1. Get a job and keep it. This "job" won't be writing, probably; it'll be counting things or working a register or mulching pear trees or sweeping floors in bowling alleys or delivering pizzas or teaching 6th graders or working in a snotty atheletic shop or cutting meat at Whole Foods or something. Keep this job: it's the job that pays rent or mortgage, bills, you know.2. Write.3. Submit your work.
Could Life Evolve on the Internet?
If principles of life are universal, could life emerge on the internet?I posed the question to evolutionary dynamicist Martin Nowak of Harvard University, developer of amathematical model of evolution's origins, the period during which unique chemical structures experienced mutation and selection that guided them toward replication -- and thus to life.
Though Nowak's focus is biological life, the principles seem broadly applicable, perhaps even to configurations of electrons coursing through the Internet's silicon and fiber-optic substrate.
"Computer viruses are some form of evolution," said Nowak.
"Viruses fulfill replication, mutation and selection -- but people don't consider them to be alive, because they think life has to be made of chemicals," saidIrene Chen, a Harvard systems biologist who specializes in early biomolecules.
"We can definitely make things in a computer that fulfill the criteria for life that NASA uses, except it's not chemical," she added, and cited the AVIDAprogram at Michigan State...
While Sarah was mayor of Wasilla, she tried to fire our highly respected city librarian because the librarian refused to consider removing from the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City residents rallied to the defense of the city librarian and against Palin's attempt at out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew her termination letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the librarian are on her enemies list to this day.
About Sarah Palin: an e-mail from Wasilla
Editor's note: The writer is a homemaker and education advocate in Wasilla, Alaska. Late last week, Anne Kilkenny penned an e-mail for her friends about vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, whom she personally knows, that has since circulated across comment forums and blogs nationwide. Here is her e-mail in its entirety, posted with her permission.
I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Gov. Sarah Palin since 1992. Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her father was my child's favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a first-name basis with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings during her administration than about 99 percent of the residents of the city.
She is enormously popular; in every way she's like the most popular girl in middle school. Even men who think she is a poor choice for vice president and won't vote for her can't quit smiling when talking about her because she is a "babe."
It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She kept her most recent pregnancy a secret from her children and parents for seven months.
She is "pro-life." She recently gave birth to a Down's syndrome baby. There is no cover-up involved here; Trig is her baby.
She is energetic and hardworking. She regularly worked out at the gym.
She is savvy. She doesn't take positions; she just "puts things out there" and if they prove to be popular, then she takes credit.
Her husband works a union job on the North Slope for BP and is a champion snowmobile racer. Todd Palin's kind of job is highly sought-after because of the schedule and high pay. He arranges his work schedule so he can fish for salmon in Bristol Bay for a month or so in summer, but by no stretch of the imagination is fishing their major source of income. Nor has her lifestyle ever been anything like that of native Alaskans.
Sarah and her whole family are avid hunters.
She's smart.
Her experience is as mayor of a city with a population of about 5,000 (at the time) and less than two years as governor of a state with about 670,000 residents.
During her mayoral administration, most of the actual work of running this small city was turned over to an administrator. She had been pushed to hire this administrator by party power-brokers after she had gotten herself into some trouble over precipitous firings, which had given rise to a recall campaign.
Sarah campaigned in Wasilla as a "fiscal conservative." During her six years as mayor, she increased general government expenditures by more than 33 percent. During those same six years, the amount of taxes collected by the city increased by 38 percent. This was during a period of low inflation (1996-2002). She reduced progressive property taxes and increased a regressive sales tax, which taxed even food. The tax cuts that she promoted benefitted large corporate property owners way more than they benefited residents.
The huge increases in tax revenue during her mayoral administration weren't enough to fund everything on her wish list, though — borrowed money was needed, too. She inherited a city with zero debt but left it with indebtedness of more than $22 million. What did Mayor Palin encourage the voters to borrow money for? Was it the infrastructure that she said she supported? The sewage treatment plant that the city lacked? Or a new library? No. $1 million for a park. $15 million-plus for construction of a multi-use sports complex, which she rushed through, on a piece of property that the city didn't even have clear title to. That was still in litigation seven years later — to the delight of the lawyers involved! The sports complex itself is a nice addition to the community but a huge money pit, not the profit-generator she claimed it would be. She also supported bonds for $5.5 million for road projects that could have been done in five to seven years without any borrowing.
While Mayor, City Hall was extensively remodeled and her office redecorated more than once.
These are small numbers, but Wasilla is a very small city.
As an oil producer, the high price of oil has created a budget surplus in Alaska. Rather than invest this surplus in technology that will make us energy independent and increase efficiency, as governor Sarah proposed distribution of this surplus to every individual in the state.
In this time of record state revenues and budget surpluses, she recommended that the state borrow/bond for road projects, even while she proposed distribution of surplus state revenue: Spend today's surplus, borrow for needs.
She's not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas or compromise. As mayor, she fought ideas that weren't generated by her or her staff. Ideas weren't evaluated on their merits but on the basis of who proposed them.
While Sarah was mayor of Wasilla, she tried to fire our highly respected city librarian because the librarian refused to consider removing from the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City residents rallied to the defense of the city librarian and against Palin's attempt at out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew her termination letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the librarian are on her enemies list to this day.
Sarah complained about the "old boy's club" when she first ran for mayor, so what did she bring Wasilla? A new set of "old boys." Palin fired most of the experienced staff she inherited. At the city and as governor, she hired or elevated new, inexperienced, obscure people, creating a staff totally dependent on her for their jobs and eternally grateful and fiercely loyal — loyal to the point of abusing their power to further her personal agenda, as she has acknowledged happened in the case of pressuring the state's top cop.
As mayor, Sarah fired Wasilla's police chief because he "intimidated" her, she told the press. As governor, her recent firing of Alaska's top cop has the ring of familiarity about it. He served at her pleasure and she had every legal right to fire him, but it's pretty clear that an important factor in her decision to fire him was because he wouldn't fire her sister's ex-husband, a state trooper. Under investigation for abuse of power, she has had to admit that more than two dozen contacts were made between her staff and family to the person that she later fired, pressuring him to fire her ex-brother-in-law. She tried to replace the man she fired with a man who she knew had been reprimanded for sexual harassment; when this caused a public furor, she withdrew her support.
She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in help. The City Council person who personally escorted her around town, introducing her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council became one of her first targets when she was later elected mayor. She abruptly fired her loyal city administrator; even people who didn't like the guy were stunned by this ruthlessness.
Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything publicly about her.
When then-Gov. Frank Murkowski was handing out political plums, Sarah got the best, chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission — one of the few jobs not in Juneau and one of the best paid. She had no background in oil and gas issues. Within months of scoring this great job, which paid $122,400 a year, she was complaining in the press about the high salary. I was told that she hated that job: the commute, the structured hours, the work. Sarah became aware that a member of this commission (who was also the state chair of the Republican Party) engaged in unethical behavior on the job. In a gutsy move which some undoubtedly cautioned her could be political suicide, Sarah solved all her problems in one fell swoop: got out of the job she hated and garnered gobs of media attention as the patron saint of ethics and as a gutsy fighter against the "old boys' club," when she dramatically quit, exposing this man's ethics violations (for which he was fined).
As mayor, she had her hand stuck out as far as anyone for pork from Sen. Ted Stevens. Lately, she has castigated his pork-barrel politics and publicly humiliated him. She only opposed the "bridge to nowhere" after it became clear that it would be unwise not to.
As governor, she gave the Legislature no direction and budget guidelines, then made a big grandstand display of line-item vetoing projects, calling them pork. Public outcry and further legislative action restored most of these projects — which had been vetoed simply because she was not aware of their importance — but with the unobservant she had gained a reputation as "anti-pork."
She is solidly Republican: no political maverick. The state party leaders hate her because she has bit them in the back and humiliated them. Other members of the party object to her self-description as a fiscal conservative.
Around Wasilla, there are people who went to high school with Sarah. They call her "Sarah Barracuda" because of her unbridled ambition and predatory ruthlessness. Before she became so powerful, very ugly stories circulated around town about shenanigans she pulled to be made point guard on the high school basketball team. When Sarah's mother-in-law, a highly respected member of the community and experienced manager, ran for mayor, Sarah refused to endorse her.
As governor, she stepped outside of the box and put together of package of legislation known as "AGIA" that forced the oil companies to march to the beat of her drum.
Like most Alaskans, she favors drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). She has questioned if the loss of sea ice is linked to global warming. She campaigned "as a private citizen" against a state initiaitive that would have either protected salmon streams from pollution from mines or tied up in the courts all mining in the state (depending on whom you listen to). She has pushed the state's lawsuit against the Department of the Interior's decision to list polar bears as a threatened species.
McCain is the oldest person to ever run for president; Sarah will be a heartbeat away from being president.
There has to be literally millions of Americans who are more knowledgeable and experienced than she.
However, there are a lot of people who have underestimated her and are regretting it.
Claim vs. Fact
- "Hockey mom": True for a few years
- "PTA mom": True years ago when her first-born was in elementary school, not since
- "NRA supporter": Absolutely true
- Social conservative: mixed. Opposes gay marriage, but vetoed a bill that would have denied benefits to employees in same-sex relationships (said she did this because it was unconsitutional).
- Pro-creationism: Mixed. Supports it, but did nothing as governor to promote it.
- "Pro-life": Mixed. Knowingly gave birth to a Down's syndrome baby but declined to call a special legislative session on some pro-life legislation.
- "Experienced": Some high schools have more students than Wasilla has residents. Many cities have more residents than the state of Alaska. No legislative experience other than City Council. Little hands-on supervisory or managerial experience; needed help of a city administrator to run town of about 5,000.
- Political maverick: Not at all.
- Gutsy: Absolutely!
- Open and transparent: ??? Good at keeping secrets. Not good at explaining actions.
- Has a developed philosophy of public policy: No.
- "A Greenie": No. Turned Wasilla into a wasteland of big box stores and disconnected parking lots. Is pro-drilling off-shore and in ANWR.
- Fiscal conservative: Not by my definition!
- Pro-infrastructure: No. Promoted a sports complex and park in a city without a sewage treatment plant or storm drainage system. Built streets to early 20th century standards.
- Pro-tax relief: Lowered taxes for businesses, increased tax burden on residents
- Pro-small government: No. Oversaw greatest expansion of city government in Wasilla's history.
- Pro-labor/pro-union: No. Just because her husband works union doesn't make her pro-labor. I have seen nothing to support any claim that she is pro-labor/pro-union.
Why am I writing this?
First, I have long believed in the importance of being an informed voter. I am a voter registrar. For 10 years I put on student voting programs in the schools. If you google my name, you will find references to my participation in local government, education, and PTA/parent organizations.
Secondly, I've always operated in the belief that "bad things happen when good people stay silent." Few people know as much as I do because few have gone to as many City Council meetings.
Third, I am just a housewife. I don't have a job she can bump me out of. I don't belong to any organization that she can hurt. But I am no fool; she is immensely popular here, and it is likely that this will cost me somehow in the future: that's life.
Fourth, she has hated me since back in 1996, when I was one of the 100 or so people who rallied to support the city librarian against Sarah's attempt at censorship.
Fifth, I looked around and realized that everybody else was afraid to say anything because they were somehow vulnerable.
Caveats: I am not a statistician. I developed the numbers for the increase in spending and taxation two years ago (when Palin was running for governor) from information supplied to me by the finance director of the City of Wasilla, and I can't recall exactly what I adjusted for: Did I adjust for inflation? For population increases? Right now, it is impossible for a private person to get any info out of City Hall — they are swamped. So I can't verify my numbers.
You may have noticed that there are various numbers circulating for the population of Wasilla, ranging from my "about 5,000" up to 9,000. The day Palin's selection was announced, a city official told me that the current population is about 7,000. The official 2000 census count was 5,460. I have used about 5,000 because Palin was Mayor from 1996 to 2002, and the city was growing rapidly in the mid-1990s.
- Anne Kilkenny is a homemaker and education advocate in Wasilla, Alaska.
Forced Migration Online (FMO) provides instant access to a wide variety of online resources dealing with the situation of forced migrants worldwide. Designed for use by practitioners, policy makers, researchers, students or anyone interested in the field, FMO aims to give comprehensive information in an impartial environment and to promote increased awareness of human displacement issues to an international community of users. We have prepared an introductory guide to forced migration for visitors who are new to the subject.
FMO is coordinated by a team based at the Refugee Studies Centre, Department of International Development (QEH), University of Oxford. FMO and the Digital Library Project were funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the European Commission between 1997 and 2004. Since January 2005, FMO has been funded by the Department for International Development (DFID).
Judge orders woman to return two library books or go to jail
A judge has ordered JoAn Karkos of Lewiston, Maine to return two copies of It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex and Sexual Health, which she checked out the Lewiston and Auburn public libraries last year.
In September, Karkos sent letters to the libraries, including checks to pay for the cost of the books. The letters said, in part, “I have been sufficiently horrified of the illustrations and sexually graphic, amoral, abnormal contents. I will not be returning the books.”
The judge has ordered Karkos, who is being held in contempt of court, to return the books and pay a $100 fine by Friday at 4pm. If she doesn't comply, she'll be arrested.
In 2007, NPR reported on the incident, providing several links, including a link to a letter Karkos wrote to the Sun Journal.
Dear Mr. Evans:
Thank you for contacting me with your concerns about amendments to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA). As you know, FISA passed the Senate on July 9, 2008, and I appreciate having the benefit of your comments.
Gathering communications intelligence is one of America’s front lines of defense in the war on terror. As you may know, Congress passed the Protect America Act in August 2007, modernizing FISA to give intelligence professionals the tools they urgently need to gather information, while still protecting the civil liberties of Americans. Senator John Rockefeller introduced the FISA Amendments Act of 2007 (S. 2248) on October 26, 2007, to continue this vital work. S. 2248 creates an expanded role for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, empowering the court to have more scrutiny over surveillance procedures and acquisitions. Additionally, this legislation increases congressional oversight by strengthening reporting and auditing requirements by the Inspector General.
The changes to FISA under S. 2248 also provide civil immunity for communications carriers that assisted the government with surveillance in the past, as well as creating civil immunity for future assistance. Communications carriers are currently facing billions of dollars in lawsuits for their role in assisting the National Security Agency’s Terrorist Surveillance Program instituted after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. This program worked to thwart future terrorist attacks by intercepting communications between suspected terrorists overseas and potential operatives within the United States. Though acting without a court warrant, the program was conducted under the President’s broad authority to protect and defend the nation. Communications carriers provided invaluable assistance, relying on official assurances about legality. While the process of litigation is integral to our system of laws, I believe it is unfair to punish the communications companies for patriotic compliance with the government’s war on terror.
Providing prospective civil immunity for communications carriers that assist government surveillance in the future is important to ensuring effective collection of intelligence. Communications technology has become so complex that our country needs the voluntary cooperation of carriers. Without it, our intelligence efforts will be severely debilitated. Providing immunity guarantees the needed cooperation of communications carriers who can rely on official assurances about necessity and legality. It is important to note that S. 2248 does not grant immunity to government officials.
S. 2248 overwhelmingly passed in the Senate Intelligence Committee, by a bipartisan vote of 13–2, and was passed by the Senate on February 12, 2008, by a bipartisan vote of 68–29. Unfortunately, this bipartisan Senate compromise was rejected by the House of Representatives, allowing FISA to expire on February 16, 2008, and leaving our nation’s intelligence community in the dark for a critical period of time.
In June 2008, the House of Representatives passed the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 (H.R. 6304), and on July 9, 2008, the Senate approved H.R. 6304 by a bipartisan vote of 69–28. I was pleased to see that members of Congress can work together in a bipartisan manner to improve our national security. H.R. 6304 currently awaits further consideration by President George W. Bush.
As a member of both the Senate Armed Services and Judiciary Committees, I am committed to ensuring that we appropriately balance our national security needs and the protection of our civil liberties. I believe that the amended FISA bill, including the immunity provision for communications carriers, strikes this much needed balance. I appreciate the opportunity to represent the interests of Texans in the United States Senate, and am thankful for your comments about this important legislation.
Sincerely,
(Senator X, we'll call him)
Enter DTIC Public STINET
Coverage: 1965-present (Research Summaries); full text: 1924-present (selected documents)
Description: U.S. Defense Technical Information Center's technical reports and specifications (including DODISS), mostly in fields related to aerospace engineering and aerodynamics. STINET MultiSearch allows simultaneous searching of up to 34 databases including NASA, NIH, DOE, EPA, FDA, and USDA.
Welcome to Library X, which type of account would you like? your options are:
. The Buzz Plan: you can check out up to 100 items at once, but they're all due back within 48 hours. Stiff late fines go with this one, and a deposit of $x is required.
. The Daily: standard item numbers and return times. normal fines, no deposits.
. The Milquetoast: you can only have out 5 items at a time, but the items check out for a month. normal late fines after due date. For the slow, meandering, distracted reader. Low pressure, no pressure, no hassle!!!
. The Homebrew Plan: drop by to talk with our Circulation Librarian (meetings by appointment are best), to work out a customized account that meets your specific needs. Only interested in reading one genre? Can you make the case for a lower fine rate, or longer checkout periods? Maybe you're just into graphic novels, and you read really fast. We can take your particulars into account on a case-by-case basis. Signing up for a customized plan requires a mandatory deposit of $x.
'The implication is clear: the global power economy is in the early stages of a shift as profound as the shift when gasoline began to be widely used. With new battery technology expected in the near future the issues around powering systems at night and handling spikes in demand my begin to be solved, resulting in a complete green power revolution.'
By the way, I guess you noticed I got my dates wrong on that FISA bill thing. But what the hell. Once you tell yr representatives that yr vote for their re-election is on the line, you've played the last hand. No ace card left, is there?
"Over on Boing Boing Gadgets, our Joel posts this video in which Tim Ferriss interviews Daniel "Pentagon Papers" Ellsberg about tomorrow's vote on warrantless wiretapping in the USA. If Congress passes this bill (the "FISA bill"), it will become legal for intelligence agencies to bulk-wiretap American citizens without a warrant, using data-mining to listen in on millions of Internet and phone connections. Ellsberg, a heroic former intelligence officer, is eloquent and uncompromising in his condemnation of this -- and he makes a good case that any Congressperson who votes for it is violating her/his oath to uphold the Constitution."
Action Alert: Tell Your Senators: "Don't Shred the Constitution this July 4th -- Reject Telecom Immunity!"
After the Fourth of July holiday, the Senate will vote on the FISA Amendments Act (FAA), a bill that would betray the spirit of 1776 by radically expanding the president’s spying powers and granting immunity to the companies that colluded in his illegal program. Now that the House has passed the FAA, the Senate is the last front left in the battle against immunity, and every vote -- from cloture, to the amendments, to final passage -- counts.
Therefore EFF urges all patriots to celebrate the Fourth of July this year by demanding that their senators uphold the rule of law and stand up for civil liberties, by voting against the FAA and for the amendments to the bill that would eliminate or weaken its telecom immunity provisions.
or email them:
verbiage like:
I'm a constituent and I urge you to oppose telecom immunity and the FISA Amendments Act (FAA). As a constituent, I am very troubled that during this patriotic holiday season, the Senate appears ready to toss civil liberties and the rule of law out the window, and so I urge you oppose telecom immunity with every vote that you have when the FISA bill comes to the Senate floor on Tuesday, July 8th:
Vote "YES" on the Dodd-Feingold amendment, which would strip telecom immunity from the bill entirely.
Vote "YES" on the Bingaman amendment, which would delay implementation of telecom immunity until after Congress has received the Inspectors General report on the president's warrantless surveillance program.
Vote "NO" on the cloture motion to end debate on the FAA,
And finally, vote "NO" on the FISA Amendments Act, an unconstitutional and dangerous bill that would radically expand the president's spying powers and immunize the companies that helped him break the law.
with an emphasis on "YOUR RE-ELECTION DEPENDS on you FIGHTING FOR THE 4th AMENDMENT."
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Fledgling Rebellion on Facebook Is Struck Down by Force in EgyptBy Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, May 18, 2008; A01CAIRO -- At 1:49 a.m. in an Internet cafe only then quieting after Cairo's daily rumble, 27-year-old Ahmed Maher worked at a computer. He wore the same shirt he had had on for two days. The essentials of his life on the run lay splayed out next to his keyboard -- car keys, cigarettes, prepaid cellphone.
Maher pursed his lips, typing intently. His dream of a people's uprising organized on Facebook was beginning to slip through his scrabbling fingers.
Worries about the risks of political activism in Egypt were spilling onto his screen. It won't work, one man wrote. The government's already infiltrated us, wrote another. This is stupid, wrote a third.
Since late March, 74,000 people had registered on a Facebook page created and run by Maher and a few other young Egyptians, most of them newcomers to activism. Even some of Egypt's older, more disillusioned proponents of democracy had let themselves hope that a social networking Web site created by American college students could become an electronic rallying point for protest against President Hosni Mubarak's 27-year rule.
But the experience of the Facebook activists showed the limits of technology as a means of organizing dissent against a repressive government. Maher would end up among what rights groups said were 500 Egyptians arrested during two months of political activism in Egypt -- and find himself stripped and beaten in a Cairo police station, he said.
Check Warren Ellis' wikipedia page:
Warren Ellis Born February 16, 1968
Essex, EnglandOccupation writer Nationality British Genres science fiction, superhero Literary movement Extropianism, Transhumanism Notable work(s) Transmetropolitan
Planetary
The Authority
Nextwave
Global FrequencyNotable award(s) Eagle Award
Powerset Demo Video from officialpowerset on Vimeo.
ICRC, Myanmar, [donations link].
It only recently occurred to me that people don’t realize that I’m absolutely serious about starting a new nation state within three or four years if conditions are historically right.
Albert Hofmann, LSD inventor, RIP
Albert Hofmann, who first synthesized Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), has passed away. He was 102 years-old."I believe that if people would learn to use LSD's vision-inducing capability more wisely, under suitable conditions, in medical practice and in conjunction with meditation, then in the future this problem child could become a wonderchild." -- Albert Hofmann (1906-2008)
Link to Wikipedia article
On April 17, The Thomson Corp. announced that it had completed its acquisition of Reuters Group, PLC, forming Thomson Reuters, a provider of "intelligent information" for businesses and professionals in the financial, legal, tax and accounting, scientific, healthcare, and media markets. Thomson Reuters has more than 50,000 employees with operations in 93 countries on six continents and 2007 pro forma revenues of approximately $12.4 billion.
At Library Journal, Michael Rogers reports that Gale's going to add text-to-audio software into 6 of its databases (including Opposing Viewpoints!)
Second session was on Second Life. Ms. Lorin Fisher gave a good introductory talk on Second Life, Second Life Library (infoisland, or info archipelago now?), and the particulars of doing reference service in SL. I asked her abt making use of SL in the here/now of my community's daily, RL reference needs. I remain unconvinced that SL librarianship has much at all to do with RL service and getting the information to the people, despite the excellent points she raised about meeting professors teaching in SL on their own pedagogical turf. (I know of one prof teaching an anthropology course in SL at my college, but there are probably more doing it.) I just don't yet think SL serves the mass of us. I can't help but see it as a "wow, ain't this cool!" tool for the info-elite who have the luxury of time to romp around being a dinosaur-fairy-goth-robot in wonderland. But. That's not to say SL lacks potential, and I think Ms. Fisher did a good job in asking us to think about what that potential could be.
