I thought I’d add another name to the vendor black list.
Apparently, Quantum Sails of Newport doesn’t think much of its customers, at least in one case I’ve seen. I was looking at the stack pack on a friend’s boat, and there was a section about three inches long that the stitching had missed going through [...]
Tonight, on the news, I saw this story. Having been a caretaker for someone with terminal cancer, it is inconceivable that anyone would deliberately withhold cancer chemotherapy drugs from someone diagnosed with an 85–90% chance of survival.
However, Kristen Anne LaBrie, a 36-year-old Beverly mother did just that—deliberately withholding cancer chemotherapy drugs from her [...]
Recently, some companies have come out with personal breathalyzers. People are supposed to buy these small, portable, battery-powered devices so they can find out whether they’ve had too much to drink or not. Will using a personal portable breathalyzer help reduce drunk driving? No, I actually think it may make things worse. [...]
Apparently, Diebold has issued a quiet recall on the motherboards in their insecure electronic voting machines. This article from the freedom to tinker blog has the details. One interesting detail in the story is that according to a Diebold internal memo, the flaw was known in March of 2004, and yet Diebold allowed [...]
One of my favorite comic strips to read is Doonesbury. Garry Trudeau has been drawing this strip forever, and what I love about it is the strong political sensibilities he has. Today’s comic is a prime example of this.
The political blustering and fear-mongering used by the Republicans should be overshadowed by their lack [...]
Wired.com has an interesting article on the controversy created by Christopher Soghoian, a security researcher, who had created a website application that allowed one to generate authentic looking, but completely bogus, Northwest Airline Boarding Passes. He created the application in hopes of getting Congress to take a real look at the security vulnerabilities of [...]
I love the recent Slate.com story about casino mogul Steve Wynn, who put his elbow through a Picasso original at a cocktail party. You would think that he would be more careful around a $139 million painting…I certainly would be. The story goes on to say what methods would probably be used to [...]
Well, scientists are stating the obvious again. In a recent NYT article, they publish the results of a study, which concludes that listening to music at too loud a volume will lead to hearing damage. Umm…this is news?
The New York Times has a good article on how easy it is to hack some of the new “touchless” RFID-based credit cards. My favorite quote from the article:
And because the cards can be read even through a wallet or an item of clothing, the security of the information, the researchers say, is startlingly [...]
I recently found two comments on my blog for Bayliner Discovery boats. Apparently, the company has hired someone to place a marketing pitch on the comments of blogs that are boating related. I have found the comment on Bonnie’s blog, Frogma, as well as Sherry’s blog, Stay of Execution. They’ve apparently attempted [...]
Paris Parfait has an excellent entry for today. It truly expresses the difference between being an American and the American government—which has abused the tragedy of this day to hold on to political and economic power for itself. My thanks to Erin for the link. From Paris Parfait’s post:
No words adequate
to describe the emotions
brought [...]
Today, I’m writing this post from my hotel room, down in Newport News, Virginia. I flew down this evening for a wedding tomorrow. I’m due to fly back on Sunday morning. The problem with air travel, aside from the security issues, is that trying to do so during the hurricane season can [...]
Well, I did go out sailing on Wednesday. While the day was pretty good overall, my cell phone was killed in action. It fell out of my shirt pocket, and into the water along side the Pretty Gee, when I was tieing off one of the docklines. So, if you’re trying to reach [...]
Here’s the story behind why I was at the marina until 3:00 a.m. on the morning of the Fourth of July.
On the afternoon of third of July, I was was sitting on the Pretty Gee, looking at the navigation electronics, as I wanted to see what the current wind conditions were like—as I was thinking [...]
Have you ever lost a cell phone or PDA? I know that most of my techie friends would be up the creek if they ever lost their cell phone. Over the years, I’ve found a few, and always try to get in touch with the owner to return it.
The problem is not actually [...]
This post mixes two of my favorite topics: computer security and sailing.
On one of the many sailing boards I visit, there was a posting for crew positions on the Team Compass Point boat for the 2006 Sydney-Hobart and Gosford-Lord Howe Island Races. I was curious about this, so I requested the information—sending them an [...]
Generally, there isn’t a police officer around when you need one. There have been many times, on my various road trips, where I just wished a police officer was nearby, to see some of the incredibly stupid things some drivers do. Saturday was the exception that proves the rule.
This past Saturday, as I [...]
I’ve been going over the work done by Peter Kennedy Yatch Services on the Pretty Gee, and it isn’t very pretty. Even though Peter Kennedy came very highly recommended by several sailors I had e-mailed and spoken with, and by Performance Cruising, the manufacturers of the Telstar, I would not recommend him. While I [...]
More short entries about recent news worth looking at.
More Political Corruption
A recent New York Times article mentions that a former governor of Illinois, Republican George Ryan, has been convicted of all charges in a federal corruption case. The administrations of several Illinois Democrats, including Governor Rod Blagojevich and Chicago Mayor Richard Daley are also [...]
This is a roundup of various small news articles I’d just like to highlight.
Vermont Calls for Bush Impeachment
According to this Yahoo News article, the state government of Vermont, which is highly Democratic, passed a motion asking Congress to open impeachment proceedings against George W. Bush.
This is probably a good idea, as what George W. [...]
Bad behavior still showing up in Republicans all around. Not all that surprising… kind of predictable, and very sad.
Unethical Voter Registration—California Style
In California, the Republican Party has been accused of flipping people to the Republican party without their permission.
Orange County election officials received complaints from 167 people, and an investigation by [...]
Apparently, the Bush regime, the Republican Party and their supporters don’t have any idea of what is ethical or moral behavior. The party of the Moral Majority seems to have no bounds to the depths of unethical and stupid behaviour that they will stoop.
Telemarketing Firm Official Indicted in Phone Jamming Case
It isn’t enough that [...]
Forbes has an article on the ten most polluted cities in the United States. In their slide show of the ten cities they mention US highways.
Unfortunately, the idiots editors over at Forbes don’t seem to realize that there is a difference between US highways, like US Route 1—which are the old federal [...]
Here are a collection of stories from recent news. The stories include security scares in Florida and Pennsylvania , pre-emptive law enforcement in Texas, more NSA civil rights violations, Ohio town stupidity, and more Bush corruption.
Domestic Terror Scares
In Pittsburgh, PA, a local worker caused a terrorism scare. A two-hour long disruption was caused [...]
Apparently, the GOP has decided to use deception as one of its fundraising tactics. Jim, over at the Irregular Times received a piece of mail that looks a lot like an IRS official envelope. This is very disturbing, on so many levels. The moral corruption and lack of ethics in the Republican party apparently knows no limits.
I recently received an e-mail which states that the Bush regime is spending money at the rate of $1 billion every eight hours and twenty minutes. This means that Bu$hco is spending a little over $33,000 per second. This is over twice the $16,090 poverty-level income for a family of three—per second.
This [...]
Recently, there was an article from ZDNet about how a Mac was “hacked” in a mere thirty minutes. Much was made about how insecure Mac OS X is because of this article.
However, one very important fact that was never mentioned in the ZDNet Wintel propaganda article was that the person who “hacked” [...]
Wonkette has an article on her blog about the censorship that the Bush regime which affects what our troops deployed in Iraq can see on the web. Of interest and what is extremely suspicious are what sights are being allowed, versus which sites are being blocked.
This is a collection of disturbing developments. Some point towards increasing fascism under neo-conservatives, and others point out continuing incompetence in the new regime.
Here are a collection of short posts that all seem to have a common thread—Republicans misbehaving. Whether it is lying, intimidation, spying, breaking the law, or stealing, it all seems to point to a definite lack of moral values by the party of the Moral Majority. How sad. Even worse is that the American people continue to allow such behavior to continue endlessly.