Gum for Thought

2004-12-24T10:04:00.000-05:00

What are you doing here? I post at Chicago Boyz now.

2004-09-13T19:03:00.000-04:00

... And Yet Another One Several mutual fund subsidiaries owned by Allianz AG have settled with the SEC over market timing. Once again, the case involved the Canary Partners hedge fund. The subsidiaries include the fund distributors, the investment advisor, and the sub-advisor for the stock funds. The PIMCO fixed income funds were not involved. Civil suits against two top managers are still

2004-09-10T21:05:00.000-04:00

Not Many Left to Settle Invesco/AIM was one of the last fund families to settle with the SEC and the attorneys general of New York and Colorado for $450 million. The company press release doesn't mention it, but their former CEO has agreed to a $500,000 fine and a lifetime ban from the industry. Invesco was involved in market timing with Canary Partners, the hedge fund that kicked off the whole

2004-07-17T01:03:00.000-04:00

I guess I've been putting more effort into other blogs than into my own, so I'm going to cross-reference the places I've posted comments. Go read them -- they usually make more sense than I do. Meryl Yourish Sassy Lawyer Samizdata

2004-07-16T20:07:00.000-04:00

How to Speak Liberal Sometimes it seems like we're not all speaking the same language. It sounds the same, but doesn't always mean the same. The ancient sages struggled with this, too: 'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean--neither more nor less.' 'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you CAN make words mean so many

2004-06-25T22:29:00.000-04:00

Another Shoe Drops. Too Bad a Centipede Lives Upstairs Pilgrim Baxter has settled, leaving Pilgrim and Baxter to face the SEC. There are still civil actions against them, so they may have to bring that jar of pennies to the bank. Or not.

2004-06-25T22:25:00.000-04:00

The Most Dangerous Man is a Poet with a Gun Go read Wretchard, ignore me.

2004-06-19T14:01:00.000-04:00

Pondering the Imponderables Do Junior Mints imply a Senior Mints? Not according to the history on the manufacturer's website. The candy was named for a Broadway show, Junior Miss. (The link is to the movie. Consult your local high school drama club for the stage script.) So was there an Absorbine Sr.? Closer. The original Absorbine was a horse liniment. Farmers started using it themselves,

2004-06-16T20:33:00.000-04:00

Product Endorsement No, no one is offering money for me to wear athletic shoes — or loafers, for that matter. I want to recommend the SanDisk Cruzer, a USB flash memory unit. It's slightly smaller than a pack a gum, which means I keep losing it. Usually it turns up next to the driver's seat, in the wrong pants, under the sofa cushions, etc. This time it reappeared in the clothes dryer, having

2004-06-14T20:34:00.000-04:00

Sarbanes-Oxley Update There is no link available, but the dead tree edition of the Wall Street Journal had a guest editorial by Paul Volker and Arthur Levitt (if you don't recognize these names, consider yourself excused from reading any further). I'm not posting this to Chicago Boyz because we covered it last month. Don't skip the comments. The central argument they raise is that SarBox

2004-05-25T19:38:00.000-04:00

Top Stories from Reuters May 25 11:36am ET Iraqis Demand More Freedom, Swift End to Occupation Bush's Public Approval Rating at New Low, Poll Says Holiest Shi'ite Shrine in Iraq Damaged in Attack Iraqis Say U.S. Soldiers Steal During House Raids Qaeda Has 18,000 Militants for Raids - Think Tank Is it just me, or is it Reuters?

2004-05-21T21:53:00.000-04:00

Another Fund Settlement One more of the holdouts in the mutual fund scandal has settled. Richard Strong, founder of the Strong Funds, has paid a $60 million fine and been banned from the industry for life. His company paid $115 million and agreed to expense reductions (there it is again), and two other executives have also been banned for life. This was an especially bad case — Mr. Strong was

2004-05-08T11:50:00.000-04:00

Local Flavor I had not linked to this before because I could not get the audio to work. It looks like the site has added an MP3 that works fine, so without further ado, permit me to introduce Hoover, the famous talking seal. I had the honor of meeting Hoover at the New England Aquarium many years ago and remember enjoying his conversation very much. His remarks were more cogent and intelligible

2004-05-08T11:09:00.000-04:00

Spring Cleaning I've deleted some items from my blogroll, where either the link has been broken or the blog is clearly dormant. The one exception is Norwegian Blogger, for sentimental reasons. I keep hoping he will come back. Sigh. Maybe if we pester him enough ...

2004-05-06T09:17:00.000-04:00

Unintended Consequences — Spam and the Blogosphere Back in the day, one of the easiest ways to get spammed was to post your e-mail address to Usenet. Within days of posting, connoisseurs of Nigerian 419 scam letters could relish new variations on the theme (taking off the caps lock, for example). Putting your e-mail out on your website is still a good way to get a spam-a-lanche for your inbox.

2004-05-05T21:45:00.000-04:00

Local Boy Makes Good Hey, I'm one of the Chicago Boyz. No, they're not making me move out there to Flatland. It's one of the blogs I have been reading daily for over a year, and they put out a notice asking if anyone wanted to join. I did, of course — this is the big leagues. 'Course, now I have to think of something to write.

2004-04-30T16:11:00.000-04:00

Guilty Conscience Here's an actual work-related link on the fund scandal — John Bogle (who else?) saying Hate to Say I Told You So. Journal of Indexes, the site where I found it, is also a great site for research.

2004-04-30T14:43:00.000-04:00

OK, it's a slow Friday, so here goes nothing Euphemisms according to vocations and pastimes: Network engineer hitting on a woman: pinging the server. Naturalist dumping her boyfriend: returning him to his natural habitat. Investment banker dumping his girlfriend: spinning off a division. Fisherman's one-night stand: catch and release dating. Any suggestions?

2004-04-28T09:35:00.000-04:00

Another Fund Settlement Janus has settled with the SEC and the various attorneys general. Of the total $225 million settlement, $125 million comes in the form of reduced fees over five years. This latter sanction, similar to several others, addresses the real mutual fund scandal: exorbitant expense ratios. This leaves Strong, Pilgrim Baxter, Franklin, Federated, and quite a few others still

2004-04-11T19:21:00.000-04:00

"Victory for the Iraqi resistance" OK, now can I question their patriotism? And to think that I saw it in the Boston Globe.

2004-03-31T19:00:00.000-05:00

MFS Again One of the other well-known but even more damaging practices in mutual funds is when brokers are given incentives to push customers into a particular fund or family of funds. True, there are rules requiring brokers to consider whether an investment is appropriate for an investor, but this leaves an awful lot of wiggle room. Also, for example, if an international equity fund is

2004-03-16T19:00:00.000-05:00

Civil suits against mutual fund management companies will be consolidated in Baltimore, according to this article in the Miami Herald. Scroll down for an excellent timeline of the whole nasty business. I realize I haven't been posting about this, but I have an excuse: I've been working non-stop on this in real life, plus a big dollop of Sarbanes-Oxley work. What seems to be a recurring theme

2003-12-10T21:48:00.000-05:00

Why I'm not a leftist any more The short answer is that I had seen the future and it didn't work. Let me elaborate. I spent nearly ten years working for the Social Security Administration, mostly in the SSI program, in a run-down small city north of Boston. What I saw was that the money used for welfare programs of one sort or another were at once too generous and too miserly. They were too

2003-12-09T23:18:00.000-05:00

MFS Again OK, maybe I was a little hasty in opining that MFS was clean. According to this Boston Globe article, the SEC is ready to bring indictments regarding market timing in several of their funds. The funds involved were large domestic funds, not the usual international or junk bond funds used in market timing. They put the policy in a memorandum, which makes the investigation a lot easier.

2003-12-08T19:50:00.000-05:00

Another fraud indictment in the mutual fund scandal, this one involving market timing. This time it's Invesco, the parent of the AIM funds. The fund group and its CEO are being charged with felony fraud. The company gives its side here. Their statement basically sounds like "no controlling legal authority." It looks to me like the SEC took too much grief from the quick settlement of Putnam's

2003-11-27T13:45:00.000-05:00

PCs are not PC? The Volokh Conspiracyhas a funny piece about LA County requiring that computer disk drive configurations not be described as master and slave. It sounds like they have taken the interim step of putting tape over the jumper setting connections. For the sake of consistency, they should probably also remove the master and slave cylinders from the brake systems of their vehicles,

2003-11-21T21:04:00.000-05:00

More Fund FolliesI'm happy to see that my gift for prophecy is still working. Larry Lasser lasted less than a week after the expression of confidence by the board of directors. Putnam is now joined by Fidelity, MFS, Scudder, Hancock, Loomis Sayles, and Pioneer. There is a new issue here as well: directed brokerage. This is a system in which a fund sponsor asks a broker to push their funds in

2003-11-01T15:30:00.000-05:00

Mutual Fund Follies Larry Lasser, the head of Putnam, has received an expression of "great confidence" from the chairman of Putnam's parent company, Marsh & McLennan. That is usually the kiss of death. Meanwhile, state pension funds are withdrawing (reg. req'd) from Putnam. Even Massachusetts, where Putnam is based, withdrew its $1.6 billion. With that kind of money walking out the door, can

2003-10-25T13:26:00.000-04:00

The Louisiana CPA society has come out with a calendar purporting to show that accountants are not as boring as the public seems to think. I would have thought that a couple of years full of scandals, bankruptcies, and trials should already taken care of the boring image.

2003-10-22T18:25:00.000-04:00

The mutual fund scandal is spreading, with Massachusetts Secretary of State William F. Galvin saying that he will be charging Putnam, one of the ten biggest fund sponsors, with civil securities fraud. The fraud allegation arises from Putnam's expressed policy of forbidding market timing in general while allowing it for certain accounts. Meanwhile, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is

2003-10-17T10:42:00.000-04:00

More Local Interest On the Boston area's obsessions: Did you know that Derek Jeter's full name is Derek Sanderson Jeter? That's right, folks. The shortstop you love to hate was named after one of the best players ever to lace up for the Boston Bruins. The ALCS was a beauty, despite the results. The two teams were well-matched, and both looked like they belonged there in terms of starters,

2003-10-11T00:36:00.000-04:00

Five Finger ExercisesThe "blood for oil" nonsense has always given me a rash. Now that we have some facts and figures, let's have another look at it and see how it holds up. First, we get most of our oil from Canada, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela (remember how the strike there pushed our prices up?), Mexico, and Nigeria in that order. Two-thirds is from outside OPEC. This is not a new

2003-10-09T15:30:00.000-04:00

Local Interest H. Paul Rico, formerly famous as the FBI agent who broke up the Angiulo and Patriarcha organized crime families in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, has seen the luster of his star dimming. It turned out that the Boston FBI office had sent innocent men to prison for murders committed by FBI informants. Now he has been arrested for his involvement in a 1981 murder, allegedly

2003-10-09T13:21:00.000-04:00

A Modest Proposal The Nobel Peace Prize will be awarded tomorrow. If it is not too late, I would like to nominate Saddam Hussein. Given that the unilateralist United States is the leading threat to world peace, who would better represent the principled resistance to the hyperpower? As the first to stand up to the United States, Saddam led the way for France, Russia, Germany, Canada, Syria, and

2003-10-02T10:01:00.000-04:00

I've been busy with the job search, but have been posting to Samizdata's comments. Live Free or Die!

2003-09-28T16:34:00.000-04:00

Being out of work has at least reinforced for me the value of a dollar (currently about $1.15/euro). I was able to save a packet of money by building my own computer, but software can very easily double the price. Fortunately, there are many useful applications out there for little or no money. Here is one of them; I will bring up some of the others I'm currently using in another article.

2003-09-12T14:17:00.000-04:00

I just vent about my business ... I just posted a llllooooonnnggggg article on my business site about the developing mutual fund scandal. What it amounts to is another way the little investor can get screwed, without even getting a dinner before or flowers afterwards. To save you some time and trouble, most of it is explanations of what was done and how. The part that interests me, though, is

2003-09-11T09:37:00.000-04:00

Another day that will live in infamy. This was the impetus for the start of many weblogs, particularly the "warblog" variety. This may be one of them, since the author firmly believes in peace, and that there's nobody as peaceful as a dead troublemaker (Keith Laumer). Meantime, I've been building another site for my business/career, plus another site for fun.

2003-06-27T10:58:00.000-04:00

Recording Artists vs. Recording Industry -- Update Somehow this got by me, but the lawsuit led by Sam Moore of Sam & Dave that I discussed previously has made some progress. The part of the suit charging AFTRA with failing to make sure the record companies paid into the artists' pension fund was settled in December. The record companies are still on the hook for overdue payments. Funny, isn't

2003-06-17T19:00:00.000-04:00

This is getting weird About two and a half years ago, there was a hideous massacre in an office a couple of blocks from me. Now yesterday, the helicopters were hovering again, and I felt this sinking feeling. It turns out there was a man living in the neighborhood who has spent the last two years in prison for possession of a sawed-off shotgun. One of his family members thought it would be

2003-06-12T08:13:00.000-04:00

Religion of Peace Update The islamofascists have resumed blowing up busses in Israel. Their manifest intent is to prevent a peaceful solution based on two states side by side. We should not be surprised -- the Psalmist understood this several millenia ago. Psalm 120 6 My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace. 7 I am for peace: but when I speak, they are for war.

2003-06-11T17:21:00.000-04:00

The New Marianne? I didn't know there were any libertarians/classical liberals in France, but it turns out there are a few and they have a lot to say. Here is a translation of a speech made at a counter-demonstration against the chaos caused by the strikes. No to the undeserving trade unions!!! Speech given Sunday May 25, at the rally at la place de l'Hôtel de ville. My dear friends, My name

2003-06-11T13:54:00.000-04:00

How Can I Miss You if You Won't Go Away? Eight years of the self-absorbed, mendacious Clintons, and here's Hillary!® plugging her new book. You know, the one with the $8 million advance from the friendly publisher? Does anyone recall the prodigious amount of crap given to Gingrich for a much less lucrative deal? Must not have had enough oral sex in it. But I digress. So, according to the

2003-06-10T08:55:00.000-04:00

America for Dummies LT Smash has a few pointers for the rest of the world on how to cope with Americans, since it doesn't look like we're going away any time soon. His section on our reverence for the Constitution is worth reading, if you're not yet part of the family. When the International Court of Justice was being discussed, many US commentators objected that some of its provisions violated

2003-06-06T08:28:00.000-04:00

I guess I must have strayed into leftie land, but I can't figure out which blogger it was. My browser history didn't help. Anyway, there was a snide remark made about right-wingers sitting around blogging in their Star Wars jammies. There may have been some use of the odious Britishism "wankers." If I could remember where I saw it, I would visit condign punishment on the miscreant. Let me

2003-06-05T11:19:00.000-04:00

Democracy in Iraq? The short answer is "not likely." The long answer is that democracy is the worst form of government, except for everything else that has been tried, as Churchill said. This implies that many other forms of government will be tried first, and this is usually the case. Consider France, which has gone through two monarchies, two empires, five republics, one commune, and

2003-06-03T13:47:00.000-04:00

Richard Chamberlain outed himself today. I wonder why he bothered? Was this supposed to have been a secret? Oh, wait, I see -- he's plugging his memoirs.

2003-05-28T15:36:00.000-04:00

Welcome to Massachusetts This little item never made it into the Boston Globe, wasn't reported on TV or radio, and landed fairly deep in the Boston Herald. For those of you from outside the area, a little background might help. The whole thing is recounted in the book Black Mass (and I don't get anything from Amazon, thanks). The synopsis is this: The FBI recruited Whitey Bulger, the brother of

2003-05-25T10:42:00.000-04:00

Smoking Gun in Iraq? The Telegraph has an article on a missile Iraq was developing, with a range of 600 miles and the potential to carry chemical warheads. This information was apparently gotten from one of the captured Iraqi generals. It looks like we're picking up some great deals in the Baath going out of business sales.

2003-05-24T19:42:00.000-04:00

Technical note You may have noticed that I have inserted pictures into the free version of Blogger. It's not hard, really. Your ISP probably gives you a free website with some unintelligible URL, as mine does. All you need to do is stick your pictures there and use a little HTML magic to refer to them. Nothing says your text and pictures have to be on the same server. Haggai, Vegard -- let

2003-05-24T19:22:00.000-04:00

More Disinformation? France has accused the US of an orchestrated disinformation campaign designed to stir up bad feelings toward them. Well, it looks to me like the Bush administration has decided to spare their feelings by burying this story on the Saturday of a 3-day weekend. US intelligence has found a dozen French passports. There's no word on their provenance -- they

2003-05-22T15:35:00.000-04:00

Ten Things I Learned from Soap Operas Most people are incredibly attractive. Amnesia is a widespread health problem. One should approach a sixth marriage with the conviction that this time it's for real. Just like the previous five. The leading causes of death among affluent Americans are murder, car accidents, and airplane crashes in remote tropical areas. Death by this third method is rarely

2003-05-17T17:22:00.000-04:00

I just couldn't resist this:

2003-05-15T20:25:00.000-04:00

China Threatens to Execute Those Who Spread SARS Intentionally This is according to Fox News. They also promise to impose prison sentences on those who violate quarantine orders. May I venture a modest proposal? Simply execute anyone showing symptoms of SARS. This should stop the epidemic rather quickly.

2003-05-15T11:58:00.000-04:00

I've been a bad boy lately, posting on other peoples' comments sections without doing anything on my blog. I've still been writing, you just have to look for it all over the place. Here's one I wrote in response to an article in The Edge of England's Sword. Kris, speaking as a CPA, nothing would please me more than tax simplification and a general reduction of rates. My area of practice was

2003-05-01T21:05:00.000-04:00

Dawn Breaks over Marblehead It looks like the French are starting to realize that opposing the #1 military power and excluding #2 may not be as good an idea as it seems on its face. Here is today's le Monde editorial: Le Monde Editorial Blair against Chirac Crises have the advantage of clarifying things. The deep division across the European Union on the war in Iraq forces Europeans to answer

2003-05-01T13:48:00.000-04:00

It looks like the US Army confiscated several Kalashnikovs from the unarmed Iraqi demonstrators in Fallujah, according to the Times. Also in that article, one of the rocks the peaceful demonstrators were tossing had the bad luck to mistake itself for a grenade and detonate, injuring 7 soldiers.

2003-04-29T19:48:00.000-04:00

It looks like the job offers are pouring in for former Iraqi Minister of Information Mohammed Saeed Al-Sahaf. This one, unlike those from American comedians, appears to be genuine. What a novel career path. Too bad I can't tell extravagant lies with a straight face. Of course, that would qualify me for many other positions.

2003-04-23T22:47:00.000-04:00

Well, it looks like warblogging will be a little thin for a while, since most of the bad guys are either dead, in custody, hiding, or president of France. So on a personal note, we have just acquired a puppy, and I must say it is good to see the Boston Globe editorial and op-ed pages treated with the contempt they deserve. Take that, Oliphant! In your face, Kuttner!

2003-04-02T17:11:00.000-05:00

Here is one that is not worth translating: L'éditorial du Monde: Victimes civiles It purports to describe the tragic incident where US soldiers fired upon a van that attempted to speed through a roadblock. Le Monde's supposed source was this article in the Washington Post. Note that while le Monde states there were no warning shots, the Post article states that there was first a warning shot,

2003-04-02T01:02:00.000-05:00

Here's another translation of an op-ed piece from the French, this time from the left-center Le Monde. What I don't get is the writer's argument that the UK can only preserve its national identity by subsuming it in a greater European identity, one which no doubt will partake generously of the French national identity. Is it wrong of me to think that the European Union, at least as far as

2003-03-31T11:39:00.000-05:00

Just to give a sense of proportion -- today was a recycling day. Every other week, we put out bottles, cans, and newspapers alongside the trash for separate pickup. Among the newspapers, there was one with a headline about Bush giving Saddam 48 hours to leave or face war. Could we please back off from how long this war is taking?

2003-03-30T19:58:00.000-05:00

I just finished translating an article from le Figaro, a fairly conservative French newspaper. The original article can be found here. The thing that seemed odd to me is that it appears to be repeating Pat Buchanan's nonsense about a neocon-Zionist axis without once bringing him into it. Could there be an international anti-Zionist conspiracy? Here, judge for yourself. George W. Bush and the

2003-03-29T17:34:00.000-05:00

Quizilla is often silly, but it nailed this one: what band member are you? brought to you by Quizilla Did I mention that I still have my Hofner Beatle bass and Traynor tube amp head?

2003-03-27T13:17:00.000-05:00

History Lesson: How to Negotiate Letter to General S. B. Buckner, Confederate Army Headquarters, Army in the Field Camp near Fort Donelson, February 18th, 1862 Sir: Yours of this date, proposing armistice and appointment of commissioners to settle terms of capitulation, is just received. No terms except unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon

2003-03-20T13:07:00.000-05:00

I've been trying to come to grips with the connection between Iraq and al Qaeda. I'd like to give the president some slack on this matter -- most of whatever information he has should probably remain secret. But let's take the worst case -- that there is not much connection between Saddam and bin Laden. This war may actually be a good thing, serving to counter the asymmetrical warfare strategy

2003-03-12T23:28:00.000-05:00

When I Become Dictator When you are president for life, term limits can be a bitch. Nevertheless, here is my program in the unlikely event that I become absolute ruler. Possession of an accordion will be a misdemeanor. Possession of an accordion with intent to commit "Lady of Spain" will be a felony, punishable by bagpiping for a term of not less than one year. Any female wishing to call

2003-03-09T21:13:00.000-05:00

Won't Carter Please Go to Sweden and Stay There? Jimmy Carter, or St. James the Least, has written an op-ed for the New York Times against the impending war with Iraq. I simply cannot restrain myself from an ad hominem attack upon the man, who more than anyone else turned me from a Democrat to a Republican. Once I have finished venting, I will attempt to answer his arguments, if I can make them

2003-03-08T11:08:00.000-05:00

American Arrogance May I submit that much of what is ascribed to American arrogance is our stubborn refusal to recognize the superiority of our "betters," such as the French. If you treat someone as an equal who considers himself a superior, the alleged superior will have one of two reactions. Case 1: The alleged superior publicly and overtly asserts his superiority. Worst outcome: In this

2003-02-27T20:55:00.000-05:00

A good friend of mine says she is going with another woman and two gay men (these two categories must encompass most of the audience) to see "Puppetry of the Penis," which I gather involves these two fellows stretching and pulling their marriage tackle into a variety of shapes. I told her I'll wait for the sequel -- "Ventriloquism of the Vagina."

2003-02-27T11:24:00.000-05:00

Under US law, you cannot declare personal bankruptcy for 7 years after last doing so. The Left, it seems, declares moral bankruptcy every day. Michele at A Small Victory catches them at it. The upshot is that some Iraqi exiles begged to differ at an anti-war rally. Their point was that the killing has already started, war or no war; the only difference is that war is the only hope of ending

2003-02-26T22:49:00.000-05:00

Today is the 10th anniversary of the first World Trade Center bombing. It was carried out by fundamentalist muslims, with the blessings of their cleric, Omar Abdel Rahman. The participants included an Iraqi who has never been caught. The Europeans say we are always late for the war; considering that this one started at least 8 years before we fought back, I guess they're right. The thing is

2003-02-25T13:14:00.000-05:00

More on Iraq You know what opinions are like -- everyone has one, and they all stink. So here's mine. I've been trying to figure out what the French are up to in this whole mess. Their fight to keep the US out of Iraq and Saddam away from the hangman has gone on long past the point where they could win, and yet they persist. Chirac has the reputation of a blunderer, but he doesn't seem to be

2003-02-24T14:06:00.000-05:00

The long sad saga of my "rebuilt" PC has come to a happy conclusion, although not what I thought it would be at first. The new motherboard is in and the machine runs beautifully. With DSL installed and the router doing its routing thing, life is good. It turns out that I may have waited to long to upgrade, as I wound up using a lot fewer of the old components than I had anticipated. Anything

2003-02-10T18:18:00.000-05:00

Dude, you're getting a cell! The annoying kid on the Dell commercials just got popped for holding weed. Who could have imagined? Maybe it's a method actor exercise.

2003-02-08T20:39:00.000-05:00

I had an interview for a contract job at Fidelity in Merrimack, and it looks good. The job involves doing small Access/SQL things, working directly with the users.

2003-01-27T10:07:00.000-05:00

Sigh. The new motherboard is dead. No video with 3 different graphics cards (2 AGP, 1 PCI), 2 different monitors/cables. Return is in process. Dude, next time you're getting a Dell. Nothing new on the job front, although a couple of very desirable companies have sniffed at my resume on Jobfind.com since I put it out on Friday. Let's hope something good comes of it. Meanwhile, with the

2003-01-15T11:21:00.000-05:00

Adventures in hardware continue. I had a queasy feeling when the motherboard package proclaimed that it was for Win98, ME, XP, & 2000 ONLY, as though this was something to be proud of. Go figure. I had no idea why a motherboard would support only the later Windows stuff and not Linux. Well, here's why: There is no parallel, serial, or PS2 port on the god-damned thing! There is a welter of

2003-01-07T20:18:00.000-05:00

Well, that was exciting. I shouldn't have spoken about smoke in my last post, because I nearly succeeded in setting fire to the computer. If you are interested in replicating this feat, here's how. All you need to do is mount the floppy drive and then connect the power cable. The standard connector for a floppy is not a real obvious looking thing, and if you can't see what you're doing and

2002-12-14T20:04:00.000-05:00

This is going to be a short post, since I've been reduced to the necessity of borrowing a computer from my son. My new box, cobbled together from mooched, used, obsolete, and cheap parts, is apparently too technically advanced for Win95 (attempting a hard drive transplant). No smoke yet, but I'm still trying. Later.

2002-12-13T00:16:00.000-05:00

See previous post below. The more I think about it, the madder I get. This racist crap has got to stop. Besides the flimsy "states rights" cover used by the segregationists, there is the question of how to remember those who fought the Confederacy. We have heard the arguments that they merely honor the bravery of those fighting, or the heritage of the South, not the cause they fought for. I

2002-12-12T23:03:00.000-05:00

Back to the political stuff. Trent Lott must step aside. If he won't move without being pushed, Bush should give him a shove. Speaking as a former Democrat and current Republican, the Republican party is really a coalition party. I could never have voted for Strom Thurmond for president. For one thing, my African-American, Asian-American, and mixed-race relatives would never forgive me,

2002-12-10T20:07:00.000-05:00

Well, it seems to be an occupational hazard for bloggers, but I got laid off yesterday. No, I wasn't goofing off or working on my blog instead of what the company paid me for. My former employer had rarely laid people off, and this came as a bit of a surprise to everyone. That's the bad news. So after sanding and staining some bookcases this morning, I finished putting my resume together

2002-12-08T14:50:00.000-05:00

This stuff is hitting a little too close to home (again). Problem Solution

2002-12-02T19:54:00.000-05:00

Oh. My. God. I just read this article by Oriana Fallaci. I'm in awe. If you want to see ranting done right, here it is. Perhaps the best response to the barbarity of the jihadist murderers is just rage. What seems most to infuriate her is the slimy moral posturing of their European apologists. She sees it as a betrayal by the Left of their basic principals, but I would remind her that the

2002-11-30T17:30:00.000-05:00

From The Wall Street Ledger: The consolidation in the cults and loonies industry continues as the Unification Church (ticker symbol UCCO) announced after yesterday’s market close that it will acquire the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON). ISKCON is best known for its bald nut cases chanting “Hare Krishna” at airports and bus stations. Spokesman Pie Moon described the

2002-11-13T20:28:00.000-05:00

If you're in financial services, take a look at More Than Zero, which has a great write-up about the unintended secondary effects of regulation in the brokerage industry. There is a requirement that brokers consider the suitability of an investment for each particular client. In theory, this should mean looking at the client's risk tolerance, tax situation, investment goals (besides making more

2002-11-12T23:04:00.000-05:00

you have an ominosity quotient ofseven. you are as ominous as the creators of this quiz. which terrifies us. find out your ominosity quotient I sure hope my P.O. doesn't see this.

2002-11-12T19:03:00.000-05:00

My bad -- Le Monde did have an article: Attaque meurtière dans un kibboutz, but it was difficult to find -- I only saw it when reading today's follow-up analysis. Today's analysis seems to wonder whether Arafat is willing or able to control his own Al Aqsa Martyrs assassins, let alone Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Gee, ya think?

2002-11-11T17:19:00.000-05:00

Update -- maybe I was too harsh on Reuters. Le Monde didn't find the incident worth mentioning at all.

2002-11-11T15:22:00.000-05:00

Let me see if I have got this straight. Someone breaks into a home, guns down a mother, slaughters two little boys hiding under the blankets, and Reuters describes the perpetrator as a "militant" and as a "gunman," but not a killer or a terrorist. Disgusting.

2002-11-10T19:45:00.000-05:00

Bloviation alert -- this is one of those "What Does It All Mean?" pieces. We have all had a chance to get used to the idea that the Nasdaq is going to take a long time, maybe a decade, to recover the 2/3's of its value it has lost. Earnest young consultants by the thousands have sold the Porsche and moved back in with Mom and Dad. Fiber optic demand is still far below capacity. Up until three

2002-11-07T22:55:00.000-05:00

Some people just can't help themselves. They just have to go just a little bit farther than the rest of us. Take this letter to a utility company, for example: Hartford, February 12, 1891 Dear Sirs: Some day you will move me almost to the verge of irritation by your chuckle-headed Goddamned fashion of shutting your Goddamned gas off without giving any notice to your Goddamned parishioners.

2002-11-06T19:30:00.000-05:00

Whee, I got Blogrolling going! I put in some of the blogs that I had on yellow stickies, and will start transferring others from my links soon. Big bloggers will have their own lists. I also cloned the blog template in "regular" HTML and will use that as an annex with a different host. Regarding the election results: I forget who in the last administration it was, but when he got caught in

2002-11-05T20:30:00.000-05:00

Well, that was productive. Sort of. I sneaked a JavaScript into the Blogger template that creates a "mailto:" without actually leaving it out in the open for the spam bots to harvest, so I won't see a big increase in spam from putting my e-mail on view. If you don't have a clue what I'm talking about, relax, it's just something a geek would care about. If you do, you can click "view source"

2002-11-04T21:51:00.000-05:00

Online music sales plummet -- Recording industry blames file-sharing. Jeez, that's terrible. In general, I support property rights as an essential guarantor of freedom. Intellectual property rights, the exclusive right to profit from one's own efforts and inspiration, are particularly sacred. A friend recently described my musical tastes as bipolar. I don't think that covers it. The CD

2002-11-03T18:40:00.000-05:00

Election day is Tuesday, which means this is one of those rare times I'll be looking forward to a Wednesday. The stereotype in US politics is that Democrats think Republicans are mean, and Republicans think Democrats are stupid. To combat this, here in Massachusetts we have the Republican candidate for governor, Mitt Romney, looking stupid and Shannon O'Brien, Democrat, being mean. The ads

2002-10-25T22:57:00.000-04:00

On the subway this morning, my heart was nearly broken. A man got on with 2 little girls at Downtown Crossing (Washington St.). The younger one, about 5, got a seat immediately. I stood up and the elder, about 8, sat down a few seats away, and sat scowling, looking at the floor. The man stood by the younger one. She asked "Who was that little boy?" "He's older than both of you. His name is

2002-10-25T20:00:00.000-04:00

On the Bellesiles issue for what is very likely the last time, Instapundit tells us that Prof. Michael Bellesiles has resigned from Emory after the committee investigating the charges against him found that they could not prove falsification. This was mainly because the supporting documentation he provided was so poor that they could not tell whether it was fraud or just incompetence. Some of

2002-10-24T20:08:00.000-04:00

The Nation has a breathtakingly incompetent defense of The Arming of America by Michael Bellesiles. The Guardian, hardly a haven for right-wing gun nuts, also summarized the criticism of Michael Bellesiles' work. The Guardian, though, cites a finding that completely obliterates the position taken by the Nation. The Nation argues that because the disputed records in San Francisco pertained to