 U.S. Presidential Election (Part I) - I'm fully convinced that when it comes to the race for the White House it is always silly season. Republican Michele Bachmann officially launched her White House bid, casting herself as hard-charging conservative capable of carrying the party into the 2012 election over a crowded field of GOP rivals Crowded? I suppose that's one way to describe it. More on that in a minute. Bachmann steered clear of specific proposals she'd advance as president. She's staunchly conservative on social issues, calling for more abortion restrictions and constitutional amendments to ban gay marriage. Both of which I'm confident will, no doubt, improve the economy and, I daresay, go a long way toward achieving world peace.

2012 U.S. Presidential Election (Part II) - Okay, so about that field of presidential candidates. As of now, we have 13 contenders for the Republican nomination and two for the Democratic nomination. Your GOP contenders include:

• Michele Bachmann, U.S. Representative from Minnesota
• Herman Cain, former Federal Reserve banker and businessman from Georgia
• Newt Gingrich, former U.S. Speaker of the House of Representatives from Georgia
• Jon Huntsman, Jr., former U.S. Ambassador to China and former Governor governor of Utah
  Dude's last assignment was U.S. Ambassador to China courtesy of the current President
• Gary Johnson former Governor of New Mexico
• Fred Karger, political consultant and gay rights activist from California Who besides me wants to see this guy in a debate with Michelle Bachmann?
• Andy Martin, perennial candidate from Illinois
  What exactly does it mean to be a perennial candidate? Sounds suspiciously like perennial loser to me
• Jimmy McMillan, perennial candidate from New York
• Ron Paul, U.S. Representative from Texas
• Tim Pawlenty, former Governor of Minnesota
• Mitt Romney, former Governor of Massachusetts
• Rick Santorum, former Senator from Pennsylvania
• Jonathon Sharkey, perennial candidate from Florida

As you might expect, the list of Democratic contenders is a bit smaller

• Barack Obama, incumbent President of the United States from Illinois
• Randall Terry, pro-life activist from New York
  Good luck there, sparkplug

Computer Hacking - I'm actually reading a pretty good book in this topic, so naturally my interest was piqued when I saw this story. Members of the shadowy but media-savvy hacking collective Lulz Security, or LulzSec, announced their group's dissolution in a Twitter message to 280,000 followers. In their 50 days of activity, the publicity-seeking group had successfully hacked the websites of the CIA, the U.S. Senate, Britain's Serious Organized Crime Agency, Sony, PBS, and other high-profile targets. Among the theories for why LulzSec has suddenly and mysteriously disappeared: The law was closing in; they were just bored; they picked disastrous fights with rival hacker groups; and they had run out of ideas. I'm a bit perplexed on several fronts. Can someone please tell me what sort of world we live in where illicit activity is bragged about on Twitter (to hundreds of thousands of followers no less), where hacking has apparently become some sort of sport akin to tagging public property, where despite having 280,000 followers on Twitter, these guys has still managed to elude law enforcement, and where the only thing that seemed to work to stop this hacking, was lack of continued interest by said perpetrators?

Motor Sports - I've neglected Formula One for far, far too long. In an attempt to remedy this, I bring you this history making story. All 24 starters made it to the chequered flag in Valencia last weekend, only the fourth time in F1 history that the entire starting field has made it to the finish and the first time ever that a driver finished 24th while running. The irony here is that some drivers are complaining that the improved reliability in the cars is making the racing less interesting. Personally, I have no problem will every car entered in a race making it to the finish. If you want to complain about the racing, how about the fact that Formula One races are basically won in qualifying. For those of you who don't follow this racing series, one guy has won 6 of 8 races this season and come in second in the other two. And boyfriend started in the first row in every single race. Where is the drama in that? In fairness, you have to tip your cap to Sebastian Vettel. What this guy is doing is none short of amazing.

Soccer - The 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup got underway yesterday in host nation Germany. To wit, I give you my "take it to the bank" picks for advancing from group play.

• Group A: Canada, France, Germany, Nigeria
  Emerging from what is arguably the toughest group, I'm taking Germany and France.
• Group B: England, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand
  Gimme England and Japan
• Group C: Colombia, North Korea, Sweden, United States
  Gotta go with Sweden and the Stars and Stripes.
• Group D: Australia, Brazil, Equatorial Guinea, Norway
  My head tells me to go with Equatorial Guinea, but my heart has me going with Brazil and Norway.