Faithless in America

All Trends Considered

Our game design classes at Wake Tech this semester have been taking place in a game design lab of fancy new high-spec Alienware PCs with wide high-density LCD screens.

Last night, when I arrived at the lab for SGD 112, the head of the Simulation and Game Design department sat there basking in the afterglow of a PR event. Reportedly, a senator or congresscritter came around for some official dedication or something, which I reckon is better senatoring than Hilary Clinton's antivideogamist fearpandering.

Listening to WUNC's broadcast of All Things Considered while driving to campus, a local reporter did a news bite about the new lab. Pity she wasted 6 seconds on an inane intro like No question about it, video games are hot. And so Wake Tech is capitalizing on this trend.

Timely trendspotting! You know what's also trendy? They making handheld phones you can carry out of your home and use anywhere. They're very hot now. Oh, and a hot movie format is making videotapes obsolete. They press films on CD-like discs called 'DVDs'. Verrry trendy!

Would You Vote for a Smoker?

I Want Understanding for Christmas

The World Can't Wait

The Raleigh branch of the nationwide World Can't Wait protest was rather low-key. Surely the smallest protest I've attended, about 30 people at most. (Yet we still rated 4 cops on foot, 2 on motorcyles, and 4 on horseback.)

Four were conspiracy theorists wearing 911truth.org T-shirts, holding 9/11 was an inside job signs. They gave away tickets to a free screening of 911 Mysteries--Demolitions at Cameron Village Public Library on October 29, and gave out DVDs with Terror Storm and Loose Change 2. I told them I had seen director Dylan Avery lose a debate about his theories on Democracy Now, but they just said I should come to their screening.

murderers of democracy

What can be said about Senators who pass a law to allow anyone to be seized and tortured in a network of secret prisons, without charge or trial, forever?

Chris Floyd knows, and isn't mincing words:

Who are these people? Who are these useless hanks of bone and fat that call themselves Senators of the United States? Let's call them what they really are, let's speak the truth about what they've done today with their votes on the bill to enshrine Bush's gulag of torture and endless detention into American law.

Who are they? The murderers of democracy. Sold our liberty to keep their coddled, corrupt backsides squatting in the Beltway gravy a little longer.

Who are they? The murderers of democracy. Cowards and slaves, giving up our most ancient freedoms to a dull-eyed, dim-witted pipsqueak and his cohort of bagmen, cranks and degenerate toadies. For make no mistake: despite all the lies and distorted media soundbites, the draconian strictures of this bill apply to American citizens as well as to all them devilish foreigners.

Who are they? The murderers of democracy. Traitors to the nation, filthy time-servers and bootlickers, turning America into a rogue state, an open champion of torture, repression and terror.

Who are they? The murderers of democracy. Threw our freedom on the ground and raped it, beat it, shot it, stuck their knives into it and set it on fire.

Anyone who voted for this evil, un-American bill is an enemy of America. Republican or Democrat, these unworthies are unfit for office and for decent society. Not only should they be voted out, one and all, they should be shunned.

Why don't you just leave?

Because I didn't want to get out of bed to help my father turn his computer on, my father demanded, for the third time this month, Why don't you just leave this house?

Despite my name being on the deed along with his, he demanded that when he spent half each year living with me in Pennsylvania, too. On a couple occasions, I called his bluff and started packing my bags into my van, and he backpedaled. My closest friend told me for years, You have to get out of that house.

He sold that house in Pennsylvania and gave away my van, with my cooperation. He bought me a house in North Carolina instead, fixing it up to my specifications, but kept my name off the deed for legal reasons. If he wanted to, he really could throw me out.

So all morning I thought about answer his question.

Why don't you just leave?

When? My classes run through December, and I'm earning a degree this term, so how about January? January would be easier. Oh, and if you're not giving me this house, how about you give me a third of what you sold the old house for? That should be enough to get an apartment.

Bob Woodward

Listening to his mealymouthed excuses for helping cover up Treasongate, I wonder how Bob Woodward went from journalist to stenographer.

Was Woodward ever the crusading journalist that Robert Redford portrayed in All the President's Men, cracking the Watergate coverup? Did he just ride on Bernstein's coattails? Why, when he got a taste of fame, did he sell his soul for invitations to hobnob with the elite? Why has Bob Woodward gone from exposing dirty tricks campaigns to participating in them? Merely for the dubious prestige of scribing lies straight from a president's lips?

His refusal to reveal Deep Throat was a shining example of the virtue of journalists shielding anonymous whistleblowers informing on criminals in high places. Now he and Tim Russert and Judy Miller and Bob Novak distort that principle to allow criminals in high places to anonymously attack whistleblowers. They invoke journalistic privilege not to expose corruption, but to cloak the corrupt.

Where's Spider Jerusalem when we need him? In Britain today, the editors of The Spectator and Private Eye are asking people to leak them documents, just classified under their Official Secrets Act, that prove Bush planned to assassinate foreign journalists. They say if someone leaks them the documents, they'll defy the law and proudly go to jail for publishing them. Those are leakers who warrant protection, those are truths that must be revealed. That's what real journalists stand for.

Bob Woodward stood for that, too, once. Alas, our heroes sometimes have fingers of clay.

Christmas in November

Driving to the airport this morning, my mother turned on the radio. Sunny 98.3 began to play It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas.

Call me a Scrooge, but I expostulated It's not even Thanksgiving! at the radio. Looking out a window at Route 1, it didn't look at all like Christmas.

When their next song was Rudolph the Red-Nosed Rendeer, I got annoyed enough to change the station.

End of Ages

Cancelled my preorder of Myst V Limited Edition from store.ubi.com today.

MystVGame.com misstates that the Limited Edition has a 152-page collector's booklet, which includes a 4-page preview of The Book of Marrim and a 20-page complete D'ni grammar and dictionary.

However, this booklet is only in the European Collector's Edition. Ubisoft's site takes preorders for the US Limited Edition, which instead has numbered lithograph of concept art and a Prima strategy guide.

Since I want the D'ni dictionary, I ordered a Collector's Edition from Games Warehouse in Australia. They show the US box art but lists the contents of the European package, and are throwing in a free wooden puzzle cube with each purchase.

Weight a minute

• 1 kg on Terra = 1 kg on Luna, because kilograms are units of mass, not weight. (Also, 1 lb. on Terra ≅ 0.2 lb. on Luna, because 1⁄6 g ≅ 0.17 g.)

Fisking the struggle

Juan Cole, a history professor, has excellently and uncompromisingly fisked the history of our so-called war on terror.

Which now they're ironically rebranding our struggle against extremism. Easier to say than the name Bush gave it last year: We actually misnamed the war on terror. It ought to be the struggle against ideological extremists who do not believe in free societies and who happen to use terror as a weapon to try to shake the conscience of the free world.

Or the SAIEWDNBiFSAWHtUTaaWtTtStCofFW, for short.

Don't Tread on Me

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

• He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
• He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
• He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
• He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
• He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
• He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
• He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
• He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
• He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
• He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
• He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
• He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
• He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
  • For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
  • For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
  • For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
  • For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
  • For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
  • For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
  • For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
  • For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
  • For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
• He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
• He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
• He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
• He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
• He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

My card

Why does my father try to destroy my happiness?

For winning Chron X's 2005 Grand Championships last month, my likeness will be on a Very Rare card in the new card set, Corruption. Earlier this week, I rushed to develop film we shot in Florida to scan and mail a photo to card artist Mike Dreher. But our cheap disposable camera's flash was no good and produced fuzzy photos. I dug out my damaged Kodak DC-120 to use instead, awkwardly pointing it at my face. My digital photos came out better despite schmutz inside the lens I cannot wipe clean.

Corruption was released yesterday evening. A tournament called Friday Noon Showdown was held with a booster of the new card set as a prize. At game time, CEO Andrea asked me to run the tourney for her. I agreed.

I felt excited about my upcoming card and pleased about being so respected that I was entrusted to run an official tourney. Sometime during the third round, my father yelled at me for wasting my time playing games instead of signing up for a summer semester and/or getting a job. He particularly emphasized that I am a disappointment to him.

So on what should've been a great day for me, whenever I started feeling excited about my card, my father's voice in my head reminded me that even if I'm a champion in some unimportant game, I am a great disappointment to him, always.

Sigh.

welcome center

Driving down to Florida, I lost my cat Velcro at the Georgia welcome center off Interstate 95 South.

I stopped to clean cat poo off my back seat. When I opened the door, she darted into a thicket of trees and dense underbrush between parking lot and highway.

Unable to coax her out or find her in the dark, I phoned home from a pay phone to tell my parents I'd be late. I laid her bowl of dry cat food on my hood as bait, sat in my car, and waited. And waited.

I woke up around 2 AM to hear her meowing nearby. She was on the hood of the car parked next to mine, peering through its dew-fogged windshield and meowing at its sleeping driver. I turned on my headlights, opened my door, and called Velcro!. Startled, she ran several feet off, into my headlights's beam. As she froze, I stepped in front of my car, calling her again. After a moment, I took a step closer. She scampered into the bushes.

Perhaps hunger would bring her around again. So I kept waiting. But when dawn came, so did birds, many birds. Oh no, she'll be in there hunting all day. Damp night turned to hot, sunny day.

In daylight, I trudged through the thicket after her. Thorny creepers tore holes in my pants and gave my arms scratches that would itch for days. On my third expedition, I spotted her tail under a bush, merely ten steps away--ten steps that would take me thirty seconds without a machete. I called, she silently crept out of sight.

As afternoon came, I was starving and tired. Thrice she had run from me. I could wait around no longer.

Tearfully, I drove away.

I stopped for lunch at a barbecue stand, bought a submarine for dinner at a nearby gas station, then turned around and drove back. (I had to go up to Exit 5 in South Carolina to U-turn back to I-95 South.)

Lack of sleep caught up with me and I dozed a while. Time passed. I played the beginning of City of Secrets on my laptop. Around 10 PM, I unwrapped my sub and sat on the grass eating it.

Velcro emerged and meowed to me.

I swallowed my mouthful and slowly set my sub down on its wrapper.

Dare I call to her? Better not. A hint of frustration or irritation in my tone might spook her anew.

So I sang. Seranaded her in Esperanto, because I thought it sounded sweeter. Mia bela katino, kion mi amas, mia bela katino, ne kuru mi petas ...

She came a little closer. Sat and watched. Came closer. Rolled in the dirt. Came close. Sniffed at chipotle-stained paper. Sniffed a morsel I held out. Let me pick her up.

I arrived in Florida drowsy and a day late, but newly appreciating how important Velcro is to me.

Leaden lead-in

Scott Reaves of Forbes:

Beauty and the Beast is the fable of a young woman who frees her prince from the body of a beast with love.

But a similar tale--call it Beauty and the Labor Market--finds pay differentials based on looks and doesn't have a happy ending for just plain folks.

How similar those tales are. Reminds me of beloved knockoffs like Jack and the Farm Subsidy and The Prince and the Estate Tax. Nice introduction, Scott.

We need a hero

An excessively star-spangled banner, popular on a conservative message board, reads,

Unfortunately for we who measure heroism by deeds, not flags.

42

Geeks all over know this famous scene in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

The room was much as Slartibartfast had described it. In seven and a half million years it had been well looked after and cleaned regularly every century or so. The ultramahagony desk was worn at the edges, the carpet a little faded now, but the large computer terminal sat in sparkling glory on the desk's leather top, as bright as if it had been constructed yesterday.

Two severely dressed men sat respectfully before the terminal and waited.

The time is nearly upon us, said one, and Arthur was surprised to see a word suddenly materialize in thin air just by the man's neck. The word was loonquawl, and it flashed a couple of times and the disappeared again. Before Arthur was able to assimilate this the other man spoke and the word phouchg appeared by his neck.

Seventy-five thousand generations ago, our ancestors set this program in motion, the second man said, and in all that time we will be the first to hear the computer speak.

An awesome prospect, Phouchg, agreed the first man, and Arthur suddenly realized that he was watching a recording with subtitles.

We are the ones who will hear, said Phouchg, the answer to the great question of Life ...!

The Universe ...! said Loonquawl.

And Everything ...!

Shhh, said Loonquawl with a slight gesture, I think Deep Thought is preparing to speak!

There was a moment's expectant pause whilst panels slowly came to life on the front of the console. Lights flashed on and off experimentally and settled down into a businesslike pattern. A soft low hum came from the communication channel.

Good morning, said Deep Thought at last.

Er ... Good morning, O Deep Thought, said Loonquawl nervously, do you have ... er, that is ...

An answer for you? interrupted Deep Thought majestically. Yes. I have.

The two men shivered with expectancy. Their waiting had not been in vain.

There really is one? breathed Phouchg.

There really is one, confirmed Deep Thought.

To Everything? To the great Question of Life, the Universe and Everything?

Yes.

Both of the men had been trained for this moment, their lives had been a preparation for it, they had been selected at birth as those who would witness the answer, but even so they found themselves gasping and squirming like excited children.

And you're ready to give it to us? urged Loonquawl.

I am.

Now?

Now, said Deep Thought.

They both licked their dry lips.

Though I don't think, added Deep Thought, that you're going to like it.

Doesn't matter! said Phouchg. We must know it! Now!

Now? inquired Deep Thought.

Yes! Now ...

Alright, said the computer and settled into silence again. The two men fidgeted. The tension was unbearable.

You're really not going to like it, observed Deep Thought.

Tell us!

Alright, said Deep Thought. The Answer to the Great Question ...

Yes ...!

Of Life, the Universe and Everything ... said Deep Thought.

Yes ...!

Is ... said Deep Thought, and paused.

Yes ...!

Is ...

Yes ...!!! ...?

Forty-two, said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.

Today someone told me of Geoff Fortytwo, who changed his last name to the Ultimate Answer.

Geoff wanted a unique last name, such that no other human, living or dead, should ever have had the same last name as me. The Winona Daily News reported,

Busker can only guess that Fortytwo hasn't been used before. He said Romans named their children with numerals, referring to Octavius VIII, so it's possible that somewhere along the line someone had 42 kids and named somebody 42, but the odds are unlikely.

I opined that Geoff XLII would be shorter, but still a very xlii name.

Thus I gained new insight into Deep Thought's answer. I think the moral of the story is, Ask a xlii question, get a xlii answer.

forged memos

It'll be a shame if these poorly forged memos inoculate Bush against valid criticism of his desertion and lies about his National Guard record. Reminds me of the Rovian subterfuge against Fortunate Son; Rove found an author with skeletons in his closet, leaked him information about Bush's 1972 arrest for cocaine possession, then buried the story by discrediting the author.

Space Bush

Worldwide Republicans For A Better Planet Security (which I'd abbreviate WRBPS, but they abbreviate WRAPS) spammed me a crude comic panel (perhaps drawn with Microsoft Paint) captioned Future WMDs.

On a cloud in space far above Mother Earth (whose oceans are apparently boiling away), a figure in cowboy hat and trenchcoat raises his arm in a Sieg Heil to an SS space ghost, and says, Technology of DNA and genetic engineering has come forth to mankind. The humans of the earth are ignorant and foolish. The mortal people of earth are not ready or prepared. From the filename spcbushe.gif, this must be astro-Texan Space Bush.

His phantom soldier, a floating combat helmet and rifle-toting trenchcoat with glowing red eyes, says, The black horses go into the north country, and the white horses go forth after them. The pale horses go toward the south country. And the red go to and fro through the earth. Take these spirits into battle to defend and preserve the mortal people of the earth. Who but Space Bush could order the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse to defend and preserve us, the mortal peoples of the earth?

WRBPS wants you to spread this message. As their spam says, You are permitted to copy and redistribute this cartoon to any extent only for the good of the Bush For President Campaign and or the good, welfare, and future of all nations and all mankind. And providing that the contents of the cartoon are r not altered.

So, for the good of all humanity, I share with you WRBPS's plea: vote for Space Bush, commander-in-chief of War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death.

Barbie and Blaine

Barbie broke up with Ken a few months ago. Her new boyfriend, selected by poll on Barbie.com, is her friend Summer's older brother, a blond Aussie surfer boy named Blaine.

I pity jilted Dashing Groom Ken.

Blaine seems dinkum enough. Barbie could do worse. At least she's not dating G.I. Joe or Flight Suit George.

G.I. Joe's too old for her. And Flight Suit George will make a commitment to spend time with you, then disappear for months and months without a call or a letter.

nigger toes

Just now, my mother shocked me by bringing me a bowl of nuts and asking if I wanted some nigger toes. Never in my whole life have I heard Brazil nuts referred to that way.

My father had just finished a container of cashews. I said to him, I see mom got out the Brazil nuts because you finished off the ofay toes. He chuckled.

Reagan

I was a child during the Reagan years. Ronald Reagan was planning how to win a nuclear war, and I feared humanity might not survive the millennium. My local newspaper described what would happen to us if New York City got nuked. On my radio, Sting sang:

Mr. Reagan says we will protect you
I don't subscribe to this point of view
Believe me when I say to you
I hope the Russians love their children too

Reagan's mind has been lost to Alzheimer's Disease for a decade, but yesterday his body caught up. Despite having to hear conservatives eulogize his awful administration, my world is a little bit brighter knowing I have outlived him. It's 2004 and we're not a radioactive cinder after all.

He was a glib liar who shielded himself from being told inconvenient facts to preserve deniability. He drove our nation into a trillion-dollar deficit by cutting taxes for the rich and spending like there's no tomorrow. A millennialist who believed he lived in the end times, he attacked the separation of church and state, pandered to Christian fundamentalists, and invited them into the White House. He tried to overturn clean-air standards, and to open wildlife refuges to clearcutting and oil drilling. He slashed funding for social programs like health, education, and welfare, while giving billions in sweetheart deals to defense contractors. He sank millions into a Star Wars missile defense despite experts saying it was scientifically unfeasible. He overthrew a democratically elected government in a tiny country in the West Indies, and rushed our nation into an unwarranted and unnecessary war.

Thank goodness that's all over. Hey, wait a minute ...

by definition

Condoleeza Rice: Mr. Roemer, by definition, we didn't have enough information, we didn't have enough protection, because the attack happened -- by definition.

I'd like to try that excuse on my professors.

Where's your report?

You didn't give me enough time.

I gave you three weeks!

I know, but by definition, you didn't give me enough time, because I didn't finish it -- by definition.

[Ed.: Said so on The Randi Rhodes Show. Randi responded, Ohh! I like that! That works for me, except don't say it too loud, because I've got a kid, and if she hears that, the next thing you know, she's going to tell me she didn't do her homework, because by definition, they didn't give her enough time to do it.]

get together

le parkour

Iain Merrick reviewed Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, comparing it to le parkour, an urban sport of getting from place to place, elegantly and efficiently jumping and climbing over any obstacle in your way.

Le parkour would've appealed greatly to me as a teen, had I heard of it. I acrophilically climbed onto rooftops, to see what I could see. I dashed across the tops of wooden barricades for the fun of it. Perhaps I would've become a wannabe parkouriste.

11-M

Prime Minister José María Aznar tried to do with 11-M what George W. Bush did with 9/11: cynically exploit a national tragedy to attack people who had nothing to do with it. Spainiards voted him out for being a crooked liar, not to capitulate to terrorists.

Though they could blame the Aznar government for making Spain a target of al-Qaida by joining our coalition of the billing and sending troops to Iraq against the people's will, according to polls, Spaniards were angrier at his administration for playing politics with the 11-M train bombings. A Barcelona attorney wrote about her thoughts to Randy Paul:

So, the PP knew that their antiterrorist policy (against ETA) was one of its main winning cards, and they didn't hesitate to blatantly manipulate the 11-M attack, suppressing information, calling people to demonstrate against ETA, knowing all the while that the Antiterrorist Information Brigade had as good as discarded ETA authorship a few hours after the attack. The antiterrorist police heads even threatened to resign at the madness of it all, and this was leaked to the opposition and the press. And all the while the state TVE showing documentaries about ETA activities right until late Saturday night, on the eve of the election, and failing to report live on Minister Acebes informing about the Al-Q line of investigation which he had been forced to acknowledge -- forced by his own angered police heads and by the media which had all the information but was withholding it just long enough for the Minister to do the decent thing. This heartless manipulation of the dead for political gain clinched it -- it was the last straw, it galvanised a portion of apathetic socialist voters who would have otherwise abstained, galvanised first-time voters, and galvanised Izquierda Unida voters (which include communists) who opted for heaping their vote on the PSOE for a higher chance of defeating Aznar (IU lost 5 seats because of that). In Spain, government change has always been heralded by a higher participation of voters. In a nutshell, many Spaniards felt badly abused, and acted accordingly. So, yes, 11-M influenced the vote, but not because we are overcome by fear, or because we think that we can avert further attacks, but because we will only put up with so much lying and manipulation, and especially not when it is the dead and their families that are being heartlessly and shamelessly manipulated.

In fine democratic tradition, Spaniards kicked out a corrupt, dishonest government by electing themselves a new one. May we follow their example.

John Kerry

Unfortunately, the Democratic Party's about to settle for John Kerry for president.

As Molly Ivins wrote in her optimistically titled book, Shrub: The Short But Happy Political Life of George W. Bush, Young political reporters are always told there are three ways to judge a politician. The first is to look at the record. The second is to look at the record. And third, look at the record.

I'm unimpressed by Kerry's forceful criticism of the USA PATRIOT Act, Iraq War, and Bush tax cuts, given his record of voting for them. Bush jokes about Kerry's flip-flops, though he's even worse. Either of them will play both sides of an issue. I distrust them both.

Dennis Kuchinich stands up for his principles. He voted against the USA PATRIOT Act, Iraq Use of Force Resolution, and Bush tax cuts. He takes unpopular stands in support of gay marriage and medical marijuana.

He's so principled, he's unelectable. Even Democrats who agree with him didn't vote for him, because no one will vote for him, because everyone believes no one will vote for him. (I would vote for him. According to PresidentMatch, his positions accord remarkably well with mine.) May we one day have approval voting, so we can vote without a thought to how anyone else votes.

Bush's record is nothing to campaign on. What issues can he run on? The economy? The Iraq War? National security? Social Security? Health care? Education? The environment? He's a disaster on all counts. So he tried to run on bigotry, announcing his support for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and perhaps also civil unions.

However, Kerry supports such an amendment too, as long as civil unions are allowed. On All Things Considered, Melissa Block asked him:

Block: I'd like to turn to the subject of gay marriage. The highest court in your home state of Massachusetts has said that same-sex couples do have the right to marry. I know that you've said that you oppose gay marriage, but would you support a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as a heterosexual union?

Kerry: Well, it depends entirely on the language -- whether it permits civil union and partnership or not. I'm for civil union; I'm for partnership rights. I think what ought to condition this debate is not the term marriage as much as the rights that people are afforded. Obviously, under the Constitution of the United States, you need equal protection under the law, and I think equal protection means the rights that go with it. I think the word marriage kind of gets in the way of the whole debate, to be honest with you, because marriage to many people is obviously what is sanctified by a church -- it's sacramental -- or by a synagogue, or by a mosque, or by whatever religious connotation it has, and clearly there's a separation of church and state here.

Block: And why would you support, say, civil unions, or what you call partnership rights, and not gay marriage, then?

Kerry: Because I think marriage is a separate institution. I think marriage is, under the church, between a man and a woman, and I think there's a separate meaning to it, that's why.

Block: Even for marriages that aren't conducted in a house of worship.

Kerry: Correct, even for those that aren't, there are still two meanings. I mean the state picked up the concept afterwards; it's a latecomer to the state. You know, for those who have separate beliefs, there ought to be a way here to be able to deal with it, but what you call something is not that critical.

Have we forgotten Brown v. Board of Education? Separate but equal is still discrimination, not equal protection. Equal means one thing for all couples regardless of gender. Everyone gets marriages, or everyone gets civil unions. The word marriage does not discriminate, people do. Gay couples can marry in Toronto is no more a contradiction in terms than Some doctors are women. The church can decide for itself what sorts of marriages it wants to sanctify, but the government has no place codifying religious prejudices into law.

So when it comes down to Bush versus Kerry, I may have to vote for Ralph Nader again.

PHONETIC.FON

Spent five hours trying to figure out why a webpage produced blank body text viewed with Firefox and Opera on my Windows XP system, but not with Firefox on someone else's Windows 98 system.

Finally tracked it down to a font-family: fixed style declaration. Fixed seems to be a common Linux font, but on my system, it corresponded to a corrupt 16-bit bitmap font PHONETIC.FON, which my Fonts control panel called fixed instead of Phonetic. In Character Map, PHONETIC.FON appeared to contain only blank glyphs.

Deleting the corrupt font fixed everything. It was a holdover from Encarta 98, several operating systems ago.

political horoscopes

Though I take political coverage by The New York Times with a grain of salt and knowledge of their biases, I still expect better of our mutable paper of record than evaluating candidates by their horoscopes:

John Edwards, born on June 10, 1953, is a Gemini with the Moon in Gemini. There is much in his horoscope that makes him the puer æternus, the eternal boy. His mind is playful and rich with ideas. However, his chart shows him to be a true son of the messenger and trickster god, and so capable of exceptional dualism. His horoscope tells us that he abhors confrontation unless he knows he is morally justified. Having battled inner demons over the last three years, Mr. Edwards will rise this summer like a giant refreshed.

John Kerry, born on Dec. 11, 1943, is a Sagittarius with four Gemini planets in the public relationship sector of his birth chart. He has a judicial character, but also has little tolerance for fools. Born with the rare Mars retrograde, he entered life with a rage -- a deep, inner need to overcome (the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. also had the Mars retrograde). He has a strong sense of responsibility as well as feelings of caution about his message. Over the last 18 months the planets have empowered him with core strength. The long-term picture depicts him achieving his highest goals.

Dennis Kucinich, born on Oct. 8, 1946, has his Sun in Libra with its opposite sign, Aries, rising at birth. This is the signature of the peaceful warrior, who desires serenity but is willing to spar for it. The planetary formation at birth endows Mr Kucinich with a profound dedication to conservation of resources, both natural and manufactured. He is relentless in his pursuit of justice and truth. He deeply empathizes with the collective suffering of humanity. The planets show his life at a major juncture; he is only just beginning to establish roots and a sense of real security.

The paper of astrological record. Oy vey!

E-mailed James Randi about this. His comments should be interesting.

evil chemistry

The Associated Press reports John Ashcroft's latest justification for our pre-emptive war of aggression against Iraq:

Saddam Hussein's past use of evil chemistry and evil biology and the threats they posed justified the war in Iraq even if no weapons of mass destruction are ever found, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft said Monday.

Hey, I took those courses when I studied for my baccalaureate in mad science! (They said I'd never find work as a mad scientist in today's economy, but I'll show them! I'll show them all! Ha ha ha ha ha!)

Hope this won't lead to an evil science crackdown. It'd hinder my dark ambitions if the next FBI bulletin told law enforcement to look out not only for people with almanacs and maps, but also for people with chemistry and biology textbooks.

African American

Trevor Richards moved from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Omaha, Nebraska, in 1997.

Recently, three high school juniors posted posters and passed around a petition promoting him for Westside High's Highest Achieving African-American Student Award. For their campaign, they and Trevor were suspended.

Why? Because Trevor's not black enough. He's positively white.

African American is an inept euphemism that Americans who dare not say black use to refer to black Americans who aren't from Africa. I've even heard it refer to Nelson Mandela, a black African who isn't from America.

As a fellow smarty-pants, I applaud Trevor and his supporters for their satire. Westside High should have called a spade a spade and straightforwardly called it a Highest Achieving Black Student Award if that's what they meant.

Shame on Westside. Instead of seizing a teachable moment to discuss discrimination, they punished the kids for embarrassing the grown-ups.

L. Ross Raszewski told me of another incident this reminded him of. The black principal of Kent Island High School in Stevensville, Maryland caused uproar by holding a special assembly for minorities, but no students of Hispanic, Asian, or Native American descent were allowed in. Nor girls nor gays, unless they were black. There, minorities meant blacks only.

weapons :-) of mass :-) destruction :-)

Nancy Pelosi, Democratic party leader of the House of Representatives, has a scary smile which never reaches her eyes. Giving her opinion of our fraudulent president's State of the Union address, perhaps to cover catching up with her teleprompter, she paused and punctuated her words with a plastic smile. Even when talking about the proliferation :-) of weapons :-) of mass :-) destruction :-). How soulless!

Habeas

Reporting spam through SpamCop yesterday, I noticed one had some curious headers:

X-Habeas-SWE-1: winter into spring
X-Habeas-SWE-2: brightly anticipated
X-Habeas-SWE-3: like Habeas SWE (tm)
X-Habeas-SWE-4: Copyright 2002 Habeas (tm)
X-Habeas-SWE-5: Sender Warranted Email (SWE) (tm). The sender of this
X-Habeas-SWE-6: email in exchange for a license for this Habeas
X-Habeas-SWE-7: warrant mark warrants that this is a Habeas Compliant
X-Habeas-SWE-8: Message (HCM) and not spam. Please report use of this
X-Habeas-SWE-9: mark in spam to <http://www.habeas.com/report/>.

I was skeptical, though according to their press releases, they've successfully sued spammers for unauthorized use of their header haiku.

Habeas wants mailservers to whitelist these trademarked headers. Innocent users of ISPs blacklisted by the shadowy sentinels of SPEWS might benefit. They would insert these headers into their e-mail, swearing it's not spam on penalty of violating US trademark law.

But what of spammers outside US jurisdiction? If these tags ever became a reliable way to get around SPEWS, every spamhaus in Taiwan and China would put them in every e-mail they send. Thus rendering them worthless except, perhaps, as a probable spam indicator.

Cobalt Flux

My friends Haze, Dan, and Lisa came up for a New Year's party last night. Spent an enjoyable hour trying out my beautiful new Cobalt Flux dance platforms for Dance Dance Revolution, a videogame in which you step onto arrow buttons in time to dance music.

My old Topway hard plastic dance platforms served me well for two years of button stomping, but the time has come to retire them:

• Rubber stoppers where the cables enter the platforms have pulled loose, exposing several centimeters of unprotected wire. If someone tugs or trips over a cable, the platform may stop responding until the cable is jiggled.
• They're noisy. When I played wearing wireless headphones so as not to wake my father resting in the next room, he was disturbed by the clacking of the buttons.

I won't miss the LEDs within the buttons that light up when you step onto them. They're cute, but they're for your audience. You don't see them while your eyes are on the screen.

Cobalt Flux platforms are made of lexan and galvanized steel. Though surprisingly thin, they feel much heavier than my Topway platforms. Just positioning them on the floor takes effort. No more sliding platforms! Connecting them with the aluminum bar, I can play Double mode with no risk of them drifting apart midsong.

Responsive, too. Step lightly with confidence that sensors detect even mild pressure. I'm dancing faster now, which has improved my game.

If I want to play Pump It Up, another dancing videogame which uses diagonal arrows and a center button instead of cardinal arrows, I can enable the center panel by unscrewing it and removing a piece of wood.

I love these pads!

Rent-a-Corpse

HARARE (Reuters) -- Two Zimbabwean mortuary workers have been arrested on charges they rented out corpses to motorists to enable them to take advantage of special fuel preferences given to hearses.

Shucks, now I won't be able to patent my business plan to lend stuffed corpses to motorists wishing to use carpool lanes.

Rent-A-Corpse: We prep 'em, you shlep 'em!

enfemination

My first good laugh of the day:

On ifMUD today, L. Ross Rasewski was recounting a conversation with someone who argued that Microsoft Word was sexist because its spelling dictionary didn't accept the spelling womyn for woman.

Chris Tate: You remind me of a feminist text in which it was declared that the term masturbation was sexist because it contained master, and went on to coin a new term enfemination for female self-stimulation.

Alexandre Muñiz: I guess using a vibrator would be artificial enfemination.

sociopath

George W. Bush doesn't care how many lives he sacrifices to secure oil fields.

Mark Miller may be on to something when he says, I think that Bush is a sociopathic personality. I think he's incapable of empathy. Miller collected Bushisms for his book called The Bush Dyslexicon, and found a pattern behind what Bush can say easily, and what he can't say without stumbling.

He has no trouble speaking off the cuff when he's speaking punitively, when he's talking about violence, when he's talking about revenge.

When he struts and thumps his chest, his syntax and grammar are fine, Miller said.

It's only when he leaps into the wild blue yonder of compassion, or idealism, or altruism, that he makes these hilarious mistakes.

Miller reads much into a memorable malaprop:

Fool me once, shame ... shame on ... you. Long, uncomfortable pause. Fool me-- can't get fooled again!

Played for laughs everywhere, Miller saw a darkness underlying the gaffe.

There's an episode of Happy Days, where The Fonz has to say, I'm sorry and can't do it. Same thing, Miller said.

What's revealing about this is that Bush could not say, Shame on me to save his life. That's a completely alien idea to him. This is a guy who is absolutely proud of his own inflexibility and rectitude.

Torturing animals for fun is a warning sign of a sociopathic child. Terry Throckmorton, a childhood friend of Bush, told a New York Times reporter that as kids

We were terrible to animals, recalled Mr. Throckmorton, laughing. A dip behind the Bush home turned into a small lake after a good rain, and thousands of frogs would come out.

Everybody would get BB guns and shoot them, Mr. Throckmorton said. Or we'd put firecrackers in the frogs and throw them and blow them up.

Several things gave the lie to Bush's compassionate conservatism on the campaign trail. He coldheartedly mocked Karla Baye Tucker's televised plea for clemency. Interviewing Bush for Talk in August 1999, Tucker Carlson (now conservative host of Crossfire) recounted:

In the weeks before the execution, Bush says, Bianca Jagger and a number of other protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Tucker. Did you meet with any of them? I ask.

Bush whips around and stares at me. No, I didn't meet with any of them, he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest, most offensive question ever posed. I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with [Tucker], though. He asked her real difficult questions, like What would you say to Governor Bush? What was her answer? I wonder.

Please, Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, don't kill me.

I must look shocked -- ridiculing the pleas of a condemned prisoner who has since been executed seems odd and cruel, even for someone as militantly anticrime as Bush -- because he immediately stops smirking. It's tough stuff, Bush says, suddenly somber, but my job is to enforce the law. As it turns out, the Larry King-Karla Faye Tucker exchange Bush recounted never took place, at least not on television. During her interview with King, however, Tucker did imply that Bush was succumbing to election-year pressure from pro-death penalty voters.

Apparently Bush never forgot it. He has a long memory for slights.

• The proverb is, Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

Bomb Iraq, continued

One more, with a nod to the late Bill Hicks:

OUR INTELLIGENCE AGENTS
ARE QUITE ELITE
WE'RE SURE THEY
HAVE ANTHRAX
WE SAVED THE RECEIPT
Bomb Iraq

• Bill Hicks was a comedian who did routines about Gulf War.

  During the Persian Gulf War, those intelligence reports would come out: Iraq: incredible weapons--incredible weapons.

  How do you know that?

  Well ... we looked at the receipt ... But as soon as that check clears, we're goin' in! What time does the bank open, 8:00? We're goin' in at 9:00!

Bomb Iraq

Today we creative folks over at ifMUD were making sarcastic political rhymes in the style of Burma Shave signs, ending in Bomb Iraq.

Here are a few of mine:

CAN'T FIND USAMA?
RECESSION IN ACTION?
DEPLOY A WEAPON
OF MASS
DISTRACTION
Bomb Iraq

FORGET BIN LADEN
HE'S USEFUL LOOSE
JUST HELP US
HUNT FOR
OUR EXCUSE
Bomb Iraq

DON'T NEED ALLIES
LET 'EM TALK RUDE
THEY'LL LOVE US
WHEN WE HAVE
ALL THE CRUDE
Bomb Iraq

driver's license

At last, I have obtained my Holy Grail -- a driver's license in my new name.

A few years ago, I changed my name to Robin Lionheart, merely by adopting it. My quest has been to legally change my name on all forms of identification without a court procedure.

US citizens can change their names to whatever they want under common law. However, changing your name on your driver's license generally requires a marriage certificate or a court order. But for a judicial procedure in Pike County, I'd have to pay $92 to file a petition, be fingerprinted by the state police like a criminal, and buy a newspaper advertisement announcing the court date. And all that could become a waste of time and money if the judge rejects my petition. Why go to so much trouble?

My hero Richard Feynman liked to tell a funny anecdote about agreeing to speak at a city college on condition that he wouldn't have to sign his name more than thirteen times. (Twelve signatures later, he refused to sign twice more to receive his check, despite the college's insistence that he must because they can't account for money that the recipient won't sign for.) I resolved to legally change my name without the expense and indignities of a judicial procedure.

The Pennsylvania Driver's Manual states, If you hold a valid driver's license from another state, you must get a Pennsylvania driver's license within 60 days after moving to Pennsylvania and surrender your out-of-state license. I tried, three times. When I moved to Pennsylvania a couple years ago, I went to two Department of Transportation offices to exchange my New Jersey driver's license for a Pennsylvania one. Each time I was referred to Bill P--, a belligerent manager who chided me for not getting my name changed the right way.

Well, I reasoned, I complied with the law by duly surrendering my out-of-state license. If Pennsylvania returned it and refused me an in-state license, I had no control over that. So I continued to drive with my valid New Jersey license, and renewed it last year by mail.

Having different names on my driver's license and Social Security Card was inconvenient. Local banks wouldn't open an account for me, so I opened one with an out-of-state credit union. Since I had trouble getting auto insurance yesterday, I went back to PennDOT for another try.

This time, I had a passport in my old name with my new name as an a/k/a. I brought tax returns, bank statements, life insurance binders, my Social Security Card, and my voter registration. I surrendered my old license again.

The office had a new manager, who listened to my situation and spent an hour and a half making phone calls to check my credentials. I fidgeted uneasily on a plastic chair in the waiting room, then decided it didn't matter what happened, and started to read a book.

Just then, it felt like my chest was filled with a warm sense of peace and well-being. A luminous feeling like being in love. If I believed in guardian angels, I might've thought mine was telling me not to worry. Maybe releasing all those attachments caused me to experience satori for a couple minutes. A wonderful sensation, just sitting there placidly feeling everything was going to be all right.

It was. The polite manager eventually accepted my identification and directed me to a counter to fill out paperwork to get my license, apologizing at least three times but after 9/11 we have to be careful. I wondered what went through his mind as he waited on hold for the State Department, if he imagined himself the hero in a drama, catching an unidentified terrorist trying to get false identification.

Chilling Effects

Chilling Effects posted an annotated version of the legal threat I received from Consumers Union a couple months ago.

$1,500

Consumers Union e-mailed me a legal threat for some Consumer Reports review summaries in Amway: The Untold Story. How disappointing to receive unfounded threats from a company I respect.

accident

An SUV hit me head-on on Valentine's Day. My tibia is broken.

Xenogears

Finally finished Xenogears today. Marked the occasion with a bottle of black cherry soda.

What a pity Square only finished half the game. On disc two, whole chapters are narrated in a prolonged infodump, punctuated by a few boss fights. They should've released disc one as part one, then finished the second half as a separate release.

Square intended Xenogears to be chapter five of a grand saga. Monolith Soft now plans to make the six game series as Xenosaga. Perhaps when they remake chapter five, it'll get the full treatment it deserves.

joejob

I've been joejobbed!

Some people have complained about a fraudulent spam purporting to solicit donations to pay search engine fees for my mirror of Aaron Bazaar's Global Prosperity Scam site. (Perhaps they mean paid listings. I have not bought advertisements of any sort for my personal websites, nor do I plan to.)

This inarticulate spam practically asks the reader not to complain or else my ISP will shut down my site: I do not send spam and have stated this on my site to make my intentions clear and to make sure that my isp will not take my site down. Subtle it is not.

Legend of the Rangers

Just saw the pilot for a new Babylon 5: Legend of the Rangers series, To Live and Die in Starlight.

No layers, no wheels within wheels, no subtlety. Any strategy is explained twice so inattentive folks in the back row can keep up. In short, not up to the level I expect from Babylon 5.

But it was an entertaining enough way to spend two hours.

I said so to my friend Carl Muckenhoupt, who was reminded of a conversation he had with someone about Galaxy Quest, singing the praises of its adequacy. His interlocutor said if he'd been approached by a cameraperson recording audience reactions outside the theater, he'd have enthusiastically declared, It kept me occupied for two hours!

Wal-Mart

Wal-Mart's TV ads show workers talking about what a wonderful place it is to work.

We laugh. We laugh at Wal-Mart.

Yeah, I too laugh at Wal-Mart. Especially when they advertise their oppressive workplace with phrases like Wal-Mart is a great place to work for anybody.

spiritual shield

Zell Miller

most tragic hour

At a Pentagon press briefing before our fraudulent president's speech, Senator John Warner of the Armed Services Committee declared, This is indeed the most tragic hour in America's history.

No, the most tragic hour in our history was when we became the first and only country to use atomic weapons in war, instantly killing approximately 70,000 human beings (out of a total death toll of about 200,000). We weren't the victims then, but that is undeniably America's history.

World Trade Center

The World Trade Center has collapsed. Terrorists crashed planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Watched coverage on various networks of the disaster. CN8 showed lots of amateur video footage. Having nothing to say over it, they babbled things like this is the unbelievable footage where you just can't believe this is happening in the United States.

BBC America told me more about the attacks in ten minutes than CNN over the previous hour.

Talking heads on the Fox News Channel, the most biased name in news, referred to pressure on other governments to come up with some kind of target for a military response. The media, too, is searching for a boogeyman to blame, suggesting every known terrorist group they could think of.

Most immediately pointed fingers at Usama bin Laden, dubitably asserting that only his group is organized enough to pull this off.

One network showed footage of Palestinians in the West Bank cheering about the destruction. By telephone, anchors asked a foreign correspondent in Palestine how we can believe them when they say they weren't involved. Though celebration of death and destruction is shameful, I think I understand how Palestinians whose homes are shelled daily with American bombs could cheer about the impregnable USA finally being hit hard.

More grist for the propaganda mill. Reminds me of irresponsible finger-pointing after the Oklahoma City bombing, mostly at bin Laden.

Hours after the bomb went off, CBS Evening News featured Steven Emerson, a ubiquitous terrorism expert, who eagerly presented his biases as objective analysis: This was done with the intent to inflict as many casualties as possible. That is a Middle Eastern trait.

...

The New York Times speculated in its first day of reporting on why terrorists would have struck in Oklahoma City: Some Middle Eastern groups have held meetings there, and the city is home to at least three mosques.

The culprit turned out to be just disgruntled American Tim McVeigh.

Before going into hiding, our acting president tried to sound presidential (while mispronouncing words like appropriate). The United States will hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts, Bush droned in such an unfeeling voice, he might as well have been speaking about Social Security.

We'll probably fixate on some target to flex our tremendous military at, with much beating of drums and rallying of popular support, rather than redress legitimate grievances underlying such deep hatred of our country.

[Ed.: CNN's footage of Palestinians celebrating on the streets of Nablus was real, despite rumors that it dated from 1991 and showed Palestinians cheering the Gulf War.]

Topway dance platforms

At last, my hard dance platforms from DDR Depot have arrived!

The Topway PlayStation platforms weigh about 30 pounds. The buttons take more pressure to depress than on vinyl mats. I experienced a lot more misses at first from tapping the buttons or stepping on them off center. Playing Dance Dance Revolution in my socks, feeling when my feet miss the buttons surely improves my game.

Photographs don't show two small black buttons atop each pad, sized for fingers, not for feet. One is Start, the other toggles the lights. When on, stepping on an arrow button lights up a ring of LEDs within the circumference. More for the benefit of spectators than for yourself, but it does enhance the arcade feel.

Unfortunately, there's no button corresponding to Select. Without a Select button, you can't activate hidden play modes (Little, Hidden, Left, Right, Turn, and Shuffle) or reset the game by depressing Select and Start simultaneously. Vinyl mats for the PlayStation have a Select button in the upper left corner, narrow but wide enough to step on. To do anything requiring Select with a Topway platform, you must unplug it, plug in a standard controller, press Select, unplug the controller, and plug in the platform again. Very inconvenient.

They also work with my Dreamcast edition of Dance Dance Revolution using a Total Control Plus PSX-to-Dreamcast controller adapter. Dreamcast controllers have no Select button, so to activate special modes and alternate character designs in the Dreamcast edition, you use the analog control stick on a hand controller, or step on the Konami logo that replaces Select on a Dreamcast vinyl mat. Since Topway platforms simulate neither, you can't access hidden modes without swapping controllers.

Though rated to endure up to 250 pounds of weight, one pad could not endure rough handling by UPS. Its corner was broken into black plastic fragments. The pad was functional, but its internals were knocked out of alignment so that the power button wouldn't remain depressed. Will write DDR Depot to inquire about getting a replacement.

crappytire.com

Just finished making an Open Directory category about the crappytire.com domain dispute. Canadian Tire went before an arbitration board to claim trademark infringement, since Crappy Tire is a colloquial name for them. Or as more than one article put it, their lawyers set out to prove that when Canadians say crappy tire, they mean Canadian Tire.

The press coverage was amusing. Most laughable domain dispute since Tata Sons, Ltd. claimed bodacious-tatas.com was taking a cash-ride on the image and status of the TATA mark.

The Deprogrammer

Had the disturbingly beautiful chorus of The Bobs' The Deprogrammer running through my head all day long. I was half-listening to tracks from The Bobs' first eponymous album, when that chorus touched a nerve.

The hook kept bringing me back. The more I mulled over the song echoing in my head, the more my confusing feelings about it intensified. Eventually, sadness and a sense of isolation overwhelmed me, and I wept.

That probably says more about me than about the song. Still, I want to remember how I felt about it today.

Happy Birthday to You

For the first time, a Slashdot post of mine (a comment about the copyright on Happy Birthday to You) was moderated up to 5 points. Hooray! Now that my karma's reached 25, maybe I'll finally start posting at 2 points. Perhaps I should expand that post into an essay.

Free Sklyarov

Put together an Open Directory category about the USA v. Dmitry Sklyarov case this week.

I'm disappointed in the EFF sacrificing its credibility in its meretricious joint press release with Adobe, praising them for doing the right thing by recommending his release and saying they've lived up to the high standard of integrity that has made the company successful.

Seems like this transparent spin doctoring was the price of getting Adobe to recommend Dmitry's release. But the FBI isn't dropping Adobe's charges. Nothing has changed for Dmitry. He's still in jail.

Adobe has not done the right thing. The right thing would be to make amends for their wrongdoing, such as by paying for Dmitry's defense. Adobe merely stopped doing the wrong thing, to avoid more bad press and picketers outside their headquarters. Now they've used the EFF to tout an integrity that their actions belie.

raccoon

Pancake mix covers my pantry floor, from a box with a hole torn out of the side. Large paw prints lead away. I think I know who the culprit is.

A couple weeks ago, I heard a crash in the kitchen and came downstairs to find a raccoon eating my cat Velcro's food. It had torn a hole in a corner of my screen door.

Next time it came around, an odd jobber who was making repairs chased it around the house and up a tree. It stayed up there for hours.

Hadn't seen it for a while, so I forgot about it and neglected to fix the screen door. Won't make that mistake again.

heart attack

My father suffered a heart attack while at a bridge convention in Tulsa. Fortunately, his partner, who he was sharing a hotel room with, was present and summoned medical help right away. He had a quintuple bypass.

He's out of intensive care now, but it'll be several weeks before he can return home.

[Ed.: I could've joked about hoping the spirits of the chain letter are now at peace, but it's no laughing matter.]

chain letter

My sister sent me the most life-threatening chain letter I've ever read.

CASE 1:

Kelly Sedey had one wish, for her boyfriend of three years, David Marsden, to propose to her. Then one day when she was out to lunch David proposed! She accepted, but then had to leave because she had a meeting in 20 min. When she got to her office, she noticed on her computer she had e-mail. She checked it, the usual stuff from her friends, but then she saw one that she had never gotten before. It was this letter. She simply deleted it without even reading all of it.

BIG MISTAKE!

Later that evening, she received a phone call from the police. It was about DAVID! He had been in an accident with an 18 wheeler. He didn't survive.

CASE 2: Take Katie Robbenson.

She received this letter and being the believer that she was, she sent it to a few of her friends but didn't have enough e-mail addresses to send out the full 10 that you must. Three days later, Katie went to a masquerade ball. Later that night when she left to get to her car to go home, she was killed on the spot by a hit-and-run drunk driver.

No lesser punishments like lost jobs or stolen cars. No, if the chain is broken, someone must die. The vengeful spirits of the chain letter cry out for blood!

Fortunately, Katie Robbenson's surviving relatives went through her e-mail inbox, found the unacknowledged letter, and informed the sender so they could include her tragedy in the letter as a warning.

I e-mailed a reply to my sister saying I care too much about my friends to forward an message that'll kill them or someone they love if they overlook it. For the love of humanity, the carnage stops here! Oh, and if I die in a horrible accident, it's all her fault.

doh

Read a BBC article saying that the Oxford English Dictionary has added Homer Simpson's favorite interjection, doh!.

Like the Encyclopedia Britannica, the online OED requires a paid subscription, but their news section had the definition.

Memento

farbenfrohe

A German Web design article about link icons linked to my Web page:

Neben erklärenden Icons werden vereinzelt auch Farbcodierungen des Textlinks eingesetzt, um dem Leser zu signalisieren, ob ein Icon zu einem ergänzenden Dokument auf der eigenen Site oder nach draußen führt. Gewohnt minimalistisch erfolgt der Einsatz dieses Mittels bei Ralph Segert, während die Bösewichte von cphack.robinlionheart.com eine eher farbenfrohe Variante vorstellen.

Naturally, I was keen to know what a farbenfrohe Variante was. Babelfish offered color-glad version as a translation. How delightful! But then a similar English idiom occurred to me.

Using Babelfish and a pocket German-English dictionary, I translated it:

Besides explanatory icons, color codes of text links alone will also be used, in order to signal to the reader whether an icon leads to a supplementary document on its own site instead of leading outside. Usual minimalistic results come from the application of these means by Ralph Segert, while the rogues of cphack.robinlionheart.com present a rather color-happy version.

[Ed.: Gunther Schmidl has informed me that farbenfrohe just means colorful.]

ACLU card

In 1988, Presidential candidate George Bush accused his opponent Governor Michael Dukakis of being a card-carrying member of the ACLU, as if supporting an organization that defends the Bill of Rights were un-American.

My ACLU card arrived in the mail today.

It's a perforated section of their fundraising letter. My name and a 16-digit member number are spottily printed on the front. Perhaps their printer needs more toner. The ACLU's mailing address is on the back.

No phone numbers to call if I'm oppressed by The Man, no bullet points on how to conduct myself if stopped by the police, no places to show this card for discounts on bail bonds. It's not even a real card, just a perforated slip of paper.

So what's all the fuss about?

lost mail

Yesterday, I noticed that I had not received a single e-mail since 19 February, the day UpLink, my ISP, was officially subsumed into Earthlink/MindSpring. All e-mail sent to me from then through today disappeared into a black hole. If you sent me anything important in the past week, please resend.

spampoena

A pink slip in my mailbox today informed me that my letter carrier attempted to deliver a certified letter from Schwartz and Nystrom, return receipt requested. Since Schwartz and Nystrom is the law firm that sent out the CPHack spampoenas, it's probably related to my mirror of The Breaking of Cyber Patrol® 4.

Big Money

Some say lotteries are a tax on people who are bad at math. But how big a jackpot would make buying a lottery ticket a good investment?

Last week, two people split $363 million, the largest lottery jackpot ever awarded in the United States.

In this lottery, the Big Game, 5 balls are drawn from a set numbered 1-50, plus a Big Money Ball from a set numbered 1-36. The number of combinations of jackpot numbers are are ((50×49×48×47×46) / (5×4×3×2×1)) × 36, so your odds are 1 in 76,275,360.

Lottery tickets cost $1, but their actual value is a sum of each prize times your odds of winning it:

For the value to equal $1, x = $62,545,795.20. However, to actually keep $62 million of your winnings, the jackpot must be more.

Estimating federal and state tax on the jackpot at around 40%, multiply by 1.4 to make approximately $87,500,000. (I ought to figure the tax on the $150,000 prize too, but I'll let it go. It's the Big Money we're interested in, right?)

We'll choose a lump sum payout rather than a 6% annuity, since we can get a much better return by investing. I estimate the lump sum payout alternative at half the annuity face value. (50% is good enough for an estimate. A winner of $180 million is taking $90 million cash, and the Pennsylvania lottery advertises prizes like $16M annuity or $8M cash.) Thus, to receive $87,500,000 cash, the jackpot must be a $175,000,000 annuity.

Unless more than one person wins. In this case, two people split a jackpot. If the average number of jackpot winners is two, that doubles the jackpot necessary for a ticket to be worth $1, to $350,000,000. (However, if the average number of jackpot winners were more, the jackpot would have to be too.)

Therefore, this $363 million lottery may have been the first lottery in US history in which a ticket was a good investment.

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Stumbled across a deconstruction of Gilligan's Island at Transparency Now, and ended up spending hours perusing the site.

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• My answer: select id from B where id not in (select id from A where link_type = 2)

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