Spent a lot of the day laughing at the posturing over the latest Wikileaks release.  No surprises in the substance or tone State’s diplomatic traffic.  Nothing unexpected in how the United States conducts its foreign policy or manages its embassies either.  Jaw-dropping shock and awe (in a ROTFLMAO sort of way) though that the procedural security for handling of classified information has devolved in the 14 years since I left the government to the point that government spokesmen can plausibly claim a 23 -year-old Army PFC not only had access to so many documents that he had so little need to know, but that the technological safeguards in place did nothing to prevent him from downloading and e-mailing hundreds of thousands of documents to whoever he wanted, even while sitting in the middle of Iraq.

I know individual accountability has all but vanished in federal service, and in the nine years I worked with Diplomatic Security I was only aware of one Agency (certainly not mine) that held supervisors accountable for the security lapses of the sections and staff, but I’m really having trouble reconciling the concept that the federal government can properly handle information in the modern age with what PFC Manning is alleged to have been able to do single-handedly.

Very glad though that the First Amendment still has enough life left in it that the voters are able to see the sad state of the government’s information security efforts, not that it matters.  The problems are deep enough and systemic enough that I can’t see any politician having the courage to make the information colander in Washington an issue.

Very glad to see that the economy has recovered to the point where retailers can return to the time-tested practices of bait and switch advertising and their drones can rudely protest the accuracy of their small print disclaimer.

Well, glad because we were able to get even more of what we needed and save some money in the process by going elsewhere.  Double bonus because we were able to spend locally instead of giving to the local outstretched arm of an Illinois corporation.

Started off the day watching the life of a fallen superhero, and that has so far been the high point of the day.

Went from there to a local point of suburban sprawl to volunteer with some kids.  Given the tone of Spinner’s previous classes I went in with certain expectations, all of which were quickly and brutally dashed.  No imagination.  No curiosity.  Just a general sense of entitlement backed by ten years of experience that if they do nothing, someone will take care of their needs.  I wouldn’t have been surprised if Moms had swung by to spoonfeed some of these kids at lunch.

In fact they may have.  I wouldn’t know, we went out to a local burger joint.  Knowing the neighborhood I wasn’t surprised when a brand new extra-large Made in ‘Merica truck pulled up covered with posters blaming Obama for everything from global socialism to the driver’s personal bankruptcy.  Unfortunately I still wasn’t surprised when the driver turned out to be one of the Open Carry wingnuts; an old white guy with a Glock proudly on his hip in a restaurant full of children.  While I can certainly support his Second Amendment rights, I only support restaurants that make me feel welcome, safe and secure, and when the staff rushed from the back to greet their friend I knew I’d never be patronizing that business again.  We left quickly.

Got back in the car to listen to some talk radio about a bunch of Senators who feel the nation is best served by either excluding gays from service or forcing them to live lies in order to defend the Constitution in the armed services. Unit cohesion is apparently best served by lies and deception within the unit.  Morale is helped when a significant percentage of the troops are denied the family and dependent benefits available to their colleagues.  Didn’t hear much about the fierce advocate and it certainly didn’t seem like much advocating was taking place today.

Hiding now until some friends come over for the Glee premiere.  Don’t think I can handle any more real life today.

I’d seen a few of these photos around, but too many of the kids blogging (and Facebooking and Tweeting, etc), never learned how to do anything but steal an image and repost it.  Credit an artist?  No.  Cite the site where the work was found?  OMG NO!  Just put a photo in context with an accurate caption?  Huh?

Enough with the rant.  Maybe it’s yet another sign that I’m doing too much family law, but Fallen Princesses rocks.  Thanks to Soliloqueer for blogging it old school.

Meeting a physical therapist tomorrow morning at BorgHealth.  Haven’t seen one since I wiped out my back moving furniture in the 80s, but my neurologist passed the buck on deciding what I can do after having my arm in a brace since March, so here we go.  Yes, there’ve been no laps since March.  No gym since March.  Puppy walks are allowed, as long as I remember to hold the leash in the right hand (which my left-handedness usually overrules).

More and more I resemble a jelly donut, and a lack of physical activity and low body image aren’t really helping the depression coming from that whole ‘recession is hurting my business’ thing.

This is pretty much just an alcohol-fueled rant.  With a bit of luck the tequila in my system will magically heal my ulnar nerve and get rid of the numbness and weakness in my hand while I pass out tonight.  Then I can get back to my life and the meditative aspects of the swimming will help me deal with the realities of the economy.  But somehow I doubt it.  When the neurologist scheduled me for a four-month follow up I got the hint that life’s just going to suck for a long, long time.  At least I’m getting on my way to being too big to fail.  Bailout, here we come!

I’ve pretty much considered the banners here irrelevant fluff.  Random captures of things that I thought looked cool or captured my mood.  They are certainly not part of some over-arching plan to instill my social biases and predilections into the site, thereby brainwashing readers like you.  They’re just something to keep the page looking fresh. But they are mine, and no one tells me what can or can’t be used here.

So imagine me spewing my morning coffee out through my nose as I read that some wingnuts are upset with Google’s special holiday logos.  Their graphics don’t connote the correct social messages. There’s even a protest site – Google ranking: 5/10.

“I have no problem with Google commemorating obscure holidays or some of the trivial anniversaries that they note,” the site’s owner, who declined to give his name [and will go unlinked here], said via e-mail, “just so long as they also make special logos for the more significant holidays.”

Of course he means the holidays significant to him, because significance is always relative.  The article doesn’t say whether any of the critics own Google stock, which might give them some interest in how the company is run.  They seem to be treating Google as a public accomodation, which despite its ubiquitousnous, it is not (at least yet).

I certainly don’t agree with everything Google does, but if you don’t like someone’s site, the solution is to not visit their site.  Use a search engine that delivers your results with philosophically correct design elements.  Don’t be all silly and try to redesign their logo so it aligns with your priorities, or be prepared to cheer for corporate democracy when a billion chinese customers demand and get a special logo for Chairman Mao’s birthday. 

“[There is] no conveyance of ideas, expression, or anything else that could possibly amount to speech. The court finds that video games have more in common with board games and sports than they do with motion pictures.”

That piece of #$% jurisprudence is from a federal judge’s ruling last month that video games aren’t entitled to First Amendment protection, as reported at Salon.com [via Ernie the Attorney] and CNN.com. Fortunately, this idea is already in conflict with a previous ruling from the Seventh Circuit and thus, hopefully, dead on arrival.

I suppose the question I should be asking is why people get so hung up on the medium rather than the contents of the message? The case at hand involved graphically violent video games. I prefer a game called Civilization: Call to Power (and I loved its predecessor, Civilization, on my old Amiga, and later on the Mac). The goal of the game is to lead your civilization to global domination. Among other strategic actions, players must weigh the benefits of internal vs. international trade; weigh industrialization vs. environmental damage; budget for the competing concerns of scientific research and military hardware; and evaluate which government structure is best for their goals (despotism, fascism, democracy, communism, etc, all have strengths AND weaknesses to be evaluated and reevaluated as situtations change). If people got together face-to-face and discussed these issues, even in the context (or pretext) of a game, the conversations would have to be entitled to the highest level of First Amendment protection. Why should the standard be any different because the medium is new?