36 Chambers - The Legendary Journeys: Execution to the max!

One Easy Solution To This

Kevin Feasel — Tue, 21 May 2013 22:00:39 +0000

At the end of a spin session, David Axelrod accidentally speaks a vital truth: “Part of being president is there’s so much beneath you that you can’t know because the government is so vast[.]”

I fully agree with this, which is why I support eliminating as much government as we can possibly get away with. That way, the President can be more accountable and doesn’t have to try to pretend to be an expert in a couple hundred different areas simultaneously.

Bloomberg Terminals Spying On Traders

Kevin Feasel — Mon, 20 May 2013 22:00:35 +0000

Steve Sailer is having a field day with reports that Bloomberg terminals (which quite a few New York trading desks still have) are spying on the traders using them.

Presumably, Bloomberg terminals automatically lock you out if you have more than a 16-ounce soda at your desk.

The Scandals Of Our Lives

Kevin Feasel — Sun, 19 May 2013 22:00:38 +0000

The Obama administration has played it hot and heavy with scandal recently. Jim Greaghty of National Review Online listed several of the newest ones in a recent Morning Jolt. Greaghty’s examples include the utter failure of the Obama administration to respond to Benghazi in reasonable time and subsequent cover-up of their incompetence, the IRS targeting political opponents, Eric Holder’s Justice department performing unconstitutional phone record monitoring on AP journalists, and Health and Human Services secretary Kathleen Sebelius shaking down health care industry firms for money. These are potentially rather serious charges, but they’ll likely end up falling by the wayside, just like Fast and Furious (another serious charge) did. This is a Chicago presidency at its essence: the veneration of the thug.

What could potentially be even more dangerous is that the AP wiretapping may also have taken place in the House cloak room. That’s a very serious charge and I’d like to see more evidence as to whether or not it actually happened.

Hockey As She Is Played

Kevin Feasel — Sat, 18 May 2013 22:00:07 +0000

Dinosaur Comics nails it. Sometimes these scientists lose teeth—that’s how into science they are.

Suing For Boodle

Kevin Feasel — Fri, 17 May 2013 22:00:53 +0000

A solar company is suing the federal government because they aren’t getting enough taxpayer handouts. When your business model is to have Congress screw over taxpayers so you can line your pockets with money selling products that people don’t actually want, it’s understandable that you’d want those handouts to continue. Otherwise, these people would have to make things which are actually valuable enough to keep them in business, and that’s hard work.

InfoSec Notes Of Interest

Kevin Feasel — Thu, 16 May 2013 22:00:48 +0000

There can’t possibly be any potential security problems with a camera and microphone constantly watching whatever you see, right?
Speaking of insecure Google products, that AV on your Android device probably isn’t helping very much.
And we can’t talk about insecure products without mentioning Adobe. This time, it’s ColdFusion. There’s also an article about a ColdFusion bug leading to potential release of 160,000 SSNs (with 94 definitely known to have been released), but parsing the article leads me to believe that this was a case of not updating rather than a vulnerability with no patch at the time of exploitation.
And don’t forget about physical security.
Good news regarding website security. Way too many sites are still vulnerable, but SQL injection appears to be in decline, meaning that people are doing it right. Fixing cross-site scripting and information leakage problems should be relatively simple problems as well, so this number ought to go down further.

Why Was The IRS Targeting Particular Types Of Groups?

Kevin Feasel — Wed, 15 May 2013 22:00:28 +0000

The IRS appears to have targeted particular types of groups, subjecting them to intense and unconstitutional levels of scrutiny. Shockingly (shockingly!), these are right-of-center and Jewish organizations. The only valid response is to get rid of the culture of corruption at the IRS, and that means mass firings that go all the way to the top.

The likelihood of this happening, naturally, approaches zero.

Mitch McConnell notes that other governmental organizations might be complicit in similar activities and names several. I’d add the Department of Labor to that list, too. The Obama administration imported Chicago-style politics, and this is classic: use the power of the State to grind down political opponents.

Bonus snippet: an IRS agent gets a tiny piece of comeuppance.

Abort Roe v. Wade

Kevin Feasel — Tue, 14 May 2013 22:00:47 +0000

Ruth Bader Ginsburg agrees that Roe was wrongfully decided. I disagree with her reasoning, but agree with her conclusion and some of her implications. Roe was one of the most egregious examples of the Supreme Court legislating from the bench and, far from settling the issue, created a cantankerous, multi-generational debate instead. At this point, the best outcome would be to overturn Roe and surrounding court decisions and return this issue to individual states. I agree with Ginsburg that different states will have different abortion laws, and I consider that a net positive because people can take abortion laws (among many other factors) into consideration when deciding where to live. Federalism works, whereas one-size-fits-all policy tends not to.

3D-Printed Guns

Kevin Feasel — Mon, 13 May 2013 22:00:31 +0000

In the short term, 3D printed guns aren’t a big deal (somewhat contra Charles C. W. Cooke’s argument). You still need a high-end 3D printer, so it’s not the type of thing you can slap into a Maker Bot and get a working gun out of. In the medium term, I think it spells the end of effective supply-side gun control legislation. These plans will get better, the tools will get cheaper, and the knowledge necessary to create a gun will become internalized more effectively.

On the whole, I would consider this a good thing for the same reason I consider 3D printing in general a good thing: it reduces the power of the manufacturer relative to the consumer. So naturally, the end result will be banning the third dimension.

Against Overcriminalization

Kevin Feasel — Sun, 12 May 2013 22:00:44 +0000

The House is taking a look at reducing overcriminalization. I like this idea, as long as it leads to something concrete. One consequence of the regulatory State is that criminalization becomes an end in itself: force people to obey an increasing number of laws to regulate behavior all the more tightly. Another, darker consequence of overcriminalization is blackmail potential: we are all likely guilty of committing various crimes on a daily basis (inluding things as simple as jaywalking). When the State can hold that over your head, it might be able to wrest out further concessions.