(Image is used under the Pixabay license)

Some pushback on corn fuel.

"The United States' Department of Energy is stating that corn based fuel is not the future In related news, Fidel Castro is blasting the production of corn fuel as a blatant waste of food that would otherwise feed 3 billion people who will die of hunger.

Why isn't all this time/money/effort being put into electric?

Out with the old...

(Image is in the Public Domain)

Did you know that the government is discontinuing broadcast television? At least the way we know it. That means that for any TV you own that you want to be able to receive television over the air (with your rabbit ears or whatever), you will need a digital converter.

"If we don't get this transition right, then (we will be) dealing with constituents," said Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Pa. "The government has broken their TV sets."

The government is offering incentive discounts for people to get the converters:

To help consumers absorb the cost, Congress set aside $1.5 billion to subsidize converter box purchases. Every household, regardless of whether it needs a box, will be eligible to receive two coupons, each worth $40, that can be used to buy two converter boxes. The coupons, to be distributed on a first-come first-serve basis, must be requested between Jan. 1, 2008 and March 31, 2009.

DHL

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The DHS apparently has backed off of the requirement to use RFID in the National ID card. It's a start.

Is it supposed to do that?

(Image used under: Creative Commons 2.0 [SRC])

Public Citizen reports that the Consumer Product Safety Commission has begun a service that will notify consumers by e-mail of any product safety recalls. While some manufacturers will do this voluntarily, some won't and even if they do, they usually ask for you to register all your products (including loads of personal information you don't want to give).

For example, Selina Patten, of Manassas, Va., had a close call when the recalled plastic nail from a Playskool toy tool bench became lodged in the throat of her 3-year-old daughter. She was able to remove the nail before serious injury occurred. She later discovered the product had been recalled after the death of two toddlers, though she did not hear about it.

Here are some of the common recalled product lines:

* Outdoor products: such as grills and outdoor furniture for porch or patio * Outdoor power equipment: air compressors and gas pool heaters * Children’s products: outerwear with drawstrings, necklaces that contain lead, battery packs for toy vehicles, and flashing pacifiers * Power tools: cut-out tools, nailers, circular saws and pressure washers * Household products: fans, candles * Electronics: computer batteries, remote controls

Note: This requires no registration of any kind! You do not have to tell them what products you have and the only personal information (if you can call it that) that they ask for is an e-mail address. There's also very little chance of them spamming you since they are a government agency.

Watch lists have serious downsides that need to be addressed if we're going to use them

Now the terrorist watch list is making it to our everyday lives.

Private businesses such as rental and mortgage companies and car dealers are checking the names of customers against a list of suspected terrorists and drug traffickers made publicly available by the Treasury Department, sometimes denying services to ordinary people whose names are similar to those on the list.

…

Yet anyone who does business with a person or group on the list risks penalties of up to $10 million and 10 to 30 years in prison, a powerful incentive for businesses to comply.

…

"It prohibits anyone from doing business with anyone who's on the list. It does not have a minimum dollar amount. . . . The local deli, if it sells a sandwich to someone whose name appears on the list, has violated the law."

This might be a good thing if it actually worked. Judging on how the no-fly list works, I'm guessing it doesn't.

So what happens when the terrorists start using names like:

• John Smith
• Mike Brown
• Chris Anderson
• Mary Jones
• Beth Miller

(Image used under: Fair Use doctrine)

This story is hilarious! In short:

1. John McCain, Senator and Presidential hopeful, set up a Myspace page to "connect with younger audiences"
2. He used a default theme created by the author of this prank
3. He not only didn't credit the author of the theme, but one of the images in the theme was being pulled from the author's webservers costing him money every time someone loaded McCain's page.
4. The Author, to teach him a lesson, changed the picture to a joke political message

Anyway, read the details for a much better description by the author himself.

ID that broadcasts data about you. What could go wrong?

In an act of supreme stupidity and ignorance, Washington state has passed a law allowing residents to purchase an "alternative" drivers license that could be used in lieu of a passport at the Canadian border.

Citing the 9/11 Commission's support for more secure documentation for U.S. entry, Chertoff pointed out that U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents currently must look at more than 8,000 different forms of identification, whether birth certificates, driver's licenses or other documents.

So their answer to the problem?

The alternative license will contain a Radio Frequency Identification chip, commonly known as RFID, which the guard booths will use to scan the license as a traveler or trucker pulls up to the booth. U.S. passports issued since late 2006 already contain RFID chips.

They're going to offer a license that has no shielded covers like passports do that border guards will now just non-chalantly swipe across a reader rather than take the time to inspect. Brilliant. Maybe next, they can just put the readers out for the people in the vehicle to use making it even more convenient. That way, the criminals wouldn't have to bother changing the photo on the ID since no one would be looking anyway.

(Image is used under the Pixabay license)

What good would RFID passports be anyway if they don't work on security of issuance first? This article says that a suspected 10,000 passports were issued based on fake applications. That means that they have fully functional, non-cloned, non-hacked passports.

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Senator Barak Obama, not to be outdone by Hillary, has posted some questions to Yahoo Answers.

Technically, Hillary has been on Yahoo Answers since last fall, but she's only asked three questions

Hillary's Questions

1. How can we help to prevent and someday eradicate breast cancer, which has touched the lives of so many people?
2. Based on your own family's experience, what do you think we should do to improve health care in America?
3. How can we as a country promote alternative energy, use less foreign oil and reduce global warming?

Barack's Question

His specific question, which I find far more useful than Hillary's so far, was "How can we engage more people in the democratic process?" I hope he reads my answer. (Barack's profile here). Tags: Barack Obama, Congress, Yahoo Answers

Reaching out to the public openly is a good leadership trait

(Image is in the Public Domain)

I've seen this before with other famous people like Shigeru Miyamoto, but this is the first member of Congress I've seen. Perhaps this marks a shift in our leaders to using technology to help us interact with them. We can hope.