Dropsafe

JWZ posts regarding NSA interception, citing Wired :- AT&T is seeking the return of technical documents presented in a lawsuit that allegedly detail how the telecom giant helped the government set up a massive internet wiretap operation in its San Francisco facilities. In papers filed late Monday, AT&T argued that confidential technical documents provided by…

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Your morning silliness: (Via) R.E.M. and the Muppets, on Sesame Street, performing “Furry Happy Monsters.” [www.youtube.com] …and there’s even a Muppet Kate Pierson

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[www.royalsoc.ac.uk] Royal Society statement on evolution, creationism and intelligent design A statement opposing the misrepresentation of evolution in schools to promote particular religious beliefs was published today (11 April 2006) by the Royal Society, the UK national academy of science. The statement points out that evolution is “recognised as the best explanation for the development…

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[www.thedailywtf.com] German readers may be familiar with the story of Arbeitsagentur.de, the official website of the Bundesagentur f?r Arbeit (Federal Labour Office). It’s a fairly typical “big business” story: government wants a job portal website, large consulting company (Accenture) bids 65.5M Euros, government accepts, consultants start it but say they need another 100M Euros to…

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A short update on the Trike: Trice XL, as modeled by the lovely Simon… I’ve commuted to/from work on the trike half a dozen times now, and it’s going really well; I am settling into a routine of packing/unpacking – the trick is to not close-up the panniers until the last possible moment before setting…

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[www.n00bl33t.com] (Via) 14 things to do if you have missed the rapture! 7. DO NOT accept the mark of the beast (666). The Anti-Christ will control the economic system completely, and he will destroy the money system and install a number system either on your hand or your forehead. Do not take this mark. If…

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Watch the trailer for A Scanner Darkly. Bloghype is touting it as for once, a faithful adaptation. Hmmm. Update: For brownie points, download the HD trailers and identify the source material being used for text-filler on the computer displays.

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[news.independent.co.uk] One former defence official is quoted as saying the planning was based on a belief that “a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government”. London Blitz. Berlin 1945. Iraq, quite recently, really. It doesn’t work like that, guys. I wish…

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This behaviour exemplifies why it is important for us to keep on top of the UK ATM industry: [www.smh.com.au] BANKS have hit a new low by charging fees for cancelled transactions and incorrectly entered PINs, the Australian Consumers Association says. And most consumers did not know the charges existed, said the association’s senior finance policy…

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Not often I’d quote the Mail, but… [www.dailymail.co.uk] ‘Playing The Clash made me a terror suspect’ A mobile phone salesman was hauled off a plane and questioned for three hours as a terror suspect – because he listened to songs by The Clash and Led Zeppelin. Harraj Mann, 24, played the punk anthem London Calling…

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[news.independent.co.uk] Two grandmothers from Yorkshire face up to a year in prison after becoming the first people to be arrested under the Government’s latest anti-terror legislation. Helen John, 68, and Sylvia Boyes, 62, both veterans of the Greenham Common protests 25 years ago, were arrested on Saturday after deliberately setting out to highlight a change…

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Bart sent me a link to an interview with Sam Harris author of The End of Faith and one of the interviewees in The God Movie. I read it as a terribly American piece – with reason, given the precepts for his argument: Harris: […] religious moderates are giving cover to fundamentalists because of the…

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