Free Republic

Former Defense Secretary General James Mattis famously said, "PowerPoint makes us stupid." Like many among today's top military brass, he sees our culture's addiction to PowerPoint as a threat to the efficiency and effectiveness of our armed forces. Similarly, many CEOs have banned PowerPoint from their meetings, including Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Twitter's Jack Dorsey, LinkedIn's Jeff Weiner, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, and the late Steve Jobs. Smart leaders hate PowerPoint because business presentations straitjacket meetings into a slow-moving linear direction. This discourages conversation and discussion, turning the other attendees into passive chair potatoes. PowerPoint--when used as designed--reduces attention, understanding,...

On Feb. 3, long-time Trump associate Felix Sater filed a cross-complaint in a New York federal court. The complaint alleges that Russian and Kazakhstan-connected individuals and entities conducted “a shadow intelligence operation of Sater and Trump for the purpose of manufacturing information to harm Donald Trump politically,” including by providing Christopher Steele a PowerPoint presentation riddled with lies Steele later fed to the FBI. Sater’s cross suit comes nearly three years after the City of Almaty, Kazakhstan, and BTA Bank filed suit against Sater, two of the companies he owned, a former business associate, and that associate’s LLCs, in City...

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” that the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol “was driven from the top” by former President Donald Trump. Anchor George Stephanopoulos said, “It seems like every single day, Chris Christie, we’re learning more about what was going on inside the White House in those days leading up to January 6. Most recently this week, this PowerPoint presentation that was sent to Mark Meadows detailing all the ways the White House could interfere in the investigation. It may explain why the former president and his allies are...

Former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows turned over to the House select committee investigating the 6 January Capitol attack a PowerPoint recommending Donald Trump to declare a national security emergency in order to return himself to the presidency. The fact that Meadows was in possession of a PowerPoint the day before the Capitol attack that detailed ways to stage a coup suggests he was at least aware of efforts by Trump and his allies to stop Joe Biden’s certification from taking place on 6 January. The PowerPoint, titled “Election Fraud, Foreign Interference & Options for 6 Jan”,...

Andrew Yang, the 44-year-old tech entrepreneur from New York running for president, may have the most extensive and wildest platform in the Democratic field. 1. A domestic infrastructure force called the " Legion of Builders and Destroyers." Under his proposal to modernize military spending, Yang has a scheme to divert 10 percent of military funding toward an infrastructure task force he calls “The Legion of Builders and Destroyers.” The head of this task force would be called “The Commander,” and he would be given the power to overrule local zoning laws and city regulations to make sure the building and...

See video at link. Andrew Yang has been censored by MSNBC. His mic was cut off during the debate so he could not respond. The other candidates' mics were NOT cut off. He only got two questions. Why? They (media punks) said Yang was the debate's "loser". They didn't even give him the chance to speak and tried to make him appear timid and stupid. Why don't the mainstream media want people to hear what Yang has to say?

A crowd broke out into chants of "PowerPoint, PowerPoint, PowerPoint," at Democratic presidential hopeful and entrepreneur Andrew Yang's latest Seattle rally last week. The chant broke out during a Friday rally at Gas Works Park in Seattle. Yang was reiterating his promise to become the first president to use PowerPoint in the State of the Union address when the audience responded by repeating "PowerPoint," according to GeekWire. "I'm going to be the first president to use PowerPoint at the State of the Union, how do you feel about that?" Yang said. "Yes, this is the nerdiest presidential campaign in history!"...

Howard is one of the most amazing people I have ever met. Among other things, he is a corporate lawyer turned entrepreneur, inventor and corporate executive. He touched on one aspect of his story in the Wall Street Journal column “Sally Yates’s legacy of injustice at the Department of Justice.” In the fuller version of the story he tells in his Power Point presentation, we have personal interest, self-deprecating humor, intense human drama, life lessons, political angles, action items, the medical device business, federal regulation and the administrative state, criminal law, and (as in Howard’s column) Sally Yates and the...

Microsoft would never say that Sway, its new presentation app that you can download starting today, is going to kill its much-maligned cash cow PowerPoint. So I will: Microsoft Sway is a PowerPoint killer. Today, Sway goes into general availability, meaning that users of Office 365 in business and education can get it. Plus, Microsoft is releasing the official Sway app for Windows 10, alongside an update to all versions of the tool. And it's still free for consumers. Technically, you've been able to get Sway since last October when a preview version came out. At the time, Business Insider...

The Syrian Improvised Chemical Munitions that Were Used in the August 21, Nerve Agent Attack in Damascus Have a Range of About 2 Kilometers. The UN Independent Assessment of the Range of the Chemical Munition Is in Exact Agreement with Our Findings. This Indicates That These Munitions Could Not Possibly Have Been Fired at East Ghouta from the “Heart”, or from the Eastern Edge, of the Syrian Government Controlled Area Shown in the Intelligence Map Published by the White House on August 30, 2013. This mistaken Intelligence Could Have Led to an Unjustified US Military Action Based on False Intelligence....

A video view of the 40's nicely done

I want to convert an old Powerpoint presentation into a mpg, avi, flv, anything that I can rig to post to YouTube. I have a XP machine running Office 2003. Can anyone recommend a piece of software which will do this?

A chaplain who was awarded the Bronze Star has spoken out about the tour – and what appears to have been misleading media coverage. In an interview with TheBlaze.com, Lt. Col. Jon Trainer, USAF, discussed the award and the PowerPoint presentation that has generated controversy. The presentation, which was titled, “Proper Handling and Disposal of Islamic Religious Material,” was written in the wake of the accidental burning of defaced Korans by American troops. The resulting riots when the news broke lead to 30 deaths, including two U.S. troops. Initial coverage of the medal in conservative media outlets lead former Congressman...

"The best and only safe road to honor, glory, and true dignity is justice." -- George Washington (1779) A Bronze Star Power Point? Actually, not ... Drive-by Journalism at Its Worst In keeping with our publishing deadlines, every Tuesday morning I send notice of my topic for Thursday's column to our editorial team. This week, I sent notice that I was writing about "military award inflation," and particularly a story from reputable news sources about an Air Force chaplain, Lt. Col. Jon Trainer, who received a Bronze Star for a PowerPoint. I first read this story under an inflammatory National...

Air Force Chaplain Awarded Bronze Star for PowerPoint Teaching Proper Sensitivity for the Koran An Air Force chaplain has been awarded a Bronze Star for his service in crafting an especially good PowerPoint about how to treat Islamic religious materials with sensitivity, according to Ohio’s Dayton Daily News. After U.S. troops in Afghanistan accidentally burned copies of the Koran, sparking riots that took over 30 lives, Lieutenant Colonel Jon Trainer came to the rescue: After the accidental burning last year of Qurans by U.S. troops in Afghanistan sparked deadly rioting, an Air National Guard chaplain from Springfield stepped in and...

In wake of the release of a report comparing Palestinian Authority textbooks to Israeli textbooks in terms of incitement, Israel’s Strategic Affairs Ministry has released a simple PowerPoint presentation outlining PA incitement and giving examples. Among the more disturbing instances of incitement are incident in which teachers used their blogs or Facebook pages to spread hate. One PA school’s Facebook page includes an image of an Arab child being strangled by a snake marked with a Star of David. Another school’s Facebook page has an image of Adolf Hitler, complete with a quote stating that Hitler left some Jews alive...

Affected lots have last four digits: DK01, DK11, DK21, DK31, DK41, and DK51 Owners of Ranger 223 Remington 64 Grain Power-Point centerfire rifle ammunition may want to pause before chambering a round. Olin Corporation, through its Winchester Division, is recalling six lots of the Ranger 223 ammo after determining that the lots may contain incorrect propellant. The last four characters of the affected lot numbers are: DK01, DK11, DK21, DK31, DK41, and DK51. Incorrect propellant in the Ranger 223 may cause firearm damage

Intelligence is information. The best use of intelligence is to get that information in the hands of the war fighter quickly. If used correctly it saves lives and greatly aids our troops to defeat the enemy. Unfortunately, in today’s short attention span world, the most vital tool in the dissemination of intelligence is PowerPoint. More often than not, about time the PowerPoint presentation is prepared for daily briefings the information is too old to be useful. PowerPoint maybe a valuable tool but when used for routine daily briefs it is more potent than Ambien as a sleep aid. If terrorists...

Its coloured charts, graphs and bullet-points are supposed to make the most incomprehensible data crystal clear. But even the sharpest military minds in American were left baffled by this PowerPoint slide, a mind-boggling attempt to explain the situation in Afghanistan. 'When we understand that slide, we'll have won the war..

IF TORQUEMADA HAD A LAPTOP. The Defense Department has declared war on PowerPoint. Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who heads U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, told the New York Times, “It’s dangerous because it can create the illusion of understanding and the illusion of control. Some problems in the world are not bullet-izable.” To prove his point, McChrystal’s been displaying an indecipherable slide of the United States’ military strategy. “When we understand that slide, we’ll have won the war,” he’s said. Marine Corps Gen. James Mattis, Joint Forces commander, put it more succinctly: “PowerPoint makes us stupid.” Kudos to military...