Quote of the Day

"He smokes like a fish!"
-- an InDUHvidual from Dilbert.

Quote of the Day

That's right....I might not have one every single day, but if I try to keep it to one a week they just keep piling up!

On the other hand, "Lyric of the Week" is pretty much a dead feature....sure, there are songs I haven't posted yet, but almost all of them are by Leonard Cohen. OK, here goes:

"When Dad agrees to something with a smile on his face, we have learned to reconsider our request."
- some 12year old

My mother is alive and well....

But this is still the only fat mama joke that ever made me cry.....

My favorite spam....

This is unlikely to be a weekly feature, or even a yearly one. Spam rarely makes me smile. Sometimes, maybe, in a grim way....like when my mother-in-law died and they had me clean out her email (99% spam) in case there was something in there, and one of her spams promised to "increase the distance of ejaculation" as though this were some kind of Olympic event.

Today one got caught by the google mail spam filter, but as I was hitting delete it still caught my eye "we think you deserve more than simple spam".

I'm gathering it must have been rather complicated spam. I didn't read it, but the subject line still made me smirk.

Definition of the week

Maverick: somebody who makes decisions independently of peers.

Said to be an eponym based on a rancher that refused to brand his cattle - since everybody else did brand their cattle, this let him claim any unbranded cattle in the area.

Our two-party system

This article points out some of the difficulty of competing with the major parties. If you've had the feeling that the United States must have some people that would make more inspiring choices for leader than the ones we actually get to vote here, Balko points out:

The system we have now selects for the sorts of people who want to make a career of politics. If, in order to successfully run for high office, you have to spend years culling favors and working your way up through one of the two major parties, the winners in this game are going to be the party loyalists and power-hungry climbers who couldn't hack it in the private sector — frankly, the last personality type we want governing.

Bailing Out Republicans

This item struck me as amusing, in a grim way.

Actually, there is something to be said for it, or going even further. If they could only get enough Republicans into one of the houses so that Obama would have a reason for not being able to get things done, this might stop him from having to do anything harmful.

Hey, it worked for Clinton!

What a lousy job!

I tend to agree with the Onion here, via Reason.

I regret that I am not eligible for the job, but I am glad I don't have to deal with it!

Elections, how to do it right....

Coyote is pretty happy with the way his district runs the polls.

I agree a paper trail is a plus, but I'm not so sure the LED is that meaningful a feedback. Here is my dream setup:

When you vote, by whatever means, you get a paper receipt of your ballot (which might have been printed out for you if you use a machine for input). There is also a paper kept as backup. Your copy has on it an automatically generated random id number, which is electronically stored with your vote. The printed backup does not need this number (to keep votes anonymous).

Later, all the votes are published, with the random id numbers, in a random order. You can type in any id number (but only your own is meaningful to you) and get the votes. They'd better match your receipt, or there has been fraud or error. The total number of votes also better match the number of actual votes (these can be independently tracked).

Why can't they ALL be that dumb?

Probably because of how much I paid for the cellphone that was stolen from me a few weeks ago, this story gave me an unusually strong jolt of epicaricacy (yes, as per the definition of the week about a month ago, that's another word for schadenfreude).

This guy steals a phone from a deaf old woman, and then uses it to take a picture of himself on the phone network. Nice way to get a positive ID!

Quote of the Week

"I am truly saddened for all of you who have allowed sex to be the foundation of your marriages. (And just in case you don’t think that means you, here’s a test: if your spouse having sex with someone else would cause you to end your marriage, sex is the foundation of your relationship.)"
Chris Strom