RANT: empire in their final stages

Saturday, October 6, 2007

http://www.lewrockwell.com/reese/reese399.html

*** begin quote ***

We are like all empires in their final stages. We have grown soft. We like our comforts. We don’t wish to be inconvenienced. We like poor Mexicans to do our stoop work and poor Americans to do our fighting, provided they do it far away so we won’t be disturbed by explosions and screams. We enjoy our decadence, and there are always people in the media who can rationalize anything, no matter how sick and revolting it is.

As for trying to understand the world, we are just too busy being amused and following the adventures of Britney Spears and other celebrities. We like to let the TV and the politicians do our thinking for us. It saves energy. They tell us whom to hate.

The only way to avoid a bad end is to find some realists and put them in public office. We need a brave Congress, not a pack of cowards. We desperately need a president with a brain. We need to retire the warmongers in the foreign-policy establishment. Otherwise, we will join the other third-rate countries, once empires, on history’s discard pile.

*** end quote ***

Tank driver hits the nail on the head. If we don’t elect Ron Paul, it is obvious where it all ends up.

# # # # #


LIBERTY: Marshals Arrest N.H. Tax Resistors

Saturday, October 6, 2007

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8S363QO0&show_article=1

Marshals Arrest N.H. Tax Evaders
Oct 5 12:08 PM US/Eastern
By HOLLY RAMER Associated Press Writer

***Begin Quote***

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) – U.S. marshals posing as supporters arrested convicted tax-evaders Ed and Elaine Brown at their rural, fortress-like home, the head marshal said Friday.

“They invited us in, and we escorted them out,” U.S. Marshal Stephen Monier said, releasing the first details of Thursday night’s arrests.

A small team of marshals pulled off the ruse, arresting the Browns without incident on the front porch of their Plainfield home in west- central New Hampshire, Monier said.

The arrests ended a months-long standoff that began in January, when Brown, 65, a retired exterminator, and his dentist wife, 67, walked out of their federal trial in Concord. She returned to the trial but soon joined her husband at home, where they vowed to resist violently if authorities tried to arrest them.

***End Quote***

Imagine the gaul of these two people — a 67 year old dentist and a 65 year old retired exterminator — having the hubris to resist the Washington gang from stealing their earnings! Hope those “law enforcement” people are proud of themselves. Ask for hospitality and then enslave them. Nice guests! But that’s gooferment for you: force and fraud! It defines them.

Just step back for a second and ask yourself, how is it MORAL for the mob to use force on the individual. Where does that gang get the right to steal from the Browns. You could not walk into their house and take from them. I could not. SO how does it work that it is moral for the GOOFERMENT to do it in our place?

If I don’t agree to something, then you have no MORAL right to force me to obey your diktat!

How was the obligation for them to pay taxes created?

Now, I don’t think that it’s smart to go head to head with any gang. Regardless if it the Mafia, a street gang, the one in Washington, the one in Trenton, or the one down the road locally. But, that doesn’t make what they do moral. I may not be able to take them on directly but that doesn’t make me any less aware that we are their slaves. Their sheep! That they can sheer anyway the fell like. And, they can {expletive deleted; related to the reproductive act} anytime they want.

I remember the 1957 Hungry Rebellion. There will come a time when the American people will awake from their slumber and set the house back in order. I’ll be on the barricades. As the Soviet Communists realized you can only hold the people down for so long. And, just as the French Resistance went house to house executing the collaborators in certain parts of France after the Germans withdrew, so to their will come a day of retribution for the thugs, the bureaucrats, and the politicians.

A bloody day. It will be a sad day for them and a joyous day for liberty when the people rediscover their heritage.

One has to just bide one’s time.

“I know not course others will take … …”

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RANT: DELL email really grates!

Saturday, October 6, 2007

http://dhs.p.delivery.net/m/p/del/pre/preview.asp?cID=17136217872&pid=681792&mid=1807951855

*** begin quote ***

WELCOME TO THE FAMILY!

Ferdinand,
Thank you for signing up to receive Dell email updates. As a valued
subscriber, you can expect email delivered to your Inbox that will include:

• Exclusive Dell offers and promotions
• The latest Dell product and service news
• Smart and simple online shopping

To show our appreciation, we are sending you a special coupon¹ offer:

*** end quote ***

… … they gotta be joshing me. That company is on autopilot.

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TECH SERVICE: GRANDCENTRAL can’t “do” skype

Friday, October 5, 2007

I put my skype number into grandcentral and it doesn’t work. I pick up the skype call but grand central doesn’t recognize it. :-)

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LIBERTY: School trains children to be employees and consumers

Friday, October 5, 2007

http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2007/09/29/education_do_we_really_need.htm

September 29, 2007
Education: Do We Really Need Schools Or Do We Need To Better Understand What Education Should Really Be?
Robin Good
Be Smart, Be Independent, Be Good?
Edited by: Luigi Canali De Rossi

***Begin Quote***

How do we educate our children to be active, critical thinkers and not dumb passive consumers serving someone else interests? For however strange this may sound to you, it may have been “marketing” itself to bring us the terrible education system most civilized countries have adopted in the last century or so.

*** and ***

School trains children to be employees and consumers; teach your own to be leaders and adventurers. School trains children to obey reflexively; teach your own to think critically and independently.

Well-schooled kids have a low threshold for boredom; help your own to develop an inner life so that they’ll never be bored.

Urge them to take on the serious material, the grown-up material, in history, literature, philosophy, music, art, economics, theology – all the stuff schoolteachers know well enough to avoid.

***End Quote***

Robin discovers that education makes big children. I’ve been reading Gatto for a while and that’s why I think we have to end gooferment “public” eddycation by running skoolz!

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LIBERTY: Zimbabwe in hyper-inflation

Friday, October 5, 2007

http://www.sokwanele.com/thisiszimbabwe/archives/658

***Begin Quote***

The price of jam (and what’s not for sale)

***End Quote***

Store shelves in hyper-inflation.

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MONEY: Why exceed FDIC limit?

Friday, October 5, 2007

http://www.fdic.gov/news/news/press/2007/pr07083.html

FDIC Approves the Assumption of the Insured Deposits of Miami Valley Bank, Lakeview, Ohio

***Begin Quote***

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 4, 2007
Media Contact:
David Barr (202) 898-6992
cell: (703) 622-4790
e-mail: dbarr@fdic.gov

The Board of Directors of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) today approved the assumption of the insured deposits of Miami Valley Bank, Lakeview, Ohio, by The Citizens Banking Company, Sandusky, Ohio.

Miami Valley, with $86.7 million in total assets and $76 million in total deposits as of October 1, 2007, was closed today by Ohio’s Superintendent of Financial Institutions, and the FDIC was named receiver.

The failed bank’s two offices will reopen tomorrow as branches of The Citizens Banking Company. Depositors of Miami Valley will automatically become depositors of the assuming bank.

The Citizens Banking Company has agreed to assume $62 million of the failed bank’s insured deposits for a two percent premium. At the time of closing, Miami Valley had approximately $14 million in 269 deposit accounts that exceeded the federal deposit insurance limit. While these customers will have access to their insured deposits, they will become creditors of the receivership for the amount of their uninsured funds. The FDIC will retain all of Miami Valley’s assets for later disposition.

***End Quote***

Why would anyone EVER have a balance in excess of the 100k$ FDIC limit?

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LIBERTY: gambling, self-medication and sex for hire

Friday, October 5, 2007

http://www.lvrj.com/opinion/9812692.html

Sep. 16, 2007
VIN SUPRYNOWICZ: New York Times parachutes into Vegas again to make stuff up

***Begin Quote***

… … the fruitlessness of laws that seek to ban consensual acts including gambling, self-medication and sex for hire?

***End Quote***

One really has to wonder about the people and their reps. Do they live in an alternative universe from the rest of us? In that alternative universe, maybe making gambling, drugs, and prostitution illegal stops real people from doing them, but not in the real world.

Making these illegal, ensure that the mob has a constant source of income. Make them legal, would put the mob in competition with a host of internet gambling sites, WalMart & many other “drug” stores, and bevy of “escort” services now legal.

Every time I hear of a person, usually a youngster, dying of a drug over dose or impurity in the stuff, I blame gooferment. If the stuff was legal, it would be USP certified and cheap. Then, we could focus on treatment. So, be ready, when you ask me if little kids should be able to buy “drugs”, my answer is that they do now. And, your stupid laws, that are attempting to legislate morality on other people by force of gooferment, are killing people.

Argh!

Join the real world, and let’s work on solutions that will really fix problems. If you’re going to stay in that alternative universe, then please keep your ideas from leaking in over here.

Double Argh!

# # # # #


STATE MA: TX REVOLT in Taxachusetts!

Thursday, October 4, 2007

*** begin quote ***

======================================================================
LIVE IN MASSACHUSETTS? YOU CAN SIGN THE PETITION RIGHT NOW TO END THE
MASSACHUSETTS INCOME TAX.
======================================================================

Have you ever signed a petition for or against something?

Most petitions simply express your opinion. And the opinions of the
other signers.

Those petitions have NO force of law. NO direct legal power to change
anything. The signers are trying to influence or lobby those in power.

This Petition is different. It has the force of law. It is legally
certified by the Attorney General’s Office and is constitutionally and
legally authorized to put the Massachusetts Income Tax up for a
legally-binding vote.

Your signature – and that of another 106,999 voters – puts our
Initiative to END the Massachusetts Income Tax on the ballot.

Your signature costs you nothing. But it saves us $1.50 in petitioning
costs. 1,000 petition signers like you saves $1,500.

Your signature matters.

Please click the link below, follow the simple directions, help us
get this Initiative on the Ballot, and help us END the Massachusetts
Income Tax:

http://www.smallgovernmentact.org/sign_petition.html

Thank you!

*** end quote ***

Carla just missed last time she tried it. (I think it was defeated 53-47! with a lot of the liberal press “dirty tricks”.)

If it every succeeds, it’ll be the death knell of socialism here?

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RANT: Air travel in the US really sucks

Thursday, October 4, 2007

I bought a ticket for a plane ride at 11. Before I left the hotel this moring, everything was aok. I arrive at the airport and I have a gate delay of 2 hours. Argh!!

And, the security theater of the tsa is laughable. I watched a toddler being sheparded thru the process.  Business people, old folks, and just plain folks submitting meekly to a very unreasonable search and seizureby 8$/hour thugs. Sigh, where is american backbone. what “barbara streisand”.

Argh!

# # # # #


POLITICAL: Ron Paul’s Tax Free Tips Act

Thursday, October 4, 2007

http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul412.html

Statement on the Tax Free Tips Act
by Ron Paul

*** begin quote ***

Madame Speaker, I rise to help millions of working Americans by introducing the Tax Free Tips Act. As the title suggests, this legislation makes tips exempt from federal income and payroll taxes. Tips often compose a substantial portion of the earnings of waiters, waitresses, and other service-sector employees. However, unlike regular wages, a service-sector employee usually has no guarantee of, or legal right to, a tip. Instead, the amount of a tip usually depends on how well an employee satisfies a client. Since the amount of taxes one pays increases along with the size of tip, taxing tips punishes workers for doing a superior job!

*** end quote ***

End the Income Tax period! It’s theft.

# # # # #


MONEY: the car dealer cannot print more cars

Thursday, October 4, 2007

http://www.lewrockwell.com/raskin/raskin26.html

Run for Your Money
by Max Raskin

***Begin Quote***

Fractional reserve banking rests on the delusion that if the banks can fool enough people into thinking that they can withdraw their money at any given time, then they can expand credit and make all sorts of unwise investments. The minute the public gets wind of the bank’s insolvency, as with the latest crisis, they rush to demand their money. On the free market, fractional reserve banking is no more of a problem than fractional reserve car dealerships. If a car dealer sells two deeds to the same car it is clearly fraud. Yet somehow the banks are not burdened with the inconvenient job of repaying their depositors. Unlike the central bank, the car dealer cannot print more cars.

***End Quote***

And, they can’t print any more beach front property. Or, gold bullion coins. Or, any such commodity.

When one is in a “fiat money system” (money is unbacked by gold), then you are best advised to convert your paper into something. A house, a business, or anything that ain’t gooferment paper.

# # # # #


RANT: Force is never acceptable

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070928/ts_afp/irelandsmokingpubsmusicoffbeat_070928145420

*** begin quote ***

Interesting…they should try it in Vegas!

*** end quote ***

Vegas has the smoking Nazis already.

It’s not complete, but it’s getting there.

It is the INITIATION OF FORCE. They are using gooferment to inflict their values on us. It’s OK because you agree with this one. What if it is one of your vices? Like golf? It very wasteful of time, energy, and attention citizen. Further, people get hurt at golf and miss work and can’t maximize their tax payments to the state. And, think of the ecology. What about all the poor animals displaced for your “golf course”. That money and land could have been given to the “poor”.

How does that fit for size? Little tight.

If some one can use gooferment to force YOU or ME or ANYONE to do ONE thing, then we are slaves and they can makes us do anything. Citizen, it unhealthy for you to go to Church, wear clothes, eat at mickeyd’s.

Look it from a freedom side. Does anyone FORCE those musicians to take their equipment to the smoke filled pubs? No, they can say “I only play at smoke free venues”. But, then they have to bear the COSTS of that action. And, who owns the pubs. Obviously, the gooferment since they call the shots. Is anyone forced to patronize the pubs? Yes, the gooferment “regulates” them.

Without the gooferment, there’s be MORE CHOICES. The marketplace would create smoke free Irish pubs.

See in a free market, no one is compelled to do squat. Everyone would get to make choices. When you spend your certificates of appreciation give by your fellow workers for something you’ve done that they like, then it’s like having a mini election. AND, everyone is allowed to decide. Sort of like democracy without the force of mob rule.

See no one can be “wealthy” without serving their fellow man. The free market is essentially a coordination mechanism that allows us to cooperate. Socialism is enforced slavery; free markets are a very complex calculus that allows everyone to be satisfied with what’s available to the maximum extent possible.

Socialism’s mantra “from each, according to ability; to each, according to need. The Free Markets mantra is “serve your fellow man and be rewarded to the extent of your contribution”.

See first, you have to dig the well, and then you get to drink. Catch 10 fish and the market can equate that to 2 loaves of bread. If you catch 10 fish and I catch 5, you get two loaves and I get a lesson in motivation and ability.

It’s a complex mechanism, since if fishing is bad and you only catch 5 and I get 1, then the price of fish will rise. If the baker doesn’t lower his price of bread, he winds up with stale bread. So magically, there will be fish for the baker and bread for us.

It’s when force aka gets involved that the mechanism breaks down.

Argh!

# # # # #


RANT: Developer Builds Around Woman’s Home

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8S1FESO0&show_article=1

Developer Builds Around Woman’s Home
Oct 2 09:57 PM US/Eastern

*** begin quote ***

SEATTLE (AP) – When 86-year-old Edith Macefield refused a $1 million offer to move from her Seattle home, a developer started building a five-story project around it.

*** end quote ***

SO much for zoning. Health codes. And, all those politicians promising to protect the old folks.

# # # # #


INTERESTING: How to win at roulette

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

I thought that title would get your ‘attention’. This is my second post to John’s blog, he gave me authorship privileges to write ‘one’ article a couple of weeks ago, and now here I am putting another post on his blog! (I may lose my ‘interim’ author privileges, eh?) Well here goes…my late father wrote some memoirs before he died, and in those he wrote a piece about how he won on the roulette tables. Not always win he said, but more often than not. He looked at the roulette wheel as a circle, with various ‘arcs’ within it. I believe he had memorized the position of the numbers on the wheel, or maybe he carried a picture like the one below with him.

His ‘process’ was to look at the previous numbers that had ‘hit’ on a wheel (all casinos display them as a list…probably about the last 20 spins I believe). He would look for ‘patterns’ in the hits, ie, an abundance of numbers hitting that fell into a particular ‘arc’ of the wheel. In other words, take the picture below and assume the roulette wheel is a clock. Divide the clock into four sections, e.g., 12 – 3 o’clock, 3 – 6 o’clock, 6 – 9, and 9 -12. He would look at the list of the previous displayed hits on the wheel, and on some roulette tables he noticed that the most frequent numbers that hit fell into one of these four arcs, at least more times than the other arcs of the wheel. So on that roulette table, he would then place his bets on the nine or ten numbers (1/4 of the possible 38 numbers) that are located in that arc. For example, let’s say most of the numbers that had been hitting were numbers in the ‘6 – 9 o’clock’ section of the wheel. Looking in the sample wheel below, those numbers would be: 6, 10, 31, 19, 8, 12, 29, 25, 10, and 27.

Now if you follow his logic, it would imply that certain roulette tables have wheels that are slightly off-level, or for some reason have a tendency for numbers to land in a particular arc of the wheel. They are probably manufactured such that this is supposed to be an impossibility, but who knows….I know it worked for my dad, maybe it was the humidity of the room and its affect on those wheels, or some other phenomena like that…or maybe it was because this was over 15 years ago and they didn’t have the technology to make wheels like they do today. I also must confess I haven’t tried this yet, but I will on my next trip to a casino, and then I will let you know!

roulette1.gif

Image above compliments of: http://www.ds.unifi.it/VL/VL_EN/games/games5.html


TECHNOLOGY: We should all use ZULU time!

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Once again, this whole nonsense about time zones and daylight savings times aggravated me.

(I got up an hour earlier than I had to for my morning call.)

As a globe, we should all be on GMT.

Who cares if you work 9-5 in eat or 1400-2200 Zulu?

If you talk to someone in another time zone, the conversation has one variable extracted.

And, maybe Microsoft Outlook would work correctly.

Argh!

# # # # #


TECHNOLOGY: SKYPE and VWBBie

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

FYI, to anyone who is interested or cares, I participated in a conference call from the Denver Tech Center Marriott using SKYPE from my personal NOTEBOOK over the Verizon Wireless Broad Band. And it all worked.

Call was FREE, VWBB ain’t, and quality was acceptable.

So in essence I have turned a very expensive notebook into a free semi-mobile phone.

A sort of large cell phone? A funny phone booth?

Demos available at a modest fee.

Love it when stuff works.

# # # # #


PRODUCTIVITY: Thoughts about “dumb” questions

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

If I can help you in any way please don’t hesitate to ask. Some times the Universe can be bewildering. So if you just want to ask what you think is the dumbest question imaginable, then feel free to bounce it off me. If I can’t answer it, I’ll ask the appropriate people. They already think I’m a “character, so “dumb” will just be confirming their beliefs.

I personally believe that there are literally no “dumb” questions.

Those supposedly “dumb” questions are: (1) not so “dumb” because probably some one else has the same question but is too “embarrassed” to ask something so “dumb”; AND (2) even if it is “dumb”, all those “smart” people should have made the question unnecessary (i.e., FAQ, documentation, help files, wiki). So as you can see, I never fault anyone who asks “dumb” questions. Or, even think less of them.

And, I’ve learned over my career is that I can learn quite a bit from “dumb” questions. Best is when children ask them because they see things completely differently.

So, if I can help, please just ask.

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TECH SERVICE: NOTE2EMAIL (My rating 5 *’s)

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

http://www.note2email.com/write

NOTE2EMAIL

***Begin Quote***

Send quick notes to your email address in one easy step.
No need for passwords or usernames.
Note it down and send it , as simple as that !

***End Quote***

Very neat. Very clean. Very … elegant.

Love it. Am quickly integrating it into my SOE.

# # #

UPDATE: One “curve” if you send one to someone else, then you have to tell them not to reply to it. Replies appear to go to the bit bucket. Great service; needs improvement. Definitely a keeper.

# # #

UPDATE: The developer responds. How kool is that?

From: Andrei Aldescu
Sent: Monday, October 01, 2007 1:40 PM
To: Reinke’s Catch All Email
Subject: Re: What happens to replies?

Hello,

We are sorry but the notes are sent from a generic email address note@note2email.com) therefore, displaying the replay to the sender is not available right now. Basically if someone replies to a note that was sent via note2email.com, that reply will only get in the note2email.com inbox  and will not be redirected in any way to the sender.

We are currently working on a mechanism that shows the status of a note and displays the content of any replies.

Thank you for using our service ,
We will keep you posted.

Andrei

# # #

[Of course, I have to have the last word!]

As you can see from my blog, I like it. It would seem “easy” (Easy for me, cause I don’t have to do anything.) to allow the inputter to supply a reply to address. That would make it the cat’s meow. :-) fjohn

# # #

I’m sure he will be anxious to impress a blogger with 7 readers. :-)  W, MI, SS, F, MF, JF, GC … … and you thought I was kidding. :-)

# # # # #



POLITICAL: The DOWGs separation of powers was “a nice try”; NEVADA demonstration

Tuesday, October 2, 2007

http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2003/Jul-11-Fri-2003/news/21707576.html

*** begin quote ***

TAX TIME: So much for the suspense. The state Supreme Court announced Thursday that the Legislature, already in triple overtime, was free to ignore the constitutional requirement of a two-thirds majority to pass new taxes. The court ruled that, at this late date, a simple majority is good enough for government work.

Not that it should surprise anyone who has followed the tumultuous proceedings the past seven months, but the high court’s ruling is bound to generate all manner of litigation and citizen initiative petitions. Nevada Republican Liberty Caucus official Dan Burdish, acting in his capacity as the leader of Nevadans for Tax Restraint, wasted little time in bashing the court.

“The Nevada Supreme Court in an unprecedented usurpation of the Separation of Powers today threw out the Gibbons Tax Restraint Initiative,” he wrote in a mass e-mail. “Nevadans for Tax Restraint is considering a recall of these six Justices in addition to the Referendum we will conduct to overthrow the soon to be passed $1 billion tax increase.”

You didn’t actually expect the tax-increase critics to go away, did you?

*** end quote ***

Well, “nice try” DOWGs. The Framers of the Constitution never expected that all three branches of gooferment to be in bed with one another.

But, we know better.

# # # # #


INTERESTING: Beyonce gets labeled “obscene”?

Tuesday, October 2, 2007

http://www.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idUSKLR22737320071002?feedType=RSS&feedName=entertainmentNews&rpc=22&sp=true

Beyonce dumps Malaysia show to avoid Muslim outcry
Tue Oct 2, 2007 1:43am EDT

***Begin Quote***

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – U.S. R&B star Beyonce Knowles has axed her debut concert in Malaysia in protest against the nation’s ultra-strict dress code and over fears of a Muslim outcry over her show, an industry source said on Tuesday.

***End Quote***

While they are oppressing their people and our visitors, then they can’t be busy making other mischief. It should be a wake up to the women in our country of just how oppressive “religion” can be.

Hey, it’s freedom of religion for everyone to be free from the religion of others!

When I see women in this country dressed in Muslim attire, I just shake my head. Of course, they can do whatever they want. But, I wonder how much is their own free choice.

We need every person in this country “working” on what they see as their best interest. We don’t need to shackle a portion of “our” productive brains. That’s why irrational discrimination is wrong. It hurts the bigot, the victim, and us in general as a civil society.

So, I think this is a perfect issue for the feminists and libertarians.

And, you know these nuts jobs have a Playboy or two hidden away.

So they are sexists and hypocrites. Probably a lot of other ists and ites as well.

# # # # #


TECHNOLOGY: the computer industry’s soft underbelly

Tuesday, October 2, 2007

http://www.networkworld.com/columnists/2007/092607backspin.html?page=2

The industry’s soft underbelly
Backspin By Mark Gibbs, Network World, 09/26/07

*** begin quote ***

What are the big issues that people outside of the computer business should really pay attention to? More important, if we believe that outsiders should be paying attention, then what will it take to clue them in? So, you tell me: What is the computer industry’s soft underbelly? What should consumers know?

*** end quote ***

I think there are several “hot issues”:

1) Computers don’t necessarily make one more productive. The certainly don’t make organizations more efficient. And, the noise level of electronic communication is such that it really prevents concentration, attention, and focus. Computing can effectively conceal process problems.

2) The novice, and most experienced, users have no clue how fragile everything is. Hard disk failure is the easiest understood. Data corruption by — malicious, corrupt, buggy, or poorly designed — software is the hardest to understand and protect against.

3) Similarly, software sucks. It’s rare that it works with 100% reliability. If you could keep it locked in a box, then maybe it would stay uncorrupted, unupdated, unfixed, uncustomized, un-what-evered. Put it in use and stuff happens. And, some of that stuff ain’t good. For example, look at Microsoft SUS updating “silently” regardless of what your settings are.

4) Now let’s talk about costs. You don’t “buy” software. “barbara streisand” You give the vendor your money and that the last you’ll get any attention from them. So you don’t “buy” it, but you pay thru the nose. If you’re an old pro, you use Open Source Software where your upfront cost is zero and you can buy some support as you need it. (A better model imho).

5) Companies want your credit card so they can keep billing that card month after month. Good luck getting them to stop. Plan on changing your number to get rid of them. AND, Intelligent Designer help you if you want a refund!

These vex pros and novices alike. And, no one talks about it. But, these are the 800# gorillas in the room imho.

# # # # #


LIBERTY: Forced service is slavery!

Tuesday, October 2, 2007

http://www.nhinsider.com/matt-simon/2007/9/21/values-voters-get-earful-of-truth-from-ron-paul.html

Values Voters’ Get Earful of Truth from Ron Paul

***Begin Quote***

But anyway, I want to get back to the draft…

This is an issue where the pro-liberty position, the truly moral position, is painfully simple. If we are forced into a service for which we would not volunteer, then we do not own ourselves. If we do not own ourselves, we are not free people. This would have been a no-brainer for the founding fathers, who constructed our government based on the notion that individuals were born free and sovereign.

To the signers of the Declaration of Independence, it was “self-evident” that people were born with “inalienable rights” and that a legitimate government “derives its just powers from the consent of the governed.” Over time, we have been successful in extending the Declaration’s promise to individuals who happen to be female and/or non-white. But we’ve gone in a radically wrong directon on other fronts, and the draft provides a perfect example. Forced service is a form of slavery, period.

***End Quote***

It’s clearly an idea who’s time has past!

So why are the politicians afraid to end it?

It means jobs for their friends and relatives. Contracts for their contributors. And, more than anything, something they can pander about!

End the draft and draft registration now!!

# # # # #


PRODUCTIVITY: Some times people come down the up ramp

Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Lesson Learned: Always watch the traffic.

Interesting, during my recent trip to LV, there must have been a bad accident on the interstate. Let me start at the beginning, departing one casino, we were waiting at the traffic light. (If you miss a light in Vegas, you have a lot of time to admire the scenery!) I noticed a helicopter hovering in the distance. It had to be a “traffic” copter. You just don’t see helicopters hovering in one spot. What would they be doing — drying a lawn? Upon closer study, it was over my road. So I immediately began thinking of alternatives. (Who wants to waste gambling time stuck in traffic?) So as I closed the distance, I could see the interstate was bumper2bumper. (Hey great, I ain’t going that way, and I wasn’t planning to go that way. Thanks Intelligent Designer for not putting it on my path!) As me, and two of my closest competitors to get across town first raced down Flamingo Boulevard, we approached the on ramp to the interstate. Did the guy in the right lane (I was in middle) get a surprise when some bozo from the on ramp made a tight left turn in front of him. Right-lane guy was doing 65; down-the-on-ramp guy was doing 5 as a result of that tight reverse 135 degree turn! People were streaming down the on-ramp. It was like a TEOTWAWKI (The End Of The World As We Know It) movie where people were escaping from Godzilla on the interstate. Luckily, the right lane guy wasn’t turning to get on the interstate, or it would have made an even bigger big mess. More importantly, (after all this is all about me), I recognized the situation, and in true Christian fellowship, ever mindful of the Pontiff’s directive on Christian Driving, I had slowed down to permit the right hand guy to use my lane to escape the accident that was going to happen should he not have an escape route. (The fact, that if right-lane guy had hit down-the-on-ramp guy, there was a very good chance one or both of those bozos would have hit me, thus delaying me from my appointed rounds delivering my cash to casinos though out the Las Vegas valley! Of course, that fact never entered my mind.)

Lesson Learned: Don’t assume that on ramps won’t have exiting traffic! There may not be a traffic helicopter hovering over the road to alert you.

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RANT: Hillary’s Health Care

Monday, October 1, 2007

DINNER WITH HILLARY: TALKING POINTS FOR THE NEXT ROUND
Dick Morris Reports
By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN
Published on TheHill.com on September 26, 2007.

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Even for her, Hillary Clinton showed tremendous skill at batting aside questions asked of her on the Sunday shows this past weekend and giving, instead, her standard talking points. Pinning this lady down is admitted ly not easy. Two of the best interviewers on political TV — Chris Wallace and Tim Russert — asked tough questions but got scripted and memorized retorts for their pains. But here are some questions (along with follow-ups) that I suggest they ask during the next round of Sunday shows — if she ever goes back on the circuit.

{Extraneous Deleted}

• You base your healthcare proposal on the need to cover 47 million “uninsured Americans.” Since about a third of them are illegal immigrants and another third are eligible for Medicaid right now and just don’t apply for it, aren’t you overstating the problem?

(As a follow-up to No. 4) In 2005 you co-sponsored legislation to provide health insurance to the children of illegal immigrants who have lived in this country for five years. In other words, their children would get subsidized healthcare under the State Children’s Health Insurance Program as a reward for dodging the cops for five years. Do you still support that proposal?

• You say that your healthcare proposal will leave alone those who are happy with their current insurance. But if you provide health benefits for close to 50 million new people, thereby generating huge new demand for medical care without any increase in the supply of doctors, nurses or hospitals, it will drive up prices radically. Won’t that force you to institute cost controls by limiting the care those now on health insurance can receive?

{Extraneous Deleted}

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Hillary’s Health Care for illegal aliens. Rationing. And gooferment healthcare? You have to be kidding.

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MONEY: Bullion coins in turbulent times

Monday, October 1, 2007

I never read any stories about the Iraqi economy during the regime change process. I would believe that bullion coins would be a store of value. Better than the worthless fiat currency.

Any one see anything?

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