Parity Violation

Wow, Keith Olbermann responds forcefully to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s speech attacking war critics yesterday. He pretty much nails it. A little exceprt:

That about which Mr. Rumsfeld is confused… is simply this: This is a Democracy. Still. Sometimes just barely. And as such, all voices count — not just his. Had he or his President perhaps proven any of their prior claims of omniscience – about Osama Bin Laden’s plans five years ago – about Saddam Hussein’s weapons four years ago – about Hurricane Katrina’s impact one year ago – we all might be able to swallow hard, and accept their omniscience as a bearable, even useful recipe, of fact, plus ego. But, to date, this government has proved little besides its own arrogance, and its own hubris.

Well well. I had written the Astros off about 3-4 times during the current road trip, but each time I had left them for dead … they managed to win a game. They finished the road trip 6-5. Shocking.

As Lance Berkman said, they really have to win 10 games straight to have a shot at making the playoffs. Maybe they can do it. They did a similar feat in 2004. They really don’t know how to make it easy. In my years as an Astros fan the only stress free year I had was 1998 when they coasted to the division crown and won 102 games. Every year since it’s been a manic run to make the playoffs.

And how about Willy T? 30 game hit streak. Very impressive. Still barely halfway to the magic number of 56. I hope he continues the streak on the homestand, that should make for some additional excitement.

Two years ago today, the Astros started a thirteen game winning streak. Of course, they were already at .500 at the time. Still, the NL is much weaker this year than then. They could yet well pull it off. This homestand starting this week would be a good place to start a big winning streak.

Daring Fireball has a comprehensive look at this MacBook hack story that started in the Washington Post some weeks ago. The exploit used a 3rd party wireless USB adapter and a third-party driver.

What’s amazing is the key question is still unanswered by the supposed security experts. And that question is – is the default Macbook wireless card and the built-in OS X driver vulnerable to this hack? They still have not answered that question, and Apple flatly denies that they have been shown any proof or code that their products are vulnerable.

The story first appeared a few weeks ago. A Macbook was compromised based on a flawed hardware driver. Egads. Macs are hackable. Our smugness has caught up with us.

Problem? The exploit had nothing to do with MacOS X or Apple products. They used a USB wireless adapter and a 3rd-party driver. So, the hack was bogus.

Well, I read with interest a story about how Best Buy is trying to purge bargain-hunters from their stores. Basically, the store is trying to identify customers who only show up looking for the best deals or loss-leaders, and those who buy multiple non-discounted items. The worst customers are “devils”

The devils are its worst customers. They buy products, apply for rebates, return the purchases, then buy them back at returned-merchandise discounts. They load up on “loss leaders,” severely discounted merchandise designed to boost store traffic, then flip the goods at a profit on eBay. They slap down rock-bottom price quotes from Web sites and demand that Best Buy make good on its lowest-price pledge. “They can wreak enormous economic havoc,” says Mr. Anderson.

Now, I do buy products on sale. I apply for rebates too. However, I don’t flip items and sell them on eBay. That seems unscrupulous. But, looking for the best price on an item or buying only items on sale is just common sense.

I also read somewhere else that Best Buy tries to get away with charging more than MSRP. Indeed, I just bought this headset from Best Buy last week when it was on sale. This week, it’s $1 more than MSRP. That’s crazy.

I understand the desire to prevent people from buying multiple products that are being sold at a loss and then resellling them on eBay. However, when you try to lure people to a store with one product on sale and then stick it to them on others, this is what you get. If stores would just sell all their products at some modest discount or a good price, even if it’s not the lowest, and not try these sneaky tactics… I think that would be both fair and useful and that would be the sort of store where I’d shop regularly.

But if they’re going to charge a sale price on some things and $1 more than MSRP on others… well, what do they expect a savvy customer to do? Buy the cheap item, buy everything else somewhere else.

I grow weary of this “democrats weak on security” nonsense. Our response should be – we’re strong on this issue, you’re weak. The Bush administration and the Republicans think this boondoggle of a war in Iraq is part of the war on terror? It’s a complete side show and a huge waste of resources. The war on terror is fought primarily with intelligence gathering and law enforcement, not marines and bombs. Something even George Will seems to understand. The war in Iraq has done nothing but create more terrorists. We oppose the war because it makes us weaker and less secure.

Perhaps the GOP’s reaction to Pearl Harbor would be to invade Mexico. That’s what the war in Iraq is. Beyond Iraq, there is the matter of the Bush administration’s secret spying. No democrat wants to not spy on terrorists. Of course we should monitor terrorists. What we’re saying is that if the executive branch wants to peep in on calls involving people on American soil, you have to get a warrant. You know, that pesky thing called the constitution and separation of powers. Can you imagine the GOP reaction if the Clinton administration had been doing warrantless wiretapping?

Not to mention the pork-barrel the Homeland Security office has become. By now you’ve heard of this absurd potential target list that sends money to the middle of nowhere.

This is typical of an administration that makes us weaker and less safe. It’s time for them all to go. There’s your message, democratic candidates. Fight fire with fire.

Ok, Astros fans – it’s not that complicated. If you sit in the field box level and a foul ball comes your way your actions depend on whether the Astros hit the ball, or whether the other team hit the ball.

• If an Astros hits a pop fly – we don’t want it caught – so you stand up and try to catch the ball, not letting the other team make an easy play on it. (Two dopes in the stands just moments ago didn’t even stand up and the Padres third baseman made an easy catch on a pop up from an Astro.)
• If the visiting team hits a pop fly, we want it caught, you get out of the way and let the Astros try to make a play on it.
• Similarly if an Astros smashes a fair ball that then rolls near the stands – Don’t touch it! – you’ll rob us of a run or extra bases. Really you should never touch a fair ball in play
• However, if the other team hits the ball foul, and you are willing to face potential ejection, reach out, grab the ball, and save the Astros a run or an extra base perhaps.

It’s that complicated. Act to help your team. I suppose this requires people at the game to pay attention to what is going on in the game. Perhaps that’s too much to ask. If you can’t handle good seats, you can just give them to me.

Well, early results are not looking good for Joe Lieberman. If he indeed loses, it’s more than just his pro-Iraq-war vote and his continuing stance on keeping troops there and support the administration. As Salon’s war room points out, the problem is Lieberman uses Rove-like language against his fellow Democrats who oppose the war, and oppose the Bush administration’s handling of the war.

From the Salon posting..

Lieberman suggested that vocal opposition to the war was tantamount to assisting America’s enemies: “My point here is that the home front affects the battle front. Politics as usual at home can and will have unusually bad consequences in Iraq. It encourages our enemies to believe they are succeeding in their attempts to influence our policy. They clearly seek by their hostage taking, by their desecration of the bodies of our dead, and by their terrorism to break the will of the people of America.”

As Salon notes, if that’s what he thinks of democrats who speak out against the war, than it’s no surprise these same democrats would decide on a new candidate. It’s also important to note that opposition to the Iraq war is mainstream – with sizable majorities believing the war was not worth it, and that troops should come home sooner rather than later.

Well, lots of people will have lots to say about the expected announcements at Apple’s WWDC keynote today. As expected we have new Mac Pro desktop machines, and a preview of new features in the next version of MacOS X, “Leopard”.

For me, I was just thinking about this automatic backup feature, dubbed Time Machine. Am I the only one that thinks this is a security risk? What if you want to delete some sensitive financial document or whatever? Someone else can just “fly back” in time and find the file from days ago? That’s somewhat disquieting.

Perhaps it’s designed to not function when you use the Finder’s “secure delete” option. But the demo shows it recovering photos from iPhoto … what if really wanted that picture of you in that ugly Christmas sweater deleted for good but then… woosh someone accesses the time machine and blamo – it’s back. I hope Apple puts some security measures in place… like perhaps encrypting the data on the backup external disk.

I am also disappointed in the Mac Pro’s graphics card, which is fairly low end, and the price – I’d like a single processor version somewhere in the 1600 dollar range.. or Core 2 Duo’s in the iMac line… there seems to be a missing price point. You’ve got the iMac at like $1600, and then the Mac Pro with no monitor and four cores for $2500. Can Apple not find a middle ground here?

MMm, some web sites go overboard in the name of security. A financial web site I use (my bank) recently insisted I change my (otherwise very secure) password to something with numbers and a capital letter. So, I did, modifying my old (very secure) password.

But, of course, I forgot the new password and after 3 tries using the old one – boom locked out of my account. And, the “recover password” feature doesn’t work. Hold time on a phone call? 40 minutes – AND no indication I was on hold, no music or anything, just silence.

So, I emailed them and told them to call me but I’m not holding my breath. I like this particular institution in general, but sometimes all this hand wringing about selecting a good password creates more problems than the tiny increase in security it creates. I mean yes, we don’t want people using “dog” as a password, but still – let’s calm the password hysteria.