000902.html
From The Sun, September 2000:
There are good reasons why everybody should heed politicians' advice not to believe the media. One of the best is that the media report what politicians say. -- Russell BakerI find television very educational. Every time someone switches it on, I go into another room and read a good book. -- Groucho Marx
Chris Lehourites of AP via Yahoo News - Sect Member Ordered Into Custody: The medical fascists are at it again. They've taken a pregnant mom into custody for not birthing her kids in the state-proscribed fashion. Her last baby was stillborn or died soon after birth, and they're claiming that they could have prevented his death. So they're going to poke and prod her through this birth, against her will, against her religion. Sieg Heil! John VanDyk is "hot under the collar" about this. So, Alwin, did I behave as expected? [heart]
Peter Coffee at ZDNet - No master keys for me, thank you: an "I told you so" about the recent PGP bug. Why key escrow is a really bad idea. [faisal]
When I'm going out of town for weeks at a time, I leave a key with a trusted neighbor who brings in the mail and who looks for signs of anything untoward. I don't tell the postal service that I'm leaving, and I don't leave a key with the local police. I choose whom I'll trust in terms of people, not institutions, and I decide for myself how far I'll trust them: My neighbor has a key to the house, but not to my car or my lab....
Advocates of "key escrow" schemes believe that I'll agree to do things differently when I'm on line: that I'll accept a mandate that I should entrust some institution, or group of institutions, with the knowledge they require to intercept my private communications at will.
James Q. Wilson at Slate - Legalizing Drugs Makes Matters Worse: Decides that after legalization, the effective price of drugs (chiefly cocaine, heroin, PCP, and methamphetamine) will be reduced by a factor of 50. Sounds about right to me. This means that a $100 gram of coke will go for $2 (what does coke cost nowadays?). He believes this will cause abuse to skyrocket. I disagree. People will initially use more of these poisons until they notice their friends dying, then it will go back to about what it is now. He thinks that crime will skyrocket. I disagree. When $10 worth of cocaine is a lethal dose, nobody's going to have to steal to get their fix. And the addicts who commit real crimes: violence, theft, and fraud, will still go to jail, as they should. [mind]
Washington Post - Al Gore Unplugged : a Real Video clip of a 30-second attack ad from the RNC. Good work guys! The transcript is here .
William Saletan and Jacob Weisberg at Slate - Bush Torpedoes Himself: these guys think Bush'es ad was a bad idea. To my mind it launches a well-deserved torpedo in algore's direction.
James Bovard at the Washington Times - Holiday seatbelt trap: the seat belt fascists will be out in force this weekend. [lew]
I spent a few hours reading about and playing with JMS last night. JMS is the Java Messaging System, Message-Oriented-Middleware reborn. "Email for programs", is an easy way to think about it. I'm using SwiftMQ. It's free, and seems to work. No source, though. May switch to one of the open source vendors at some point, but for now it's just a learning experience.