Electronic Waste

This year in Minnesota the legislature might pass a law requiring a $10 surcharge on all TVs and computers. All retailers must collect the fee; therefore, the entire fee is passed on to the consumer. Retailers keep 5% of the collected fees to administer the recycling program and the remainder is remitted to the state.

Cradle to grave, beeatch.

In 2003, Minnesotans bought 703,000 PCs, 266,000 laptops, and 608,000 TVs. Hennepin County collected 2000 tons of electronic waste.

When I was at the Merriam Park library reading magazines as part of the fulfillment of my New Year's resolutions, I read about the Basel Convention, members of which prevent the exporting of e-waste to other countries. For example, a country prohibits the export of trashed computers to a dump in china frequented nightly by one alf hickey scavenging for copper by smashing cathode ray tubes.

sophistry

if this is true, it's hot. bush is promoting social security reform to african americans by claiming blacks don't receive as much benefit from social security as whites or hispanics because of lower african american life expectancy. a little specious? yes. a lie? yes. low life expectation is not a good indicator of return from social security benefits. i didn't pay a lot of FICA tax until i was twenty two.

krugman article

i want to take a survey.

will the elimination of social security will help poor people.
yes, no, or comment.

if i created a think tank with egregiously poor research methodology and analysis, would you work for me.

yes, no, or comment.

Hovland, Minnesota

So. Back to Martin Luther King Jr. weekend. If you read Tim’s blog, you’ll read a better account of the happenings. Marye and I arrived at the cabin Friday night just before midnight. The wind was roaring and causing a stir I’ve never witnessed on Lake Superior. Even inside we heard the noise of large waves crashing on shore and the gusts of wind through the pine trees. We scheduled the trip up to the north shore before we knew the weather forecast; otherwise, we may not have been brave enough to vacation in such numbing cold. The low Sunday night was -36 degrees Fahrenheit, the coldest temperature I have ever experienced sans wind chill. As some of you may know, this is the kind of weather that drives me to type in “Yakutsk, Russia” on weather.com and escape the depression of my location by reveling in relativity. The ten-day forecast in Yakutsk looks something like this every day: high of -32F and low of -57F. I’ve never been to Yakutsk, but I’ve never heard of legendary northerners living under a protective dome. To where to Yakutskans look for winter solace. So. Back to Hovland. The cabin was great, but the septic system was weak. The rule for the weekend was “If it’s yellow, let it mellow. If it’s brown, flush it down.” The water was not potable, so we had to partake in the drinking of spirits, many spirits. The sauna was a disgrace, especially to Finns. I was reading a book called The Sauna by Rob Roy, and he said Finnish saunas sometimes approach 220 degrees. This sauna approached 110 degrees near the ceiling while the floor kept your drink on ice. No need to jump in a lake, just go down a tier or two in the sauna. The lake was not frozen over and the surface was steaming like my hot body after a run. The shore was fantastic. Water bathed, froze, and coated the rocks along the shore. The water then smoothly and roundly cut shapes in the ice leaving bigger rocks with mushroom ice cap hats and dripping lustrous dreadlocks. So many fascinating shapes. I could stare for hours. This experience solidifies the ranking of water near the top of my list of life’s most spectacular gifts. Tim, Marye, and I had a most excellent hike on Sunday afternoon. Tim cross country skied and Marye and I hiked a twelve kilometer loop near Grand Portage. We hiked up to an old fire lookout tower. We were so high we could see the extreme curvature of the earth. Circular, bitches. As for fauna, we roused a grouse while walking along the trail. We also saw fox tracks and fresh moose droppings. I tried to give a moose call I had learned from one of the interesting books stored on the shelves back in the cabin. To our great dismay, a bull moose emerged from the woods looking for some action. Poor Tim. Anyway, Marye and I brought the weekend to closure by dining at Sven and Olie’s before returning to the metropolis.

read up

In the news:

SBC said to be in talks to buy AT&T
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/27/business/27deal.html?hp&ex=1106888400&en=cd978a9d7502bc8f&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Chile's retirees find shortfall in private plan
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/27/business/worldbusiness/27pension.html?hp&ex=1106888400&en=82af08c4c479186f&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Series: Freeing Sex Slaves
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/19/opinion/19kristof-cambodia.html?ex=1106974800&en=d56d7e7b0bb0f067&ei=5070

bridging India's digital divide with Linux
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/GA28Df06.html

Also, safin defeated federer in the australian open.

miscellaneous

new year's resolutions.

one of my resolutions was to read more magazines. another was to buy more music. i bought an antibalas cd last weekend. it's funky, but not as funky as fela. antibalas is an afrobeat group from brooklyn. one magazine in particular i want to read more is the economist.

time to go out on hazardous waste inspections. maybe i will mutate into the hulk. please don't make me angry.

first day

work will be very busy and very awesome.
i will no longer post every weekday.
i would like to guarantee every other day.
actually, i could still post every weekday, but it would be worse than usual.
i still need to write about the weekend up north and the home improvement project.
later.

LogIn, Inc.

On August 27, 2001 I began work at my first real job for LogIn, Inc., a company which has provided information to local governments since 1981. IACP Net was created in 1991 as a spinoff of LOGIN when LOGIN partnered with the International Association of Chiefs of Police. IACP Net generates most of LOGIN's revenue and is now an online research tool for almost two thousand law enforcement agencies. Early in 2001 LOGIN debuted Planapolis, WorksTogether, Parks Pavilion, and HealtheCommunity, websites for municipal planners, public works, parks and recreation, and health organizations, respectively. Each website has a similar design, but obviously the information differs by product. I will walk you through the most successful product, IACP Net.

There are three main sections on the site: databases, networking, and current affairs.

The databases section includes:

Core Database
The Core Database contains documents of innovations, programs, policies, solutions, and ordinances pertaining to law enforcement. FAST Search facilitates access to commonly requested searches.

Select Site
This portal filters the Internet for law enforcement websites and allows you to perform a search of these selected sites through keyword searching.

LEPAS
Law Enforcement Products and Services allows you to view specifications, testimonials, pricing, manufacturer contacts as well as vendor/distributor information for police products and services.

Policies
The Policies Database contains standard operating procedures from policy manuals. This database is extremely popular.

LEMAS
Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics contains reports and department profiles that can be used as a comparative tool in all areas of law enforcement management and administration.

Archive
The Archive Database houses older documents that were entered prior to 1996.

The networking section includes:

Quest-Response
The Quest-Response Service is where members exchange information with other members. If you have a problem or issue, and you would like feedback from your peers, post it as a Quest. Members showcase innovations and help others by responding to Quests. This is an extremely popular feature of the website.

Roundtable
Roundtables provide a unique forum for discussing issues and hot topics in law enforcement. Members use Roundtables to learn what others are thinking and to share opinions.

Survey
Periodically, IACP Net posts survey questions requesting feedback. Members participate by answering the survey, then see live survey results.

User Directory
The user directory provides a white pages of all IACP Net members. Telephone numbers and e-mail address are listed if supplied by the member.

Links
IACP Net reviews web sites for content and lists valuable information sites in the Links service.

The current affairs section includes:

News
Members stay informed on the latest news and announcements from IACP, federal agencies and sources around the country.

Publications
Publications include articles and issues from various different magazines: The Police Chief, Sheriff, Community Links or the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, etc.

Funding
Funding is updated regularly and provides sources of grants and funding available to law enforcement agencies. Sources of grant solicitations include mostly federal grants and private. The information editor reads the lengthy, tiresome grant announcement and summarizes the important information: program description, funding amount, eligibility, deadline, contact information.

Briefing Papers
Find white papers and reports on hot topics and current issues. New briefing papers are added monthly.

Legislation
This section lists relevant legislative bills and tracks the progress of the bills through Congress.

Traffic Tech Notes
Traffic Tech Notes is a publication of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

Calendar
Members stay current on training, conferences and other events by reviewing calendar items.

at this point you might be wondering what my job was. my job title was information editor. i was responsible for posting all the content on our websites. i would scour the internet for germane information. of course, many times information was copyrighted and i had to call and request permission to reproduce. i would also receive information from our members. i also had ongoing partnerships with various organizations and they would mail hard or electronic copies of information not found online. basically, i got information from everywhere. in an age when excess information creates difficulty in locating exact information, LOGIN provides ease of access through consolidation and focused searching. ready to fax in your service order.

before i posted information on the site, i had to edit it to a specified format. i would scan printed documents and optical character recognition software would convert the document to electronic text. editing takes a surprising amount of time.

then i would index the document; that is, i would read the document and record keywords from the document with the purpose of representing document content and ensuring the search engine would recall the document if our customer's search matched the keywords associated with the document. it's different than google. google searches the actual text of web pages. when a customer performs a search on LOGIN, the search references only the list of keywords i provided in each document and displays a list of documents with the specified keywords.

when i added a document to the website, i filled in a number of fields and then clicked submit. do i know a lot about computers. no. if i'm having a conversation with a stranger and heshe asked me about my job but didn't really care. yes, i'm a computer genius.

now you know what i did for the past three years and five months of my life from eight to five monday through friday forty seven weeks of the year.

the law of deminishing resolve

tomorrow is my last day at work. tomorrow i post about my job.

jose, little by little i will reveal the conversations we had.

jose was talking about his creative desire to be at the vanguard of novel research. he talked about telomeres.

"Inside the nucleus of virtually all of our cells are chromosomes, 46 in all. At the tips of these chromosomes are telomeres, repeating sequences of genetic material that shorten each time a cell divides. Cell division is important because many cells in our body (e.g., those that line our digestive tract) must be replaced over time. When a cell's telomeres reach a critically short length, however, that cell can no longer replicate. Its structure and function begin to fail as it enters this state of growth arrest, called replicative senescence. Some have likened the process of telomere shortening to a genetic biological clock that winds down over time. Today, researchers continue to probe the telomeric "timepiece," hoping to better understand the aging process and fight diseases, particularly cancer."

jude is pursuing a phd in psychology at the university of southern mississippi in hattiesburg, mississippi. jude plans to research the nature of religiosity among individuals/groups. why are people religious.

intrinsic - religion as an end
extrinsic - religion as a means
quest - religion as a search

i've always had a tough time wrapping my mind around the meaning/expression of intrinsic.

psychology of religion

einar is pursuing a degree at the university of california at irvine. he has a web site about his research interests. also, i looked up snekker and it appears to be a cabinetmaker, carpenter, or builder. what.

article about wal-mart
down and out in discount america

wyoming's two-edged welfare experiment

maureen dowd writes about men who are afraid of powerful women. i am married to an intelligent, beautiful, powerful woman. it doesn't bother me. but that's probably because i'm ridiculously masculine.

here are some sites that i look at every day

great source of planning news: planetizen

smart communities network: creating energy smart communities

juveniles in corrections

check out this pdf
juveniles in corrections
1999 statistics on juveniles in custody
good stats by state

highlights:

minority youth accounted for 7 in 10 juveniles held in custody for a violent offense in 1999.

black youth accounted for 55% of juveniles held for robbery and 65% of those held for drug trafficking.

minority youth accounted for 34% of the u.s. juvenile population and 62% of juveniles in custody.

for every 100,000 black juveniles living in the u.s., 1,004 were in a residential placement facility on october 27, 1999; the rate was 485 for hispanics and 212 for whites.

custody rate per 100,000 of black juvenile population
top five:
south dakota (big winner)
wyoming
connecticut
wisconsin
iowa

custody rate per 100,000 of hispanic juvenile population
top five:
mississippi (winner by a multiple of three)
connecticut
michigan
south dakota
pennsylvania

greek mythology and economist articles

last weekend jose and i were talking about prometheus. greek mythology is awesome. i had never heard of the greeks or of mythology until i left nebraska for macalester. inspired by jose, i've been reading a little about greek mythology.

here’s my summary on prometheus:

prometheus gave many gifts to humanity. most importantly, he stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. the gift of fire helped man to flourish, as it was the impetus for many other discoveries. zeus was furious (anger management problems) and chained prometheus to a mountain high in the caucuses. each day an eagle came and tore at prometheus and tore until the liver of prometheus was torn out. prometheus, a titan, would heal over night and the next day the eagle came back to exact the same painful, interminable punishment. in addition, to reverse the benefit to mankind of all the gifts bequeathed by prometheus, zeus commissioned the gods to create pandora. in pandora's box was pestilence, vice, war, and many other sorrows to destroy man. however, in a moment of compassion, the gods included hope; unreasonable, groundless hope, which turns the curse of life into a blessing.

i'm glad i read about prometheus yesterday because i learned there is a play called prometheus bound, and last night i was reading the economist and a title of an article i read was: prometheus unbound, a bit. the article was about freedom of the press in different countries. i have incredible access to information. i have the wealth to surf the internet, watch tv, buy a newspaper subscription, listen to a radio powered by electricity. the good news for other countries is technology is improving and technology costs are decreasing. the radio medium is a great way to reach people. hand crank radios provide a great opportunity to access information, no batteries required.

although, people have an insatiable appetite for shitty news, tabloid news. why are we so fascinated with aberrant behavior, crime, grisly misfortune, and celebrity peccadilloes. why do we like violent movies and violent video games. do these obsessions reinforce right and wrong, stigmatize wrongs, prevent wrongs, and create a more perfect society. how many people watch the lehrer news hour. not me. it's boring. i want to see news about a local boy who got a bath toy stuck in his ass, or a police pursuit of two women who stole an ice auger from wal-mart.

i read an article in the economist about bhutan. bhutan is located east of nepal, north of bangladesh, and surrounded by the giants of china and india. bhutan is a country which exists presently in the past; it is an anachronism. if i were to visit bhutan, i would sit in the himalayas and write poetry about what a simple and idyllic life the noble bhutanese live. anyway, bhutan is wrestling with globalization. most people survive by subsistence agriculture. the government wants to protect forested mountainsides. the government has mandated the wearing of traditional garb. and, of most interest to me, the government uses the measure of gross national happiness. for real.

there are two more greek mythology figures i want to talk about. sisyphus was a thief and a murderer. as punishment, he was forced to roll a big stone up a steep hill, but before it reached the top of the hill, the stone rolled down to the bottom of the hill and sisyphus began over again. sisyphean. tantalus stole nectar and ambrosia from zeus' table. as punishment, tantalus was made to stand in a pool of water beneath a fruit tree with low branches. when tantalus reached for fruit, the branches raised, and when he bent for drink, the water receded. tantalizing. dante's inferno has some good punishments too.

no fun league

randy
1. having a coarse manner
2. lustful, lecherous

After scoring a touchdown against the Packers on Sunday, Randy Moss strode to the endzone goalpost, directed his ass toward the crowd, and pantomimed mooning the crowd and rubbing his ass on the goalpost.

I was outraged. The public was outraged. at long last sir, have you no sense of decency. have you no shame.

speaking of impropriety

I’m drawing inspiration from Nate’s blog. He had a very good post about Randy Moss and decency. Anyway, Nate reminded me of a commercial I saw a few weeks ago. The commercial features frozen packaged dinner rolls from Pillsbury and a very thinly veiled reference to kinky sex: wife tells curious husband, "I don't know how much more of this experimentation I can take....in the kitchen, that is." then the music started and the doughboy appeared on the scene clad in buttless chaps.*

i was shocked, mostly because i didn't expect an overt reference to kneeling pretzel sex in a wholesome biscuit commercial featuring two pedestrian forty-year-olds. unfortunately, i believe the biscuit industry suffered a tragic loss of innocence.

in other news

Marye and I are flying to Amsterdam in February. Kofi and Kate will be meeting us there for the weekend.

So I was doing a little reading about Amsterdam. Amsterdam has a homomonument, which is a pink triangle with three dimensions: warning from the past, confrontation with the present, and inspiration for the future. I found the Amsterdam city flag interesting too. The three stars stand for valor, resolution, and mercy. Nice.

*didn't happen, but it's a slippery slope

journalism scandal

jose was in the twin cities looking at the u of m medical school over the weekend. jose interviewed with dr. steven miles, 2004 minnesotan of the year. it was great to talk with jose. on saturday night we had a little reunion of sorts, including jose, ziyad, and el klinker. significant others were there as well, i don't want to slight anybody.

anyway, jose recommended a book to me:
understanding health policy: a clinical approach
by thomas s. bodenheimer and kevin grumbach

while i was looking for the author of the book i found a pdf with a primer on state health care spending.

the time is nearing for the winter trip up north to the hovland hideaway.
here's the forecast for hovland, minnesota (highs and lows):
friday -7/-20
saturday -5/-15
sunday 4/-4
monday 8/0

in other news, william safire of the new york times is obviously reading my blog. on friday i wrote about how my child had asked me about why god let the tsunami happen. why do bad things happen to good people. i alluded to the philosophy of dr. pangloss in voltaire's candide, which challenged the existence of god after a huge earthquake in 1755 devastated lisbon. the earthquake killed over 100,000 people and was followed by a tsunami and fire, resulting in near total destruction.

let me digress. there is a poem by oliver wendell holmes called the deacon's masterpiece or the wonderful one-hoss shay. it refers to the lisbon earthquake. it is also a humorous poem about the weakest link, or lack thereof. a shay is a horse-drawn carriage.

back to my point. today, monday january 10, william safire of the new york times wrote his editorial about why god let the tsunami happen. he wrote about voltaire's candide. he also wrote about the book of job, which is a good book but based on a rather ridiculous premise.

god: job is a good man.

satan: job is a good man but he will betray you if fortune frowns on him. god, you are not all-powerful and cannot see into the future of men. so let us make a bet on what will happen to job if he is tested by you, the somewhat-powerful.

god: good idea satan. i have no idea what will happen in the future. i am not outside of time. i fly by the seat of my pants from day to day. sometimes i feel like i'm sitting in the back seat of a speeding car. anyway, i’ll take your bet satan.

angel: god, you are so gambling.

god: shut up.

i can’t focus. my point is william safire uses my blog to get ideas for his editorials.

dirty sanchez

Kofi sent out an email today. it was hilarious. here is some of it:

quote

After coming back from mass at St. Paul's Cathedral on Christmas Eve, I was nervously flipping channels while waiting for kick-off of the Vikes-Pack game when I noticed something on the TV guide on MTV titled "Dirty Sanchez"... you gotta watch anything with a title like that. So I flipped to it and was shortly thereafter rewarded with the most disgusting thing I've ever seen on TV. Turns out this was a warped British variation of "Jackass", and here's the stunt I happened to catch:

They put a beer bong up a guy's ass, filled his ass with beer while holding him upside down, took out the bong, shook him around for a few minutes (while still upside-down), and then flipped him over, at which point the beer - now murky & brown - started coming out of his anus... one guy caught a fair quantity of this "newly brewed stout" (that's what they called it!) in a bowl, and the three of them passed it around and drank it!

Anyway, at this point, I went into a mini-seizure and began to realize that this was an experience I would never recover from... of course the Vikes soon lost afterwards, putting me into a state of catatonic shock for Christmas Even and most of Christmas day... not a bright start to the season of good cheer!

end quote

However, the new year was off to an auspicious start when Kofi won $1700 in his NFL pool.

In other news, I saw that the tsunami was so powerful that it swept around the world over the next 36 hours, with its last residual waves perceptibly jostling tide gauges from Russia's remote northeastern Pacific waters to the North Atlantic.

incidentally, my child was asking me some questions about the tsunami the other night.

dad, why did god let the tsunami happen.

child, everything happens for a reason.

dad, for what reason did the tsunami happen.

child, it's not because god is angry at the democratic muslim nation of indonesia.

no, i wouldn't think so dad. but why didn't god stop the tsunami. does god not care enough to intervene.

egad child, what are you, a deist. we are all sinners. besides, it's all part of god's plan. all is for the best in this, the best of all possible worlds.

whatever pangloss.

what. who. go to your room child.

lacuna

it has been a long time. but now it's time to reacquaint myself with the blog. the hiatus in my posting can be blamed partially on attorney general gonzales, who has been censoring my site and arduously limiting my ability to access the internet. i have also been very busy at work. my last day at my job is friday january 14, at which point my week-long vacation commences with a trip north, way north, to hovland. speaking of north, yarrow's brother is named north. also, there was a man in my hometown of hastings who was known only as northpark. he had straight hair down to his shoulders. he wore sunglasses and practiced karate on trees. he was tough, and mysterious. anyway, i will soon be writing about login, inc., my place of employment for over three years. i will then post about all the previous jobs i have ever worked for money. i don't know if i will be able to post at my new job. i could access my neighbors' wireless internet from our house and post that way. what's the vote on that unethical practice.