I forgot to say in an earlier post, besides being inclined to war mongering, Peter Hegseth is a BS meister. A link where he does nothing but shovel and shovel and ...

Eric Black does the expose, at MinnPost. Not that Black says Hegseth's a BS meister. Not at all. He simply quotes the man at length, letting him define himself for who he is.

Whatever Klobuchar's faults, she has no time to do this kind of sleazy content-free puffery stuff. She's busy. Doing her job.

Sometimes Klobuchar does the job in ways that progressives and environmentalists cringe over, but she's not an empty suit.

As is Hagseth. This is his:

First seen by me, on Norwegianity.

SINGLE PAYER WILL END ATROCITIES LIKE ACCRETIVE HEALTH -- NY Times: "Accretive is one of the few companies specializing in hospital debt collection that is publicly traded. Last year, it reported $29.2 million in profit, up 130 percent from a year earlier. Late last month, Fairview Health Services, a Minnesota hospital group that Accretive provided services to, announced it was canceling its contract with Accretive for back-office debt collection. After Accretive informed investors, its stock plunged 19 percent in a day. On Tuesday, the company’s shares closed at $18.49, down 2.7 percent."

click image to enlarge and read

Susan Perry of MinnPost reported the story tightly, but with a host of relevant links. Read it, follow the links. Original unaltered screen capture from here.

How would his firm treat Ann Romney's preexistant conditions?

This link. Or are the 1%'er folks team players, among themselves, log rolling for one another while being anti-union? Against workers conspiring together to force things upon defenseless employers? Well, I for one want to see all ordinary folks pray at night for Ann Romney, that her stable full of dressage horses stay healthy, that all her Cadillacs run trouble free, and that each of the mansions is staffed by good people.

Amy K. and the three Dwarfs.

Yes, Snow White had seven and they were called Dwarfs not dwarves. Amy has three. The Dwarfs names; Bills, Hegseth, and Severson. Crabgrass gives the names in order of likely appeal to Republicans per commitments being inferred leading up to the GOP endorsement convention - the delegate nose-count-nose-guess game, it is called. This link.

Sixth District Republican king maker Dave Fitzsimmons is on the Bills bandwagon, (although he failed to make a king out of Tom Emmer). Not even a slik purse, from that starting material. Big among CD 6 Republicans, (with a so-what yawn from others I suppose). Like the Tom Waits song, Big in Japan. Big in CD 6. Among Republicans.

Hegseth is a military hawk, just what we do not need - a hothead to go along with Romney and Bachmann about getting into war, yes another, with Iran. A loser as far as I am concerned. We don't need more deaths fighting somebody else's grudge matches.

Bills has a campaign website. If Hegseth has one, I am unaware of it. Severson has a website with one of those super-tacky lead-in pages. I think it is a YouTube embedded video, extolling the virtues of the product the way one would market beer or an automobile brand. But not that slick.

From Ripple in Stillwater, here.
(Read of Karl and the site, and the City Pages award.)

Amy K. has taken positions that vex progressives. And she has taken positions that greatly vex environmentalists. However, if Hegseth is the GOP candidate, then in a heartbeat, I would choose Amy as the better of that pair - and recipient of my vote.

Between Severson and Bills, it would take a Republican to want to take the time to study either -- what one says, what the other's record is, that stuff.

It's a be vexed and unhappy with Klobuchar situation, but you have to end up casting the vote for Klobuchar. It is a no-brainer that way if Hegseth is the general election opposition choice.

Bills, if endorsed, at least I would pay attention to him to see if he is akin to Ron Paul on issues, given that he has Ron Paul's endorsement. I would take time to seriously study that. Auditing the Fed, and looking at how the money supply is manipulated, ostensibly in the pubic interest, by a cabal of bankers is something Ron Paul questions and too few others do. Also, warmongering is not a Ron Paul position. Skepticism about the so-called Patriot Act is also insufficiently strong, but the Ron Paul people have that to consider. If Bills tracks such policy positions he would be appealing, even though a Republican.

PREDICTING GOP WHIMS AND PREDILECTIONS: My guess is we will see a Klobuchar - Bills general election, and I doubt that if Bills is endorsed that either Hegseth or Severson would run a primary challenge. And Bills would make the strongest opponent of the three.

A primary contest to become general election chopped liver is a low percentage play. It would be a surprise if Hegseth or Severson will see any cause for a primary.

Microsoft releases Security Essentials ver 4.0 [there was no ver. 3.0] yesterday. Google yesterday released its Google Drive cloud storage product.

Security Essentials update reporting, here and here. The user interface was tweaked to convey that it is a software update, not merely a malware definitions update. It's a windows only thing, and if you use other anti-malware software, do you care?

When MS Security Essentials first came out as a Microsoft security product it got fairly extensive tech-press attention, as with the first release of a new version 2.0. This upgrade was almost totally a ho-hum thing.

For Windows users, it is the most popular security software. It costs nothing extra, and requires less attention and tweaking than products such as Avast. A popular marketing plan of vendors besides McAfee, Kaspersky and Symantic is to offer a free on demand scan and a realtime internet traffic monitoring install, with bonus features if you buy the premium edition [or ads and nag-screens are killed if you pay]. Antimalware software is something you want in place and then do not want to worry about it; and renewal fee nagging as with Symantic and McAfee are avoided by using the for-free Microsoft product.

Google Drive is something that interfaces with multiple operating systems, and mobile devices [Android based, for sure, Apple products, probably].

The Google Drive homepage, here. The blog post, here.

Representative reporting, ars technica here, here, here, here, here. They offer 5 gig free cloud storage, with Dropbox at only 2 gig free.

Microsoft SkyDrive offers the most storage, and it is from Redmond with a Microsoft look and feel, and the firm will not fold overnight nor will Google, nor Amazon. (If you were to rely on cloud storage with a lesser vendor a worry would be an insolvency and loss of data.)

Local backup is necessary, (but many are not as diligent as they should be and are caught short if a drive crashes), yet offsite backup is the enterprise gold standard, and it is what the cloud offers.

I remember how in the early to mid-1980's when Slade Gorton was Washington State Attorney General, he had an antitrust database litigation-support operation running on a Prime minicomputer [a firm that has since folded], with removable 12-15 inch diameter plastic-encased hard disks. Gorton's people were using a bank safe deposit facility on his building's ground floor for storing offsite backup disks.

That was back when a regular PC base model had no hard drive, and the deluxe top of line model was 10 meg.

Now a terabyte drive is around or under a hundred bucks, with that being the main disincentive for individual consumer use of cloud storage.

Cloud enterprise server and storage services is the big-buck market that is being targeted by Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and others chasing the business. Start-up capital investment can be curbed that way, going onto payments and relying on the cloud, but will Boeing or Lockheed or BNSF move much that way?

Perhaps they already have.

The thing is a firm such as Amazon with its online retail servers, and Google with its search servers install to meet and serve peak demand, at that capacity level, with off peak storage in excess which they can market to others for further cash flow, to customers wanting and satisfied with 99% assurance of immediate data access, but willing to live with the very infrequent interrupted cloud service customers face when the servers are facing a data storm of preemptive owner use.

With local storage so cheap, and with chip memory allowing substantial storage on portable devices, the cloud vendors seem to be gravitating to a business plan of offering free service to individuals, to test the market and start with market share in their favor in that sector, while courting enterprise customers as a bread-and-butter cash flow.

The firm that seems to have the most steady market is Cisco, where its router technology dominates on the web. I remember ten years ago talking to a cousin in Louisiana, mentioning Cisco when discussing likely safe investments. She'd never heard of it. It was big then, and had router dominant share then. The biggest question with Cisco might be how big the market demand remains, as web backbone and connection infrastructure is built out. There is always India, China, and Eastern Europe, all probably still building infrastructure.

Strib reports Wisconsin lost more jobs than any other state last year. Scott Walker and his alleged "job creator" favorites, debunked. Now, recall the gentleman, and put things on the right track.

This link. For Strib's carried AP feed. Do your own web search = Wisconsin labor statistics, and even if the Strib item does not remain posted, other reporting exists. E.g., here and here.

So, what is Scott Walker good for?

Good for nothing.

An economic disaster. A portent of what others marching to ALEC marching orders can achieve. Mary Kiffmeyer, others in Minnesota, do you want us to be Number One? Stop, please.

For those married to the Grover Norquist "shrink the beast no matter what at every level" mentality, most of the job losses were within the public sector. Those few can rejoice.

For those buying into the falsehood that if government revenue is cut it will somehow morph magically into a private sector job Nirvana, it's a crock, so quit talking it, quit believing there is any truth to it.

Ramsey - The Council - what are they up to now?

Musical chairs, reported by Sakry, here. Read it and think, what in the world is a "management analyst?"

It is a term somebody on council must have invented. The report has a range of activities that surely sounds like a planning head, with TIF duties overlapping. Kurt should be the only interfact to the HRA mischief, since it is the big time money-sink risk-taking game the council's playing, and the top boss should interface between Darren and the council. It's not good when individual council members are pulling on Darren's sleeve, or colluding on stuff that gets dropped on an agenda/meeting after some are insiders with insider knowledge and others are not. The original sin that way was hiring Darren in the get-go, how that was handled. Dehen and Dave Jeffrey left in the dark until the thing was sprung on them at a meeting, their first notice, no 72-hour advanced notice, if I recall correctly the ABC Newspaper reporting back then.

To repeat, Kurt and nobody lower in the diffused responsibility network should be riding herd on Darren and council members and how Darren reports and responds to the council and to individual members.

With the Sakry report saying "internal recruitment" and eliminating the planning intern thing, either Tim the planner gets kicked upstairs or Tim the engineer gets it and Tim the planner becomes a non-intern regular staff person. Or what? 

Anderson might be considered, he's been a good hire, good working with citizens - with the public - but that "recruited internally" sure seems as if some on Council have already had their heads together and a done deal has been "unofficially implemented," subject to later public notice.

It gives that impression. That somebody on council (or Kurt) already has somebody in mind, and the repercussions and shake out detail will happen along such lines.

Next, not having an open recruitment, not defining a clear job spec and pay level and allowing outside applicants - is that the best way to run a city?

Lots of questions, loose-ends, all of that exists; and is it back to, with different titles, an appearance of having an administrator and deputy administrator, which seemed redundant and was characterized that way in the mayor's precipitous effort to shrink such a structure down by sending Kurt away.

It surely is an invented job title. Yet, it is the politics of it that seems more worrisome than inventing a new position name. Is it that a contract is in place with the public workers union on different jobs and pay ranges, and this invention is a circumvention? Any reader with helpful info is asked to leave a comment.

Who are these people at Strib? They want massive public money put into Wilfare, and they call Ron Paul a "firebrand." What are they using? Ron Paul appears to believe what he says, and he says it in a respectful way inviting disagreement and debate. He avoids name-calling, unlike say Bachmann discussing Obama policy. Ron Paul a Firebrand? Get real.

This paragraph, this item:

In addition, Shortridge has been working quietly to appease supporters of libertarian presidential candidate Ron Paul. The firebrand's adherents have won a large majority of delegate spots to the Republican National Convention, locking up 20 of the 24 spots so far. Paul supporters, who long have disdained the GOP leadership's close ties to more establishment candidates, are nibbling away at state party leadership.

Here.

He is working from within the political process not from outside it.

He wants to audit the Fed, not burn it down.

He wants to restore peace and bring the troops home.

He has beliefs and defends them, orally and in writings. Was Bill Buckley a "firebrand?" Closer to one than Ron Paul, but compared to the neocons of Bush-Cheney-Powell warmongering us into Iraq on false evidence and inflamed rhetoric, no way is Ron Paul a firebrand.

Rev. King? Ghandi? Each wanted change and confronted issues in ways the public noticed. Is that being a firebrand?

Some things Ron Paul advocates I agree with. On other things I disagree. Never in a million years would I call the man a "firebrand." I would call him rationally dissatisfied with the status quo. For that, I'd give him a gold star, not any pejorative and insulting terminology.

That one word used as it is in a lengthy report discredits the authors, who did well on much else they wrote.

Avidor has a great post at Dump Bachmann about the GOP's "big tent." After you read that, return to Crabgrass. Sore loser egos. Whatever.

Here.

For convenience, the links he posts, the Torgerson "going to hell with the Libertarians" rant, here. The GOP eviction and parallel cash woes and unresolved Crony Tony legal billings from the unneeded Emmer recount, here. But read the Avidor item. Also Bradlee Dean shunning reported at DB, if you look at other recent posts. Not BD being shunned by decent minded folks, but by Republicans - against Republicans - more signs of disarray.

That Torgerson thing raises one question - what's the difference between a rant and a screed? Without checking definitions, I think one is oral the other written. It's a Torgerson screed, that's probably the better characterization. And from what she has to say, you can see the Libertarians are the best of what any Republicans have to offer in today's contest of "ideas." Stepping a bit away from Tweedle Dee - Tweedle Dum "fight over the spoils" two party BAU, those Libertarians and how they carry on. Life to those folks, not dead from the knees up.

Schadenfreude? Over the GOP having proactive Libertarians? Not exactly. Just, I'd like the DFL to shake it up a little, actually, on the left side of things.

Note, as incentive for you to go to DB, I am not posting the link about the newsworthy Libertarian delegate count to the GOP national convention nor to any Bradlee Dean stuff. Go check out DB.

Now, if you want Schadenfreude, this email did induce a smidge of Sf. (click it to enlarge and read):

With that "digging out of the quagmire" message, regardless how awful we dig day-by-day; is it anyone's wonder that Sutton and Brodkorb were sent marching, not to go away mad ...

Back to former gymnast Lynn Torgerson, get this from her campaign site bio -

Ms. Torgerson, a Community Activist, has devoted her adult career to protecting the Constitutional rights of people of all races, nationalities, walks of life and religions. Ms. Torgerson, well respected in her field, was awarded Attorney of the Year and won a case at the United States Supreme Court on constitutional grounds. Ms. Torgerson helped establish "the Law of the Land."

That is all nice. However, on the thing Avidor links to, her blog post, the first thing she dumps on Libertarians for is opposition to the so-called Patriot Act. Second, opposition to TSA. Down the list, opposition to the "War on Drugs." Yet she says she wants to protect Constitutional rights implying a strong respect for the Constitution.

Defending the TSA and Patriot Act and warmongering (against drugs and Islamists), and yet -- a Constitutionalist with great affection for constitutional freedoms?

Okay, I guess, if she says so ...

Then her media and news page. Little there but dumping on Ellison because of his faith. How it is.

And she really likes video. A dislike of Libertarians. A dislike of Muslims. Liking -what- Lynn Torgerson? And video.

Here are three thumbnail stills from her website videos, where she in at least one repeatedly shows the distracting habit of interlocking the fingers of her hands as she speaks. For each, a link to watch the YouTube of the video is in the caption.

link

link

link

Finally and in fairness. Torgerson stayed with the fight in the Bobadilla case, even after an adverse holding from the Minnesota Supreme Court, and pursued federal litigation via a habeas corpus petition to correctly have a trial and conviction set aside per a denial of Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses against the defendant. She won at the District Court and Eighth Circuit levels and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case. She prevailed. She did pursue a Constitutional right of the accused. Credit is due for that. Federal court opinions are online here and here. Links to state court litigation are given at the beginning of the first of those two opinions, for anyone wanting to follow the full history of the case.

While Torgerson is not one I would vote for against Ellison, in a heartbeat I would favor her were she making a GOP primary challenge in the Sixth District against Michele Bachmann. She has some credibility.

Bachmann markets her version of sizzle on the steak - but with no steak.

Ditto re Torgerson were she running in a primary against Col. Kline. (Kline lacks both sizzle, and steak.)

Even so, despite things such as this or this; and this AND this imitating this, still a notch better than Bachmann. But perhaps Col. Klink is not so bad after all ....

And those gunning for ya' shots, I would hate to be a bystander if the Kiffer cut loose with that "tight" a pattern; and the Torger, she does not dare show the target she gets blind shooting while facing the camera. Vanity, you are a Republican.


And wait, there's more. Perhaps the complaint is not the Libertarians per se and in terms of ideology, but something closer to the heart:

This link. Also, Patch.

I wonder what the personal protocol was when younger, and she did not take home gold medals in gymnastics. Dump a load on the judges?

Stadium-related information from about two weeks ago, but timely because it reports an ongong effort. And needing to be published here on a blog because of scant mainstream media attention. Editoral policy is clearest by considering what does not even get mentioned, much less slant and nuance in wording of what is "news."

A two page press release, with contact person info at the end (click an image to enlarge and read):

Creative thinking about Zygi buying himself a stadium, how it can be facilitated short of dumping tons of public cash into Wilfare.

A friend forwarded this by email, and while it was news several days ago, it did not get much press coverage:

by Sen. Roger Chamberlain, Dist. 53

An Alternate Plan — SF 2127

Most of the discussion regarding the funding of a new Vikings football stadium has focused on what is becoming known as the Dayton Wilf plan.As a reminder, that plan proposes to build a $1.2 billion dollar domed stadium, primarily with public money.

There is another way to solve this problem, there is another plan, Senate file 2127. Unlike the Dayton Wilf proposal, it has passed through a senate committee. It has not received much attention because it doesn't rely on taxpayer money to pay for the stadium project. It places the burden of payment on those who will use and benefit the most from a new stadium.

Senate file 2127 fundamentally changes the conversation and business model regarding building professional sports stadiums. More importantly, it accounts for the 68% of Minnesotans who believe that any new Vikings stadium should be entirely paid for with private money. Change isn't easy. But just because we have been doing something for a period of time, doesn't mean it is right.

The idea is simple and it is fair to all parties and taxpayers across the state. Our goal is to treat the Vikings the same as we would treat any other business. It provides a framework for real negotiations to begin.

The plan is site neutral, requires no gaming money, no general fund money, no new taxes and no local contributions. The state would facilitate a low interest loan to the Vikings for construction of the stadium. Debt service on the loan would be paid for primarily with user fees on transactions within the stadium including parking.The Vikings would be allowed and encouraged to partner with other Minnesota businesses to create a reserve fund to subsidize any shortfall in debt service payments.

In addition to providing a low interest loan, the state would also provide needed infrastructure and offer a sales tax exemption for construction materials.

Minnesota Management and Budget estimated if we were to loan $300 million for 30 years at the reduced rate, the debt service would be about $23 million a year. The estimates from user fees range from $15 million to $20 million a year. The Vikings could choose to make up any difference, enter into agreements with other business partners or reduce the cost of the stadium.

There are plenty of financial resources available to the Vikings. Unlike the state, the NFL is flush with cash. At a recent senate hearing, Ted Mondale testified that the NFL is one of the most successful organizations in the country. Indeed, the NFL commissioner, Roger Caddell recently boasted on a 60 Minutes interview that in 2011 the NFL generated $6 billion in TV revenue alone. That revenue is evenly distributed among all the NFL teams.

Minnesota is blessed with many successful businesses. The top 20 Fortune 500 companies in Minnesota generated about $425 billion in gross revenue in 2011. I am not suggesting these businesses pay for all of our desires, but they have claimed business will benefit from a new stadium and have been advocating for a solution. Between the Vikings and our business community I'm certain they could find a way to partially fund a new stadium home for the Vikings.

We have been told the Vikings need $1.2 billion for a new stadium. But no one has asked why? The answer is that is what Mr. WIlf requested. And why not, if someone else will pay for it, he should get as much as he can. Mr. WIlf approached the governor and other legislators advised them he wanted a $1.2 billion stadium, they agreed and began writing legislation to accommodate Mr. Wilf's request.

However, the Vikings could do with less.Mr. Wilf has estimated the team could build an open air stadium for around $600 million. Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots spent $350 million of his own money to build a new stadium which opened in 2002. Heinz Field in Pittsburgh opened in 2001 with a cost of $281 million.

The point is there are many other ways to solve the stadium problem. Senate File 2127 is a place to start. It fair and it is doable. We do not, and should not accept the premise that Minnesota taxpayers should directly or indirectly pay for a football stadium for the Vikings.It is bad policy and neither Minneapolis nor the state can afford to build, own and operate another professional sports stadium.

Info on Sen. Chamberlain is here. Info on SF 2127 is here. If legislators regarded SF 2127 as DOA, I am troubled by that, and wonder why.

___________UPDATE__________
Please, however, do not lose sight of what Wilfare is given in that bill draft which stands somewhat less generous to out-of-state interests than others would intend.

Inch-by-inch the field of discourse narrows, drop by drop the water torture continues. Yet, the public will is ignored.

No referendum, no respect. And if they do not respect us they do not deserve our votes.

Wow, can the Bachmann people ever dump scorn and venom on the proud people of the Sixth District. What folks they are.

Strib reporting, here:

Bachmann campaign spokesman Chase Kroll said that when voters learn Graves supports abortion rights, gay marriage and President Obama's health care law, they will view him differently.

"Our opponent is totally out of touch with the values and the vision of the people in Minnesota's Sixth District," Kroll said. Bachmann, he said, "is in sync with her constituents and has worked in a bipartisan fashion to deliver on the issues most important to them. People know Michele Bachmann, and they know they can trust her."

How cynically scornful can they be? Thinking us barely civilized. Ripe for plucking.

In contrast Graves, speaking for himself and not sending henchmen, says - according to Strib:

Graves said the district needs a full-time representative, not Bachmann, who spent much of 2011 vying for the GOP presidential nomination.

"We're pro-family," Graves said. "We believe in people having good jobs with good benefits and supporting women, letting them make their own decisions."

Bachmann, he said, "has a very specific agenda that revolves around the congresswoman. [...]

Does that final sentence hit the nail on the head? Does it ever. Dead on the head.

Bachmann's world is Michele Bachmann, throw Marcus in as an afterthought, keeping the paycheck and the limelight of Rupert's love, all about Numero Uno. The one and only. It's not merely her passion it's her pathology.

The District needs to quit feeding the beast.

Additional data provided by Tricare Management Activity, the arm of the Department of Defense that manages health care services for the military, reveals that the number of Ritalin and Adderall prescriptions written for active-duty service members increased by nearly 1,000 percent in five years, to 32,000 from 3,000.

This link.

Taxed by the Boss - Corporate Socialism - Good Jobs First

image from Reuters - link below

If you want vexing tax facts and a business subsidy saga, read on. It is all tied together if you start here with Reuters.

That report mentions Good Jobs First, something you can investigate, here.

If you think Minnesota may experience runaway plants, or runaway headquarters over the next decade or so, these links give a hint of who may bribe the movement away from ten thousand lakes to elsewhere.

Expect Democrats to be largely outraged, and the Ron Paul folks to see market disruption forces at play counterproductive to free market optimality and balance.

Dems saying, "They are screwing with us;" Ron Paulists saying, "They are screwing with markets."

Now that Romney has the GOP nomination sewn up, an open thread. Who will be his running mate and why? Reader comments on point are most welcome.

Well, gee. I have a choice and the aim is to make Romney look less robotic, less a machine, more warm and more human.

Agent Smith, from The Matrix.

Please do not expect a few things such as facts to get in the way of Michele Bachmann's telling what to her is a good story.

Obamacare as George Washintoncare? Never mind Romneycare.

The individual mandate as founding father stuff?

Bachmann would tear into that the way she tears into gay people (including her step sister - not out of hate for them but because of hatred of sin). With venom and rhetoric she would denounce such patent lies, facts be damned in the process.

Hat tip to Eric Black of MinnPost for noticing and highlighting a Harvard Law School prof's New Republic item.

What law school again did Obama attend, where he was Law Review editor? Oh, of course, that explains the guy from there using facts to unfairly debunk such well-sounding Republican spinmeister truth as we are hearing, said often enough that it must be true ...

One last thing, the New Republic having that www.tnr.com/ web name, it confused me greatly so that I almost attributed the pro-mandate reporting to National Review. It is so easy to confuse the two, but in the future I will try to be vigilant about tnr.com not being National Review. Content-wise, tell me readers, what's the difference? It is like my confusing Breitbart with Buckley, similar names, with now, thankfully, that problem mooted. Previously I needed attentiveness to stylistic nuance to distinguish between them.

Gentlemen, before going further,
have each of you complied with the healthcare individual mandate?
photo from this link

Links to stuff.

Women's health issues. Maternal childbirth risk and the abortion pill.

Wishing Goodell had stayed home.

Biggest barrier to low-cost education.

Orrin.

Your pick of Obama - Student loan cost stories. One of several.

Wouldn't you be disillusioned with Sarkozy as a choice?

If your first shot at traction fails, try "tar baby."

Survived a test in the minors, now it's time for a test in the big leagues.

Acting school, a topic on my mind. More.

The Franson lady. Representative of her district? Do they all there stick out their chin and say, "Hit me"?

"The Richfield-based retailer's new commitment to transparency will help it recruit a world-class leader, experts say." Now available, would Gingrich be a good fit.

Take working money and give it to cronies? "Agency managers must find the money within their own budgets, he added; the state doesn't provide money specifically for merit compensation." Is that the Grover Norquist way?

Work on the boards and on the end of the court that matters, not the end that gets the feature photo.

Tomorrow is Earth Day, Mary Franson knows that. Take a tour Mary?

When Marley sang, "I shot the sheriff," he did not mean it literally, but conceptually.

Freedom rings for Scott Walker. (But Gary does not vote in Wisconsin any more than Mac Hammond does in the Sixth District.) Leave Gary a comment. He works hard at what he does. Civil comments, even in disagreement, are welcome by Gary.

Try a lookback. Well, the archive's been hijacked, or what? Scrubbing bubbles? See this, for prescience about things to come as well as things for the moment. Try, "... my ethics are not governed by legal interpretations." "Betty McCollum" removed as a sidebar site topic (or a never was on the sidebar topic)? There's a sidebar search box and putting Betty's name in gets, for instance, this. Nothing about Betty or her staff. Or did I miss something? Looking at that anti-Betty item, we have so much to look forward to this election. How can we wait?

A tent that any former hippie can relate to. Design and marketing types take notice too. Do you think if you gave one to David Flaherty he would recognize the design?

A site with compelling sidebar images, enough to perhaps review some content. Perhaps not?

Last, if you go to a website and do not like the layout, e.g., pastel lettering on black background - anything about layout that ticks you off, try this Read Easily Firefox addon. If you use Firefox you should try it. It toggles CSS scripting on/off. If you load it, try it with the Strib homepage.

____________UPDATE____________
Who will be the Dropbox of enterprise computing? Is any reader out there using Dropbox, who is enthusiastic enough about it to post a comment saying, "I'd be lost without synchronized file saving in the cloud"? If so, leave that comment please. Any reader wanting to say, ho-hum, so what, please do so. I am curious whether the cloud is selling to individual consumer-users the way Apple's stuff is, and gotta-have texting capability, etc. Texting and twitter seem made for each other. Between tweets, look up at the road while driving.

David Brauer has two interesting items at MinnPost related to $tadium Wilfare.

Here and here. That's in the order I read them. The first has more to do with journalism standards of disclosure, the second with Wilfare give and take [Wilfs giving some or offering to, while taking is their key objective - that's my view, not Bauer's per his report].

Communication experimentation. Try this, and leave a comment of your impressions. Michele Bachmann prognosticating on oil pricing, when they are pumping all they can out of North Dakota and Twin Cities pump prices are kept high - with only one refinery in town but with us being the closest major metropolitan market to the drilling here, drilling now. Are we seeing sincerity, or something different? I look at blink rate ...

[UPDATE: THE PARAGRAPH AFTER THE QUOTE HAS BEEN REWRTTEN FOR CLARITY] First, read MinnPost, here, but hold off playing the embedded Shark Tank video.

Then read Forbes, here, on twelve detection clues.

Then go back to MinnPost and view the video with the sound off, not tracking the words, but the unspoken communication.

MinnPost in presenting the video quotes a part of the Bachmann presentation:

“This is just about waving a tar baby in the air and saying that something else is a problem,” Bachmann said, adding later: “The president is a complete and utter fraud and a hypocrite on this issue, with all due respect to the president."

Again with sound off from the start, before listening/watching with sound on, make your best guess of where in that video Bachmann drops each of these little hummers - first "tar baby" in connection with President Obama, then later, when she, Bachmann, calls someone else a "total fraud" it again being Obama, "with all due respect" she says. Watch it more than once, sound off, to decide your best guess for when she is dropping each of the two statements. Then see how close you came from non-verbal cues to pinning down the particular "tar baby" text that has gained Bachmann what she intended to gain, widespread press attention to her, independent of the quality of her ideas; and then later the "total fraud" allegation being lodged by her, against another. See if you nail it, or close to it.

NOW: Who do you trust these days? What non-verbal bases have you for the decision?

Try the same thing with online Romney video. Then Obama. Then perhaps the same resources, with sound on, and see if the impression is entirely different. Remember the reporting about the first Kennedy-Nixon debate. Those listening on radio were far more inclined to say Nixon did a good job, or Nixon won the debate, than those who watched it on TV.

Think it over.

__________UPDATE__________
It is hard to say. Where on the time line I believe I see Bachmann over-emoting non-verbally: :15-:25, 1:24, 1:48-1:55 (major), 2:03, 2:30. Making a wholly blind guess, I never did have the sound on because her voice grates om me so badly, but that early at :15-:24 she dropped the "tar baby" line; and then at the 1:48-1:55 she did her major embellishment. And that the other early noted times were transitional and then 2:03 and 2:30 were wrap-up and repeat. In putting this up I realize I might be wholly wrong, and that she dropped phrases into things at less emotive points, but I don't mind going on record. Keep a post-it handy when you do the soundless video play, and note times you see as striking, or indicative of Bachmann using overly contrived non-verbal reinforcement of the words she speaks at different points in the segment. Then see what, at those times, her chosen words were.

Please, do give it a try. Then, as said before, think it over.

I am guessing that somewhere in her lifetime travels she took acting classes, (but never mastered the subtleties of being really good at it). In St. Louis or some place she may have lived but never or infrequently mentions and with acting training never formally showing on her resume, for obvious reasons. I envision in her younger days her taking part in a play or two, something like that - during high school, possibly but more likely later, and really getting an emotional high from it that carried over to her wanting to become a career on-stage-a-lot politician. Not that such a supposition fits into the story she tells, of God's choosing nudges that she first doubts but then humbly yet willfully follows, that scenario, the one she touts. With Reagan the acting background was public knowledge. With Bachmann it is just a feeling, and one with no actual known public evidence to back it up and contrary to the official resume. So, take it as absolute pure speculation that we are presented with an actress with a drive to attain public notice - to have a stage, to be seen as important.

Here is a video freeze frame screen capture, a mannerism, around the 1:48-1:55 time of the segment, from the MinnPost - Shark Tank item - Bachmann drawing her head back, pursing her lips - part of an over-emoting sequence after having leaned forward toward the camera 5-10 seconds earlier, then at about 1:54, a brief look away, etc.

_________FURTHER UPDATE_________
As to things that may have never appeared in the Bachmann resume or saga, or that have gotten dropped along the way, I could find only one hit per current search engine algorithms, for the story of her having earned college tuition gutting fish in Alaska. Aptly enough, here. My guess is gutting fish in Alaska is not the image to project after having served long enough in the House to lock in full pension rights. By then, some of the lobbyists you crave and court might find "gutting fish" to be too distant from their clients' needs. Gutting fish and working on the Bachmann family dairy farm in Wisconsin shortly after marriage to Marcus Bachmann were past staples in the prior upward mobility saga that is getting less and less play these days. Acting lessons could have happened, and been written out of the story from the politician's roots. I do not know if the press has ever presented the question to Bachmann, "Were you always this way, theatrical, or did you take lessons to get here?"

__________FURTHER UPDATE__________
BET online covers the "tar baby" speech, here, with a general analysis that does not overemphasize the "tar baby" language, and with a last paragraph noting things Bachmann said of Obama which, though not mentioned in the BET coverage, could equally be said or more appropriately said of Bachmann herself.

Mary Franson, is she channeling Michele Bachmann for advantage, thinking to advance as Bachmann has, or are they just a pair of kindred GOP souls?

This link.

Lazarus alive in purple, at the old ammo plant.

Budig of HometownSource.com reporting. This excerpt:

The pitch came short days after the Minneapolis Vikings stadium proposal crashed in the House Government Operations and Elections Committee.

“This (Arden Hills) is the rabbit,” said Rep. Tim Mahoney, DFL-St. Paul, alluding to the magician’s trick some see as necessary for getting a stadium bill passed when legislative leader speak of winding up the session in short days.

But Mahoney [...] said as much can get done in the final 100 hours of a session than in the previous month.

[...] Ramsey County Commissioners Rafael Ortega and Tony Bennett insist the Arden Hills site — land adjoining the old Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant — is primed for immediate construction. “We can start building next week if the Legislature can figure out how to fund it,” Bennett said.

[...] Ortega, when asked about the House committee shoot-down of the Minneapolis stadium proposal, styled the proposal “convoluted.” It was never vetted to the degree the Arden Hills’ stadium proposal was, he argued.

Mahoney mentioned speaking with House Government Operations and Elections Committee Chairwoman Joyce Peppin, R-Rogers, [... who] serves on the rules committee, Peppin said, and would be willing to consider holding a hearing in her committee for Arden Hills.

But she thought it incumbent on Mahoney to get the Democratic support on the committee for his bill that the Minneapolis Vikings’ stadium bill failed to muster.

[...]

Did I say Lazarus walks? How about limps and crawls and shows death rattles suggesting a short comeback. Wilfare falters. Pohlad fields a team without pitching arms, but he's already gotten his serving of stadium largesse. Zygi asks, "Where did you find the menu?" Pohlad answers, "It was help from a bunch of guys who used to be in the legislature." With the election approaching, that's the story until next session.

What are the Republicans in DC waiting for? It is their job to be passing needed legislation.

And "The Paying a Fair Share Act" is not only needed, it has been overdue since before the Gipper rode his white horse into the White House. And it's only seven pages long and so simply worded that even a Republican can read and understand it. Paul Ryan and Grover Norquist, each can understand it. Each knows in his inner heart why it is both just, and needed. Two pages are presented below, and the link has been given where you can read the entire thing. After the opening bill title page, below, a page suggesting (at line 18) who might think the idea is not so good, and might even marshal forces in opposition. It is not me. It is not you.

Can you say 1%? Can you explain to me why the 1% should not be paying a fair share, why people like Crabgrass readers should be carrying them on their backs? And "trickle down" and "job creator" BS does not hack it. Crooks and Liars, reports with an embedded video, about the 1%'s job creator rhetoric, the video being of a hoax parroted for us by an emotionless parrot wearing a tiny flag lapel pin (made in China).

___________UPDATE___________
GovTrack for this bill, here. GovTrack home -> congress -> bills link, if you want to do bookmarking:

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/

An email from Senator Rick.

Click the image to enlarge and read.

Walking through it, I was not able to make the conference call, not knowing it would be held, etc. There is at least one Ramsey family I expect made it to a piece of  the calling. Down Highway 10, Ralph and Mary distraught but also fighting on.

Still first paragraph of Senator Rick's email. There's Old Testament, New Testament, and Rick Testament. How the man picks his words.

Later: I want to keep fighting, send money. The send money part earning red highlighting.

"During this Presidential race we sacrificed almost everything we have...". So says Rick.

I will be setting a Google Alert, "Santorum bankruptcy." Since poor Rick's sacrificed it all the filing likely will be days away.

For a wrap up, read Crooks and Liars carrying an Al Jazeera-English item by Cliff Schecter, on just how influential Senator Rick has been as a force in the GOP presidential sweepstakes. And Senator Rick vows he will continue his best effort, such as it's been. Embryos carrying Etch-A-Sketch units, marching in brigades for Senator Rick, like it used to be in Red Square on May Day. (Speaking figuratively, of course.)

ALEC corporate confederates have taken the tax pledge. That they will not pay any taxes, however they can rig the game; ALEC helping.

This link. And here. Naming names.

Legacy MDE - Last post, months old, no new foster parent steps forward, so stick it with a fork to prove it died.

The Eveready bunny quit going.

Another ho-hum UI benefits denial? Brodkorb runs into the famous DEED telephonic rubber stamp of the hearing examiner on "appeal." It must mean "fired for cause."

Second runner-up for Mr. Minnesota. Winner, Mr. Congeniality ...
photo from here

Readers can search the web for other coverage, but Strib's reporting was striking:

The hearing didn't delve into the relationship he admitted having with former Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch, which cost Brodkorb his job as communications chief for the GOP caucus and Koch her leadership post.

No immediate decisions were made. Brodkorb was terminated from his $90,000 a year late last year after reports of an affair surfaced.

According to a record read by the judge during the telephone hearing, Brodkorb filed out a form where he said he was appealing because there was "no violation of any internal senate policy. No employee misconduct."

If the Koch situation was not the lynchpin for deciding it was a firing for cause, might it perhaps have hinged on MB wanting to be the boss of the show while having been elected to nothing, and having been hired as press secretary not as boss of anything?

Might that be the actual scenario, the one DEED relied on in denying benefits, the one that violated employer policy ("internal senate policy") in that legislative hirelings are never intended to be the boss of the elected ego tripping show, that being unstated but clear "policy?"

Was it that the lead ego trippers of the Republican side sent the Reaper with that message to fire the guy for that "cause"? That diddling of the "boss" by the boss-wannabe was coincidental, it was the wannabe dimension that was problematic, not the diddling?

It looks that way. Brodkorb's error might have been his getting his finger too deeply into policy (and perk distributions) re gambling and stadium stuff, where "senate internal policy" is shared decision making by those elected after much speechifying and posturing by the ego-tripping elected wonders.

I never saw any ballot with Brodkorb's name on it. Did you?

So, how much of a reach is Strib making with that "... which cost Brodkorb his job ..." language regarding bed incidents? That seems to be conclusory editorializing, not reporting. The reporting part is, "Brodkorb was terminated from his $90,000 a year [job] late last year after reports of an affair surfaced." The sequence is there, but any cause-effect conclusion awaits whether Brodkorb goes to trial and we get to see testimony and emails and such introduced into evidence.

That "... which cost Brodkorb his job ..." surely is the story Mike wants to sue on, but is it the real story? The theme of surface and underlayers at play is explored in a linguistically flowery way fitting the situation, in Brodkorb coverage including exceptionally fine use of images (and with a cautionary headline about not misstepping); by who but Nick Coleman, this link.

Over a month old but still warm. Bookmark the website.

Michele Bachmann - All those babies, five stretchmark deliveries, twenty-five foster babies taken into the Bachmann household, and now she gets herself one more ...

click image to enlarge and read

Yup, the hobo lady in pink from Congressional District 4, the tar baby just sitting. Following her inner rage and nastiness, she took her windup and her swing:

So, here I am going from CD 4
where I live to CD 6 seeking my fortune,
belongings over my shoulder
in my pink hooch cloth,
and yo, a tar baby just sitting defenseless
ripe for a big time Ms. Bachmann
sockoroney in the schnoz ...

BOTTOM LINE: She did not have to do it. She figured it would get press attention, that wording, and so she did it. Inner nastiness? Inner drive to be center of attention? Who knows. The workings of that singular mind are a total mystery to ordinary people. Astoundingly so. What will this publicity seeker do for an encore? Stay tuned to channel Bozo. Channel Bachmann.

That'll show Hotelman Graves how to make a spectacle of oneself. Ya betcha. Not that he'd want to. Now she can have three more days of press attention, an appearance on Rupert TV, explaining she meant no racial bias in dredging up Uncle Remus terminology - it was just a spur of the moment thing and she'll match her heartland Iowa birth certificate against any Hawaiian's.

The Met Council reads tea leaves for the metro area, circa 2040.

Journalism 101

Strib reports, without giving any link to the actual resource, the Met Council document.

PiPress, ditto.

MinnPost, home page, a search for "council" gives no hit. Either the story is buried after other stuff in the listing, or probably expect featured coverage tomorrow or later today. Probably expect a highest quality coverage, but a day later.

Search of Google News, for "Met Council MPR 2040" gives no hits. However, go to the MPR homepage, it is the featured story.

This link for MPR coverage, as with other reporting, no link to the primary resource.

A Met Council homepage search "2040" gives this as the top [most relevant] return. Still a few more layers of onion peeling to go, still reading somebody's summary of this and that, but almost there.

Why do the major papers, online, not give the link? My best guess, they want you to read more of their stuff on the Vikings stadium saga, the Republicans ramping up for energizing the evangelical vote by pandering to choice-hating rage, etc., rather than have a reader go to a primary source via a link to another website, where Strib and/or PiPress earns zippo in per-click and other online ways and means of generating advertising revenue. That's just a guess that non-linking is motivated and not accidental.

_________UPDATE__________
Specific to City of Ramsey, in light of the trending that the soothsayers say, I do not see how Flaherty's high-end rental by the noisy rails will resonate into 2040. (The bigger question on it, will it resonate at all in 2013, after this fall's elections.)

_________FURTHER UPDATE_________
A somewhat extended excerpt from the Met Council's reporting link, (from the middle of the item):

As the age profile of the population shifts, the mix of households is also changing. Growth in Generation Y will still generate growth in households with children. However, most of the growth among households with children is anticipated to be growth in one-parent households (up 80,000 over 30 years).

Senior citizens will be the most significant contributors to the forecasted increase in households. Seniors tend to live alone, or with a spouse. Not surprisingly, most of the gain in households projected by the Council is reflected in net growth of one-person households (up 179,000 over 30 years) and of married couples without children (up 87,000). These gains reflect a progression of the household life-cycle, as married couples with children become households without children.

“The diversity and availability of our housing stock is an important component in the strength of our regional economy,” continued Chair Haigh. “As our population shifts between now and 2040, communities and the Council must plan and be creative to ensure housing is affordable and meets the needs of an aging population.” The Council is currently working on a housing policy plan that will provide critical support as the region experiences these changes in the coming decades. The last regional housing policy plan was approved by the Metropolitan Council in 1985.

The Metropolitan Council is the regional planning organization in the seven-county Twin Cities metropolitan area. The Council is tasked with regional forecasting and policy planning in Minnesota Statutes §473.146 and §473.859. The Council, in partnership with Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) acquired a new forecasting model in 2011 that is expected to increase forecasting accuracy.

The regional forecast and local forecasts serve as a statement of future expectations and inform both the Council’s planning and local government planning. The preliminary regional forecast will be followed by preliminary local forecasts in 2013. As the Council drafts its next metropolitan development guide, Thrive MSP 2040, the forecasts will be updated to reflect the impact of policy changes adopted by the Council. A final regional forecast, including community-level data, is expected to be adopted by the Council in 2014.

CISPA and the privacy of individual Americans.

Readers can do a websearch of CISPA, and see if they like their prospects for privacy, if it is passed.

Cnet coverage of the question, here.

EFF, wanting to always protect internet users and their rights - privacy being one among many - has this site.

EFF on "Stop Cyber Spying Week," here.

Have a look. Do your own web search. Contact Franken, Klobuchar (who is up for reelection), or your Congressional district Rep.

Mine's Bachmann, so why bother. She talks a talk, but will NOT walk this walk.

Give it a try with Bachmann.

See if I am guessing wrongly.

Contact her saying CISPA stinks.

See what you get back, if anything. Tell her you are in her district (if that's truly so), and see if she cares.

_____________UPDATE____________
The tracker firms that make money selling a profile of you to advertising interests accumulate data about you.

It is your data. It is not theirs. Or so the actual main "father" of the internet says, in a Guardian interview, reported by Cnet, here.

___________FURTHER UPDATE__________
Earlier Cnet CISPA coverage, here. Who Google says is a threat to Internet freedom, here.

__________FURTHER UPDATE___________
The text of the latest CISPA draft, as best I understand things, is online as a pdf, here.

The cyber big players are happy because if "cyber security intelligence" information is shared with government snoops about you, by them, the bill if passed says you cannot sue the willingly co-opted business firms. They have a safe harbor from liability, regardless of what they "share" with the snoops.

You, on the other hand, have no rights. "Shared" info about you, whichever way the info flows, snoops to corporations or vice versa, is exempt from any right you have to know a thing about your info being "shared." Indeed, the firms cannot tell you about snooping even if they wanted to. That is how things are written. It's about you, but you are out of the loop, Constitution and privacy norms be damned, if passed it will be as it is written. It sucks. Write somebody. Klobuchar's online contact page is here:

http://www.amyklobuchar.com/contact

Use it.

Or in terms of your privacy, lose it.

Consistently throughout the timeline, the Vikings never pulled out.

There was oblique talk about no team at present in Los Angeles, but from McCombs through Zygi's Wilfare efforts the team never pulled out of Minnesota. In Anoka County, in Arden Hills, there were courtship hopes and promises - and dread by many in Anoka County - and never any formal team recognition that a referendum would matter - because there was always the recognition that a referendum for massive public spending for absentee wealth-mongers had no traction with voters.

The timeline, online, via PiPress, here.

Buck$ for Billionaire$? It's the politician$' way.

Pohlad is $miling.

Jim Graves opponent for Congress. Something I off-and-on wonder about, was there a message of a new direction for the Republican party intended, that grip and all, a message in that event of Dominionism vs. Corporatism?

Here. And then here. Hopefully both items remain posted.

_____________UPDATE____________
Better terminology than in the headline might be secular corporatism vs. Dominionist corporatism. Santorum would clearly be within the Dominionist corporatist camp - wanting a strong interlocked private-public effort to run the nation based on Christian theocratic aims, or on his view of what Christian theocratic aims should be.

For example, Santorum would restrict liberty and choices other individuals might wish to have or to see preserved, in ways that would spring from his own religious feelings and worldview. Presumably foreign policy and military objectives would be similarly set.

Bachmann would do the same, although Santorum and Bachmann might differ on things where the Papacy and extreme fundamentalist Evangelical belief sets may differ, such as the Papacy's expression of social conscience for the poor worldwide vs. simplistic Mac Hammond prosperity gospel humbug.  Palin would qualify as a Bachmann lockstep fellow-traveler.

Santorum and Bachmann each is on record as opposed to contraception availability as mandated healthcare coverage for any insured person seeking it. I.e., opposed to others making a birth control choice because they, personally, don't like it and want to dictate choices for others

Bush, aside from pandering to the religious right to gain votes from them, was not pursuing a Dominionist agenda. Yet he undeniably pursued a secular corporatist one, Big Oil, globalism, tax policy, Wall Street, and all.

Can you copyright a programming language? This is not a work, a sequence of specific steps in a language, but the language itself.

Ars Technica. Grocklaw, current, days earlier.

Oracle started demanding - suing for billions. Things are carved to millions, and going to trial.

At issue, Oracle's Java and Google's Android languages. Oracle wants to crimp Google's flexibility in the mobile device market. Google wants Larry Ellison to go away.

__________UPDATE__________
While telling only one side of the disputed story, Google's slides on what the litigation is about are online and amusing. This link, from Groklaw.

_________FURTHER UPDATE__________
Here, reporting which includes a link to visuals which Oracle prepared to tell its side of the story. That report indicates internal Google email to the effect that obtaining a Java license might be necessary. That could only mean necessary to assure insulation from a lawsuit by Oracle of the type now going on. Not that Android could not legally be done without Oracle's licensing permission, only that without licensing - in effect a contract to pay Oracle to not get sued by Oracle - litigation was possible which, litigation being what it is, could be won by Google or could be lost by Google. The only sure thing is a license, and then if a third party says "that's fine between the two of you but I have property rights," another license it or litigate it situation would arise. Email discussing a license is not a smoking gun unless some highly damaging language was used in the email.

Scholarship advances. Digitization you cannot criticize or second guess.

Part of an ArsTechnica report:

This week the University of Oxford and the Vatican announced a plan to collaborate in digitizing 1.5 million pages of rare and ancient texts, most dating from the 16th century or earlier. The project is expected to span about 4 years and was made possible by a donation of £2 million (approximately $3.1 million) from the Polonsky Foundation—a charitable organization that supports higher education, medical research, and other general matters in the arts and sciences.

Specifically, the texts will include pages from Oxford's Bodleian Libraries and the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana (BAV). The digitized pages will include early printed books—called incunabula—from Rome and the surrounding area; Greek manuscripts including early church texts and works by Homer, Sophocles, Plato, Hippocrates; and Hebrew manuscripts from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. "With approximately two-thirds of the material coming from the BAV and the remainder from the Bodleian, the digitization effort will also benefit scholars by uniting virtually materials that have been dispersed between the two collections over the centuries," a statement from Oxford read.

This translated link.

Sergey Aleynikov, and spam the trackers.

Back in July 2009 Sergey got Crabgrass attention, here, when things were becoming distressful for him because Goldman Sachs wanted him pilloried.

 He had crossed the mighty GS and they wanted their pound of flesh. They accused him of stealing proprietary high-speed trading software on his way out at Goldman from a comfortable six-figure salary [but in New York City] headed for an even more comfortable six-figure salary at a startup high-speed trading operation in Chicago, where he knew start-up people. In the course of things one affidavit against Sergey stated that one possessing the proprietary software and knowing how to use it, "could manipulate the market." So what, really, had Goldman, knowing how to use the software, developed the software for? That is a collateral question aside from the main thread of the story. Interestingly, it never got asked in judicial proceedings or in mainstream press coverage (although affidavit reporting did appear in a place or two online excerpting that part of the affidavit, and letting it speak for itself without further ado).

Anyway, Sergey is off the hook, according to the Second Circuit. You can do your own web search under Sergey's name, he has a Wikipedia page, and TechCrunch has good reporting on how the court panel held that the criminalizing parts of two acts did not apply to what Sergey had done, the TC report stating in part:

Contrary to some previous coverage, the court’s decision is focused not on whether software code is property capable of being stolen, but instead, on the specific scope of the NSPA and the EEA as enacted by Congress. The impact is smaller than it might have first appeared.

In fact, the decision is based on a careful consideration of prior legal precedent, the precise language of each law, relevant legislative history, and the well-reasoned principle that courts should favor narrow interpretations of criminal laws that are ambiguous.

But the decision is nonetheless a setback for businesses hoping to protect intellectual property trade secrets. Since the court concluded that the NSPA does not apply to “intangible” intellectual property, insiders may now have less to fear by stealing proprietary software. This reality will not be lost on unscrupulous employees: although Aleynikov clearly stole valuable proprietary software from Goldman, he was able to escape conviction by uploading the information to a remote server (rather than downloading and storing the code on a physical device, such as a flash drive).

Moreover, as proprietary software is increasingly integrated into business methods, the incentives and opportunities for theft will grow. The impact could be especially large for technology companies that develop and market software as their primary product. In particular, software-based trade secrets that are not actually designed for licensing or sale in the open market (like Goldman’s HFT system) will be especially vulnerable. Companies concerned about intellectual property trade secrets should therefore begin monitoring HTTPS transfers on their servers, paying special attention to any instances of large amounts of data leaving their network.

The court recognizes this negative impact. As argued by Justice Calabresi, who concurred in the opinion (although somewhat reluctantly it seems), courts should consider the actual “mischief” that a law is designed to address when interpreting its context and meaning. As Calabresi acknowledges, “[I]t is hard for me to conclude that Congress, in this law, actually meant to exempt the kind of behavior in which Aleynikov engaged…I wish to express the hope that Congress will return to the issue and state, in appropriate language, what I believe they meant to make criminal in the EEA.”

They wrote it in Congress as they did and this panel of judges, in a criminal prosecution setting, refused to stretch analysis to what Congress might have or should have intended and written. While interpreting the intent of the legislature is a guiding principle for the courts, they do not substitute wholly new reach beyond what a statute clearly says, when it is so clear to not be "ambiguous" (with lawyers trained and experienced to find real or imagined ambiguity favoring a client's position). If interested in reading more, follow the links within the items Crabgrass links to, and do a web search.

Spam the trackers.

There are products such as Ghostery, and Do Not Track Plus, which can be added cost free to a browser, to lessen tracking of user web searches and other traffic. The add-ons are more flexible for Mozilla Firefox than for Google Chrome, probably because Google's entire business plan is to sell user information for targeted advertisement, and collect revenue on a pay per click basis from advertisers who have targeted content clicked by targeted web users.

Web tracking has drawn FTC and Congressional attention as something presently unregulated which might benefit by explicit limiting rules. If you web-search Ghostery you will find it a product sponsored and offered by an advertising trade association in hopes of convincingly showing self-regulation is possible in ways that, if Congress acts at all, Congress will legislate flexible law allowing for a possibility of honest and meaningful self-regulation to function in place of iron rules. (That a self-regulating approach worked as it did during the financial services industry doing its self-policing of housing derivatives where AIG was allowed to write a profitable multi-billion dollar portfolio of hedging products without any required pool of cash to back up the stuff if the market made paying off on the products necessary, stands as evidence of the ultimate wisdom of self-regulating approaches; but tradesmen will always argue "our group, our trade, is different.")

Anyway, there is one product available across browsers, from researchers at NYU, that obfuscates tracking efforts by allowing a user to install the product in a full range of browsers, with it then generating random searches sent to the search engines, which become incorporated into your user profile, so that the profiling targets something random besides your own actual search history - i.e., your history plus noise upon that signal, a working approach so long as the tracking firms do not have good signal extraction software - the likely case unless and until such an add-on becomes popular enough to make a market-impact difference.

TrackMeNot is the product, it even allows a tool-bar display showing the different various noise searches it propogates, and it has configuration options for flexiblity. Links: chrome webstore, Firefox addons, plus here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. Do a web search for more if you wish.

Now, were I a skilled programmer with a mean streak, which I am not, I might decide to produce a similar product, except with tracking itself, and if the individual tracked appeared to be, say a Michele Bachmann supporter, I might then use non-random search noise, and use your imagination on how that could play out. So, trust going without TrackMeNot and being profiled - indeed some want profiling, so as to reenforce biases via creating a search bubble rather than having enlarged but possibly more irrelevant search returns relative to personal likes and dislikes - but if not that kind of person, trust TrackMeNot only if you feel that academic computer science researchers would not be hoodwinking you with tracking of their own. And a comparably advertised product, from say Mark Zuckerberg's operators at Facebook, might do the search obfuscation on an actual random and heavy basis while tracking everything but its own generated noise separately, so as to be able to sell advertisers a "clean stream" track and profile for you, and family. So: Enjoy the Internet. And presume the NSA knows much about you from the process.

Note that the random search TMN displayed in the toolbar when I began this sentence was "expecting a child with" and it switched during typing to "American multinational commerce." You can set differing frequencies at which spam search terms will be sent to the search engine firms, and you can target AOL, Google, Bing, and Yahoo. I waited, next spam search "poll released Thursday."

More TMN settings exist. As you will see if you decide to try TMN.

From having TMN installed, it seems to not slow actual searching or site loading.

There are other browser addons aimed at privacy protection. Or aimed at blocking advertising from distractingly displaying on your screen while reading.

I am unaware of what's possible with Microsoft's Internet Explorer because I only use it for a limited range of services. I prefer Firefox, and Chrome, in that order. Each of the three have substantial market share, and fans.

It seems there is a bit of a cat and mouse game between the helpful privacy-addon authoring world, and the world of firms wanting to advertise and sell stuff and firms with a business plan to make bucks as a facilitating intermediary for the latter.

However, consider whether search help such as Google provides would be developed without some attendant business plan to make money from it. Take the bitter with the sweet, look at and test the cat and mouse stuff, it's all a wild west shootout, still, on the web. There is an adage found many places on the Internet:

If you are not paying for it, you are not the customer, you are the product being sold.

Spell it out for me, Watchdog. What's THE PROGRAM?

Two related posts, seemingly so in my view, at Residual Forces, one presenting Watchdog barking, "GET WITH THE PROGRAM."

Here most recently, then here.

The program is hold Ron Paul under water until there's no flaiing left, then sing Kumbaya with the Mittster and his stay-at-home spouse (even so years after the oldest offspring's left the nest)? Like it. Love it. Hunt for a YouTube posting of Michael Douglas as Gordon Gecko, giving the "Greed is Good" speech?

Is that THE PROGRAM. Spell it out, please.

Co-opt enough people this election to get control of the spoils?

Is that THE PROGRAM?

That sounds more like an expedient than a PROGRAM.

Things seem very confusing to me and one hopes to see THE PROGRAM spelled out for us folks who will vote this November.

What're rank and file Republicans to "GET WITH?"

Is half a bark better than no bark at all? I'd like the full and detailed bark, please.

THE PROGRAM. Please.

___________UPDATE__________
Is this a hint? The Ron Paul people commune with and channel demons? They are a different breed of RINO?

Not like the Emmer people turning away from Marty Siefert preordination, which then was freedom of choice but, somehow, not turncoat insurrection.

Is that THE PROGRAM?

Lockstep, we go as the Mittster's purchased herd, bought fair and square for corporatism, by corporate super-PAC "people"?

Am I learning Republican-speak? Huh?

_________FURTHER UPDATE__________
A friend sent this link. Reading it, I can infer majority rule is not always if it ever was THE PROGRAM.

Still, Watchdog, spell out THE PROGRAM, please. So I do not follow some blind alley of inference and speculation.

_________FURTHER UPDATE_________
Perhaps the mainstream and alternate press may give me a hint of THE PROGRAM. Today's Strib home page, ditto for MinnPost, do a page search for "ron paul." Nothing. Zippo.

Am I getting hot? Towards THE PROGRAM, in all its aspects?

I suppose there is no Minnesota recent news, that would trigger a "ron paul" hit on press homepages. There is this Strib news:

This MinnPost news:

I bet if I were to check those two news outlet home pages for "Rodney Dangerfield" he'd get no respect either.