Obama: No reason to be ‘cocky’

Sen. Barack Obama cautioned supporters Thursday against becoming complacent during the final days leading up to the election, noting he lost the New Hampshire primary despite a lead in the polls.

After debating Sen. John McCain, Sen. Barack Obama says there’s still plenty of campaigning to be done.

“For those of you who are feeling giddy or cocky and think this is all set, I just [have] two words for you: New Hampshire,” the Democratic presidential nominee said during a fundraiser breakfast in New York. “You know I’ve been in these positions before where we were favored and the press starts getting carried away and we end up getting spanked. And so that’s another good lesson that Hillary Clinton taught me.”

About 10 hours after debating Sen. John McCain, Obama urged top campaign contributors at the Metropolitan Club in Manhattan to not be overconfident, despite leading in a number of national polls.

A CNN Poll of Polls calculated Wednesday showed him leading 51 percent to 42 percent.

“We’ve got 19 days,” Obama said. “We’re going to have to work absolutely as hard as we’ve ever worked in our lives in order to just to get to the start of what is going to be a very difficult and very challenging but ultimately a very fulfilling four years where we can get this country back on track.” 

Hours later, Obama spoke to a crowd in Londonberry, New Hampshire, lashing out at McCain’s debate tactics.

“Well, New Hampshire, last night we had a debate. I think you saw a bit of the McCain attack strategy in action,” he said. “But here’s what Sen. McCain doesn’t seem to understand: With the economy in turmoil and the American dream at risk, the American people don’t want to hear politicians attack each other — you want to hear about how we’re going to attack the challenges facing middle-class families each and every day.”

Obama urged McCain to “debate our genuine differences on the issues that matter” rather than making the Arizona senator’s campaign “all about me.”

“The truth is, this campaign is about you. It’s about your jobs. It’s about your health care. It’s about your retirement. It’s about your children’s future,” he added. 

McCain, speaking at an event in Downington, Pennsylvania, on Thursday, touched on his debate performance.

“We had a good debate last night. It was a lot of fun. … I thought I did pretty well,” he said to loud cheers.

McCain reiterated his position for taking America forward as economists say a recession is all but inevitable.

“We can’t spend the next four years waiting for our luck to change … I’ll take us in a new direction,” he said. “Our troubles are getting worse, our enemies watch and we have to fight, and that’s what I’ll do for you … I’m not afraid of the fight, I’m ready for it.”

McCain also urged voters there to help him win Pennsylvania — a state where a CNN Poll of Polls shows Obama leading his counterpart 50 percent to 40 percent.

“I need your vote. We will carry Pennsylvania. … We need your help. … It’s a close race, my friends,” he said.

McCain also responded to Obama’s assertions that his crowds are unruly and use dangerous language to describe the Illinois senator.

“I cannot tell you about how proud I am of you,” he said. It was a line that he used in Wednesday night’s debate. 

Obama and McCain are scheduled to speak Thursday night at the Alfred E. Smith dinner, a political tradition that dates back to 1945. It honors the first Catholic ever nominated for president and was begun by Francis J. Spellman, the archbishop of New York’s Roman Catholic Archdiocese at the time.

The Republican presidential nominee will also appear on the “Late Show with David Letterman,” after canceling an earlier appearance, which left the host fuming.

Also Thursday, McCain’s running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, sounded a note of triumph about Wednesday’s presidential debate while campaigning in Bangor, Maine.

“They [Obama and Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden] look to the past because they’d rather run against the current administration, it sounds like, and that strategy though, thankfully, it’s really starting to wear very very thin,” Palin said. “As John McCain reminded Barack Obama last night, if he wanted to run against George Bush, he had his chance four years ago. This year, the name on the ballot is John McCain — and America knows that John McCain is his own man, he is the maverick.”

Though Maine has trended Democratic for nearly two decades, the McCain campaign is making a push in the state’s rural 2nd Congressional District, which is allotted one electoral vote independent of how the state votes at large. Despite the McCain camp’s efforts, the Republican National Committee has stopped running advertisements in the state.

Palin later traveled to Elon, North Carolina. At an afternoon rally at Elon University, near Greensboro, Palin pressed the audience to stand firm against accusations of negative campaigning, and told them to pay “close attention” to Obama’s record.

“It’s not mean-spirited and it’s not negative campaigning when you call someone out on their record,” she said. “So don’t let anyone, don’t let them make you believe that you’re being negative or mean-spirited or unpatriotic or unfair when you are asking about somebody’s record, OK?”

After the rally, Palin continued on to a fundraiser at a home in Greensboro.

Biden is traveling to Los Angeles, California, taping appearances on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” and the “Ellen Degeneres Show.”

http://www.cnn.com

The most exciting new gadget of 2008

T-Mobile’s G1 Android-powered phone, the first cell phone with an operating system designed by Google

Most first-generation gadgets aren’t really worth the bother. They’re overpriced, buggy, hard to figure out, and they break too easily. But the G1 is none of these things. Not only is it worth your while, the Google phone is easily the most exciting new tech product of the year.

If the iPhone is the beauty, then the G1 is the brains. Sure, the Google phone lacks much of the iPhone’s external finesse: it’s thicker and has a slew of buttons and a slightly smaller screen. But spend more than five minutes with T-Mobile’s G1, which runs on Google’s new Android operating system, and you’ll uncover its inner brilliance.

The G1’s Google Maps app, for instance, is genius. It incorporates 360-degree views of urban streets, plus an innovative compass mode that shifts the onscreen image depending on how you hold the device. Hold it up, and you’ll see rooftops and blue sky. Point it down and you’ll see car wheels and pavement. No other smartphone is so transporting.

The G1’s 3.25-in. touchscreen works just fine, but I found myself reaching for the built-in trackball instead. As BlackBerry aficionados will probably agree, the impressive precision and frictionless gliding of a trackball makes clicking on links quicker and easier. It’s also indispensable for selecting text to cut and paste (something you can’t do on the iPhone).

The home button at the bottom of the phone is a multitasker’s must-have. The G1 remembers the last six applications you used and keeps them running and easily accessible in the background; press the home button and a small menu pops up displaying the icon for each open app. It’s handy for those times when you want to play a game, check the news online and snap a quick picture all within a matter of minutes.

Google’s Android Market, which will eventually include thousands of add-on applications, doesn’t officially open until the G1 goes on sale Oct. 22. But the dozen or so free apps I tested in the market’s beta version worked great. Addictive games include a shape-matching brainteaser called MisMisMatch, a beeping Simon Says–type game called Android Says and classics like Pac-Man. The BarCode Scanner is a handy app that lets you use the built-in camera to scan a product’s bar code at the store, then instantly compare prices online. But my personal favorite has to be Cooking Taster, which includes short how-to videos and easy-to-follow recipes for ethnic food.

Other goodies: T-Mobile’s 3G network was faster and more reliable than AT&T’s (Apple’s carrier) in my New York City–based tests. The speakerphone is louder and clearer than the iPhone’s. And the removable battery will save you money and time should it ever quit on you — instead of bringing the whole device in to be repaired, you can just swap out the battery yourself.

About the only thing the iPhone has on the G1 is the onscreen magnifying glass, which lets you zoom in on text you want to edit. Otherwise, the functional differences between the phones were either inconsequential or improved in the G1. I thought I would miss Apple’s iTunes, but downloading music on the G1, from Amazon’s MP3 store, worked just fine and none of the songs were copy protected. And I definitely did not miss having to sync my phone with a computer to transfer applications, download songs or update my operating system — something you often wind up doing with the iPhone. The G1, in contrast, is its own self-contained mobile device.

In short, the $179 G1 is the one smartphone that won’t make you jealous of people with an iPhone. Google’s commitment to a free and open market for add-on applications — users can even tweak the open-source Android operating system — also gives gadget lovers something to cheer. If nothing else, G1 will win geeky hearts and minds everywhere with its reassuring end-credits-style device info: “No robots were harmed in the making of this product.”

http://www.time.com

Ganti Wallpaper Toolbar

PCPLUS

Apa yang kita pakai untuk menjelajah isi harddisk, membuka folder, mengakses file di Windows? Jawabnya pasti Windows Explorer.

Anda bisa saja membuat Windows Explorer tampil lebih menarik. Caranya, hiasi toolbar Windows Explorer dengan gambar. Toolbar yang biasanya tampil dengan warna coklat polos tanpa motif bisa berubah menjadi toolbar dengan gambar pilihan kita.

Berikut adalah langkah-langkah untuk menghiasi toolbar dengan gambar.
1. Siapkan gambar untuk dijadikan latar belakang Windows Explorer. Lebar gambarnya sekitar 80 pixel, sedangkan panjangnya terserah Anda.
2. Ingat-ingat lokasi penyimpanan gambar tersebut dan pastikan gambar tersebut disimpan dengan format bitmap (BMP).
3. Buat sebuah file registry dengan menggunakan Notepad atau penyunting teks lainnya. Ketikkan skrip ini.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER-Software-Microsoft-Internet Explorer-Toolbar]
“BackBitmap”=”D:–Wallpaper–Gambar BLEACH–title.bmp”

Baris pertama menandakan bawah Registry Editor yang digunakan adalah Registry Editor versi 5 yang digunakan di Windows 2000, XP, atau NT. Kalau Anda memakai Windows 98 atau ME, ketikkan “REGEDIT4”. Baris berikutnya adalah letak file latar belakang yang hendak menghiasi toobar. Jika Anda tidak tahu letak filenya, klik kanan pada file latar belakang, klik [Properties], lalu salin tulisan yang ada pada bagian sebelah kanan Location. Jangan lupa, pada registry, direktori menggunakan “–”, bukan “-” seperti di Properties.

4. Selanjutnya simpan file tersebut dengan ekstensi REG. Caranya klik [File] > [Save As]. Di bagian “Save as type:” pilih [All Files], dan ketikkan nama file dengan ekstensi REG.

http://www.kompas.com