From Pine View Farm

2017 archive

Geeking Out 0

Virtual Machines of Windows 7 and SolusOS running in VirtualBox on Slackware –Current.

Screenshot

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Sanctifying Stupid 0

Warning: Language.

Aside:

Paul said, “Faith is the evidence of things unseen.”

He did not say that it is the disproof of things seen.

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Speechless 0

The voice of Jay Ward Cartoons has passed away.

Cast of Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoon characters in tears as empty speech bubbles float over their heads.

Click for the original image.

I would argue that Rocky and Bullwinkle, in their continual struggle against Boris, Natasha, and FL, offered, beneath masterful puns, silliness, and absurdity, some of the most perceptive commentary on the political theatre of their time, much of it still valid today.

Not half an hour ago I was quoting my favorite line, one that still rings true:

In the Pentagon, there was General Consternation . . . and his entire staff.

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“Not Political Footballs” 0

In the far western corner of Virginia, there is an annual event called the Remote Area Medical Expedition at Wise. Doctors, dentists, nurses, and many other volunteer their time to treat persons who otherwise have no access to health care.

In The Roanoke Times, Dr. Ralph Northam, current Virginia Lieutenant Governor, writes eloquently of his experience there this year. Here’s a bit:

Both federal and state policymakers should also not lose sight of the enormous stress this (Trumpcare–ed.) debate is putting on millions of Virginians. A woman I met at Wise underscored this to me after I diagnosed her daughter.

She was scared, but not about her plan for treatment. She was scared her daughter would be unable to get health insurance because she now had a pre-existing condition. This is a mother and child. These are our friends, our neighbors. They are not political footballs.

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A Worst Class Scout 0

Jack Ohman preview the new Donald Trump Memorial Edition Boy Scout Handbook.

View the video at its original location.

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How Far Will Wells-Fargo? 0

Apparently, pretty damned far.

Scandal-plagued Wells Fargo is back in hot water for signing customers up for products that they didn’t need or want. This time it’s auto insurance, and the bank says it may have cost about 20,000 people their cars.

San Francisco-based Wells Fargo acknowledged late Thursday that it enrolled roughly 570,000 auto loan borrowers for what’s known as collateral production insurance on their vehicles when the customers already had appropriate insurance. It will pay $80 million in refunds and account adjustments to those people.

If my father were alive today, he would be ashamed of the industry that he worked in for two decades.

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Sculpted Features 0

Picture of Mt. Rushmore with the rear end of a horse to the right of Lincoln.  Caption:  Adding Trump to Mt. Rushmore.

Via Job’s Anger.

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QOTD 0

John Buchan:

The dividing line between wish and need was never clear.

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Political Hacks 0

El Reg reports on how easy it is to hack American voting machines. A snippet:

This year at the DEF CON hacking conference in Las Vegas, 30 computer-powered ballot boxes used in American elections were set up in a simulated national White House race – and hackers got to work physically breaking the gear open to find out what was hidden inside.

In less than 90 minutes, the first cracks in the systems’ defenses started appearing, revealing an embarrassing low level of security. Then one was hacked wirelessly.

“Without question, our voting systems are weak and susceptible. Thanks to the contributions of the hacker community today, we’ve uncovered even more about exactly how,” said Jake Braun, who sold DEF CON founder Jeff Moss on the idea earlier this year.

I do not think that the manufacturers are consciously enabling easy hacking. Rather time and again experience has demonstrated that, in manufacturing, security is often an afterthought. For example.

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Symptomology 0

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Whatever you do, don’t give politeness the finger.

Police in eastern Idaho say a 49-year-old Rexburg man accidentally shot off his middle finger.

Rexburg police tell KIFI-TV that the man didn’t think the gun was loaded when he pulled the trigger on the .44-caliber handgun at about 12:20 a.m. Friday.

Aside:

I was taught to assume that every gun is loaded.

The stupid. It burns.

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Colludal Suspension 0

Title:  Secret Photo of Donnie Jr.'s Meeting with the Russian.  Image:  Picture lampooning Donald Truupm, Jr.'s, collusion, including images of Boris Badenov and Natasha Fatale.

The one ray of hope is this: These persons, however malignant they may be and certainly are, however protected they have been by their (illusion of) wealth, are truly and fundamentally stupid.

Via Job’s Anger.

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“General Incompetence” 0

Trump is tweeting,


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Trumpling the Art of the Con 0

Tony Norman thinks that Donald Trump may have gone one con too many. A snippet (follow the link for the rest; it is worth your while):

Suddenly, even the dimmest pundit understood Mr. Trump’s modus operandi. Candidate Trump conned religious conservatives into giving up their concerns about his questionable morality in exchange for appointing only ideological conservatives to the U.S. Supreme Court. They also wanted someone like Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions as attorney general.

Methinks Mr. Norman waxes optimistic. Trump’s true believers, even among the punditocracy, will continue to believe the con because they want to believe (and their paychecks depend on their believing, or, at least, on professing that belief).

If they were willing to see through the smokescreen, they would have done so years ago.

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One Good Screed Deserves Another 0

Two boy scouts on street.  One kicks an old lady in the rear while saying,

Via Juanita Jean.

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The Week That Was . . . . 0

c

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QOTD 0

Faith Hunter:

Humans are insane. We kill our own people, starve our own people, sell them, work them to death, beat them, don’t give them affordable/free/good healthcare, and let them live in misery, while a few of us have – we have all we want. We are evil.

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Loyalty Oafs 0

At Above the Law, James Goodnow contrasts Donald Trump’s conception of loyalty with ethical lawyers’ (no, that is not an oxymoron) loyalty to their clients. It’s an interesting take on the concept of loyalty and worth the three minutes it takes to read.

Here’s a bit:

There appear to be only two things that can secure one’s place in the Trump administration. The first option, and by far the best if you can swing it, is to be related to him. Trump’s family members seem to be largely immune to Trump’s ups and downs. If you can’t get an invitation to Thanksgiving dinner at Mar-a-Lago, the only other sure bet seems to be blind, unquestioning loyalty to whatever version of reality the president is pitching on a given day. Scaramucci, Kellyanne Conway, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and Stephen Miller are the four horsemen of the fact-pocalypse, seemingly willing to commit to anything and everything that serves the interests of the commander-in-chief, and equally willing to fall on their swords when Trump changes his mind a day or two later. All four are, in Trump’s view of the world, loyal.

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Cavalcade of Crazy 0

Thom rounds up a few stories that haven’t gotten much notice in the furor over healthcare.

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In Contempt of the (Scout) Law 0

Daniel Ruth parses Donald Trump’s speech to the Boy Scouts. A snippet:

Let’s break down the Boy Scout law, which reads: “A Scout is trustworthy (Trump University?), loyal (Is that Jeff Sessions under the bus?), helpful (No tax returns for you!), kind (I know my press secretary is a devout Catholic, but I’m not going to let him meet the pope.), obedient (Conflicts of interest? What conflicts of interests?), cheerful (War hero? John McCain? Please!), thrifty (Trips to Mar-a-Lago? $20 million and counting.), brave (Proudly claimed to have avoided contracting a sexually transmitted disease during the Vietnam War era. Courage!), clean (Okay, he is famously germophobic.), and reverent (Belittled the parents of a Muslim-American soldier who died in combat defending his country in Iraq.)”

Much more at the link.

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