Bob Jensen's Tidbits

In the October 10 Edition of Tidbits I showed three mountain ranges are visible of the left side of our living room.
I did not show our right-side closest mountains (Cannon, Three Graces, North Kinsman, and South Kinsman).
The above picture on shows these six closest mountains. The ski tram building is visible on top of Cannon.
Cannon Mountain is the home base of World Cup Champion Bode Miller who grew up in Cannon's shadows.
This week there's snow building up on Cannon. We sometimes watch the skiers through binoculars.

Online Video, Slide Shows, and Audio
In the past I've provided links to various types of music and video available free on the Web.
I created a page that summarizes those various links --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/music.htm

Video from the Liberal Left Asserting that the Taliban is the Best of the Bad Alternatives for the Future --- http://www.thenation.com/doc/20061030/parenti_video
Jensen Comment
The prediction is that the U.S., Canada, and the rest of NATO will weary of fighting terrorism and let the Taliban and as Qaeda have Afghanistan.

Note how the women never even look up at this office male silliness --- Click Here

Online Books, Poems, References, and Other Literature
In the past I've provided links to various types electronic literature available free on the Web.
I created a page that summarizes those various links --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm

The Literary Encyclopedia is an expanding global literary reference work written by over 1400 specialists from universities around the world, and currently provides over 3550 authoritative profiles of authors, works and literary and historical topics. We will provide over 3800 by the end of this year and aim to publish at least 800 new profiles (circa 1.6m words) in the next 15 months. We also list nearly 19,000 works by date, country and genre, and provide advanced software tools. Membership costs only $17.95 for a full year (circa £10.00 or € 14.50) and helps us to build this valuable resource. In May 2006 we delivered over 1.8m pages to over 500,000 visits.
The Literary Encyclopedia --- http://www.litencyc.com/

Why don't you shut the f**k up! If you can't take a joke, why don't you leave and get your money back.
Barbara Streisand in concert in New York City on October 10, 2006
Jensen Comment
This will endure as Streisand's most unforgettable, albeit not beloved, quotation.
Increasingly children think foul language is cool. It's not cool to be a profane role model Barbara!
Adults who inspire millions of children to talk like this are lowlifes.

Charlotte Church (immensely more profane than Streisand) has a new talk show in England, where she plays a profanity-spewing hostess who is part Rosie O'Donnell, part Keith Olbermann (she has bashed President Bush as 'clueless' and a 'twat') and completely unhinged. The pilot episode featured Charlotte calling Pope Benedict XVI a Nazi, dressing as a nun and pretending to hallucinate while eating communion wafers imprinted with smiley faces…
Michelle Malkin, "Where have all the good girls gone?" WorldNetDaily, September 27, 2006 --- http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=52163
Jensen Comment
Michelle Malkin's critical commentary on Charlotte Church's bad behavior made her (Michelle) an Internet assault target --- http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=52430
I wonder who would be the target if Charlotte Church dared to portray a Muslim leader as a Nazi! BBC wisely will not allow Charlotte Church to criticize Muslims --- only Christians, Jews, and the U.S. coalition forces.
You can listen to foul-mouthed Charlotte Church masquerading as an sweet-voiced angel at http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/music/sites/charlottechurch/
(Click on the listing under Media Clips)

I have lived as a philosopher and die as a Christian.
Giacomo Cassanova (de Seingalt) (1725-1798). Purported to be the last words of a lecher who became a self-proclaimed philosopher ---
Click Here
Jensen Comment
I think Cassanova made a mistake on his death bed. It would have been better, especially in his case, to look forward to owning 78 virgin slaves in the afterlife.

[S]cientists must be ever so careful when talking to reporters, especially those not trained in science or who are working on a tight deadline. Scientific progress can be halting, technically dense, often incomplete and filled with caveats. The scientific story is often messy, with lingering doubts, rival hypotheses, and always lots more work to be done (because the more we learn, the more we realize we have yet to learn). Reporters, on the other hand, want a neat story, simply told and unambiguous in its meaning. Reporters also love a controversy, and (in the interests of ‘fair and balanced’ reporting) will often present two opposing viewpoints with equal weight, even when the scientific community overwhelmingly endorses just one conclusion.
Robert Hazen as quoted by Michael Bugeja, "Sound Science or Sound Bite?" Inside Higher Ed, October 10, 2006 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2006/10/10/bugeja

Correspondent Haggai Huberman reports on a new phenomenon among the Arabs of Judea and Samaria: Youths carry knives or small bombs across checkpoints in order to get themselves arrested so that they can study for high school matriculation exams at the State of Israel's expense. Sitting in jail for a number of weeks or months is a small price to pay, and the returns are significant: A high school diploma, and a high social standing as a "freed terrorist." Huberman notes that earlier this week, IDF soldiers reported that they had thwarted an attack in the northern Shomron when they arrested two 19-year-old boys carrying two pipebombs of one kilogram (2.2 lbs.) each. However, the IDF later concluded that the boys were merely trying to get arrested for the purpose of matriculation exams, and that the pipebombs were not designed to cause significant damage.
Hillel Fendel, "Four Kassams In and Near Sderot; Faking Terror to Graduate," Israel Nation News, October 12, 2006 --- http://israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=113448

A HUNDRED YEARS AGO 100 WHITE MEN CHASING A BLACK MAN WAS CALLED THE KU KLUX KLAN, TODAY IT'S CALLED THE PGA TOUR.
Author unknown

The world is already filled with too many spoiled brats who didn't hear "no" and "don't" enough when they were young. Now they're grown up with kids of their own, and those kids will only turn out more spoiled than their parents, especially if they're in the Australian day care system.
Erik Deckers, "How to Raise a Spoiled Child," The Irascible Professor, October 5, 2006 ---
http://irascibleprofessor.com/comments-10-05-06.htm

Akira Haraguchi, 60, needed more than 16 hours to recite the number to 100,000 decimal places, breaking his personal best of 83,431 digits set in 1995, his office said Wednesday. He made the attempt at a public hall in Kisarazu, just east of Tokyo.
ABC News, October 4, 2006 --- http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2525927

But here in the parched canyons along the Yellow River known as the Loess Plateau, some parents with dead bachelor sons will go a step further. To ensure a son’s contentment in the afterlife, some grieving parents will search for a dead woman to be his bride and, once a corpse is obtained, bury the pair together as a married couple.
Jim Yardly, "Dead Bachelors in Remote China Still Find Wives," The New York Times, October 5, 2006 --- Click Here
Jensen Comment
And if both of them were buried in Texas, they'd be allowed to vote.

What I'm doing today is doing what I'm doing now: I'm educating a new generation in the CIA that the Muslim Brotherhood was a fascist organization that was hired by Western intelligence that evolved over time into what we today know as al-Qaeda. Here's how the story began. In the 1920s there was a young Egyptian named al Bana. And al Bana formed this nationalist group called the Muslim Brotherhood. Al Bana was a devout admirer of Adolph Hitler and wrote to him frequently. So persistent was he in his admiration of the new Nazi Party that in the 1930s, al-Bana and the Muslim Brotherhood became a secret arm of Nazi intelligence.
John Loftus, "The Muslim Brotherhood, Nazis and Al-Qaeda," Canada Free Press, October 11, 2006 --- http://www.canadafreepress.com/2006/loftus101106.htm

Are China and Russia Secretly Behind This Latest North Korean Nuclear Extortion Scheme?

"Russia might have given know-how of miniature nukes to N. Korea" Kong Sung-jin, a S. Korean opposition lawmaker at Intelligence Committee of National Assembly, told on Oct. 11, "We have intelligence that the reason why Russia is the first nation N. Korea gave advance warning of its nuclear test is because Russia gave N. Korea technology for miniaturizing nukes. They are trying to verify the allegation." Legislator Kong appeared on 'Open World Today with Chang Sung-min,' a news talk show of Pyong-hwa Radio . . .
""Russia might have given N. Korea know-how of miniature nukes" Chosun.com, October 11, 2006 ---
http://www.chosun.com/politics/news/200610/200610110236.html

Few realize that whatever it was that North Korea detonated on Sunday, it packed barely the explosive force of a 10-yard cube of explosive fertilizer. A hundred thousand bucks' worth of ammonium nitrate could produce much the same bang. Far larger quantities of explosives have gone off accidentally in the last century. Sometimes, these big booms claimed thousands of victims, as at Texas City in 1948. Sometimes, they took only one -- the night watchman of the fertilizer plant in Toulouse that disappeared from the face of the Earth in 2001.
Russell Seitz, "Parody Physics Package?" The Wall Street Journal, October 13, 2006; Page A12 --- Click Here

When the bulky page proofs for Myra MacPherson’s ”All Governments Lie”: The Life and Times of Rebel Journalist I.F. Stone, published by Scribner, landed on my desk a couple of months back, I started reading it while wearing, so to speak, two different hats . . . A few pages later in The Best of I.F. Stone, you can read an account of visiting Moscow following Krushchev’s famous “de-Stalinization” speech. The visiting journalist tells Soviet citizens that the “thaw” will mean nothing if they don’t acquire the right of habeas corpus. Fifty years have passed. There must be people who can read that passage now without tears in their eyes. But given the news lately, I am not one of them.
Scott McLemee, "Like a Rock," Inside Higher Ed, October 11, 2006 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2006/10/11/mclemee

There are two kinds of rogue dictators: the successful kind, who stay in office by playing major powers off against each other; and the failures, who overreach, unite the world against them and thereby summon the forces of regime change. Until Monday, Kim Jong-Il seemed to fit into the first category. But things have now changed. As Con Coughlin of the Daily Telegraph notes, thanks to Pyongyang's underground nuclear test, "The world's leaders have finally found something on which they can all agree."
"Kim Jong-Il's explosive mistake," Canada's National Post, October 10, 2006 --- Click Here

Jensen Comment
I totally disagree! I speculate that current Russian and Chinese protests over Kim's nuclear test are a theatrical sham. It seems more likely in my suspicious mind that Russia and China are secretly conspiring with the Great Leader Comrade Kim Jong-Il in his effort to extort billions from the West to shore up the sinking North Korean economy. Without those added billions, Russia and China will have to bear more and more of the cost of saving a faltering communist ally. It was an extortion ploy that worked when Bill Clinton was President of the United States. Now we'll see whether media coverage and world pressures force President Bush to pay similar extortion fees in a costly effort to shore up U.S. image at home and abroad.

Note that although China signed off on the recent U.N. sanctions of North Korea, China refused to allow U.S. inspections of goods being shipped to North Korea through China. That way China can still allow any goods to be shipped, including military goods.

The old regimes in Russia and China are still in a Cold War with the West. We're just afraid to look behind the facades being held up by totalitarian superpowers still bent on bringing down the United States. The tactics of cold war shifted to economic tactics since President Reagan prematurely claimed a Cold War victory. What's scary about the latest heating up of the old Cold War is that there will probably be a growing number of fanatical jihad players in nuclear posturing are not controllable in the long-term by Russia, China, the U.S. and other superpowers. The problem is that Russia and China still have the old Cold War mentality that will get them, and us, into dangerous brinksmanship like the world has never known.

If China and Russia seriously want to snuff out North Korea's nuclear ambitions, all they have to do is threaten to cut off military aid to North Korea. That probably won't happen (except maybe in false media reports). North Korea insists that it wants unilateral negotiations with the U.S. North Korea does not want China and Russia included at the bargaining, because the U.S. might insist that China and Russia really cut off military aid as part of a packaged deal. North Korea prefers to dupe President Bush out of cash, power plants, oil, food, and other payoffs like it extorted out of President Clinton. Kim's dream is win control over all of Korea --- North and South. China's dream is to bleed the U.S. into bankruptcy. Russia should be more careful about its own long-term strategy in light of the "Midwife" document below that is circulating in China.

The media clamors that Iran and/or al-Qaeda will buy nukes from North Korea if the U.S. does not give in to Kim's extortion demands. It will be many years before North Korea's low-tech nukes are worth Kim's price (billions). I would instead worry about the Russian Mafia who will probably charge less for high-tech nukes on the black market whenever Vladimir Putin decides the time is right.

At the moment Putin seems content to watch us throw billions ($335 billion to date) each day fighting a losing war with Iran in Iraq --- http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182

Important and Revealing Document about China's Military-Leader Strategy
Germany’s dream to be the “lord of the earth” failed, because ultimately, history did not bestow this great mission upon them. But the three lessons Germany learned from experience are what we (in China) ought to remember as we complete our historic mission and revitalize our race. The three lessons are: Firmly grasp the country’s living space, firmly grasp the Party’s control over the nation, and firmly grasp the general direction toward becoming the “lord of the earth.”
"War Is Not Far from Us and Is the Midwife of the Chinese Century Leading CCP official argues for exterminating U.S. population," by Chi Haotian, The Epoch Times (a Falungong newspaper) ---
http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/5-8-8/31055.html
Jensen Comment
China tightly controls what is allowed to circulate on the Internet. A genuine expert on China tells me that the Chinese government allowed this "Midwife" racist document to circulate throughout China. It's revealing of the long-term strategy of some of the present military leaders in China. Nuclear extortion of the U.S. may well be one of the tactics under this strategy where North Korea is dancing with puppet strings.

It's enough now to observe that the diplomacy continued but led to nothing, as it had to, for it was based on the fundamentally false and unworkable premise that countries that insist on having nuclear weapons can prevent proliferation by those who don't, a process that a French defense minister once described as trying to "castrate the impotent." The indivisibility of the nuclear dilemma that Americans felt after Hiroshima and the chill in their bones that everyone now feels again is also a feature of the arsenals that produce the chill. They are all the progeny of the same scientific formulas and technical inventions, and for more than sixty years, they have been summoning one another into existence, terror provoking counterterror, bomb dueling bomb. And it is not, of course, North Korea's tiny arsenal that can lay waste continents and bring on nuclear winter; it is the arsenals of the United States and Russia, not to speak of England, France, China, Pakistan, India and Israel, about none of which anyone seems to have had a great deal to say recently.
Jonathan Schell, "Shock Waves From Kilju, The Nation, October 11, 2006 --- http://www.thenation.com/doc/20061030/schell
Jensen Comment
That's not to say that Russian and China could not put an end nuclear development in Iran and North Korea if Sino Soviet superpowers were not still playing cold war games with the U.S. Instead they're using Iran and North Korea to bleed the U.S. economy and weaken our resolve for spreading democracy and freedom of speech around the world. Democracy is a very fragile form of government in the earliest stages of development in the Middle East, Far East, Africa, and South America. I really think that Bush and Cheney at one time thought, naively, that Russia and China would allow democracy to take hold in their own countries and elsewhere in the world. It's time to face up to reality and stop playing into the hands of communist states who changed only in name and have never truly allowed the first requisite of democracy --- freedom of speech!

Having said this, I must admit that the U.S. is not lily pure in pursuit of democracy. History is replete with our willingness to back "friendly" corrupt dictators, especially in Latin America and South America as well as totally corrupt warlords in Afghanistan. And our multinational business firms have exploited commodity and labor resources under false pretenses in many instances. The big difference in the U.S. is that the world media is free to bring our misdeeds to light.

The problem with free speech is increasingly that of separating fact from fiction.

Statistical analysis or politics?
The MSM had a field day on October 11 with two reports. The first was by a Johns Hopkins scientist, suggesting that there have been more than 600,000 civilian deaths in Iraq during the current conflict - a full order of magnitude greater than the US-government estimate of 30-50,000. Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic & International Studies criticized the way the estimate was derived and noted that the results were released shortly before the Nov. 7 election." They're almost certainly way too high. This is not analysis, this is politics," Cordesman said.
"Rumsfeld, Casey Reject Reports on Iraqi Civilian Deaths, Troop Levels," by Mark Finkelstein, Newsbusters, October 12, 2006 --- http://newsbusters.org/node/8269

At a separate Pentagon briefing, Gen. George Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said that the figure "seems way, way beyond any number that I have seen. I've not seen a number higher than 50,000. And so I don't give it that much credibility at all."
San Francisco Chronicle, October 12, 2006 ---
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/10/12/MNGUTLNP6C1.DTL

Jensen Comment
Given the present hostilities, I would not place much faith on a survey conducted by eight Iraqi physicians who surveyed 1,849 Iraqi families leading to the estimate of over 600,000 deaths. Statisticians sometimes place too much faith in the inference numbers and formulas rather than the prejudices of the respondents. I suspect that disgruntled Iraqi respondents inflated the numbers when given an opportunity to rid Iraq of the U.S. infidels.

It's a shame if Russia and China grow militarily impatient for the fall of the U.S. The U.S. will bring itself to bankruptcy if our Congress is given just a little more time to mortgage our future generations --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/entitlements.htm

With their record over the past few years, the Big Government Republicans in Washington do not merit the support of conservatives. They have busted the federal budget for generations to come with the prescription-drug benefit and the creation and expansion of other programs. They have brought forth a limitless flow of pork for the sole, immoral purpose of holding onto office. They have expanded government regulation into every aspect of our lives and refused to deal seriously with mounting domestic problems such as illegal immigration. They have spent more time seeking the favors of K Street lobbyists than listening to the conservatives who brought them to power. And they have sunk us into the very sort of nation-building war that candidate George W. Bush promised to avoid, while ignoring rising threats such as communist China and the oil-rich “new Castro,” Hugo Chavez.
Richard A. Viguerie, "The show must not go on," The Washington Monthly, October 2006 --- http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0610.viguerie.html

"Book Argues for Retaking the 'Conservative Soul'," by Robert Siegel, NPR, October 12, 2006 --- http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6253752

Naturally The Washington Post Says It's All Bush's Fault
"Bush's 'Axis of Evil' Comes Back to Haunt United States," by Glenn Kessler and Peter Baker, The Washington Post, October 10, 2006 --- Click Here

"Whaddaya Know: Thomas Friedman Says It's Not All Bush's Fault ," by Mark Finkelstein, Newsbusters, October 11, 2006 --- http://newsbusters.org/node/8234

Question
What's the main reason a New Media emerged in the face of the Old Media?

"New Media A Weapon in New World Of Politics," by John F. Harris, The Washington Post, October 6, 2006 ---
Click Here

In Taking On Fox, Democrats See Reward in the Risk
The attacks represent a new twist on the Democrats’ complicated dance with the cable news channel. Though Fox News maintains that its reporting is down the middle, Democrats have long complained that the news channel operates like a public relations outpost of the Bush White House. But never before has that anger built into a mad-as-hell-and-not-going-to-take-it-any-more moment, and spilled over in such naked and sustained fashion onto Fox News itself.
Lorne Manly, "In Taking On Fox, Democrats See Reward in the Risk," The New York Times, October 1, 1006 --- http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/01/weekinreview/01manley.html

On October 5 Fox interviewed Ian Bremmer, author of The J Curve: A New Way to Understand Why Nations Rise and Fall. Bremmer is a very articulate speaker. His discussion helped me better understand that some of the nutty things expounded by leaders of rogue nations (e.g., "there was no WW II holocaust") are largely played for internal political purposes in spite of how poorly their nutty outbursts play outside their own nations. Bremmer was also interviewed by John Stewart on Comedy Central, but the interviewer degenerated into silliness --- which I guess is to be expected on Comedy Central. Actually John did a better job interviewing Pervez Musharaf.

Hunger Strikes at Guantanamo Bay Are Rare
Fueled by a high-calorie diet, detainees at Guantanamo Bay are becoming fat. Most of the prisoners arrived at the military prison in southeast Cuba slightly underweight but have since gained an average of 20 pounds (9 kilograms), and most are now "normal to mildly overweight or mildly obese," Navy Cmdr. Robert Durand, spokesman for the detention facilities, said Monday.
Michael Malia, "Fueled by a high-calorie diet, detainees at Guantanamo Bay are becoming fat," ABC News, October 3, 2006 --- http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=2521953&page=1

Canadian troops find it hard to "smoke" out the Taliban in this jungle
Canadian troops fighting Taliban militants in Afghanistan have stumbled across an unexpected and potent enemy -- almost impenetrable forests of 10-feet (three metre) high marijuana plants. General Rick Hillier, chief of the Canadian defence staff, said on Thursday that Taliban fighters were using the forests as cover. In response, the crew of at least one armored car had camouflaged their vehicle with marijuana.
"Canada troops battle 10-ft Afghan marijuana plants," Yahoo News, October 12, 2006 --- Click Here

From Opinion Journal, on October 13, 2006
The Taliban are at an advantage here, since they have plenty of experience with getting stoned. http://www.rawa.org/stoning.htm

Even physical sex with Congressional pages doesn't necessarily get you kicked out of Congress
Gerry Eastman Studds . . . served as a Congressman for Massachusetts beginning in 1973. He was the first openly homosexual member of the US Congress and, more generally, the first openly gay national politician in the US. In 1983, he admitted to having had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old male page and was censured by the House of Representatives. In spite of this Congressman Studds was repeatedly re-elected and served another 14 years until 1997.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerry_Studds
Jensen Added Comment
A 17-year old is considered to be of legal age for consentual sex, but that does not protect Congressional representatives from censure. Dan Crane, who in 1983 had sex with a 17-year old female page, was also censured. But Crane, unlike Studds, was not re-elected to Congress. Most states set the legal age at 16 years of age and over.

Question
If Mark Foley had been a public school teacher, how difficult would it be to fire him for sending sexually explicit email messages to his students?

"How to Fire an Incompetent Teacher: An illustrated guide to New York's public school bureaucracy," by John Stossel (one of my media heroes), Reason Magazine, October 2006 --- http://www.reason.com/0610/fe.js.how.shtml

Also see
"A History of Sex With Students, Unchallenged," by David Kocieniewski, The New York Times, October 10, 2006 ---
Click Here

Say What? Has the Voting Rights Act gone this far in Mississippi?
Ike Brown, chairman of the Democratic Executive Committee of Noxubee County, Miss., faces a federal suit. MACON, Miss., Oct. 5 — The Justice Department has chosen this no-stoplight, courthouse town buried in the eastern Mississippi prairie for an unusual civil rights test: the first federal lawsuit under the Voting Rights Act accusing blacks of suppressing the rights of whites.
Adam Nositer, "U.S. Says Blacks in Mississippi Suppress White Vote," The New York Times, October 11, 2006 --- http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/us/politics/11voting.html

Rosa Robota has gone down in Jewish Holocaust history as a heroine for her actions involving the smuggling of black powder (schwartzpulver) into Auschwitz. This product was made into explosives which were used during the famous Sonderkommando Revolt. Although this prisoner-uprising failed to stop the wheels of death at Auschwitz, Crematorium IV was successfully destroyed by the demolition. In addition, the prisoners in Auschwitz for a brief moment, showed the Germans they were capable of resistance - even in this most extreme of environments. The actions by Rosa were ones for which she gave up her life - for she was caught, interrogated, tortured and then executed by the SS in Auschwitz.
"ROSA ROBOTA: HEROINE OF AUSCHWITZ --- http://www.datasync.com/~davidg59/rosa.html
This link was forwarded by Naomi Ragen [nragen@netvision.net.il]

Many Liberal Elitists Going Out of State for Wal-Mart shopping
Here's a simple test for the wealthy, liberal elites in Massachusetts who oppose Wal-Mart ("Seeking Growth in Urban Areas, Wal-Mart Gets Cold Shoulder," WSJ, page one, Sept. 25): Visit the New Hampshire shopping centers near the Massachusetts border and check out the high volume of cars with Bay State license plates and "Impeach Bush" bumper stickers. Turns out that even Massachusetts liberals like tax-free shopping and, if given the chance, would flock to Wal-Mart's low prices.
Michael Paranzino, "Are Some Liberal Elitists Sneaking Into Wal-Mart?" The Wall Street Journal, October 5, 2006; Page A21 --- Click Here
Jensen Comment
I live 10 miles from a Wal-Mart in northern New Hampshire that has the highest sales revenue per square foot relative to all Wal-Mart stores in the U.S. The main reason is the sea of green license plates in the parking lot (Vermont license plates are green.) Vermont is one of the nation's more liberal states that bans building of more Wal-Mart stores in addition to having a sales tax. New Hampshire has not sales tax.

Jensen Warning
Microsoft's new version of Internet Explorer is due to be released sometime this month. In addition to the usual problems that arise with new versions of Microsoft software, this upgrade may be more troublesome according to Wired News --- http://blog.wired.com/monkeybites/2006/10/why_internet_ex.html

Face-to-Face With Microsoft: Google's Free Word Processing and Spreadsheet Software is Now Available ---
Click Here

Here's another way airlines are cheating you!
The increase raises several questions about the long-held airline practice of selling more tickets for a flight than there are seats on the plane. For one: The DOT requires that airlines compensate passengers for bumping them off flights, but the maximum amount of $400 was set in 1978 and hasn't changed. Had the maximum amount been adjusted for inflation, it would be more than $1,200 today. And some argue that since the last tickets sold are usually the most expensive, airlines have too much incentive to sell $1,000 tickets when no seats are available if the penalty is only $400 to bump a cheaper-fare passenger.
Scott McCartney, "More Fliers Forced To Give Up Seats: Overbookings Surge as Airlines Trim Schedules; Passenger Compensation Unchanged Since 1978," The Wall Street Journal, October 10, 2006 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116043869972187538.html?mod=todays_us_personal_journal

"The Organic Myth: Pastoral ideals are getting trampled as organic food goes mass market," Business Week, October 18, 2006 --- Click Here

The Non-Organic Reality That Might Force McDonald's Corporation into Bankruptcy
(if billions of former customers join in this legal lottery)

Question
What made the old Sony Walkman better than all new "audiobooks" for the blind?

As a library trying to implement digital audiobooks for our patrons, the dreadful state of player technology presents us with a serious obstacle ("Getting an Earful of Printed Words -- Downloads, Small Devices Draw a Wider Audience of Audiobook Listeners," Personal Journal, Sept. 28). The nearly 30-year-old Sony Walkman is easy to grasp and can be used by anyone with about 10 seconds of training. The controls can be manipulated with ease in the dark or by a blind person. It is cheap, reliable and has a consistent form factor. But the new, portable digital media players, regardless of price and maker, suffer from overengineering, and their features are focused on the music customer, ignoring the needs of the audio book user. None of the new devices can be used by the blind or visually impaired because the controls have no tactile feedback, are multifunction and ridiculously small. The displays, when they exist, are too small even for people with good eyesight. The process of downloading the book, transferring it to the device and then trying to keep your place while "reading" over a series of hours, days or weeks is daunting to the best and impossible for many. Many users give up after trying it once or twice.
Vern Mastel, "New Audiobook Technology Frustrates Blind Listeners," The Wall Street Journal, October 7, 2006 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116017662453985426.html?mod=todays_us_opinion

"The Best B-Schools Of 2006," Business Week Cover Story (Complete with a slide show), October 23, 2006 --- Click Here

Question
What makes the Sansa Rhapsody something other than an iPod clone and is this a good thing?

"The New iPod: Ready for Battle? We Test Apple's Latest Revamp As Microsoft Challenge Looms; iTunes Gets Gussied Up, To," by Walter S. Mossberg and Katherine Boehret, The Wall Street Journal, October 4, 2006; Page D1 --- http://online.wsj.com/article/the_mossberg_solution.html