Global Toad News

It seems that Obama’s bill is going to be passed.  The Hillary supporters at HillaryIs44.org, have written an article that includes a clip where Eric Massa discusses some of the behind the scenes actions that read like The Pelican Brief movie.

I mean does it make sense that this little known congressman suddenly now has to resign, allowing the Democratic leadership to force the healtcare bill through with only 216, instead of the previous 218.  I don’t see how this “doesn’t really affect the ObamaCARE vote“.  Now the only things stopping the democrats from passing whatever they were going to anyways is themselves.

In other words, I expect a national healthcare nightmare, that even the Senators who wrote it probably feel is a bad thing.   Of course that’s why they are exempt.

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The U.S. military is in a tough spot, on the one hand they want to keep and retain the best people, but on the other hand the military is encouraged to promote “minorities” above anything else.

While most people are familiar with the Army’s major Hasan, and some are aware of the Fort Jackson food poisoning attempt, few are aware of the reality of the anti white male atmosphere that really exists in the military today. 

Case in point is the recent article in Time about the “Female Captain Bligh” (from Mutiny on the Bounty fame).  According to the article Captain Holly Graf, would publicly berate the crew, throw coffee cups at them, and was unresponsive to any needs of the crew members.

Of course, this had been going on for years, as a male officer who had served under reports (who retired after 20 years at a lower pay grade than Captain Graf) “When I think of Holly Graf, even 12 years later, I shake”.  That officer knew that there wasn’t anything he could do, because if he said anything it would held against him more than the untouchable Graf.

But Graf was an equal opportunity fascist, and even some women who feel that “ the Navy pushed women into command too quickly” complained about Graf’s “sadistic cruelty”.  Hopefully people will wake up that treating people equally means that, not giving the people who whine the most special privileges because they know that the system can be taken advantage of if you know the key words and tricky phrases.

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I hate to say that Windows can have better security (or at least easier to set up) than Linux.   It seems that Whole Drive Encryption is not something that is supported out of the box with any Linux distribution at this time. 
I am a big fan of TrueCrypt, and think that having your entire drive encrypted is something everyone should start doing, but that is just risky with Linux.  The argument is that you only need to encrypt your user data, not the entire drive, my point is that the system keeps footprints, and I would rather that I have to put in a password for anyone to access anything, than have the chance that something goes in the wrong place.

I still think Linux is great for many things, but you have a more secure Windows machine if you set it up right, than you can a Linux box, and that’s just sad.  And with Microsoft giving away their Security Essentials program, everyone running a recent version of Windows can have the antivirus protection that they’ve needed at no additional cost.

Sadly it seems that Microsoft is pulling ahead in the security arena against Linux.

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It’s being reported that Citibank sent out a nation wide addendum (you know the tiny print that banks send their customers), that said

 Effective April 1, 2010, we reserve the right to require (7) days advance notice before permitting a withdrawal from all checking accounts. While we do not currently exercise this right and have not exercised it in the past, we are required by law to notify you of this change.

That is interesting, Citibank at any moment can restrict access to your checking accounts.  Allegedly Citibank said the notice only applies to Texas, but why trust them at all.

Use a credit union, don’t support the banks,

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I just found (via What Really Happened), a book (“Woe unto you, Lawyers!”) written in 1939 by a person who went to law school back then and talks about how sick the legal system was back then.  It’s only (sadly) gotten worse in recent years.
Of course maybe it’s just because I live in Chicago that it seems that way.

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How well trained everyone seems to be, while we can’t muster universal outrage when schools are blown up,  there are those who argue that the crime of Joe Stack was  ”in no way excusable“.  I agree with using proportional force to save your life, but we’ve seen this country support armed insertions of U.S. forces for years, with no real protests against all the buildings and collateral damage that are destroyed by the U.S. backed entities.

In other words, why is what Joe Stack did so inexcusable, while we seem to excuse every other crime under the sun.  How is he worse than those who secretly say “Kill them all and let god sort them out”, while they support sending people from here to go kill (or just intimidate) people other there.

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I’m going out on a limb here and saying that I been close to Joe Stacks point of frustration (read his own explanation).  After seeing how the government “works” I feel, like many American’s that the American Dream might become something else if things aren’t done differently.

Instead we have a governmental system that seems to bent on self destruction, or least policies that do.

As for Chuck Baldwin’s point that Joe Stack was wrong to do what he did, where was the press time and time again when people were put in jail for asking the dangerous questions about income tax.  Questions that are the legal equivalent of challenging global warming, promising that you will lose the argument no matter if all the facts seem to support it, just because they are the government and you are not.

I don’t think anyone would have paid attention to Joe Stack if he just followed the fasting orsetting himself on fire protestors that have been ignored time and again by the media.  What really makes me shake my head is that there are some people who just don’t see how out control things have gotten.  That said, it is for that reason that I cherish each day I don’t have a literal boot in the back of my head.  So I am thankful for many of the things we take for granted, including not being in jail.

It’s about time for something to change, but when the people keep supporting the IRS in court cases (like where Wesley Snipes was convicted) rather than send the IRS packing shows how there is still substantial support for the status quo.  Which is what courts exist for, to keep things running smoothly for the people who own the show.  Courts are supposed to keep people from feeling that they have no hope of recourse.  The problem is that the courts seem to becoming much like the Montreal Police, they have their favorites, and as some people who talk about law all the time, it’s a bad sign when you can tell if a motion is going to get approved by the party whose name is one the presenting side, better than by the arguments with the parties names removed.

I once was naive and believed that judges actually read through the motions that people presented to them, but they don’t have to, they are busy, etc.  They just rule the way they always did in the past, and it’s considered to be within their discretion.  Of course you don’t know that unless you follow cases closely, and most of the time you can’t.  In one case, SCO v. Novell, you can see how the insiders can play the game, in full view of the public, and it shows how obscene the court system in America is.  I’m not saying that there isn’t a better way to “play” the system, I just haven’t seen a convincing record I can point you at where you are bullet proof, all I am is saying fighting the system is not easy to do head on.  Manual Noregia thought he was the president of a sovereign nation, but he ended up behind bars.

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I don’t know if it counts, but there is a google site with the whole Moscow-Vladivostok trip on it (I hear it is 6 days of video).  You have a choice of soundtracks for the trip,  and the video is quite well done.

You can start your journey here.

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Often people cry about how if we just throw more money at education it will somehow get better.  Unfortunately, what happens is that you end up with situations where there are towns where the average teacher makes more than 3 times as much as the average non teacher, and yet the teachers felt they were unfairly treated when only about 50% are passing and only 50% of all students graduate from high school, and the superintendent asked them to help with tutoring and do some extra work to help the students.

Of course the reason given for the student doing badly?  “ the students are lazy.”

Fortunately for the students, all those teachers have been fired, because it seems like they really don’t care about anything but the money.

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It appears that robotic lawyers are now legal.  Having been to a “trial” in which the judge (who was the only person in the remote court room I could see) appeared on a closed circuit television, where after he let all sorts of felons (who had been eluding capture) be  released on their own recognizance, told me that either I paid bail (which I couldn’t since the police had thrown my wallet away after taking my license) or I plead no contest to the criminal charge of failing to sign a citation,  I am not surprised.

Which brings us to this item at Wired.com, in which Google deleted blogs that had broken links to files that, even if they were working, some of the sites had permission to use the files.  Of course, Google does have a tendency to delete blogs that they don’t like, so pretending that Google protects free speech is like pretending Obama really is the Prince of Peace.

In other words, the computer robot swore under penalty of perjury that files that DIDN”T exist were infringing.  Unfortunately judges love corporations more than they tolerate people, so don’t expect the corporate  machine to get slapped.  This is similar to the Apex Technology issue, where a judge decided to remove websites just because a company felt that posting information about it’s “indentured servitude” policies were infringing.

Of course, there is a solution being proposed by the “mainstream” media and their corporate masters, require an license to use the Internet!

You might laugh but such a solution was made public by Microsoft Chief Research and Strategy Officer, Craig Mundie last month at the Davos Economic Forum and enthusatically embreaced by Time Magazine, which is discussed in more detail by Paul Watson.

What’s funny is that when China censors people we cry how they are stifling human rights, yet when the U.S. government does it (and certain speech on the internet is already a criminal act in the United States).  There are numerous laws out there to trip up the unwary political activist, and things being what they are, it’s best to tread carefully, because you can’t expect the U.S. government to protect the human rights of U.S. citizens.

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According to The Washington Independent, people in Kentucky are getting “survery” phone calls that then become personal attacks if they indicate that they are leaning towards voting for Rand Paul in the Republican primary in Kentucky for U.S. Senate.

Of couse this isn’t something that should surprise people, except that the election in Kentucky is in May, and there are already GOP insiders having live people call up potential voters not to say anything good about the establishment candidate, but rather to attack Rand Paul’s conservative principles (e.g. Rand Paul believes in freedom, therefore he is against torture, you don’t want the terrorists to win, do you?).

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I know that I am not as fast as other people,  trying to find independent sources for the rumors and stories that I read.

In other words, there’s a reason why I don’t have as many articles as Jeff Rense (whose web site I still recommend as a source of information).  I just am not that good at writing that is completely made up, and even worse a copy of a badly made up story.

Recently Rense published a story(pdf version)(pdf) allegedly written by Stephen Lendman which had a story about Harry Reird that was markedly similar to other stories about politicians.

I don’t know if this part of the disinformation war that is going on between Jeff Rense and Alex Jones (see this and thatarticle).  I think Alex Jones does very well in whatever he seems to be doing, and he does reach a certain audience, that isn’t reached by Jeff Rense, in other words there are people who will ridicule anything that is linked to Jeff Rense, but who will believe the same exact thing if Alex Jones presents it, and the inverse is true.

That said, I admire anyone who can fight the machine and not be rendered destitute, with constant government investigations in your and your family and friends.  Let’s face it, the reality of the situation is that even on the internet the  speech is censored, even if true.

For instance, people are aware that they are tracked over the internet (the FBI wants to expand record keeping requirements to 2 years for which web sites people visit).  The government already chaffs at not being able to get the records from some news sites like IndyMedia.org (where the government requested the “reading list” of all it’s visitors).

So I say, read both Rense and Jones, and the mainstream media, and make up your own mind based on what you can verify, or who you trust.   You’ll know who is honest by the people that are willing to correct their mistakes with humility.

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Wow, I hate it when someone sends me a short little snippet about SQL Server security to “help me” out.

Since it seems that some people don’t believe I can figure out SQL Server, here are some good starting points:

http://www.databasesecurity.com/sqlinjection-tools.htm

http://www.databasesecurity.com/sql-vatools.htm

The things that make the most difference are:

• Limiting network access (e.g. how other machines connect)
• Using good security models (e.g. if you use SQL security that the passwords are high complexity)
• Limiting which users can do what (and disabling the sa account in new versions of MSSQL Server)

What I find amazing is how many people don’t really do anything about these three basic steps, but then run around worrying about SQL injection attacks.   It’s not that people shouldn’t be aware of injection attacks (something that databases are not alone in being exposed to), but that is only a small part of a comprehensive security model.

One of the things that I appreciate about, say the U.S. Army password policy is that it enforces a pretty good policy that makes the passwords unlikely to be broken using a brute force method.  But most entities don’t want to burden people with complex rules, and thereby risk exposure.

There is also the “weak” link.  Basically if you have an enterprise system, an attacker will probe the network (a good starting point is using nmap) though for internet connected sites, Google can be a great help in finding unsecured and/or uncompleted installations that are vulnerable to being “hacked”.  You just have to have an idea of what you are looking for.

For more on basic SQL Server security see Laurentiu Cristofor’s MSDN blog.

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See this video.  Of course the police say it’s normal process to do this.

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Thanks to LewRockwell.com for finding the Harrison Bergon video on google video.

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I realize that many people still buy that even though the models of global warming haven’t been proven right about much, that we are facing the risk of global warming.  However I believe that it’s just as likely that we could be risking a period of global cooling, something that has much worse effects.  In fact, the record cold temperatures have already caused areas that relied on “green” wind turbines to be without power.   Apparently the wind turbines don’t work well in cold weather.

Making them a big waste, just as they were back when I researched this issue in college.

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Recently a friend of mine was listening to some music by PiNK, specifically “Please don’t leave me“.  What amazed me is that so many people don’t see a problem with a song (and video) that promotes women beating up men.

This double standard for domestic violence was recently highlighted in an article in the Daily Mail, which reported that while 30% of arrests of men are likely to be for crimes against a person, 35% of arrests of women are likely to be for that category.  The article went on with information that while the reports of men engaged in domestic violence has had a marked decrease, the number of women engaged in the same has had a marked increase.  It even went on to tell the tale of how 14 year old girl, filmed and participated in the beating that resulted in the death of a man (apparently called happy slapping).

And this mirrors some of my own experiences, I had a female friend who like to give men “happy punches”.  She saw no problem with hitting men as hard as she could and then laughing at them.  This trend towards marginalization of men has been documented by Dr. Henry Makow for years, and yet it continues, because women are just better at playing the victim card.  I’ll give one more example, I was at dinner recently, and a woman brought up how we need to do more about breast cancer, I replied that what about prostrate cancer, and she claimed that men don’t die from prostrate cancer! (This is a woman who works in the healthcare industry).

While it is true that more people die from breast cancer (Deaths: 40,170 (female); 440 (male) source National Cancer Institute), 27,360 men died in 2009 from Prostrate cancer (source NCI), but it is the joke at parties, rather than considered to be a real problem.  And this is really the sad statement of the times, that when men die it’s funny, when men are abused, it’s humor.

I am not promoting that we should continue to pit one group against another, and fall into the false traps, I am saying that people should be treated equally and ethically, and that there shouldn’t be special rights for this group or that group, because that just allows for abuse to be over looked. Either everyone has the same rights, or we just have privileges.

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According Ron Holland, a retirement consultant who lives in Zurich, the U.S. government is eyeing the private retirement accounts of U.S. persons.  He states:

I fear that today the control, nationalization and ultimate confiscation of trillions in private US retirement plan assets is on the horizon. Rick Santelli alluded to the possible nationalization and forced investment into treasuries on CNBC as recently as January 8, 2010. There was also similar coverage on Bloomberg and Business Week.

Basically the U.S. government wants to be your retirement account manager.   Of course we can count on them to manage your money to their wallets.

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I forget what position Michelle Obama is in where she is able to tell people the government is going to increase spending at the same time her husband is announcing that he is going to freeze spending.

Or maybe Barrack is just being political and saying that he will freeze spending, something that he campaigned against back in 2008.

More cynical people might think that the Obama team is flailing around saying whatever comes to mind to try and regain the hope and change mantel.

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From EduGeek.net

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