Wednesday, May 31, 2006

From the manual for DEVONthink Pro: Note: If you think the user interface for the styles editor is crap, you're right. But don't blame us, it's built into Mac OS X. It's refreshing to see honesty like that from a software company. 2:15:21 PM    comment () trackback () The madness of the National Animal Identification System. THE NATIONAL ANIMAL IDENTIFICATION SYSTEM (NAIS). Absofrickinlutely amazing how little attention it's getting. It's probably the most draconian tracking and control plan ever implemented, yet even the people most affected -- small farmers, horse owners, families with kids in 4H -- are mostly unaware of it. If you're unaware, read and weep. (The above link is the polite "official" take, here and here are real-people takes on this monstrosity.) The plan is (among other things) for every agriculture animal anywhere in the U.S. that ever leaves its premises to have a government ID number, and for every trip off the property to be reported immediately to "the authorities." That means literally that you'll be required to report to the government every time you take your horse on a trail ride, every time your kid takes a pig to the county fair, every time you give some baby chicks to your neighbor. It applies to every ag animal -- even trout if you have a little fishin' pond. Not only that, but if you've got a chicken coop, it too will have to be registered and "geo-located." There goes the privacy of your gulch, eh? But I'm not here to write about yet another government horror (and yet another government horror that -- as Silver wrote the other day about NSA snooping -- won't actually achieve what its proponents claim). This is about people. [Wolfesblog] You'd think you were hearing an urban -- or in this case rural -- legend. You'd laugh it off. After all. This is America. Only in someplace like darkest Russia could it possibly be a federal crime to ride your horse a mile down the road without reporting it to the central government. 1:08:21 PM    comment () trackback () Go, Chicks!. The Dixie Chicks' new album, Taking the Long Way, has debuted at #1 on the charts.... By Lew Rockwell. [LewRockwell.com Blog] I bought it, even though I normally don't listen to them. 1:04:52 PM    comment () trackback () You Sorta' Suspected It, Didn't You?. This is hysterical: Before President Bush touched down in Pennsylvania Wednesday to promote his nuclear energy policy, the environmental group Greenpeace was mobilizing. "This volatile and dangerous source of energy" is no answer to the country's energy needs, shouted a Greenpeace fact sheet decrying the "threat" posed by the Limerick reactors Bush visited. But a factoid or two later, the Greenpeace authors were stumped while searching for the ideal menacing metaphor. We present it here exactly as it was written, capital letters and all: "In the twenty years since the Chernobyl tragedy, the world's worst nuclear accident, there have been nearly [FILL IN ALARMIST AND ARMAGEDDONIST FACTOID HERE]." Oops! TrackBack (0) | [The Agitator] There's never an alarmist and armageddonist factoid around when you need one. 12:42:52 PM    comment () trackback () Building the Police State. Now that he is confirmed as CIA commissar, Michael Hayden can get on with his real job: vastly stepping up the spying on those the government really fears: the American people. (Thanks to LL for the link.)... By Lew Rockwell. [LewRockwell.com Blog] This nation is under attack. We, the people, are under attack. And the enemy in this case is not an Islamic radical hiding in a cave in Afghanistan but a cabal of truly evil men and women at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and on Capitol Hill aided by carefully-picked, law-ignoring appointees at the Hoover Building on Pennsylvania Avenue, a black glass-walled building at Fort Meade, MD, and a complex in Langley, Virginia. 9:41:41 AM    comment () trackback () Underground Chemistry. "I don't tell anyone about what I do at home," writes one anonymous high schooler....."A lot of ignorant people at... [Hit and Run] There's a link to a lengthy Wired article that does a pretty good job of explaining why it is that so few young Americans are interested in the sciences (particularly chemistry). I personally only know one person with a chemistry degree. She's a singer/songwriter. 9:36:59 AM    comment () trackback ()

© Copyright 2006 Ken Hagler. Last update: 6/2/2006; 10:01:00 AM.