Good News for Scott Adams

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So I guess that Scott Adams was suffering from a condition called Spasmodic Dysphonia (Wikipedia ref.) (For the medically-oriented among you, check out this eMedicine article.) This is an incredible story!

As regular readers of my blog know, I lost my voice about 18 months ago. Permanently. It’s something exotic called Spasmodic Dysphonia. Essentially a part of the brain that controls speech just shuts down in some people, usually after you strain your voice during a bout with allergies (in my case) or some other sort of normal laryngitis. It happens to people in my age bracket.

I asked my doctor – a specialist for this condition – how many people have ever gotten better. Answer: zero. While there’s no cure, painful Botox injections through the front of the neck and into the vocal cords can stop the spasms for a few months. That weakens the muscles that otherwise spasm, but your voice is breathy and weak.
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Effects of Clinton Tax Increases

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An interesting article on the effect of the Clinton tax increases. And, while I am in the area of taxes, the Wall Street Journal has an article entitled, “Tax Tidal Wave,” that shows how the Bash tax cuts so accelerated the pace of economic growth that the net effect is a booming increase in tax revenue.

Congress keeps breaking the Beltway Book of World Records for spending money, but the government will soon report that the federal budget deficit for the just-completed 2006 fiscal year fell to about $260 billion…
The main cause of the deficit decline — 90% of it, says White House budget director Rob Portman — is a tidal wave of tax revenue. Tax collections have increased by $521 billion in the last two fiscal years, the largest two-year revenue increase — even after adjusting for inflation — in American history…
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Companies that have sold my email address to spammers

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I have a unique method of signing up for online services that allows me to monitor usage of my email address. I’ll use the domain example.com to explain. I set up a redirect through my domain registrar giving me the ability to forward email sent to my example.com domain to an alias of my main Gmail address (email+alias@gmail.com). Then, instead of using my main email address to sign up for online services, I just create a new alias on the fly. For example, my amazon account uses amazon@example.com, my ebay account uses ebay@example.com, and so on. So, if one of my aliased emails starts receiving spam, then I know that either a spammer guessed this address by random chance or the company sold my address or mishandled my address.

I have two high profile examples. Recently, both netbank@example.com and ibd@example.com have started receiving spam. NetBank is an Internet bank that I used for about 5 years. They offered very good interest rates, but, ultimately, I closed my account because I wanted quick access to a bank’s local branch location to make deposits. The spam started before my account was closed. I contacted technical support through their secure bank mail and was told that I should close my account and start open a new one if I suspected fraud. I had specifically explained that I was not emailing them about fraud, but they apparently didn’t understand. I had directly asked them why they were giving away my email address…

My ibd@example.com alias email address just started receiving spam on October 17th. I used this address for my online trial account for Investor’s Business Daily, a very well-respected investing guide. It looks like this company either sold my address or accidentally gave it away. However, as you can tell by the subjects, at least the spam is related to stocks: “Finance.co m Watch out for this one,” “Alerts.co m Don’t waste this opportunity,” and “Quotes.co m – It will explode tomorrow.” In particular, all these stocks advertise “TAJ Systems,” (symbol TJSS), an online gaming company that “may very well be the next PartyPoker.com.” (yeah, right…)

So, as you can see, I am left to assume that both NetBank and Investor’s Business Daily mishandled or sold my email address and thereby violated their privacy policy. Mishandled or sold, the result is the same…illegal spam in my inbox (or actually spam folder because Gmail’s filtering works very well).

Pirates of the Mediterranean

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IN the autumn of 68 B.C. the world’s only military superpower was dealt a profound psychological blow by a daring terrorist attack on its very heart. Rome’s port at Ostia was set on fire, the consular war fleet destroyed, and two prominent senators, together with their bodyguards and staff, kidnapped.

The incident, dramatic though it was, has not attracted much attention from modern historians. But history is mutable. An event that was merely a footnote five years ago has now, in our post-9/11 world, assumed a fresh and ominous significance. For in the panicky aftermath of the attack, the Roman people made decisions that set them on the path to the destruction of their Constitution, their democracy and their liberty. One cannot help wondering if history is repeating itself.

Consider the parallels. The perpetrators of this spectacular assault were not in the pay of any foreign power: no nation would have dared to attack Rome so provocatively. They were, rather, the disaffected of the earth: “The ruined men of all nations,” in the words of the great 19th-century German historian Theodor Mommsen, “a piratical state with a peculiar esprit de corps.”

Like Al Qaeda, these pirates were loosely organized, but able to spread a disproportionate amount of fear among citizens who had believed themselves immune from attack. To quote Mommsen again: “The Latin husbandman, the traveler on the Appian highway, the genteel bathing visitor at the terrestrial paradise of Baiae were no longer secure of their property or their life for a single moment.”
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Source: NY Times: Pirates of the Mediterranean

A very interesting read noting the parallels between Rome of the first century and the United States of today. Interesting, but I hope, ultimately wrong.

Wikipedia article on Lex Gabinia, the law passed giving General Pompey basically unlimited power to pursue pirates in the mediterranean.

Sheboygan County Group Bike Rides

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My dad has a really nice website for some Tuesday/Wednesday rides. I especially like the Wednesday rides because we go out to eat after the ride. Also, if you are unfamiliar with the area, make sure to check out the Maps section…the Sheboygan-area has some terrific rides. (Let’s thank the farmers for keeping the country roads paved!)

Sheboygan Country Bike Rides/Maps

Reminiscing of the Summer of 2006

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Photos of my travels in the spring and summer of 2006:

Spring break: Chicago

I had never really been in Chicago except passing through or at the airport. We walked around the city, saw the musical “Wicked,” and saw the many attractions (museums, aquarium, navy pier).

Summer: Moab, Utah

Immediately after graduation we drove to Utah to see Canyon Country. The United States has an incredibly diverse landscape.

Summer: Immokalee, Florida

I spent one week volunteering at a food pantry in Florida.

Summer: Beartooth Mountains, Montana

My dad and I, and a friend, his dad, and his brother drove to Montana for some backpacking. On the way we stopped at Mount Rushmore and Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument. The trip was very memorable.