I'm outraged, you should be too.

And not just because I've been pretty much un-wacky lately. Lots of outrage to go around. I promise, the wacky will come eventually. But first...


Senator Inouye, Chairman of the Appropriations committee, may remove the Franken Amendment from the latest bill.
I hope I don't have to tell you how bad this would be. Apparently the defense contractors have been lobbyin hard. We, as citizens, need to lobby harder. Make a big, big noise, people. Contact Senator Inouye, contact the members of the appropriations committee. 

Here's what I wrote. 


Senator Inouye,
May I remind you that your duty is to the American people, not to Defense Contractors? I am seriously disturbed that you would even consider removing or watering down the Franken Amendment to the Appropriations Bill. I could rant long and hard here, but someone else has already boiled down how I feel much better than I ever could, to wit:
"If, to protect Haliburton, you have to side against rape victims, you might want to rethink your allegiances." - Jon Stewart

I may not be in your Senate district, but as the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, you serve a wider group of constituents than just those in Hawaii. Removing this amendment would be bad for women, bad for workers, and bad for America.

Sincerely,
<>

Twitter, Trending Topics, and Information Manipulation.

So today there was a bit of a tempest on Twitter. You may or may not have noticed, a lot of it depended on who's in your follow list, and whether or not you pay any attention to the trending topics list on the side of the page. Let's start with a short time line so that some things can be put into perspective.

This morning: A reverend with a large church and a lot of young followers posted the old "No God, No Peace, Know God, Know Peace." It gets retweeted alot, but due to the way that trending topics are created, it showed up on the list as "No God".

Mid afternoon: No God shows up on the trending topics side, and is pretty immediately grabbed by atheists and non-religionists and run with.

Evening: No God becomes the number one trending topic, with a huge chunk of the hits having no positive reference to any deity. Clearly this upsets some people because ...

All of a sudden, No God went from being #1 on the trending topics to not being there at all. Whatsoever.  It was just gone. But manually searching for it (along with other trending topics) showed that it was stil getting more hits than any other topic on the TT list.

Night: The 'Know God' trending topic starts rising up. Many a fundie starts cheering at their side 'winning' (and probably still are) but those in the know (or who simply understand how to look at links) see that the Know God TT link now brings up both Know God and No God mentions. Research showed that at no time, did the words Know God show up more often than No God.
Don't believe me?
Click here.
The point at which the 'No God' TT was taken off the list is pretty damn obvious.

"So what? You can still search for it!" you might say, but see.. I'm an Information Professional and the thing is that I know that that is really kind of a crock. Some people say that he who controls the money controls the world. Some that it's whoever controls the weapons. But the real answer to who controls the world is.. the one who controls the information. Because if you control the information, you control what people know, you control how they see and react to the world, and that in the end controls the world as e know it.

In our internet driven world, one of the most effective and insidious ways to control information is by controlling search terms. We use them every day without thinking about them, and the average joe on the street doesn't even realize how what they are finding is being controlled. A couple of recent examples-
A health database that was in part funded by the US government made 'abortion' a stop word. This means that if someone went to this database and entered abortion as a search term... they got back no results. Nothing would say that there were results that were legitimately available, you would just see that there were no articles that matched your search term. Luckily this change was caught and a cafuffle was made by librarians and other information professionals, and the database returned 'abortion' to the search terms.
Recently Amazon caused quite an uproar (amusingly, on Twitter) over the re-organizing of a number of books in their catalog so that they would not show in sales rankings.. and since sales rankings are a primary way that search results are displayed, the end result was that books about homosexuality from an anti-glbt view showed first, while those that were pro- or even just tolerant showed further down the list if at all.
In the end, other than giving a group that already has a culturally-based feeling of superiority yet more reason to crow and puff, this Twitter issue isn't going to do much. But what has to continue from here is the awareness as to what's going on, and why, and how. Because if you never know something is there, then it isn't. A lot can be hidden in the spaces you don't see.

A more educated look at Google Wave.

I've been on it what, a week now? Still liking it quite a lot, though not getting a whole lot o actual work or movement done.. which I'll cover in some of my comments I'm sure.
 1) I need to be able to trash Waves. My inbox/etc. are now full of zombie waves that I want nothing to do with (many because all i wanted to do was take a look at them and then moved on) but I can't really get rid of. Yes, I've muted them, and yes, I've put them in the trash, but they are still there. This annoys me to no end.
 2) Public previews without joining. Just sayin'.
 3) The ability to click and drag blips if you put them in the wrong place rather than having to delete and start a new one.
 4) The ability to 'protect' blips so that they can't be edited or deleted.
 5) the search function still needs to be better.
 6) There's a bug in moving waves to folders. I tend to be able to move most of them to folders and off of my inbox.. but some just won't go no matter what.
 7) Invitation protocol seriously needs to change. I understand that Google is trying to be fair, but right now the testing of Wave is not being done with anything like the desired scenario. People need more of their own close friends/work groups on, not a bunch of strangers or somewhat distant contacts.

The Wall Of Shame

My Senator, Al Franken, recently proposed an amendment to a bill, this was the amendment.

Sec. 8104. (a) None of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this Act may be used for any existing or new Federal contract if the contractor or a subcontractor at any tier requires that an employee or independent contractor, as a condition of employment, sign a contract that mandates that the employee or independent contractor performing work under the contract or subcontract resolve through arbitration any claim under title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 or any tort related to or arising out of sexual assault or harassment, including assault and battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, false imprisonment, or negligent hiring, supervision, or retention. 

To put it in common English, this amendment restricts the government from using funds from this bill to pay contracts with companies that have, as part of their employment requirements, a restriction that employees may not sue if they are raped, sexually assaulted or harassed on the job.

You might ask why such a thing would be necessary. Which means you've probably not heard of Jamie Leigh Jones. Ms. Jones was 20 years old when she went to Iraq to work for KBR, a former subsidiary for Haliburton. While she was there, she was gang raped by her fellow employees and KBR locked her up in a shipping container for 24 hours when she tried to report it, and she was only released when the U.S. Embassy got involved. When she tried to prosecute, she found that KBR had managed to 'lose' important parts of her rape kit. When she tried to sue, she found that her contract included a requirement that she submit to arbitration even in the case of rape and assault.

Other women have come forward with similar reports.

So Senator Al Franken (btw? I will never get tired of typing those words) put forth an amendment to a bill to make sure that this sort of thing doesn't happen again. It seems like a slam dunk, right?  And in the end it was. It won by a wide margin. Sixty something to 30.


"Wait." you might be saying "30 people voted against a measure that keeps the government from making contracts with abusive employers who cover up rape?"
Why yes. Yes, they did. 30 state senators voted against this amendment.
Each and every one of them a Republican. Here's the list!
Alexander (R-TN)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Graham (R-SC)
Gregg (R-NH)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Isakson (R-GA)
Johanns (R-NE)
Kyl (R-AZ)
McCain (R-AZ)
McConnell (R-KY)
Risch (R-ID)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Wicker (R-MS)

Defenses of these votes stated by these Senators included such things as "This is a political attack against Haliburton." (odd, KBR is no longer a subsidiary of Haliburton, and at any rate, how can you make a political attack against a private company) and that it amounts to restricting what private companies can have in their contract (no, no it does  not. it restricts whether the government will accept such things from companies that they pay with our tax dollars).


The Daily Show of course said it best.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Rape-Nuts
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview

I am a very bad kitty mommy.

Our new kitten, Ifrit, is being a bit of a monster lately. He has pretty much shredded my husband's legs from the knee down, etc. He has also taken to attacking the insides of my thighs as I'm sitting with my laptop. Today, Operation Control was put into effect. Every time he starts acting up, He gets picked up and plopped into his carrier for ten minutes.
I've done it three times in the last hour, but he is now snuggled up quietly and purring at my side. I hold out some hope. Next plan will be softpaws tips on his claws.

The insanity of the fundies.

I keep an eye on 'the enemy' by reading certain fundamentalist websites and web forums. It's both a hoot for me and manages to keep me up to date on what the wingnut conservatives are thinking. I am often amused by things, for instance the fact that for the last several weeks, the fundies have been complaining that Obama has not been going to church. Like, incessantly. How terrible and awful it is that he doesn't go to church, how they'd feel so much better about him if he just went to church.
So this weekend? Obama went to church.
And today? What a crock that he went to church. He isn't really a christian and this just proves it. Chruch means nothing. Him going to church was just pandering, etc. etc.
And they wonder why he doesn't bother releasing his long form birth certificate? There is no point arguing with irrational people.

Effing. Snow.

So today was the second day of snow, and for much of the day (until at least mid afternoon) there was actually visible snow on the ground though, thankfully, not on the pavement. Sure, snow is pretty and all, and I should be okay with wintery weather due to hey, choosing to live in Minnesota.
But it is only mid-October, people. The trees are still mostly green!! It's wrong, wrong and insane!
It does however keep the work pretty quiet, which is kind of a blessing because I work with the public, and it can get a little crazy.
I also came up with an idea for a cookbook. No, I'm not sharing it.