http://www.norvig.com/Gettysburg/
RANT: If Lincoln had powerpoint at Gettysburg … then what?
Sunday, June 4, 2006
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Posted by reinkefj
LIBERTY: The Constitution as an excuse instead of a restraint
Sunday, June 4, 2006http://www.lewrockwell.com/reese/reese284.html
Original Intent
by Charley Reese
***Begin Quote***
They would be disturbed at how we have allowed politicians and judges to turn the Constitution into an excuse instead of a restraint.
***End Quote***
(1) Return the foreign policy to not meddling in the affairs of others.
(2) Disband the standing army and decommission the myriad of TLAs with guns and "police power".
(3) Return sovereignty to the states.
(4) Return to U.S. senators that are selected by the state legislatures.
(5) Eliminate any federal mandate on the states (i.e., one man one vote).
(6) A party should be Constitutionally limited from a majority in the Congress when the hold the Presidency. (Not sure how to word that one?)
(7) Federal judge could be impeached by the legislature of the state in which he sat.
(8) Federal government, as an agent of the states, can only pass laws about the states not citizens of those states.
(9) No federal involvement in education, welfare, medical care, foreign aid and domestic pork-barrel projects.
I can live with that! I'm voting Charlie for President. We'll sort out the details later!
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Posted by reinkefj
TURKEY: “Why bother networking … …
Sunday, June 4, 2006http://ripples.typepad.com/ripples/2006/06/networking_made.html
***Begin Quote***
Why bother networking if it doesn't extend your network of friends?
***End Quote***
On this chilly morning as I sit and reflectively blog, I'd pontificate that "networking" is very different than "friendship".
As an injineer that has to have a taxonomy for everything, one has: spouses (high value / low maintenance if you pick right),relatives (thankfully not a greatly expanding number requiring loans, gifts, and high maintenance / low return); in laws (enough said); friends (great joys); acquaintances (casual contact); fellow bloggers (who tell you that your full of soup as needed); coworkers (limited to the lifespan of your corporate life); and service people (usually nice people you meet along the way who do stuff for you). There's a formula for everything. And, we take two parts of this and one part of that to make shazaam.
[Note the careful attention to the engineering rule of thumb five plus or minus two. (1) spouses; (2) relatives; (3) in laws; (4) friends; (5) acquaintances; (6) fellow bloggers; (7); coworkers; (8)service people. Oops! Ok combine relatives and in laws! And it now fits the rule. As I was saying: Note the careful attention to the engineering rule of thumb five plus or minus two. (1) spouses; (2) relatives and in laws; (3) friends; (4) acquaintances; (5) fellow bloggers; (6) coworkers; (7)service people. An injineer can always make the observed data fit the predetermined answer. Why do you think tuition is higher, the math is harder, and the wages better?]
Seriously, maybe networking contacts can become friends and acquaintances. Maybe that is what one needs to do. Convert the business of networking into "making friends and influencing people". I'm not so sure. But I'll take it under advisement. Till then, networking contacts don't fit into my paradigm cause it breaks the rule of five.
Maybe I need some new rules?
[FOOTNOTE: The rule of five says that people don't understand or remember things that are fewer than 3 (insufficient distinctions) and greater than 7 (too many choices). So engineers always try to ensure that stuff conforms to that rule. Next week's lesson: Why bridges don't usually fail or multiplying the right answer by ten just to be safe! That's why you don't have to worry about following a 9.5 ton truck on a one ton bridge … usually!]
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Posted by reinkefj
TECH: “OUTLOOK” does a “LOOKOUT”
Sunday, June 4, 2006Most interesting.
This morning a routine email out to my isp started failing. OK, no big deal. Often stuff has to try more than once to get out. After the third try, it was time to look into it. The message was "needs authentication". Huh? I haven't changed anything in my email accounts since I abandoned a spammy email address and created a new one. But that was a while ago. OK! Let's debug. Can we do the Outlook Lookout test account? Hmmm, everything works EXCEPT the send. OK, let's look at the email address. Looks good. Other settings? Hmmm, the outbound "needs authentication" box is unchecked. That's not right. Check it. Test it. OK. Send mail. OK. Hmm so how did that box get unchecked. Ghosts? The wicked witch of the west. Or just Outlook donning it persona of Lookout and making life interesting for the poor dumb user. And, people wonder why I want to leave Microsoft? At least, an open source vendor would be interested in my problem. Or at least feign interest if I was a donor. Heck, the beta software guys actually respond. Sigh!
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Posted by reinkefj
LIBERTY: “the Invisible Hand of Adam Smith is the same as the hand of God”
Sunday, June 4, 2006http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig6/vuk4.html
Step-by-Step Socialism
by Vedran Vuk
***Begin Quote***
Poverty is whatever the opponents of freedom make it out to be. Have capitalism and semi-free markets not increased the wealth of the poorest in America ten-fold?! The luxuries considered standard to the average U.S. citizen would have been marvels to kings and queens of a hundred and fifty years ago!
If capitalism in another hundred years improves the situation of the poor ten-fold again, the obstructers of liberty will still call it poverty! Not because the lower 20% don’t have enough but because the upper 20% have a hell of a lot more.
***End Quote***
Very insightful. Like the fellow who said that he wanted to come to America because the poor people were fast. Even he realized the fallacy of the "poverty hustlers". You know, those are those people, who appear to make their living out of lecturing us, that we are not doing enough about hunger, poverty, and homelessness.
The bottom fifth is not "poor".
Those souls in the Third World, being starved to death by their respective government, are poor.
Now, I have no doubt, that there are people in America that are "poor". I also know that I see an awful lot of "welfare queens". An, they are not all at the welfare office drawing a gubamint check. We have lots of "welfare" recipients that don't have to endure the indignity of appearing at the welfare office for it.
Let's start by cutting corporate welfare. Price supports! Here's a pet peeve. We have sugar price supports and sugar quotas. Now let me understand this I have to pay more for sugar and anything that contains it so that corporate farms that are growing it are incentivized to keep growing it. AND, since this cost is unavoidable, it's a tax. So everyone pays a sales tax to keep the sugar flowing. Does that make ANY sense at all? We have milk price minimums at the federal level. Again, it's a tax. Does it make any sense at all?
Let's examine all the wealthy welfare. Just off the top of my head, I can target Federal Flood Insurance that encourages wealthy people to rebuild expensive homes on dangerous coastlines at taxpayers' expense. I can site Sam Donaldson's sheep farm in Arizona that gets millions. And, don't forget the minimum wage that helps the unions and the gubamint workers. (And, you thought it was about helping poor people; silly taxpayer!)
So, in short, the bottom 20% needs a tax cut, a cost of living decrease, and the free market to elevate tehir living standard.
There's a bumper sticker quote to the effect that "no one ever taxed themselves to prosperity". Wow is that true!
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Posted by reinkefj
Reinke Faces Life 