Truer than I'd like to admit

FoxTrot on Electronic Voting

President Bush Repeals Posse Comitatus?

This website from an admittedly liberal-leaning group claims that a new law was signed today by President Bush that essentially repeals the posse camitatus law which forbids the use of the military on American soil. They claim that the new law would allow a president to declare martial law and imprison "undesirables".

For the current President, "enforcement of the laws to restore public order" means to commandeer guardsmen from any state, over the objections of local governmental, military and local police entities; ship them off to another state; conscript them in a law enforcement mode; and set them loose against "disorderly" citizenry - protesters, possibly, or those who object to forced vaccinations and quarantines in the event of a bio-terror event.

The law also facilitates militarized police round-ups and detention of protesters, so called "illegal aliens," "potential terrorists" and other "undesirables" for detention in facilities already contracted for and under construction by Halliburton. That's right. Under the cover of a trumped-up "immigration emergency" and the frenzied militarization of the southern border, detention camps are being constructed right under our noses, camps designed for anyone who resists the foreign and domestic agenda of the Bush administration.

Normally, I wouldn't report on such alarmist talk from an anti-Bush site, but I have a feeling this may wind up being a matter of considerable discussion and debate over the next week as we lead up to the election.

Pop-Culture watch: Patricia Heaton vs. Michael J. Fox

The state of Missouri is facing an interesting vote in a couple of weeks. The first is a vote on whether or not to allow any kind of stem cell research. Secondly they get to vote on which person they want to represent them in the Senate - the Democrat that supports all stem cell research and the Republican that is following the party line (which is far too long to explain here). As you might have guessed, any time there is a debate on stem cell research Michael J. Fox has found his way into it. In a very pointed commercial he spews his typical "stem cells can fix anything" line. Hollywood has fallen in line with Michael J. Fox, with the exception of Patricia Heaton (Ray's wife on Everybody Loves Raymond). She, along with several Missouri sports stars and Jim Caviezel (Jesus from The Passion of the Christ) have come out with a commercial that disputes the claims of MJF. It is nice to see some part of Hollywood thinking.

Sports stars tend to have a bye on political stuff, but in Hollywood coming out against stem cell research is like saying George W. Bush is human or the sky is falling. People in Hollywood tend to hold grudges in an odd way and I wonder how this will affect Heaton's career (Caviezel has already been pegged as a religious zealot so his career has already been restricted and this is not going to affect him the same way). She's a good actress - having won at least one Emmy for her work on Raymond - so it would make sense for her to continue getting work. But I wonder if the lefties out there are going to stop hiring her for saying they're wrong. This will be interesting to watch - are they as open minded as they say they are (of course not, but it'll still be fun).

A Dummies Guide to Stealing the Vote

I personally am not a fan of Halloween, but I know many people enjoy being scared. If so, check this out. It is a simple guide (though not a step-by-step) on how to steal an election with the new electronic voting machines in place in most states who have switched over since the 2000 election.

Brevity

Wired posted a great story here. Great writers, six words for stories. Below are my favorites, enjoy them!

Failed SAT. Lost scholarship. Invented rocket.
- William Shatner
Computer, did we bring batteries? Computer?
- Eileen Gunn
Dinosaurs return. Want their oil back.
- David Brin
Gown removed carelessly. Head, less so.
- Joss Whedon
We kissed. She melted. Mop please!
- James Patrick Kelly

Why are serious bugs in software considered "okay"?

This blogger has up a thought that has been bothering me of late, especially as I work on commercial systems where companies are paying thousands-to-millions of dollars for software.

I mean, look at what they've managed to do: computer users now expect new software to be buggy. That is, we fully expect a newly purchased product, straight out of the box, to be broken. Something that for any other product category would be an outrage is just shrugged off as the normal course of the business. If you bought a toaster that didn't toast, you'd take it back to the store and demand a refund, or at least a working toaster. But somehow, because computers are involved, if a new video game crashes, we just say "Oh, well, that's what I get for buying it before the patches come out."

The author applies this to the Opera browser and iTunes, but honestly I think it applies much more to large commercial vendor-supported software, where the attitude of the vendor is "It is our job to produce the software. It is your job to test it." Why do we accept this?

Honestly, though, I know the answer. It is because we are not willing to wait. If Apple holds off the newest release of iTunes by a month, people are all over the rumor sites demanding to know what corporate bigwig denied them the ability to view movies on their Mac. And if a commercial vendor delays shipping because of a critical bug, a potential customer will just go to their competitor who ships buggy, incomplete software faster. It makes no sense, but it is how we act in the 2000s.