Data Mining

This week's scandal involves the NSA and its plan to use information from telecom giants like Verizon to identify and locate potential terrorists. The authority to do stuff like that was enacted during all that post-9/11 patriotic anti-terrorist frenzy. It was a bad idea at the time, but Republicans weren't too bothered because the country was being run by the likes of Bush 43, Dick Cheney, John Ashcroft, and Karl Rove.

Now that the ON is in charge, conservatives are pissing blood over Big Government intrusion and threats to individual liberty. The same people who have been against FISA all along are equally chapped off. Add the blocs together and it makes a majority.

I have a question, though. Why is it necessary for companies like Verizon to accumulate all that data on its customers in the first place? If I can't trust the feds to use the information appropriately, why should I trust profit-oriented monoliths like Verizon?

The bottom line is that media-driven public fury will probably force the government to scale back, if not terminate, the surveillance activities in question. And as soon as terrorists cause another big explosion that kills a lot of American citizens, the public will be screaming about government's failure to prevent the attack. You'll never go broke overestimating the irrationality of the American people.

Opinions

The phone rang a few minutes ago, and the caller ID showed the number 202-810-1454 with the name SURVEY2013POLL. Since I believe pollsters are entitled to my opinion on crucial matters, I picked up. It was one of those automated voice response things that hardcore right-wingers often use. A male voice identifying himself as Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council explained that he'd like me to participate in a 45-second survey, and asked if I was willing. I said yes. This is the ensuing 'dialogue' (paraphrased):

TONY: Do you believe America is on the wrong path?

ME: No.

TONY: Do you believe the Boy Scouts of America should be bullied into accepting homosexuals as scoutmasters?

ME: Yes.

TONY: Thank you. (Click)

I wonder how long this 'survey' would have lasted if I had answered YES to question one, and NO to question two, and how long it would have taken Tony to solicit a donation. I hate right-wing religious lunatics who pretend to be Christians.

A Nuisance Call To End Them All

About six minutes ago, my telephone rang and the caller ID window showed 202-677-3013, listed as FEDR-2011 RSC. I've discovered calls identified like that are usually robo-calls and public opinion surveys, so I picked up. Whoop-ti-fucking-doo -- the voice I heard belongs to sex addict Herman "Sugar" Cain. Pie Daddy went into his spiel about turning America around and restoring her greatness, yada, yada, yada, then asked me if he could count on my support. I answered NO to that one, so he asked me to take a short opinion poll for demographic purposes. Questions about sanctity of life, sanctity of marriage, American greatness, yada, yada, yada.

It's too bad I was only hearing Pie Daddy's recorded voice instead of the godfather himself. I would've loved to say something like "F--- you, you worthless mother----er, and no, you aren't getting one mother----ing dime from me, you sorry piece of s---."

Rogue's Gallery

The Daily Beast has published its list of America's ten most misinformed leaders. It's a bipartisan list and includes all the usual suspects. Number one on the list shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who's been following politics recently. Actually, calling the politicians on the list misinformed is a polite way of saying that they spread misinformation, either out of ignorance or because it suits them to lie like dogs.

K. Parker and I agree

Kathleen Parker: Dumbed down by infomania

It isn't only Too Much Information, but the pitch and tenor of delivery that have us in a persistent state of psychic frenzy. From cable news to microblogs to the latest – Fox Nation – life's background music has become one prolonged car alarm.

The link leads to a column by Kathleen Parker. Generally, Parker and I are on opposite sides where political matters are concerned. Sometimes she'll surprise me, though -- as in her columns last year criticizing Trig's mom. All in all, she's one of a small number of conservatives I can tolerate in limited doses.

In the column, she writes about the corrosive effects of the information overload we're currently experiencing. I tend to agree with her point, and am finding that I need regular opportunities to cool down. After reading page after page of evangelunical tirades on the two "Big E" issues (Embryonic stem cells and Evolution), I realize I definitely need a break.

The people "speak"

Spare us, Mr. Simmons. Wing nuts will whine and cry like toddlers no matter what Obama does. When he doesn't provide information it is "What is he hiding?" When he does it is "Shouldn't he be working?" What Obama really should do is stop listening to the Republicans who got us into this mess in the first place. You can't find a bipartisan consensus with a party whose leadership wants the country to fail.

Comment by "John" at Austin American Statesman opinion page, March 18th

The statement above was copied from a comment board at the Statesman website, in reponse to a letter by Ken Simmons complaining that Obama wasn't keeping all of his campaign promises and was making too many public appearances. I posted this for my own use, to remind me there are still perceptive Texans who'll even add comments on message boards now and then.

Unfortunately, people like "John" are a minority on the websites I view regularly (Houston, Dallas, and Austin), each of which has six or seven yahoos and dipshits pounding out the same drivel they absorb from AM radio, day after day after day. I can ignore them automatically based strictly on screen names. Many times, the longest comments will be the most illiterate. I've cut back on lurking because it takes so much time to scroll through their horseshit trying to find anything I can agree with. Sometimes I'll stumble upon an entry so mind-numbingly stupid and poorly written that I'll quote and ridicule it on my own blogs, which is one reason I'm lurking in the first place. But overexposure to reader comments, like listening to too much AM talk radio, can be a mental health hazard.

Another big letdown

Wonkette: The D.C. Gossip » Blog Archive » Moonie Times: Jon Voight’s Insane Op-Ed Rant Against Barack Obama

Things like this just break my heart. I've seen numerous movies with Jon Voight over the last forty years or so, starting with Midnight Cowboy. I always liked him and thought he was kind of cool. Like we all do, he got older and stopped getting starring roles, but went the character actor route and starting playing bad guys and cameo parts. Last picture I saw him in was the remake of The Manchurian Candidate, not a classic like the original Frank Sinatra movie but still worth seeing.

I never had the impression that Jon Voight was a hardcore rightwinger. In fact, when he was younger, I'd have picked him to be the exact opposite. Now he's writing opinion pieces for The Washington Times, one of the linchpins of the conservative noise factory. Limbaugh quotes from it all the time. I'm not bothered by Voight's low opinion of Obama; hell, I'm not that crazy about the guy myself. But cutting down Wes Clark is three or four steps over the line.

This caught me off guard; I was unprepared for it. Like a kick in the groin.