Events

"[I]t has been a nervous year, and people have begun to feel like a Christian scientist with appendicitis."—Tom Lehrer We live in a nation founded by a conspiracy. A group of committed, passionate, and intelligent men met in secret for years, plotting and scheming, until finally they took arms against their own country and set up a radical left-wing government that subsequently became the model for the rest of the world. Grandchildren of those revolutionaries tried to do what they believed was the same...

Anne and I looked at an apartment today. Beautiful day, beautiful view, but the apartment...not so great. Still, it was worth the trip:

Adam Sharp, of Maryland-based Sharp SEO, actually read through the Justice Deptartment's Google subpoena. He posted a blog entry excerpting and linking to the actual Google subpoena which is, in turn, hosted on Ziff-Davis' website: In Google’s understanding, Defendant would use the one million URLs requested from Google to create a sample world-wide web against which to test various filtering programs for their effectiveness. Google objects to Defendant’s view of Google’s highly proprietary search...

Chicago got its first measurable snowfall since December 24th last night. As of 6 am CST/12:00 UTC, we have the following reports from area weather stations: Station Snow O'Hare 127 mm (6 in.) Midway 102 mm (4 in.) Milwaukee 127 mm (6 in.) Rockford 127 mm (6 in.) Sadly for cross-country skiiers, today's forecast calls for temperatures around 3°C (37°F), which is just warm enough to turn the snow into a heavy, soupy mess but not enough to ski along the lake. Speaking of heavy, soupy, messy snow, I will...

Three years from this moment, we will have had a new President for more than two hours.

I'm shaking my head over the report Federal prosecutors want Google search data. It seems a little poorly-timed, coming as it does during an escalating row over the government's domestic spying (reg.req). Kudos to Google for refusing to turn over the data. Google's press office doesn't have anything up yet, but I'll keep checking. Meanwhile, the Washington Post reported: "This is the government's nose under the search engine's tent. Once we cross this line it will be very difficult to turn back," said...

It's 12°C (54°F) in Chicago right now. Fifteen degrees (25°F) above normal is great in January. I may have to open a window...or go outside...things we don't normally do around here mid-winter.

The Chicago Tribune had several stories of interest this morning. Meterologist Tom Skilling noticed more daylight, possibly because he reads my blog. Unfortunately, he got the number of minutes more daylight a little wrong, because he only looked at half the equation, and even still didn't subtract correctly. First, the difference between 4:23 and 4:50 is 27 minutes, not 28; second, sunrises got later before getting earlier, so we actually have 9 hours 35 minutes of daylight now, which is 26 minutes...

The President today appointed Nicole Nason head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, apparently to reward her for her good work lobbying against the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. This is like appointing Al Capone to run the Women's Christian Temperance Union, or Mike Brown to run, well, anything. This is another in the President's long history of appointing people totally unsuited for their jobs, but unsuited in a particular, deliberate way. The appointments guarantee...

The Washington Post reports that the Republicans are now proposing restrictions on lobbying. This news comes shortly after Charlie Pace threw his "last" package of horse into the fire. Some lawmakers say GOP leaders are blaming lobbyists rather than examining the legislative processes that have invited corruption, such as the proliferation of home-district pork-barrel projects that have become prime ways to reward campaign supporters. So, let's review: The majority party, that set up a lobbying program...