My wife and I finally caved in and bought a new computer for her, an iMac G5. Her old, slow PowerMac running Mac OS 9 just couldn’t cut it anymore. The slowness, crashes, hangs, and nondeterministic behavior just finally got to be too much to bear. Also, now that the kids are starting to use… Read More: MacOS X — so right, and yet so wrong »
On the 9th of December 2005, Deborah Davis will be arraigned in U.S. District Court in a case that will determine whether Deb and the rest of us in the USA live in a free society, or in a country where we must show “papers” whenever a cop demands them. One morning in late September… Read More: “Papers, please.” »
While searching for material on the Web about the agunah problem to answer a question someone asked about whether excommunication is still used within Judaism, I came upon news I hadn’t previously heard, concerning the expulsion earlier this year of Rabbi Mordecai Tendler from the Rabbinical Council of America (RCA).
Seen recently on the lid of a jar of Cains tartar sauce, produced in literate Ayer, Mass.: REFRIGERATE AFTER OPENING TO INSURE FRESHNESS Enough said.
After a long hiatus, I recently started receiving junk faxes again. Having tired of the rigmarole of figuring out who sent them and how to sue them in small claims court, and being cognizant of the fact that a recent Massachusetts superior court ruling may in fact preclude suits against junk faxers by individuals in… Read More: Junk faxes: The FCC falls down on the job »
Updated 8/29/2015: And… They’re spamming me again. Now, it’s through the “salesforce marketing cloud.” I’ve unsubscribed using the link in today’s spam, and I also sent a complaint to SalesForce. We’ll see if anything comes of it (I doubt it). Updated 1/31/2006: I’ve put on-line the statement of claim I was intending to use to… Read More: FootSmart: Totally Evil or Totally Incompetent? »
Tomorrow is election day in the US. Since it’s an odd year, there are no elections for Federal offices tomorrow, except perhaps for a few special elections scattered here and there. Nevertheless, if there is a state or local election in your community, and you are eligible to vote, and you don’t vote tomorrow, then… Read More: Vote! »
Google has embarked on an ambitious project to scan millions of books into an online, searchable database. Many people and organizations object to the project on the grounds that it infringes on these books’ copyrights. These include the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers, both of which have filed suit to stop Google… Read More: “Google Print” is here to stay »
I tend to oppose gun control, although I’m only a little bit “right of center” on the issue. When I was young and irresponsible, I was a rabid supporter of gun control, until I actually spent some time paying careful attention to the arguments being put forth by both sides of the debate. What I… Read More: “Guns should go”? No, lies should go! »
An opinion piece about Jerusalem in the October 18, 2005 edition of the Portland State University Vanguard was so riddled with factual errors and antisemitic statements that the editors of the newspaper removed the article from their Web site on October 27 and replaced it with this text: Editor’s note, Oct. 27, 2005: This article… Read More: Ignorance and antisemitism at Portland State University »