Vitriol in my veins...

It wasn't enough to run across the following:

Operation TIPS, administered by the U.S. Department of Justice and developed in partnership with several other federal agencies, is one of the five component programs of the Citizen Corps. Operation TIPS will be a national system for reporting suspicious, and potentially terrorist-related activity. The program will involve the millions of American workers who, in the daily course of their work, are in a unique position to see potentially unusual or suspicious activity in public places.

While there's a part of me that would like to believe that this initiative is motivated by the best of intentions, there's another part of me that views the historical record and thinks that a national system such as this can all too easily become a convenient mechanism for creating the kind of atmosphere in this country that I only experienced as an outsider in the former Soviet Union.

What is even more interesting is the utter, complete lack of any coverage from so-called journalists, who are more interested in promoting their gang of thugs to be in charge of programs such as this one. The unpleasantness that Clinton arranged for his critics (tax audits, etc.) will seem a quaint memory once the folks in charge of this "Citizen Corps" get comfortable with the heft of the instrument.

In other news, the House has apparently passed a measure that provides for up to life imprisonment for computer hackers. Most folks will think this is a fine idea, although "hacker" is such an amorphous term. Will a reluctance to acquiesce to the rapacious intent of Big Computing (and Bid Entertainment) be considered grounds to be considered a "potential" hacker? or perhaps a hacker sympathizer?

As you can probably tell, I've been having a Really Bad Day.

Cheers...

MySQLing a-way-y-y!

Galina's been complaining about the "new" spreadsheet working under OpenOffice, and when I ask things like "Do you want me to go to Durango and buy a copy of Office XP for $400?" I get a kind of blank stare that says "What's wrong with the Office CD you've already got at home?" Explanations are inadequate.

Anyway, the solution is not to spiff up the spreadsheet, but to transcend it. So... I've been at the shop for the past couple of hours, getting phpMyAdmin up to speed and learning all about 'mysqlimport'. So far, I have the carrier zone and rural delivery tables populated, and the UPS table structured. Once I populate it and do the same for the FedEx and USPS tables, I can then set about writing the code that puts it all together.

Anything to take my mind off of today. I am going to try my best to avoid going in to the shop tomorrow. I don't need the depression.

Cheers...