Mitt Romney - Mormon Scientologist?

Here's what not to do when you're a Mormon running for president, trying to convince a skeptical public that you're religion isn't wacky...

Say that Battlefield Earth, written by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, is one of your favorite novels.

I don't necessarily care if a presidential candidate likes crappy science fiction books written by a leader of a religion or a cult, depending on your perspective...

But the fact that he thought this was a good thing to say in the middle of a presidential campaign speaks volumes about his political judgment.

As a Democrat, I whole-heartedly support Romney's bid for the Republican nomination. He's the surest loser for the Repbulicans in the general election.

Sansa Express - My best MP3 player yet

Last year, I posted a detailed history of MP3 players I have owned. If you really care, you can click here.

Long story short, I have no need for mass storage devices like iPods anymore... a gig or so will do me just fine. So last year I ended up buying a cheap no-name flash drive/MP3 player.

It was pretty much exactly what I needed... direct USB hook up, drag and drop from any computer, anywhere in the world, and inexpensive due to the lack of frills.

I bought it for $45, on ebay, including shipping. It worked great, of course, until it broke a couple months ago.

So now I got the Sansa Express.



This is the very first name brand MP3 player that has everything I want. A 1 GB flash drive, drag and drop... you can sync it with Windows Media Player if you want, but I prefer drag and drop... Direct USB hook up.

It also has a slot for a 2 GB Micro SD card... I haven't used this yet, but it's a great idea. The cards cost like $20... I might eventually even get more than one card and keep different music on different cards.

It's essentially a first generation iPod Shuffle, with a screen, without dependenceon iTunes, with expandable memory, and for about $20 less than the Shuffle cost at the time.

I got it for $60 at Best Buy, and I went ahead and got the 2 year Best Buy warranty for 8 bucks... I usually don't do the extended warranty thing but for 8 bucks this one seemed worth it.

The thing is sleek (nice looking screen) sturdy and seemingly very well made, as one would expect with a Sansa. I doubt I'll ever need to cash in my 2 year warranty anyway.

Thank you, Sansa, for finally delivering exactly what I want in an MP3 player.