Month: February 2004

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<![CDATA[George W. Bush's home state, Texas, is one of the states that allow first cousins to marry. Those unions are recognized by other states, despite the known genetic consequences and long-standing kin taboos against marriage of close relatives. So, if Mr. Bush could govern his state without attacking its liberal policies toward first cousins marrying, why can’t he leave well enough alone with the gays? If more than half of U.S. states have laws against cousins marrying, should that be the law of the land? Not in the opinion of Mr. Bush, apparently.
Maybe there are some married cousins in the Walker-Bush dynasty? That would certainly explain Neil Bush.]]>

<![CDATA[The Bush administration has launched an attack on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which made possible the greatest expansion in home ownership in human history. Read here.]]>

<![CDATA[The Bush Administration will not let Total Information Awareness, it's panopticon domestic spying system, die. It will say it is dead, but, in fact, the Bushies have helped it escape to a budgetary Brazil like a Nazi scientist they want to keep as an asset. TIA now lives in the Advanced Research and Development Activity budget.]]>

<![CDATA[At the beginning of a large conference call today everyone had to introduce themselves. This gets rather tedious, because by the time we get to the end, the voices of and information about those at the beginning are lost. So, why not have a resource to point to, that could be called by a conferencing application to assemble a profile of the group?
I went to World66.com to use my eye-time while listening and talking on the call.
Here's the map of the states I've visited:

and here are the states I’ve lived in:

and the countries I’ve visited:

Make your own map]]>

<![CDATA[I don't play computer games, but I do waste a tremendous amount of time thinking about baseball, and a few years ago I started playing fantasy baseball. Now that Spring Training is starting, my thoughts turn to baseball and fantasy drafts.
This year, I'm running a fantasy league for readers who want to join in the fun. Send me mail if you’d like to play. I’ll do up to two leagues and the drafts will be held the week of March 22nd, so that there is plenty of information about how players are doing.]]>

<![CDATA[I got a Canon Digital Rebel camera today. Amazing image quality. More photos ahead.
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<![CDATA[A week ago, commenter fubar, who was a Dean volunteer in Iowa, described the “murder-suicide” committed by Richard Gephardt in Iowa. Today, Howard Dean launched the same strategy against John Kerry, saying Kerry is the product of a corrupt inside-the-beltway culture.
As I said last week, Gephardt’s strategy was politics as usual and would, if it had been successful, put Gephardt into the front-runner’s position (beating Dean and the field in Iowa would have catapulted any campaign into the lead, as demonstrated by Kerry’s resurgence). The fact is, Dean is now showing how much he is a politician-as-usual, which I’ve been saying for a while.]]>