Sophont

"The lolcats, the Internet's most famous felines, may be hilarious. But in their yearning, I see nothing less than the tragedy of the human condition."

By Orson Scott Card Editor's note: Orson Scott Card is a Democrat and a newspaper columnist, and in this opinion piece he takes on both while lamenting the current state of journalism . An open letter to the local daily paper — almost every local daily paper in America: I remember reading All the President's Men and thinking: That's journalism.� You do what it takes to get the truth and you lay it before the public, because the public has a right to know. This housing crisis didn't come out of nowhere.  It was not a vague emanation of the evil Bush administration. It was a direct result of the political decision, back in the late 1990s, to loosen the rules of lending so that home loans would be more accessible to poor people. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were authorized to approve risky loans." (click on title for more)

 "I AM JOE"

"In 1964 the eminent physicist Richard Feynman served on the State of California's Curriculum Commission and saw how the Commission chose math textbooks for use in California's public schools. In his acerbic memoir of that experience, titled 'Judging Books by Their Covers,' Feynman analyzed the Commission's idiotic method of evaluating books, and he described some of the tactics employed by schoolbook salesmen who wanted the Commission to adopt their shoddy products. 'Judging Books by Their Covers' appeared as a chapter in 'Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!' -- Feynman's autobiographical book that was published in 1985 by W.W. Norton & Company."

 "Andrew Lahde, manager of a small California hedge fund, Lahde Capital, burst into the spotlight last year after his one-year-old fund returned 866 percent betting against the subprime collapse. Last month, he did the unthinkable -- he shut things down, claiming dealing with his bank counterparties had become too risky. Today, Lahde passed along his 'goodbye' letter, a rollicking missive on everything from greed to economic philosophy. Enjoy."

Wired Article : "Sleep Dealer is remarkably topical for a film set in the future (albeit one described by Rivera as taking place 'five minutes from now'). Central themes include outsourcing, corporate ownership of water, remote warfare, confessional internet diaries and military contractors who are accountable to no one. It's the rare political film without any reference to contemporary politics; like Blade Runner and other big-brained sci-fi flicks, it's about ideas, not selling merchandise." The director/writer's site: http://www.invisibleamerica.com/movies.html

So after having a sushi dinner downtown I decide to bike into Tomkins Square Park to read my software manual printouts instead of staying in my rat filled cave. It's very nice, not too hot, feet propped up on my folding bike, not too loud 80's music coming from the "movies in the park" set up, and the occasional distraction of hyperactive small dogs chasing each other on the grass. A man holding 2 shopping bags approaches me, holds one out; its filled with DVDs, and he says "triple x, triple x" I shake my head no and look back to my manual. He holds out the other one and says "photoshop office autocad final cut" I heart NY

TrueZer0

Speak, Dog! Speak!: News Flash! Hard-working American NOT a Socialist! : "Here's a video of a plumber asking Barack Obama about why he wants to raise his taxes, and The One says he doesn't want to 'punish' success, he just wants to 'spread the wealth around', because that's 'good for everyone'..."

World - smh.com.au : March 5, 2006 A 15-YEAR-OLD girl with a peanut allergy did not die from kissing her boyfriend after he ate peanut butter but from another cause, a coroner has ruled. But coroner Michel Miron would not reveal what caused Christina Desforges's death, saying he simply wanted to speak out before her case was cited by the food allergies association. 'The [association] intended to use the Desforges case to launch an education campaign,' Mr Miron said. 'I had to tell them the cause of death was different than first believed.' At the time of Desforges's death last November, officials said doctors had been unable to treat her allergic reaction to the kiss. Thinking she was having an asthma attack, Desforges had desperately searched for medicine. Friends called an ambulance as her breathing grew laboured but she collapsed. She died four days later in a Quebec hospital."

World - smh.com.au : " By Mark Coultan Herald Correspondent in New York March 4, 2006 MOVING countries and starting a business involves taking a lot of risks. But when Lincoln Mayne left his native Perth for London, then New York, he could hardly have imagined that the greatest threat to his successful design business would be anthrax. The 34-year-old has built up a business as an artist and fashion designer in five years in New York. He arrived with a backpack, hitched a ride into Manhattan and started sewing and printing. From humble beginnings on the Lower East Side, he now supplies clothes to stores in Japan and Hong Kong. He has had five animations on cable television in the US, and has exhibited his work in New York. But it all was brought to a halt by the deadly spores, apparently brought into the country in animal hides imported by a drum-maker three levels above him in a Brooklyn warehouse. When Vado Diomande, 44, came down with the symptoms of anthrax, he caused a panic...

A 2005 Rollick By James Lileks Behold: 2005 was the most important year in human history. Okay, maybe not. There have been better years, and worse ones. The Goths did not sack New York City. No plague. Asteroids didn’t deform the globe. The center held, and if some rough beast was slouching toward Bethlehem it appears he was diverted to a time-share in Branson for the season. Nothing blew up—over here at least. Despite the usual rash of false alarms, Americans no longer seem to be waiting for the other shoe bomber to drop. The economy grew much more than gloomy reporters expected. The Batman movie was good, for a change. No one on the Supreme Court tested positive for steroids. Politically, the Administration seemed determined to get the third year of its second term out of the way in the first."

Over on thisisbroken luser Susan Dombrow is upset with Symantec's response to her request that a question be answered in "plain english" and not "conmputerese" here is part of Symatec's response: Please note that the Email Protection feature of Norton AntiVirus works by monitoring traffic on the ports used by the POP3 email protocol. All data that enters or leaves your computer through these ports is stopped and scanned before being passed onto its destination. HTTP email services, such as those offered by America OnLine, Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail, do not use the POP3 ports, and cannot be scanned by Email Protection. I think that she would have been happier with the following: Please note that the Email Protection feature of Norton AntiVirus works by monitoring little dancing electric fairies that travel through the magic doorways used by the Garden Gnome's email protocol. All fairies that enters or leaves your computer through these magic doorways are s...

An Educational Voyage! : Sir, it is time for a real hard reality check for you and your administrators. Please show NYC teachers a floor plan of an honestly functional 'typical size' NYC classroom that has: 30-35 desks and chairs - arranged in cooperative groups (remember- larger children have larger furniture) A teacher's desk and chair A work space for an Educational Assistant. All adults deserve a chair. You have a chair, don't you? The Famous Rocking Chair A Classroom Library with a little space to browse. Usable Reading, Math, Writing, and Science 'Centers' that are not so crammed together that only one child at a time can fit at them. A Word Wall A Bulletin Board wall A Chalk Board Wall A Wall with Windows and A Computer area that allows a logical traffic flow that teachers and children can move around in comfortably. NYC school buildings were just not built for the class sizes we have today. 15-18 child classes are few ...

Forbes.com : "For centuries now the screw has held things together, and for almost as long it has been frustratingly inept at its central purpose. Concrete cracks when it is punctured by a screw. Plastic creeps away from the pressure, sliding down the threads so that even a tightened screw loosens almost instantly. Carmakers have to mold brass inserts into plastic parts to accept screws; otherwise they might loosen and cause a dreaded rattle. Kenneth LeVey has a better idea. A product development director at Illinois Tool Works, the nation's biggest screwmaker, he has reinvented what the company dubs the threaded fastener in a way that lets it grip tight where it used to let loose--and compete with cheaper screws made by offshore rivals. "

Times Online : "I SPENT the early part of last year in New Orleans recovering from gunshot wounds received as I was being robbed. It happened in the early evening as I walked down a quiet street with my girlfriend. There was a football game in town and the streets near the French Quarter were empty. The police presence was elsewhere. The incident itself was over in a flash but it plays over and over in my head and perhaps one day it will make sense to me. I found out later that there were fewer than 2,000 police in New Orleans at that time and it reached such a point that there was talk of the city was importing officers from Cleveland. Anyway, thanks to someone’s mobile phone, the police eventually got to the scene. Later, as I was carried into the emergency room at Charity hospital, a doctor reassured me that “New Orleans really is the best place to get shot”. They had, he explained, had plenty of practice." Ray Davies was lead singer of the Kinks. www.raydavies.info

"Monotremes are really weird. Everything about them seems to have been thought up past some kind of deadline. Take the method by which they reproduce: after mating, the female lays an egg (echidna) or two (platypus). Then she carries them around until they hatch. Monotremes are mammalian, even if what they have is a kind of free demo version of mammalianism without the really useful features like live birth, so they lactate. But they have no nipples. The milk just leaks right out of glands in their skin, and the baby monotreme laps it up with sweeps of its tiny bill."

mysanantonio.com : "I am disappointed. Women are going to lose their rights. Resolution 137 (which eliminates Iraqi family laws relative to women's rights and replaces it with Islamic legal doctrine) is coming back. Our civil family law will be canceled. We will go on Sharia law. We will be part of Iran. ..We, as constitution-drafting members, don't know what's happening. We finished on Aug. 15. The (big guys) started from zero. They changed everything in it. They are dividing the cake into pieces. It is personal. ... It is a shame we have reached this point. The big guys, every one counts how much he will benefit. My request to the women of San Antonio, my friends, can you please support the Iraqi women, to bring back our rights? Or it is our own case, nobody will help?" Dr. Rajaa Khuza, a member of the committee to write the Iraqi constitution, sent this e-mail Saturday.

SPACE.com : "In 1959, Cecelia 'Cece' Bibby found her way into the RCA graphics arts department located at Patrick Air Force Base in Cocoa Beach, Florida. Arriving at the dawn of the space age, she would soon find herself surrounded by what was then the men-only world of high performance jets and rocketry. An artist by trade, talent, and self-determination, Bibby would become the first to design and paint a logo on the outside of a U.S. manned spacecraft destined for orbit. She would work with three of the Mercury astronauts to customize their craft and in the process see her artwork become as recognizable as the astronauts themselves. Bibby's path to becoming the first woman allowed on the launch pad was not one without its hurdles."

Independent Online Edition : "Their scheme is simple enough. Tommy and Leona advertise for like-minded souls to have sex for free on camera, then upload the finished movies and pictures on to their website. Subscribers pay $15 a month to access the pictures and movies, and the subscriptions are donated to save the world's forests. Though the product is amateur and invariably involves lots of twittering birds, insects and twigs as props, it seems even this kind of sex sells. The couple say they have collected more than $100,000 since the site went live in April last year. These days the site gets 800-1,000 subscribers each month, and extra cash is raised by selling their own branded T-shirts for $20 a pop. It's a success, they say, because their subject matter and charitable goal are intrinsically linked. 'Sexuality,' explains Tommy, as if I am a bit stupid, 'is a reee-ally natural thing. Like nature, you know? I think we're all a little bit afraid of the na...