June 2000

• Democracy goes global on the Net - Anyone 16 or older with an email address can vote in the ICANN election for at-large seats on the board. Registration is open until 31 July.
• Land-Mine Legislation alert: McCain To Tack Net Filtering Onto Appropriations Bill. I wish there was an easier way to find this sort of thing. I think it's wrong and bad and sleazy. If legislation doesn't have enough support to pass on its own, tacking it onto another bill isn't the right answer. Letting it die is.
• Land-Mine Legislation alert: House Rejects Smith & Wesson Pact. This time it was the NRA that was trying this tactic. I'm all for the cause, but the tactics stink.
• I think there's something deeply wrong about a system that requires legislators to try and sneak in laws that can't pass on their own merits. I don't know what the solution is, but for now, I'll probably take some time to point this sort of chicanery out.
• Camping Tips from the Onion : Waking up feeling groggy with a sore anus is perfectly normal on camping excursions.
• Sinfest: All Hot & Bothered. It made me laugh.
• The Sermon on the Money made me laugh, too.

Weather in Minneapolis for June 30, 2000     June 30 in History

• Lenora Fulani: Why I resigned from Buchanan 2000. Pat Buchanan's response is We'll always have Texas. So much for the Reform Party (though I hadn't seriously considered voting for Pat anyhow).
• The SF Chronicle finds Casual rudeness widespread in Bay Area.
• Sovereignty no match for WTO. There's a reason I agree with folks that the WTO is a bad plan.
• Take Our Word For It is a weekly word-origin webzine.
• Reactive Targets! Things that go bang when you shoot 'em.

Weather in Minneapolis for June 26, 2000     June 26 in History

• RepairClinic.com has online appliance parts and help. Useful! It's pretty slow to load, but I suspect that's because they're getting more popular more quickly than they expected.
• Been Spammed by the Amish? If ever there was a group of Americans that you'd expect to be attuned to the dehumanizing consequences of out-of-control technology, it would be the Amish. Turns out it was the consultant doing the spamming. And the Amish guy running the biz doesn't see the complaints, because the consultant reads all the email. Sigh.
• So the other day, I stumbled upon a link to MELT-BANANA, a Japanese punk fury combo. A Melt-Banana Fan Site has more on them. But finally, in Melt-Banana On a Noise-Thrash Chop-Stick, I found the analogy that explained to me why I found them interesting at all: Melt-Banana have a precise hardcore punk sound (laced with Japanese eccentricities) coupled with YaSuKo O's frantically chirping and yelping vocals. The result sounds as if early Hüsker Dü were being fronted by a ferocious Chihuahua.
• The punk thing got me to look at TCPUNK - Punk Rock Nursing Homepage finally. Strange memories.
• Worship The Baby

Weather in Minneapolis for June 23, 2000     June 23 in History

• There's A potential test case on 2nd Amendment rights working its way through the courts.
• US v Emerson is the amended opinion submitted by Judge Sam R. Cummings. It has a lot of information on weapons ownership going back to English history.
• Emerson Oral Arguments includes the government's assertion in the appeal that there is no right to private ownership of firearms.
• The Second Amendment in court is a good column about this case, too.
• And 2nd Amendment defended by judges is more information.
• Senator Craig on the Second Amendment - Once again, Bill's End the War on Freedom page pointed me to it. It's a well-spoken speech about the meaning of the Second Amendment.
• Gun Control is not Gun Safety. Gun control is an entirely different issue from Gun Safety. Of course if nobody had guns, there wouldn't be many problems with guns. And if we didn't have cars, there wouldn't be over 17 million automobile accidents every year involving 27 million vehicles, injuring 5 million people and killing 42 thousand people (Stats from the NHTSA FARS and NASS databases, as reported in this article).

Weather in Minneapolis for June 19, 2000     June 19 in History

• The Myth of Open Source Security, by the author of the open source Mailman mailing list software. Pointed out in the latest Crypto-Gram Newsletter.
• New mission planned for Mir. MirCorp actually seems to be keeping it alive. And if you've got a spare $20 million, they'll take you up there for ten days.
• NASA's OMNI is putting satellites on the Internet. Cool.
• Museum visitor sits on chair, breaks it. Happened in Minneapolis. Was a chair from the Ming Dynasty. It wasn't me.

Weather in Minneapolis for June 16, 2000     June 16 in History

• When I was in Korea last month, I discovered soju. Here are some links describing it:
  • Korea Insights: Soju
  • Jinro Chamjinisulro Soju is the kind I brought back from Korea. The cost was 1000 Won per bottle, which translated to about 90 cents. After seeing the next link, I kinda wish I'd bought a case.
  • Jinro: CA law treats soju as beer and wine
• Blacks, Whites, and Blues talks about Dave 'Snaker' Ray. I find it hard to believe that I haven't mentioned him in Dave's Picks before, but that seems to be the case. Sorry for the omission. My bad.
• Laser surgery may ruin eyes. I'd thought about the Lasik surgery (heck, I thought about PRK surgery) to fix my eyes, but it looks like waiting a bit longer probably isn't a bad idea.
• A Data Sanctuary is Born and Ex-army major offers dotcom sanctuary: HavenCo is being started on The Principality of Sealand (which is 10 by 25 yards in size). Dan Gillmor weighs in with Data haven may be step in right direction. I wonder what their security measures are.
• Counterpane Internet Security, Inc. has changed names and directions. They're not selling technology anymore, but rather process. They have a White Paper on Managed Security Monitoring that explains the new direction. The point is that we have enough products to be pretty secure today, but few companies have the process in place to ensure security. Process is hard to get right.
  One of the things Counterpane still offers for free is Bruce Schneier's Crypto-Gram Newsletter which is good enough reading that while I may not read it as soon as I get it, I never fail to read an issue.
• On a lighter note, here are a few links with descriptive enough titles that I feel no need to comment further. The first two came from Zannah and the last is from Susan:
  • Things my girlfriend and I have argued about
  • The Björk Song
  • Karen's Quotes by Subject

Weather in Minneapolis for June 12, 2000     June 12 in History

• Congress is still Making war on free speech in the name of the War on Drugs. The Drug War's Unequal Justice covers more abuses. The original report by Human Rights Watch lists Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota as the three states with the greatest racial disparities in jailing people for drug offenses. The whole idea of the government waging a war on the citizens who are sovereign to it is appalling to me. Not only is it used to justify no knock warrants in violation of the Fourth Amendment, but it's used to justify a general transformation of police into a standing army. Free-Market.Net has a Spotlight on Police Militarization (including Brutality and Misconduct).
• At least I can name names. In the case of the Ecstasy Anti-Proliferation Act of 2000 (which isn't available yet on Thomas), it was Senator Graham, Senator Grassley, Senator Thomas and Senator Biden who are culpable. In the case of the Club Drug Anti-Proliferation Act of 2000, Representative Biggert is the bad guy. She even seems to be proud of attempting to quash the First Amendment and the Fourth Amendment. Rep. Gilman, Rep. Lipinski, Rep. Mica, Rep. Oxley and Rep. Rogan are co-conspirators. If you still think that writing to your congress-critters accomplishes anything, I suggest you drop these folks a note. The Letter from Mark Rogerson I mentioned yesterday might give you some ideas.

Weather in Minneapolis for June 10, 2000     June 10 in History

• Rose to manage Old-Timers in Buffalo, NY. He's banned from MLB, but Charlie Hustle still gets to be on the field now and again.
• APBnews lays off entire staff. They're not dead yet, but they're definitely on life-support. Another useful site that couldn't figure out how to make the internet pay. Salon has laid off a number of people, too.
• Stephen Gaskin for US President - another candidate, but this one isn't afraid of the Did you inhale? question. He answers: I didn't exhale. Refreshing honesty from a presidential candidate.
• Nader could be trouble for Gore - He could siphon off liberal votes from Algore. You can't betray a political system that has already betrayed the public.
• A Letter from Mark Rogerson to some Congress-Critters. I think I need to draft something similar to my particular representatives. Found the link on Bill's End the War on Freedom page. I'm pondering making a list of sources the way he does, but I'm also pondering other ways to automate the process of compiling Dave's Picks every week.
• Guns and Econ 101. The real costs of gun control.
• The MP3.com - Citizens of America page has the latest ads from Citizens Of America. I especially liked the Similar Artists section (which my friend Jim described as Ahh... unique).

Weather in Minneapolis for June 9, 2000     June 9 in History

• Wendy McElroy asks whether Trial by Jury is A Source of Freedom or a Bad Idea. This article got me thinking about the Fully Informed Jury Association and their goals. I've pretty much accepted that a jury's power to refuse a conviction on a bad law was a good thing. After reading the article, I'm even more convinced. Ms. McElroy's argument is that a jury of twelve people is less efficient and predictable than having a professional jurist deciding the law. While keeping the trains running on time is nice, it doesn't always fit smoothly with our American traditions. Sometimes less efficient is better, and I think nearly a thousand years of history would suggest that the jury system isn't that inefficient.
• Is there a Constitutional comeback underway on the Supreme Court? We can only hope.
• What happened to the loyal opposition? Maybe the problem is that politicians have decided that appearing nasty (by pointing out an opponent's wrongdoing) keeps them from getting elected. And it sure appears that the most important thing to most politicians is getting elected.
  So what's the answer? Maybe we need to elect more nasty people.
• Vin Suprynowicz has some Real Questions for Politicians. I'd be interested to see how my representatives would answer these, but I think it requires a face-to-face to get the full effect, and sadly, getting face-time with elected officials is difficult.
• Loaded Coverage by Kenneth Smith talks how the news media often miss the mark when covering gun issues.
• Finally, what If Gunowners Were Treated Like Other Minorities?

Weather in Minneapolis for June 5, 2000     June 5 in History

• Joe Cartoon Downloads gives us Napsterbad. Metallica's Lars Ulrich and James Hetfield (not really) discuss their views on the MP3 software Napster with a profanity-laden commentary.
• John Perry Barlow (Grateful Dead lyricist and co-founder of EFF) gives us Napster.com and the Death of the Music Industry. You gotta love Metallica. There were a pain in the ass to their parents. Now they're going to be a pain in the ass to their kids.
• Piqued Putin cancels satirical TV show and cracks down on other media that are critical of him.
• Computer-Generated Sketch that does FBI-style sketch-artist type sketches.
• Transmission Impossible details the plight of would-be microradio licensees in New York.
• calculator.com will help you calculate darned near anything.
• The History of Economic Thought. It's a mini-encyclopedia. Useful!
• Economists, Terrorists and Human Nature - Libertarians all.
• Undo me! - Why hasn't undo gotten any better? Because you don't notice whether it's there or not until too late.

Weather in Minneapolis for June 2, 2000     June 2 in History