Hello from Harlingen, Texas.
The public library to be exact.
There were no Internet options where I’m staying - but hey, it’s free, so you get what you pay for. There’s plenty to tell, but I’ve been driving a lot and entertaining a 4-year-old all weekend. From now on, my weekday afternoons will be spent in the library catching up.
Posted by Evan Bittner Mon, 02 Jul 2007 20:57:00 GMT
Well, I got out of work a little early today, and I think things are under control. Now I get to worry about the trip.
I’m meeting up with Troy, Tomoko and the rest of their circle for happy hour at Helix Hotel. Since I got out of work early, I decided to spend the interim at Mayorga on my laptop. It’s a good time to synchronize my email, write a little, and think about my trip.
I seem to have tamed my Robotic Zombie Comment Spam problem. No new junk comments since Tuesday. I started to delve into the Typo documentation, and it was a hall of mirrors. So, I’m quite happy that I found settings that would solve the problem. I was skeptical that it would be enough. In the fullness of time, it may not be.
Nevertheless, I did a bit of followup today. The mere act of loading the page with the blog post and comments in my browser forwarded me instantly to the MalwareAlarm site. (That’s a technical description of the phenomenon… It’s safe to look at.) It may be too fine a point, but I don’t think that site was the intended target - maybe it was. The commment code was somewhat obfuscated.
That MalwareAlarm site is considered a hoax by many Antivirus companies. It looks a lot like a WinXP system program. Maybe it’s well-intentioned, and maybe it’s not. The consensus seemed to be that it was inadequate protection at best, and permissive of particular viruses. I’m sure it fools a lot of people. Perhaps we’re moving on from the computer virus model to more of a Preditor and Prey camouflage model. Won’t that be exciting?
But all of the sudden I’m reminded of one of the books I’m reading - and an India experience:
The book is “The Big Con” by Jonathan Chait. It describes how the Republican party was hijacked by Supply-side economics and rabid tax-cutting for the superwealthy. Apparently, Dick Cheney once said “Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter”. He also provides a critique of the Laffer curve I hadn’t thought of, and some character assassination of Laffer himself. There s a description of how K Street lobbyists got into bed with a cabal of Republicans. There were even some rookie legislators who spoke very frankly about the relationship because for all they know, ‘twas ever thus. I will say more about it later.
In India I was exposed to something similar: Cab drivers who deliver you into the hands of merchants, for a small kickback. It’s a mutually beneficial relationship - but it doesn’t match the kind of transparent operation I’ve become accustomed to here in the United States. Surely there are cultural differences.
Well, my time is short here. I gotta run and meet the gang. Then I gotta go home and pack. I just downloaded the Airport Map for national so I could figure out which way to start walking from the Metro to the check-in. They do not offer flight status for flights tomorrow morning yet. I suspected as much.
I’ve also researched the Houston airport and my driving route through Texas. We discovered today that the speed limit will be 70mph on most of the roads.
Now I just need to come up with some instructions for Tucker.
Posted by Evan Bittner Thu, 28 Jun 2007 21:04:00 GMT
