Check out Eric Myer Photography’s “Sterotypes” page — stereotype having a nice double meaning in this case. Play around to generate some subtly disturbing images.

Hopefully with the passage of the Energy Bill, the oil and gas companies will be able to use the $2.7 billion in tax breaks they’re receiving to get on their financial feet.

The good thing is that our country’s finances are now solid enough that we can afford to give these kinds of tax breaks.

While some people might think that reducing revenue while increasing spending doesn’t make financial sense, they’re wrong.

Because.

Get this: The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) not only violated the law (specifically the Privacy Act) by collecting personal information about passengers from commercial databases, it also broke the promise it made not to do that.

One specific violation cited by the General Accounting Office (GAO) was that the TSA didn’t inform passengers about what it was doing. (Why should it? After all, it had promised not to.)

The TSA’s response? To revise its privacy notices after the fact.

Imagine that a clothing store is ordered by Congress not to take photos of shoppers in the dressing rooms because people complained. And the store promises not to do that — even posts a note in the dressing room “We will not photograph you!”

But it does anyway. And gets caught. And responds by simply changing the sign to read “We will not photograph you!”

That’s what the TSA pulled.

Of course, we’ve left the era of personal and government responsibility way behind, so what do you want to bet that no one at TSA is even reprimanded, let alone fired?

In fact, what do you want to be that TSA continues to do what it’s been doing? “Yeah, we lied and broke the law. So?”

PS: You aren’t any safer. Cargo still isn’t screened.

Next up: “Land, baby, land.”

PS: No comment, yet, at the mission to the International Space Money Pit. :)

Goes the lede from a Reuters story:

The House of Representatives, ignoring protests from civil liberties groups, renewed the USA Patriot Act on Thursday mostly along party lines, to make permanent the government’s unprecedented powers to investigate suspected terrorists.

What’s wrong? The Patriot Act is not designed for investigating suspected terrorists. It’s being used for whatever law enforcement wants to.

A perfect example comes from the Las Vegas Review Journal, which reported on one Michael Galardi, a strip club owner, who was investigated under the Patriot Act for racketeering and bribery.

The beauty of the Act is that there are lots of cases where authorities don’t need a warrant to do their searches. They just need to … well, to want to.

You would think that simply repealing the 4th Amendment would have been easier.

What happened to the Republican Party that I used to be a member of — the one that believed in limiting, not expanding, the power of government?

From the LA Times (and others):

Crash Victim’s Mourners Have Similar Accident
From Times Wire Reports

Two mourners who rode an all-terrain vehicle to the funeral for a man killed in an ATV accident were slightly injured in a similar accident as they were leaving.

Jimmy Spry and Maggan Phillips were not wearing helmets when Spry lost control of the ATV and hit a tree, said Clinton Burley of the Ceredo Volunteer Fire Department.

They had attended the burial service of Phillips’ brother, Dustin. He died of severe head injuries after his ATV hit a tree.

Beautiful San Diego.

Has Google gone too far?

Wall Street to Costco: “You’re not screwing your employees enough.”

Looking to get away from it all for a few days — all, that is, except the low-level radiation?

Consider a trip here.

Sure, when I write about the downsides to ethanol, no one cares. But when the AP comes out with an article, it’s all over the place.

Karl Rove was the guy behind campaigns that spread false information about a variety of opposition candidates — flyers claiming that candidates wanted to ban the Bible, for example, or questioning whether someone was gay.

And now the Republicans are claiming that he’s on the short end of a smear campaign?

Pot. Kettle. Black.

Working in a newsroom has some distinct advantages, most obviously getting at least some of the local news earlier than most other people.

What I like a lot about it, though, is being able to get more than what’s in the paper. And it leads me to some questions about what a newspaper should provide.

For example (and this is just an example off the top of my head — it’s not a real story), I might read about a scuffle between, say, police and protesters somewhere. The police say the protesters got out of hand; the protesters say police started hitting them without provocation.

The news story will be as balanced as possible, of course.

But let’s say I read that and want to know what really went down. I can walk over and ask the reporter, “Hey, John, do you know what really happened?”

And there’s a good chance he will. He might say, “Yeah, I could tell those cops were handing me BS. They were laughing while I was interviewing the captain.”

Or maybe the other way around: “Yeah, I know those two cops. They’re not the type, and you could see that the protesters were lying.”

But that kind of stuff won’t make it into print, of course. It’s biased, based on reporters’ opinions, and unprovable.

But it’s also probably true. And it’s also the kind of thing a lot of people would like to know, but never will.

Hence my questions, which I don’t have the answers to.

Papers pride themselves on being objective, but what if one side is clearly wrong and the other right? How do you balance telling the true story and telling the complete story.

Maybe this is one of the reasons people are starting to look at non-mainstrem news sources — it gives them that kind of perspective that your typical reporter bends over backwards to avoid.

Maybe that’s why the British tabloids do so well. They express opinion, and they calls ‘em as they sees ‘em.

[shrug] No answer I can think of. But I do wonder about the stories that I can’t ask a reporter about. What really happened?

Let me get this straight. No one says much of anything about any of the versions of the Grand Theft Auto games when they’re played without modification.

You can, for example, my friend Eric tells me, hire a prostitute, pay her, then kill her and take her money.

Not a peep.

Nor is there uproar about the other violence in the game — killing cops, bystanders, etc. No problem.

But the moment someone cracks the game and there’s nudity involved — yikes! Call out the legislators! Alert the media! We can’t let that stand!

Sheesh. Talk about misplaced priorities.

No, I don’t think the game — or any material — should be banned. I love ratings systems, because they let people make informed decisions. My point is how hypocritical people get.

The show “24,” for example. Even Dave Barry makes fun of it because the way characters solve most of their problems is by killing people. Or torturing them. That’s fine. But Janet Jackson bares a nipple at a distance for a fraction of a second and all hell breaks loose.

In-fricking-credible.

I have to do a longer post on this when I can cite more examples, but here’s a good one to start off with.

The results of an AP/Ipsos poll today shows that President Bush has an overall approval rating of just 42 percent, and a disapproval rating of 56 percent. No shock here.

But get this: 60 percent of people polled (and the poll is designed to reflect the country as a whole) say they “disapprove of the way Congress in handling its job.”

Ah, you might think, looks like there might be some shake-ups in November.

Not likely. People bitch and moan a lot, but when they step into that voting booth, they reelect the incumbent 95 percent of the time over the past 20 years or so. Maybe longer.

It’s kind of like how, when polled, people say they want to live where they can walk places, shop at local stores, have a vibrant downtown, etc. — and then drive to the mall or Wal-Mart and let the little stores and non-chain restaurants rot.

I gotta follow up on this, but for now, let’s see how right I am about Congress. 95 percent.

So HP6 comes out tomorrow at midnight. Or tonight at midnight. Whatever you want to call it.

Anyway, it’s been two years since the last book, which — if you haven’t re-read all five in that time — might mean you’ll feel a bit lost when you start Half-Blood Prince.

Conveniently, you can catch up quickly. (And if you’re not into Harry Potter, you can learn the most important plot points so you can converse with those who are.)

The folks at SparkNotes — the Cliff Notes of the Internet age — have detailed guide of the first five books, including a nicely sized plot summary for each.

Here are links to those summaries:

Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s/Sourcerer’s Stone
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

From yesterday’s afternoon White House press briefing, we have this exchange between WH press secretary Scott McClellan and a reporter named “John”:

McCLELLAN: John, you can keep jumping in, but I’m going to try to keep going to other people in this room, as well. And we can have constructive dialogue here, I think, but that’s not the way to do it.

REPORTER: It’s not my job to have a constructive dialogue, Scott. Sorry.

I need help finding the right keyboard.

I know, it’s silly. But the keyboards that come with today’s computers are either A) cheap-o junky things with mushy keys, or B) overly complex things with too many keys. Or both.

I am a huge fan of old IBM keyboards. They’re called Model Ms, or “buckling spring” keyboards. When you type on them, they’re loud. They’re also incredibly satisfying to use.

Only problem: They’re too loud. When I’m interviewing someone, I don’t always want to remind them at 50 words a minute that I’m taking notes. Also, Sam (my 2.5 year old) sleeps right across from my office, so I can’t type at night on one of the five or six IBMs I own.

I’m looking for a keyboard that’s as “clicky” as one of those IBMs, or maybe a little less so — just not mushy; I want a click. But it has to be quieter, have 101 or 104 keys, and be less than about $60.

Any suggestions? I loved my old Gateway 2000 keyboard that my Dad still uses, and maybe I could steal it back. But I’d rather find a new one (or preferably two — one for the office).

Drop me a note or put in a comment to this entry if you have a suggestion.

So Karl Rove leaked the name of a CIA operative. That’s a federal crime, and a serious one.

The White House denied knowing about this, which is now an obvious lie.

The president said he would fire the leaker. He has not.

Considering how bent out of shape some people got when Clinton lied about having sex in the White House — something that put no one’s life in danger, and didn’t affect national policy — you would think they’d have an even stronger reaction to this.

Yet not a peep: According to the Associated Press, “White House press secretary Scott McClellan refused to discuss the matter at two news briefings Monday. He said he would not comment because the leak is the focus of a federal criminal investigation.”

BTW, I took similar glee in watching Clinton squirm and lie on the stand when questioned. Ditto for Bill Gates during the Microsoft anti-trust hearings. :)

Update:
Just saw this, from today’s afternoon White House press briefing.

A reporter asked White House press secretary Scott McClellan:

Scott, if I could point out: Contradictory to that statement, on September 29th of 2003, while the investigation was ongoing, you clearly commented on it. You were the first one to have said that if anybody from the White House was involved, they would be fired.

And then, on June 10th of 2004, at Sea Island Plantation, in the midst of this investigation, when the president made his comments that, yes, he would fire anybody from the White House who was involved, so why have you commented on this during the process of the investigation in the past, but now you�ve suddenly drawn a curtain around it under the statement of, We�re not going to comment on an ongoing investigation?