WRITING: TEOTWAWKI plan — create a store of wisdom

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

http://www.frugalsquirrels.com/vb/showthread.php?t=170163

The Liebowitz project is something that everyone can do. Pick three books that are important to you, one on your profession or trade, one that is just entertainment (whatever you find enjoyable) and one that is a textbook on a basic subject you think important, and go out and purchase copies of them (library or archive quality, hardbound, if at all possible). Then, carefully preserve the books – seal them in plastic, spray the plastic with insecticide, and then seal that inside more plastic. Put the books in a safe place (I use a 20mm ammo can, painted silver).

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Starship Troopers. Thomas’ Calculus. The Thinker’s Toolkit.

So what are your three books?

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LIBERTY: “smashing the big brewers’ monopoly” leads to bypassing the legislation and a BIGGER monopoly!

Monday, March 17, 2008

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=536270&in_page_id=1770

***Begin Quote***

Then Camra, the Campaign for Real Ale, was founded to fight for traditional beer and pubs.

It found a surprising ally. Margaret Thatcher, who hated monopolies and brewers (despite the fact that they were significant donors to the Tory Party), rallied to the cause.

Laws were passed that no brewer could own more than 2,000 pubs. Furthermore, they would have to give their landlords the option of selling at least one “guest beer” produced by a rival.

The idea could not have been simpler: by smashing the big brewers’ monopoly, there would be a flowering of smaller brewers, varied pubs and more choice for drinkers. But it didn’t work out like that.

Roger Protz of Camra looks slightly uncomfortable when I ask him what went wrong. “Basically, I think we were tremendously naive,” he says.

What happened was that the brewers created stand-alone pub companies – known as PubCos – to which they sold all their pubs.

Because they didn’t brew beer themselves, these new companies were exempt from the legislation.

“There were a lot of sweetheart deals,” explains Protz. “The brewers would say to some of their management team, ‘Here’s a golden handshake, go off, buy a tranche of pubs and in return only take our beers.’ That was what happened.

“We were offered this great shangri-la of choice but now choice is just as restricted under the pub companies as it was under the brewers.”

The statistics bear him out. In 1989, the three biggest brewers owned around 20,000 pubs, about a third of the UK’s total. Today, the three biggest PubCos own – wait for it – around 20,000 pubs.

In 1989, the six biggest brewers produced 75 per cent of all the beer drunk in Britain’s pubs. Today, they produce 84per cent.

What have changed are the pubs themselves.

***End Quote***

Ahh, the gooferment at work.

It’s hard to imagine bigger stupidity.

Where there is a will, there’s a way.

And, what exactly was the gooferment seeking to do? Didn’t work. So, I guess, they’ll pass yet another law!

Argh!

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LIBERTY: The argument for liberty … …

Monday, March 17, 2008

***Begin Quote***

“The argument for liberty is not an argument against organization, which is one of the most powerful tools human reason can employ, but an argument against all exclusive, privileged, monopolistic organization, against the use of coercion to prevent others from doing better.”

– Friedrich August von Hayek (1899-1992),
Nobel Laureate of Economic Sciences 1974

***End Quote***

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INTERESTING: Last man standing

Monday, March 17, 2008

http://www.herald-mail.com/?cmd=displaystory&story_id=188712&format=html

March 16, 2008
Last man standing
By DAVE McMILLION

***Begin Quote***

CHARLES TOWN, W.VA. – He’s the last one in America who can tell stories about his experiences during World War I.

And he lives just outside of Charles Town.

Frank Woodruff Buckles became the last known surviving American veteran of the First World War this year, and his family is busy keeping track of his schedule as he grants interviews and makes appearances.

The 107-year-old veteran was honored 10 days ago during ceremonies in Washington, D.C. He visited with President Bush at the White House and a photographic portrait of Buckles was unveiled at the Pentagon.

 

***End Quote***

Wow. And, he was a POW. Stern stuff.

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LIBERTY: “Guns” are the litmus test issue

Sunday, March 16, 2008

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/15/AR2008031502358_pf.html

D.C.’s Gun Ban Gets Day in Court
Justices’ Decision May Set Precedent In Interpreting the 2nd Amendment
By Robert Barnes
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, March 16, 2008; A01

***Begin Quote***

Despite mountains of scholarly research, enough books to fill a library shelf and decades of political battles about gun control, the Supreme Court will have an opportunity this week that is almost unique for a modern court when it examines whether the District’s handgun ban violates the Second Amendment.

***End Quote***

If the Second Amendment doesn’t protect and individual right, then what does the First Amendment protect?

The right to a gun is fundamental to the question of who owns you.

Tyrants don’t want sheep that can shoot back. “Victim disarmament” is the FIRST thing that tyrants do to the people. After all, an armed citizen can be dangerous to the “bad guys”. Criminals, with or with the government uniform, can’t face an armed populace.

It’s the key issue. Let’s see what the court decides. It might surprise us.

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WRITING: FULL TEXT The Mad Chemist – A TEOTWAWKI Skill (What’s yours?)

Saturday, March 15, 2008

[I didn’t realize that it required registration to read my story. Here it is!]

http://www.frugalsquirrels.com/vb/showthread.php?p=1341855#post1341855

The Mad Chemist – A TEOTWAWKI Skill (What’s yours?)

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The Mad Chemist by reinkefj
A TEOTWAWKI Skill (What’s yours?)

It was a year after the SHTF, (does it really matter what the specific S was that hit the F?), the fat old fellow who had done some minimal prep was rolling in luxury. Or what passed for it in those days.

He had sheltered in place for the duration. He was extremely busy while everyone was lounging in their shelters. There were lines to activate. There were batches to brew. There were tests to run. He wasn’t a pioneer type. He wasn’t athletic by any means. He wasn’t the great white hunter, Rambo, medicine man, or priest. He was a dumb old injineer with a plan.

He was now living in his old house with a staff. The county hospital was opened in the next house down. As was the sheriff, a food coop, butcher, and what passed for the county library all nearby. It was grid down. But his house was lit up. Fuel trucks making deliveries were a regular. As were pig drop offs. Bicyclists, pickup trucks, and even an occasional helicopter were seen going in and out of the property. There was even a small security detail. Especially when the armored cars rolled in and out.

The bad guys were your run of the mill looters. Not too bright, they had been lucky. The jail they were in held them safe during the S that hit the F. As petty criminals, the guards let them out. (Note not all were so lucky. Some forward thinking guards either left their charges locked up to die of thirst, or did the humane thing and shot these human parasites in their cells.) They lived off the leftovers. When easy living dried up, they went back to stealing. When stealing got tougher, (victims were shooting back with greater accuracy), they moved up to full fledged raiding.

They heard about this hub of activity. And went down to look it over. There were now six of them. They were getting hungry and it looked like an easy target. The smell of pork was in the air. It would be a good strike. Maybe something that would keep them in the chips for the rest of their life. They reconned and spotted the fat old guy walking around outside with a two man protective detail. He would be their target since he was the “rich guy”. Their imaginations ran wild. Maybe he’s a Gates, Buffet, or like “howard hughes”. It would be easy since he was fat and old. The fat part got their juices really flowing since no one was fat these days.

The details of the operation are really not important. Sufficed to say four of them made it to the house and the security detail didn’t. They broke into the house and rounded up all the staff. They didn’t think much, so it wasn’t registering that a staff of 20 people was unusual. The ring leader found the fat old guy in the basement. Not cowering in fear as he expected. Not facing him with weapons. Not trying to make a deal.

The ring leader’s proposition was a variation of “your money or your life”. The old man’s response was amusing. “Please take my life. My loved ones are gone. The work is endless. And, the money is over rated.” The ring leader was confused. And then the gas hit.

The ring leader woke up in a room. He knew the Sheriff on a professional level from previous arrests. It was obvious he was in deep doo doo. “What was your plan?”. “We was going to take over and take it easy.” “Take over what? The only working drug lab making insulin, cowpox vaccine, and antibiotics in the State? I just want to meet the idiot that tried to rob a drug plant. I thought there was more to this. Take out the trash.” The leader was roughly manhandled out to the yard, past the pigs that were being harvested for their Islets of Langerhans, past the sign proclaiming the area as an “Essential State Resource”, and to the pit. The leader was shot with a small 22 to the head and his body joined his buddies being fed to the pigs.

The Sheriff was astonished that these fools didn’t know that this facility was keeping alive all the post TEO diabetics who made it, all those who had infections, and was protecting all the potential small pox victims. He just shook his head and wondered how the fat old man was coming along with his attempt to make nitroglycerin for heart patients. Maybe he’d get to Viagra soon. The fat old man did have niche skill in the new world.

-30-

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INTERESTING: Roadmap to Success?

Thursday, March 13, 2008

FROM A RECENT VENDOR EMAIL

***Begin Quote***

Roadmap to Success Series: Transitioning to Managed Services
? Register for Kaseya’s Roadmap to Success Series!

Managed Services is a hot topic within the reseller, systems integrator and service provider community. It is a lucrative business model that enhances customer satisfaction by improving IT infrastructure management while increasing service provider margins. It is a key step to retaining clients and building a predictable revenue stream. There are many challenges including; what services to offer, how to price them and how to migrate customers.

***End Quote***

Objection, your honor, assumes facts not yet in evidence!

This tacitly assumes that success is a destination. And, that it’s the same for everyone.

:-)

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TECH SOFTWARE: a strange bug or data error with Microsoft WORD2003

Monday, March 10, 2008

Microsoft Office, (Have I mentioned lately how much I hate Microsoft Office and Outlook?), specifically WORD2003, threw me a curve this weekend. I was doing my Jottings Sunday morning and was hit by a strange bug or data error.

Everything on the page was coded as a hypertext link.

I was hooked bad. On deadline, I really didn’t need that hassle. Tried to clear the format in any way I could think. New doc. New file. Cut’n’paste. Even went through the doc and “removed hyperlink” on every paragraph.

Nothing worked.

Fired up Open Office. Removed one page of links. Saved it. Uploaded it. Still screwed up.

Fired up NVU and opened the page. It allowed me to globally nuke the link and save it.

Argh!

Two hours down the tubes.

I hate Microsoft Office.

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TECH HARDWARE: troublesome laptop (mac book air) and a flight long gone

Sunday, March 9, 2008

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/019882.html

March 08, 2008
The TSA Doesn’t Dig The Macbook Air
Posted by Manuel Lora at March 8, 2008 08:28 PM

***Begin Quote***

The TSA is the federal agency that supposedly keeps airports safe. It prevents bombs, firearms, knives, brass knuckles and all sorts of evil objects and people from boarding flights. Yet they were puzzled by the new Macbook Air:

***and***

The senior agent hasn’t been trained for technological change. New products on the market? They haven’t been TSA approved. Probably shouldn’t be permitted. He requires me to open the “device” and run a program. I do, and despite his inclination, the lead agent decides to release me and my troublesome laptop. My flight is long gone now, so I head for the service center to get rebooked.

***and***

Oh heroic TSA agents, may you keep our homeland secure from all evils present and future. May your vigilant, Orwellian and totalitarian eyes look after us poor frightened citizens forever and ever. And while you’re at it, read some technology blogs and leave us alone.

***End Quote***

I guess this is one small strike against my getting one. Is this part of the cost of being on the bleeding edge?

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text


POLITICAL: “Bill! It’s for you!”

Sunday, March 9, 2008

IT’S OVER
By Dick Morris Reports <dickmorrisreports@dickmorris.com>

(Dick is funny and cutting. Has no love for Hillary. But, he does hit good points with laser-like strikes to the funny bone!)

*** begin quote ***

Suggestion for Obama:

The next time Hillary uses the recycled red phone ad, counter with one of your own. When the phone rings in the middle of the night, have a woman’s voice, with a flat Midwestern accent, answer it and say, “Hold on” into the receiver. Then she should shout, “Bill! It’s for you!”

Because with Hillary’s complete lack of any meaningful experience in foreign affairs, and her lack of the “testing” that she boldly claims, she’ll be yelling for Bill.

*** end quote ***

I think the “red phone” ad cuts against all three “candidates”. None! None of them have any leadership credentials. None of them have solid accomplishments. McCain even has a negative one — campaign finance reform that violates the First Amendment.

A plague on all their houses.

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