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B.Faso's president in re-election bid vows to end poverty

OUAGADOUGOU (AFP) – Burkina Faso's President Blaise Compaore, favoured to be re-elected in this weekend's poll, wrapped up his campaign Friday promising to "break the chains of poverty" that affect nearly half the population.

"I urge you to vote, to make the choice which will be the right choice, the choice which has allowed you to progress these last two decades," Compaore told 30,000 supporters at the stadium in Ouagadougou.

"We can go further, we can break all the chains of poverty..." he said on the last day of campaigning before Sunday's presidential election.

In power since a 1987 coup, Compaore hailed what he called his country's "democratic renaissance" after years of coups and military regimes.

One of his six opponents in the presidential race, Hama Arba Diallo from the northern city of Dori, also held a rally in the country's capital, promising change.

The other contenders chose to end the campaign in their respective strongholds around the west African nation.

The country's electoral commission said Friday it expected to announce provisional results from the first round at the latest on Thursday.

TheDC Interview: P.J. O'Rourke talks Tea Parties and potheads

After 40 years of pantsing the powerful, “it was time for me to figure out what I was talking about,” satirist P.J. O’Rourke told The Daily Caller during a recent visit. Enter: “,” O’Rourke’s most serious foray into the world of political philosophy.

That’s right: Serious. “I don’t claim to be the kind of deep thinker that Michael Oakeshottљwas,” O’Rourke told TheDC. “But I came away from the experience of trying to formulate my political thought with more sympathy for Oakeshott’s crap prose style.”

In addition to dishing on Rolling Stone, parenting, his mailman, his favorite writers and the burden of influence, O’Rourke also shared his thoughts on midterms. You can read those below, and read the rest of the hour-long interview on Thursday.

The Daily Caller: What do you think of Prop 19 in California and marijuana legalization?

P.J. O’Rourke: I find myself torn between my conservatism — I’m a father with children and I don’t want them smoking pot —

TheDC: — ever?

O’Rourke: Well, yeah!

TheDC: Are you just saying that because you’re a dad and you’re on the record?

P.J.: Well, yes, I am saying that because I’m a dad and I’m on the record, but also because I’m a father, and I know that children are plenty stupid enough. They don’t need a drug to help them be more stupid.

On the other hand, here’s a drug that makes teenage boys drive slower. [Laughs] So, I’m torn.

Truly, I think it’s up to the people of California to decide this for themselves. What I want to know is how we’ll be able to tell whether it passed or not. How much more stoned can you get in California?

TheDC: Did you see that dispensary owners are fighting Prop 19?

O’Rourke: I heard that. And so are the pot growers, more quietly. Fortunately, now they’re able to donate huge sums with anonymous protection.

TheDC: Wait — did you say fortunately?

O’Rourke: Yes, I said fortunately. Otherwise, someone might wonder where $10 million came from in Mendocino County. [Laughs]

TheDC: Right, because they have all these vibrant and diverse industries in Mendocino!

O’Rourke: Sandal-making!

TheDC: Things with beads!

O’Rourke: Navajo sand-painting!

TheDC: So, we’re a few days out from the election. Do you have any high hopes? Are you looking to the Tea Parties to save us?

O’Rourke: Well, it would be very satisfying to see Obama and the Democrats get a good drubbing at the polls, but I have two caveats on that. One thing is that I was ready to let these people take the plane for another two years.

TheDC: Because 2012 would be so much worse for Democrats if they were still in charge then?

O’Rourke: Right. I didn’t want to see a repeat of Clinton’s election in 1996. I want this guy to be a one-term president. And I don’t want him to have some Republicans in Congress, or what looks like a bunch of Republicans in Congress, to blame everything on. It would give Obama something to run on much the way it gave Clinton something to run on.

My other problem here is that I don’t know what to believe because I don’t understand where polling organizations get their information now.

TheDC: How do you mean?

O’Rourke: Nobody under the age of 65 uses a landline, everybody’s got caller ID, and who the hell calls back a polling organization?

Who, other than a crazy person, does anything besides hang up on a robo-call? Any call, any person, anywhere, under any circumstances.

If you’re doing this over the Internet, you’re getting into the loony chains almost immediately.

So all polling information, as far as I can figure out, is coming from old people, crazy people, or both.

TheDC: Crazy old people!

O’Rourke: Exactly! Crazy old people are our entire source of polling information. Unless they’re randomly stopping people on the streets. And they’re always saying “likely voters.” What, do likely voters wear a special headband?

TheDC: Does that mean any poll that doesn’t survey “likely voters” is one you should ignore?

O’Rourke: Even then, how do you determine what a likely voter is?

It’s all bullshit. But what kind of bullshit is it? Is it Dem-leaning bullshit? Is it Tea Party-leaning bullshit? I really don’t know. But I would say that the mood of the nation is “Throw the bums out.” But then again, that might just be a reflection of who I hang out with.

Read more stories from The Daily Caller

Watch Facebook's Monday 'Messaging' Press Conference Live 10 a.m. PT

Facebook is holding a press conference at 10 a.m. PT Monday where it will announce a new e-mail , PCWorld has learned. If you would like to follow a live stream video feed of the event you can do so here.

on livestream.com.

Veteran group Banda el Recodo still going strong

MIAMI (Billboard) – After more than seven decades in the business, seminal act Banda el Recodo remains one of the top-selling groups in the genre of brass-based Mexican music. Founded in 1938 by Cruz Lizarraga, the band has continued to thrive through the years thanks to Lizarraga's two sons, Joel and Alfonso, who have adapted the traditional banda format to multiple musical styles and contemporary arrangements.

Recodo's hit single "Te Presumo" spent six weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Latin Songs chart in 2009, the year's longest tenure atop the ranking. The group's latest single, "Dime Que Me Quieres," has just notched its 13th week at No. 1 on the Regional Mexican Airplay chart, the longest run so far this year on that tally.

In a recent interview, Recodo leader Alfonso (Poncho) Lizarraga spoke about the group's continued success on radio.

Billboard: How did you come to record "Dime Que Me Quieres?"

Alfonso (Poncho) Lizarraga: The song was written by two very talented young composers from Sinaloa (Mexico): Miguel Angel Romero and Luciano Luna. We had previously recorded a song by Luciano, and this one hooked me from the start. It was a ballad as opposed to a cumbia (a style of dance music that originated in Colombia). But the album already had all the ballads it needed. So I told my brother, "This song is so good, it would be a waste not to include it. Let's record a cumbia version." Fortunately, it worked. If we'd done it in the original ballad format, it may not have been as successful. Now it's a romantic track, but with a touch of rhythm that allows people to get hooked easily.

Billboard: In general, is the music on Mexican radio stations in the U.S. more danceable right now?

Lizarraga: I think listeners like everything. We've done very well with ballads, but we wanted to offer something new. There are a lot of rhythmic songs on (regional Mexican) radio, but they're kind of novelty, funny songs (like Banda Los Recoditos' "Ando Bien Pedo"). We wanted to do a romantic cumbia -- something that wasn't on the air -- so we could offer something different.

Billboard: Have you ever had a radio hit like this before?

Lizarraga: No, especially when you take into account the number of weeks it's been on the chart and the fact that it's regional Mexican music and banda. It's not easy to achieve this. We have 100 percent support from our label, and we're working together like we haven't in many years.

Billboard: What's coming up next?

Lizarraga: Our new studio album comes out next year. But in October we'll release a live album that will also include two new tracks and songs that have to do with (Mexico's) bicentennial celebration, so it should be fun. We haven't released a live album since 2003.

Nokia to Launch N8, E7 Smartphones in September

A week before its Nokia World 2010 event, Nokia has let loose with information about its next generation of smartphones, indicating news that the much-anticipated N8 will launch at the end of September.

According to , based on an article that ran in the Finnish newspaper Kauppalehti, the Nokia N8 will be available by Sept. 30. A machine translation of theshows that Tapani Kaskinen, a senior communications manager at Nokia, told the Finnish paper that N8 "advance orders begin shipping 30 September."

The phone enthusiast blog E's Phone Blog , "Those of you who have ordered the Nokia N8 directly from Nokia should receive it on Tuesday, September 28th, 2010. The Nokia N8 is the first phone to run on Symbian 3. Personally I have to say that I'm pretty impressed about this device, and I think that it will sell quite good. For instance here in Finland, you'll have to pay 499€ to get this thing and this is cheaper than what you'd have to pay for a competing device with roughly the same specs."

Read the rest of this story at eWEEK: