Thor’s Trials & Tribulations

Thursday, January 26, 2012 by Dick.

Google Latitude showed my friend Liz Arden near the Howland and Baker Islands, off Papua New Guinea the other day.

Cool.

Except she was in California, about three blocks from the Googleplex itself at the time.

I tried to put my own address in. Google puts me in Elfrin, FL. Or in Marathon. Or, after I put in the exact street address, city, and Zip three times, down the block at 150 Abblesnaffy Road, South Puffin Beach, FL, 33040. Their map and satellite imagery are right for that location but not for 920 Abblesnaffy Street, South Puffin Beach, FL, 33099.

And when it shows my location, it won’t show Liz Arden’s which strikes me as pretty useless. After all, I know where I am.

Latitudes and attitudes.

Posted in Business, Dick's Dumps | 3 Comments »

Wordless Wednesday

Wednesday, January 25, 2012 by Dick.

Posted in Wordless, Throw Da Bums Out, Politics & News | 3 Comments »

Tuesday Twaddle: The State of the Union Sucks

Tuesday, January 24, 2012 by Dick.

And it has at least since Lincoln freed no slaves.

The Emancipation Proclamation proclaimed the freedom of slaves in the ten states then in rebellion. While it apparently freed 3.1 million of the 4 million slaves in the U.S. at the time, those ten states had seceded and recognized neither U.S. law nor fiat. Mr. Lincoln’s Proclamation did not compensate the owners, did not outlaw slavery, and did not make the ex-slaves citizens.

Now federal regulators have outlawed any and all import of the reptilian plague of pythons in our swimming pools and swamps.

The import ban restricts only the Burmese python, two African pythons, and the yellow anaconda. The Obamanation called it “a victory for Florida’s native environment.” Those of us actually in Florida know it, too, freed no slaves and captured no pythons. See, these snakes are captive-bred in the U.S. so that import ban had the same effect on snakes Mr. Lincoln’s on slaves.

It took the Army of the Republic to free the slaves but slavery did finally become illegal everywhere in the U.S. in 1865 thanks to the Thirteenth Amendment. We probably won’t amend the U.S. Constitution to get rid of snakes. Or send in the army.

Of course, there are snakes and then there are snakes.

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Mr. Obama will report on the State of the Union this evening. He is expected say that unemployment is dropping but that we need to bring manufacturing jobs home from overseas, more home-mortgage market support, incentives for alternative energy development, more government, and higher taxes.

Posted in Throw Da Bums Out, Extras!, Politics & News, Random Access | 3 Comments »

Cockroaches Can Save Us Money!

Monday, January 23, 2012 by Dick.

Even as Repuglicans have abandoned the state of palmetto trees for the state of palmetto bugs, we must ponder the age old question of giant carnivorous insects, why do cockroaches fly?

Our Keys cockroaches rarely fly; they train the smaller shore birds to bring them food.

We spray the land and the air which explains a lot about our personalities. We used to have a fleet of DC-3s but those as well as the bat tower on Sugarloaf Key have been mostly abandoned. Now, the Mosquito Air Force has an $7.4 million hardened hangar at Marathon-Florida Keys Airport that allows them to fly any helicopter in rather than towing it. They built the hangar to save us money! All those ‘cides haven’t touched the “palmetto bugs,” though.

Are flying cockroaches smarter than people?

RED CROSS FINED OVER BLOOD SAFETY
Health care issue. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration fined the American Red Cross $9.59 million because 16 of its facilities failed to comply with blood-safety rules. More than 15 months ago. The FDA found “significant violations” in 2010 including inadequate “managerial control,” record-keeping, and quality assurance but there were no serious health consequences for blood recipients.

The fine will save us money. Won’t it?

KEYS RESIDENTS URGED TO VOTE
School tax issue. Monroe County Schools have been recently built and renovated, yet over $9 million remains in the capital improvements budget, that is currently needed for operational expenses, in the everyday classroom.

If voters approve the measure, 0.5 mill of the capital ad valorem tax will be moved to the operating budget to pay for teacher salaries, classroom supplies, and school athletic programs. Some $9 million is up for grabs. .

“Failure to pass this measure means that existing taxes will be frozen in capital accounts, and not available to pay the daily costs of running our schools,” past Superintendent John R. Padget wrote.

The Monroe County Democratic Executive Committee “urges all Democrats — and all voters — to support passage of this referendum.”

Sure. It will save us money. Won’t it?

Our elected reps want to move millions of taxpayer dollars around in an effort to save us money.

Let’s see. If we take money from the Red Cross at their offices over here, that means they have to charge more for blood at the hospital over there. Oooh, bonus. Health care costs go UP.

Maybe we should take money from the building fund so our general tax rates go down a hapenny. Oooh, bonus. When the roof blows off the (newish) building, we can write BONDS to pay for that.

Perhaps we could take money from the Social Security Trust Fund so our general tax rates go down. Oooh, bonus. Our grandchildren have to buy 401Ks.

Oh, wait. We already did that.

I learned at least half a century ago that when the used car salesman offers to “save you money,” hold onto your wallet ’cause you’re going for a ride.

Are flying cockroaches smarter than people?

Could be. Their Social Security seems sound since there are still more shorebirds than bugs and they haven’t even once tried to convince their prey to like being eaten.

Posted in Taxed Again, Local Issues, What? Are They Nuts?, Throw Da Bums Out, Politics & News, Stupidity, Random Access | 2 Comments »

BLACKOUT

Thursday, January 19, 2012 by Dick.

Some Internet sites were down yesterday. January 18 was “the Day the Web Went on Strike.”

“What? You were gone?”

Thanks. Thanks a lot.

The widespread, grassroots action protested Congress’ plans for the onerous Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). Those bills will establish a system to take down any website the Justice Department decides infringes on someone’s copyright. SOPA will allow the DoJ to demand that all search engines, all social networking sites, and all domain name services block access to any site they target. It would also make unauthorized web streaming of copyrighted content a felony with a penalty of up to five years in prison.

Yesterday’s showdown occurred because SOPA completely eliminates due process from those site takedown orders all in the name of stopping “offshore piracy websites” from ruining our movie and record industry.

“This may pinch a little.”

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales called yesterday’s extraordinary strike a necessary action because, “We simply cannot ignore the fact that SOPA and PIPA endanger free speech both in the United States and abroad, and set a frightening precedent of Internet censorship for the world.”

Some sites seized under earlier rules have been down for more a year with neither explanation nor recourse.

Imagine if federal agents had raided the St. Albans Messenger building in St. Albans on Thanksgiving Day of 2010, seized Publisher Emerson Lynn’s printing presses, printed a special edition with a banner headline that New England’s oldest afternoon daily newspaper was a vast criminal enterprise, and locked the doors. Now imagine that every Messenger employee was out of work for a year. That you could not read my column every Thursday. That the seizure was done under seal so Mr. Lynn never even knew what the charges were.

Now imagine that federal agents abruptly took the locks off the doors a year later, on Thanksgiving Day, 2011. “Oops. Never mind,” they said.

Couldn’t happen? ICE abruptly seized the dajaz1.com website under seal in a widespread Thanksgiving weekend action in 2010. They returned that site with no explanation a year later. Site owner and hip-hop fan “Splash” of Queens, NY, lost his livelihood for a year. They hadn’t yet even dreamed of SOPA by then.

And you thought Oops was a word only political candidates used.

Major sites that went black in yesterday’s strike included the English version of Wikipedia, plus reddit, Boing Boing, and AllArts.org. Major sites that remained active included all .GOV resources.

Wikipedia blacked out its results for 24 hours. Other organizations opposing SOPA include the American Civil Liberties Union, American Library Association, Bloomberg, Brookings Institution, the Computer & Communications Industry Association, Consumers Union, Creative Commons, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Facebook, Go Daddy, Google, Human Rights Watch, Twitter, Writers Guild of America, Yahoo, and Zynga.

“There are effective ways to combat foreign ‘rogue’ websites dedicated to copyright infringement and trademark counterfeiting,” Google notes. Instead, the US Congress chooses to go with TSA-style bullying. Good to see that the tried-and-true Joe McCarthy approach never goes out of style inside the Beltway.

Copyright infringement hurts everyone. Although musicians with major label contracts receive only pennies in sales from music sales, Vermont artists such as Carol Ann Jones, Will Patton, and Nobby Reed who produce their own albums lose real money with every song you rip from youtube.

No one on the list thinks theft is a good idea, whether it is a kid stuffing a CD down his pants at the Flying Disc in Enosburg or an organized ring selling pirated copies of a bestseller. Everyone on the list thinks government actions like SOPA are a fate worse than theft.

I could get behind the Stop Our Politicians Act but the way this turkey is written, it’s NO SOAP.

Resources for Further Reading Business News Daily Dajaz1 Seizure Google’s Protest Grammy winning American singer/songwriter Janis Ian’s Alternative View to the Internet Debacle from 2002 LA Times blackout preview Open Congress Wikipedia’s SOPA Initiative

UPDATE JANUARY 19, 2011

The news reports that the bills are dead for now. Harry Reid won’t bring PIPA to a vote in the Senate and Congress Critters are running for cover despite Christopher Dodd (the “Rubble” half of Barny Rubble)’s presence on all the newscasts.

It’s not over, though.

SOPA is gonna come back as APOS.

Posted in History, Throw Da Bums Out, Politics & News, Random Access | 5 Comments »

NO SOAP

Wednesday, January 18, 2012 by Dick.

Or at least NO SOPA.

The No Puffin Perspective™ is joining hundreds of sites around the world to ‘Go (Semi) Black’ for one day to protest Congress’ plans for the onerous Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). Please eschew our links today but stop back tomorrow for more shines and whines about the news and your friends here in Puffin Central.

Posted in Throw Da Bums Out, Politics & News, Random Access | Comments Off