so little writing.  I’ve started a lot of things for this blog that don’t seem to get finished.  Usually it’s a matter of more research, or clarifying, or substantiating facts.  Then when it’s almost done, it’s too long to post and gets put aside.  Or the computer crashes and the information from all the Explorer windows that are open gets lost.  And since there are 23 of those open now, as well as 15 emails, I better start saving some of the info before it happens again.

There’s been lots of fun political stuff flying around lately.  Former Terrorism Official Dick Clarke’s new book “Against All Enemies: Inside America’s War on Terror,” has been causing a fair amount of it.  That’s kind of interesting because he’s not really saying much that hasn’t been said before, but he is a high level source.  This is talked about in Slate’s overly longly titled article “Dick Clarke Is Telling the Truth Why he’s right about Bush’s negligence on terrorism”.

Then there’s Walter.  I never thought of Cronkite as political because the was the unbiased source of news for so long.  That’s certainly not what he is doing now in his columns which appear in the Denver Post.  I’ve only read a few, my favorites are: The scariest idea of all which talks about the absurd Bush budget numbers, Dear Senator Kerry, about it being okay to be a liberal, and U.S. unintelligence, about CIA information and Bush’s use of it.

The scariest idea article reminds me that I started one about the budget.  Walter, of course, made the points much better than I would, and really should be read if you only read one of them.  Mine is long, includes lots about the national debt and how fast it is growing.  I did research, computations, and found that once the numbers are adjusted for inflation, our $6.7 million million debt is a little more than 3 times what it was in 1950.  Maybe it’s not as bad as I thought it was.  Later that day the 1939 John Wayne classic Stagecoach was on.  A banker complained about the horrible state of our national debt.  I haven’t been able to get back to the research since hearing that.

Keyboards, computer mice and telephone dials are more infested with microbes than toilet seats, according to a new study. link

Of course, someone has a solution to sell.

Comedian Al Franken will be the lead personality on Air America Radio, a startup venture promising a liberal alternative to powerhouse radio talk show pundits like Rush Limbaugh.  Franken and others plan to launch the network on March 31 in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco.

No news yet on how to tune in.

I bought this book about six months ago but just couldn’t set aside the time to read it.  After all, it’s by an economist.  And it depressing to read about what is and has been going on in this country for the last few years.

I finally finished it today, leaving me with a nice, fresh sense of outrage at Bush & Co.

It’s mostly a collection of his N.Y. Times columns grouped by subject rather than chronologically, each area with a brief introduction.  If you’re a masochist:  the entire book, other than the intros and preface, can be found online by reading the archives of his columns.  A brief, recent review (odd, since the book has been out for quite a while) is here.

This book is a must read for a wake-up to the lies that are taking place around us.  It’s interesting that the same things discussed in the book are still taking place.  And the media still isn’t reporting it.

He’s at it again — chipping away at privacy rights.  I’ll try to make this brief:  The main article to read is from the LA Times and it’s called Ashcroft Gunning for Peek at Private Medical Records.  If it’s gone, email me and I’ll post it here (email link is in the column to the right).  If you’re already following this story, then you know what follows here, just read the Times article.

It’s surprising how difficult it is to piece together the full background for this, but here goes:

• 11/6/03:  President Bush signed legislation Wednesday banning a certain type of abortion.  A federal judge immediately questioned the law’s constitutionality and issued a limited temporary restraining order against it. – link
• 12/17/03:  Two abortion rights groups and the American Civil Liberties Union filed lawsuits to try to block the ban. – link
• 2/9/04 – 2/18/04:  The Department of Justice issued subpoenas to seven major hospitals records regarding the number and nature of the abortions, and several are refusing to comply. – link.
  Ashcroft says the records are needed to prove if the abortions are “medically necessary”, as was stated in the lawsuits. – link
  Judge Denies Ashcroft’s Request for Patient Medical Records – link
• 3/10/04:  Feds drop bid to subpoena abortion records. – link.
  Note that they are still trying to get the records, but dropping the subpoena to do it.

That first times Times article that I referenced addresses what the requests are causing in the clinics, which may be what the intended effect was to be.  The quote below (link) addresses the reason that patient records shouldn’t be needed:

The government seeks these records on the possibility that it may find something therein which would affect the testimony of Dr. Hammond adversely, that is, for its potential value in impeaching his credibility as a witness.  What the government ignores in its argument is how little, if any, probative value lies within these patient records and the ready availability of information traditionally used to challenge the veracity of Dr. Hammond’s scientific assertions and medical opinions.  The presence or absence of medical risks, their likelihood and nature are undoubtably described and discussed in available medical literature.  Challenges to Dr. Hammond’s views would be readily available, as would the enlistment of experts supporting contrary opinions.  The search for the truth that any hearing or trial seeks to produce would hardly be infringed by finding that a physician-patient privilege exists in these circumstances.

At least there’s no records of gun purchases.

The internet – you gotta love it.  Start doing one thing and two hours later you’re someplace completely different.

Quite a while back I saved a link for future posting:  It was called LA Photo Gallery, but now it’s called @LA.  It even got itself a www.at.la address.  It’s full of links to pictures of LA grouped in various categories.  The wandering starts.  Click.  Click.  Click.

Ended up on The Ridge Route, which gives the history of the first road through the San Gabriel and Tehachapi Mountains.  Built in 1915, the road essentially connects Bakersfield to LA.  It got popular quick, and was replaced by US 99 in 1933.

Naturally, there’s a website or two for it as well:  Historic US 99 Guide and Historical Tour of US 99.  I’ve seen pieces of US 99 (usually the part that goes straight into Pyramid Lake viewed from I-5) many times.  The first site says:

Between 1960 and 1967, I-5 replaced all of old US 99.  I-5 through the Tehachipis proved a major public works project – one of the most impressive in all of the Interstate Highway system.  As testament to this, more dirt was moved to grade for it than was used for the entire Aswan High Dam in Egypt and it is one of the few single man made objects that can be seen clearly from space.

No wonder a trip that took 2 days in 1920 only takes 2 hours now.  And no wonder a quick check of a link turned into a 2 hour side trip.

Poor a Heineken at Thuis Tap Test.  It’s not in english, but you’ll figure it out.

When you’re done, go Smack the Penguin (thanks Ron).  I made him slide to 586.4.

Eddie Kramer was a hard-working audio engineer and producer in the late 1960s and early 1970s.  He was also an amateur photographer close to some of the biggest stars of those days such as Jimi Hendrix, The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and Frank Zappa.

His website displays and sells a large number of his pictures.  His bio on the site is also an interesting read.

John Hogan, president and CEO of Clear Channel Radio, has pulled Howard Stern off the air.  “Clear Channel drew a line in the sand today with regard to protecting our listeners from indecent content, and Howard Stern’s show blew right through it,” Hogan said.  “It was vulgar, offensive and insulting, not just to women and African-Americans but to anyone with a sense of common decency.”

I guess Hogan, and all those employees who should have alerted him to this amazing discovery, never listened to one of their top rated shows if they are just now learning this.

On his Freedom to Tinker blog, Ed asked readers to send in the “five science and technology books you would have every student read.”  The lists are coming in, but unfortunately for Ed people love to see themselves write as much as they like to hear themselves speak.  Why else would there be blogs?

Now Ed has to figure out how to tally the votes.  The problem is that some people can’t just give a list of five books.  Some have to have ties for second place.  Some refer to other peoples’ lists.  Some give more or fewer than five books.  Because of this it’s not possible to just tally up the votes from the lists and determine the most popular.  Ed has to work harder at it, and maybe do some interpretation.

I ran into a similar problem when a group of friends did a blind champagne taste test.  They were told to rate the bottles, in four categories, from 1 to 5.  Lets ignore the problem of illegible handwriting towards the ends of the ballots.  Some people rated bottles twice.  Some people rated on a scale of 1 to 10.  Some people rated different categories on different scales.  Some just wrote “I like this one.” 

We never could determine the real winner, only make a guess at it.  Tott’s beat out Mumm’s by a tiny amount, and did it at ¼ the price.  But the purpose of this post was for the book lists, so go read them.

TerraServer gives quick access to aerial images and topo maps.  They also used up part of my day by providing links to these other cool mapping pages:

Maptech has USGS Topo Maps, NOAA Nautical Charts, Aeronautical Charts, and Aerial Photos.  Maps can be found for cities and states, zip codes, or by latitude and longitude.

TerraFly lets you “fly” over an area.  Pick a starting point and a magnification, and then maneuver using directional controls.  Very entertaining, but it stops after just a couple of minutes due to “user load”.  It’s also linked to the census data:  clicking on the image brings up another page of the data for the area, including a map of the data boundaries. 

I found my house and data for an area of only 483 housing units that includes income, population, ethnicity and time travel to work, among others.  82½% in my area work within 45 minutes of home and none use public transportation.  Not too surprising when the 1999 median household income was $96,300 and 86% have two or more vehicles per household.  I don’t think I’m doing my part.

A lot of sites want you to sign up with your email to gain access.  It used to be easy enough to give a fake one, but now they tend to send a link or password to your address so they can confirm that it’s a real one.  Sometimes I don’t mind, but not if I’m just trying to check out if their site is any good.

For 24 hours, anybody can email me at wruleati7xf@jetable.org, courtesy of Disposable Email.  When you use the service, you can pick how long the address will be valid, and then it goes away.  And you don’t get weekly advertising from yet another company.

I just used it to check out a site that I don’t want them sending me stuff in the future.  Got their confirmation code, and then got access.  And after 24 hours they won’t be able to bother me.  Way cool!

Bummer.  Now I have to do research again.

In some alternate universe, a memorable conversation in the movie The Graduate might have gone like this:

Mr. McGuire: I just wanna say one word to you. Just one word.
Ben Braddock: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Ben Braddock: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: “Corn.”

It now seems that ‘corn’ may replace ‘plastics’ in some areas of this universe as well.  Containers which look like plastic but are made from corn have been tested in Colorado and Oregon, and will hit all stores by the end of March.  Although corn containers cost 2 or 3 cents more, making them uses fewer amounts of fossil fuels and emits lower levels of greenhouse gases.  Under the right conditions they can decompose in 30 to 50 days, far different from the 1000 years it can take for a plastic beverage bottle to decompose.

A couple of new examples of the government checking into our lives in ways they are not supposed to:

Attorney General John Ashcroft insisted Thursday that doctor-patient privacy is not threatened by a government attempt to subpoena medical records in a lawsuit over the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act.  At stake are records documenting certain late-term abortions performed by doctors who have joined in a legal challenge of the disputed ban.

The subpoenas seemed to be a tactic of intimidation comparable to a subpoena issued recently in a federal grand jury probe ordering Drake University to turn over names of certain anti-war activists.

And this is without the help of the Patriot Act.

It’s nice to see so many in one place.

Flash Helicopter game that’s fun, but fortunately not too addictive.

Thanks, Ron.

According to TiVo, the Super Bowl halftime half-exposure of Janet Jackson’s breasts was the most-watched moment to date on its device.  No surprise there:  recently the Super Bowl has been the most watched show every year.  TiVo also said users had watched the few seconds nearly three times more than any other moment during the Super Bowl broadcast.  No surprise there either:  that’s what rewind is for.

The only surprise for me was that they knew not only what you watched while it downloaded, but also what was played back.  Down to the second.

Courtesy of Terry:  If you missed the most over discussed moment in recent TV history, here is a still of the moment, and here is where to buy the jewelry.

… may not just be hot air