From Pine View Farm

May, 2013 archive

Twits on Twitter 0

They flock together.

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“SMiShing” 0

Phishing comes to cell phones.

Like “phishing” scams, which seek personal information over the phone or via e-mail, “SMiShing” uses text messages, technically called “Short Messaging Service,” to fraudulently acquire sensitive personal information.

Sorrell’s office is reminding consumers to be wary of text messages and calls they did not initiate. And consumers should never give out personal information to an unverified source.

All the computer security in the world can’t overcome stupid.

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Be polite to your pre-school.

Following a report that a 4-year-old child brought a loaded handgun to a local preschool last month, the Kennebec County District Attorney’s Office has asked for more information to determine whether to bring charges.

Hallowell Police Chief Eric Nason said a staff member found the loaded .380 caliber, semi-automatic handgun in a bag brought to Rollins Family Child Care Center on Litchfield Road. Nason said the gun’s safety was on but a round was in the chamber.

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“An Act of Blogging” 0

Noz explains.

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Shenanigans 0

Called here.

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QOTD 0

Theodore Roosevelt:

A man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car, but if he has a university education he may steal the whole railroad.

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A Tale of Two Depressions 2

Donald Kaul points out, one more time, that the past is not even past, in a particularly depressing context:

Further reading has convinced me that the instance wasn’t isolated. Virtually everything about the economic catastrophe of the 1930s has a precise parallel in today’s major political dilemmas.

Conservative leaders, then as now, were absolutely clueless as to what regular people were going through. There’s a reason they call what we’ve just experienced the “Great Recession” and the 1930s economy the “Great Depression.” The Depression was much more devastating, with 13-15 million people unemployed, leaving as many as 34 million men, women, and children with no income at all.

Their safety net was often a garbage heap in which they foraged for food, or worse, begged for it. Yet President Herbert Hoover actually said: “Nobody is actually starving. The hobos, for example, are better fed than they have ever been.”

And when it was suggested that the Du Pont family’s corporation sponsor a Sunday afternoon program during the Depression, a member of the clan rejected the idea on grounds that “at three o’clock on Sunday afternoons, everybody is playing polo.”

Does that sound like Mitt Romney talking to his country club friends or what?

Read the rest.

Via The Progressive Populist.

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Hey! Rube-io! 1

Marco Rubio wants the Commissioner of the IRS to resign.

There is one slight problem.

There isn’t one.

The IRS commissioner during the probe was Donald Shulman, a holdover from the Bush administration. He left his job last November. There’s an acting commissioner right now, but he assumed his acting role well after the Cincinnati probe ended. The position of IRS commissioner is vacant, which may explain why Rubio’s letter calls for “the IRS Commissioner’s resignation” but doesn’t name whom Rubio wants to resign. Does he want the acting commissioner to resign? The old commissioner to re-resign? Appoint a new commissioner and then force that person to immediately resign?

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TSA Security Theatre 0

This is just stupid.

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The Tin-Foil Heat Brigade 5

You can’t make this stuff up.

A man who apparently thought that a pistol wrapped in aluminum foil would be undetectable to airport X-ray machines is facing a federal criminal charge for allegedly trying to smuggle the loaded weapon on a flight from San Francisco to Europe.

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Many Sappy Returns 0

I haven’t said anything about the IRS “scandal” because I don’t understand it.

Let Lawrence O’Donnell explain it to both of us.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

As I suspected, there seems to be rather an absence of there, there.

Via The Richmonder.

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Get Your Politeness on Line 0

It’s sort of like mail order gun nut viagra:

The number of non-Virginians obtaining state-issued concealed handgun permits has boomed in the four years since Ken Cuccinelli sponsored legislation making it clear that online testing meets the legal training requirement for them.

A local gun shop markets on-line training courses which residents in states with reciprocity agreements with Virginia can use to meet safety training requirements.

It makes as much sense as getting a driver’s license after learning to drive in Second Life.

Much more at the link.

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Benghazi Bugaloo 0

Shrink showing inkblots to Republican elephant; elephant keeps shouting

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QOTD 0

Ben Jonson:

Bad men excuse their faults, good men will leave them.

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Both Sides Not 0

Zandar searches for symmetry.

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Facebook Frolics, Phoning It In Dept. 2

El Reg:

Facebook’s experiment with branded hardware may be coming to an abrupt end, according to a report that AT&T is discontinuing sales of the HTC First handset after finding that people won’t buy it – even for 99 cents.

Another stop on the road to AOLville.

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Tom Friedman, Private Sloth Sleuth 2

Client consults Tom Friedman, Private Detective, who doesn't listen, gets everything wrong, and then charges a fee.

The next six frames are crucial.

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Penguins in Space 0

Heh (emphasis added).tuxspace_scaled

Manager of the Space Operations Computing (SpOC) for NASA Keith Chuvala is on the record saying, “We migrated key functions from Windows to Linux because we needed an operating system that was stable and reliable — one that would give us in-house control. So if we needed to patch, adjust, or adapt, we could.”

You can follow their lead. It’s free.

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The Past Is Not Past, It’s Sanfordized 0

You remember, of course, that, for something to be Sanfordized, it must be taken to the cleaners.

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Benghazi Bugaloo 0

Afterthought:

I think the speculation about Hilary Clinton’s running in the next presidential election is Firebagger wishful thinking combined with Republican paranoia and a dash of news media desperation.

She’ll be 69 years old in 2016. That doesn’t mean she couldn’t do it either mentally or physically, but I think it’s unlikely that she’ll want to.

Just my two cents.

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