You know technology has arrived when ...

The mainstream media have been speculating on how The Holy See might announce the passing of the head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope John Paul II.

They've reported that mourners would wait for the light to go out in the Pope's Vatican apartment as the sign of his death. Or that the window shutters would be closed. Or the bells would peel in the church towers in Rome. Or the Vicar of Rome would announce his death. Or a bronze door might close.

The Vatican used e-mail. Reported the Associated Press:

Vatican Says Pope John Paul II Has Died

VATICAN CITY - Pope John Paul II, the Polish pontiff who led the Roman Catholic Church for more than a quarter century and became history's most-traveled pope, has died at 84, the Vatican announced in an e-mail Saturday.

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No independent observers allowed: The Pinellas County Medical Examiner refused to let independent observers designated by the Schindler family view the autopsy of Terri Schindler Schiavo. This begs an answer to the question "Why?" but no reason was given for the refusal. However, unlike that of Adm Jeremy "Mike" Boorda, the autopsy results in Florida are a public document and will be made public. While the public won't be able to view photos, experts will be allowed to review tapes, pictures and tissue samples of the autopsy if requested by the family. The body of Mrs. Schiavo was cremated today.

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Is your pancake syrup made from maple furniture?: If you believe this report by National Public Radio's Robert Siegel broadcast April 1, 2005, it could be.

A living advertising legend passes into history

If you're too young to have watched a tv commercial by Frank Perdue, you've missed one of the most courageous men in advertising.

Perdue was wimpy skinny -- not svelte skinny, had a face like chicken with the eyes and nose to match and pitched his company's poultry in a high squeaky voice on the nation's airwaves from coast-to-coast.

The tagline that accompanied the advertising for Perdue chickens was "It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken." In his long white lab coat, his white hardhat and his squeaky voice, Perdue couldn't have looked less like a tough man and more out of place than former presidential candidate Michael Dukakis did in an army tank.

I remember pretty clearly in my mind's eye the ad that put his company into the national spotlight. He came on the air looking like a dweeb and acting tough and talked about this V-shaped plastic gizmo he held in his hands. His complaint was that his company has thousands of the devices, breast gauges used by the inspectors to grade the breast sizes of hens. The breast gauges, he explained, were too small the measure the breasts of his chickens. And he told the audience his problem was that he didn't know what to do with all those breast gauges other than give them to his competitors.

I roared with laughter when I saw that commercial and I know I'm not the only one. I remember reading an article sometime later where thousands of people, mostly young men but some women as well, had written to Perdue Farms requesting their own personal breast gauge.

If you were one of the lucky ones to have received a chicken breast gauge from Frank Perdue, treasure it. Many people would have told Perdue that he wasn't broadcast material, that he should hire models or actors. Reports the Associated Press:

Perdue, whose prominent nose, small dark eyes, thin lips and high-pitched voice gave him the impression of a chicken, said he was initially uncertain about whether to take to the airwaves.

He said a New York ad man persuaded him to run his own commercials, but also gave Perdue a warning. "He said, 'If you do this, you're going to have some heartaches from it. You're going to have people yelling at you or maybe screaming at you or criticizing you, but I think it's the best way to sell a superior chicken, which I think you have,'" Perdue said in a 1991 interview with The Associated Press. "

It was quite a shock to my nervous system because I'd never been in a school play or anything and I'm basically reticent about speaking in public," said Perdue, who ultimately did 156 different ads.

I don't know what Frank Perdue was like in person; I never met the man. But I know he went in the face of what people thought and turned his father's egg farm into a nearly $3 billion business and employed thousands of people, not only at his processing plant but at the chicken farms that supplied it with product.

Many folk I've met in my life are stymied by their fears of what their contemporaries would think of them if they stepped out of the anticipated and did the unexpected. No one likes to have their ideas laughed at, but it's a fact of life people ridicule things they don't understand. And if it's a new idea, of course they're going to laugh. You're the only who understands it. If they could understand it, they would have thought of it and it would be their idea.

But if you can have enough courage to believe in yourself and your ideas, who knows what you can accomplish? Frank Perdue is just one in a long line of dweebs the world has produced who are telling you you CAN if you can face your fears.

Perdue, 84, died yesterday after a short illness.

In a clearing stands a boxer and a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders of every glove that's laid him down
Or cut him 'til he cried out in his anger and his shame:
"I am leaving! I am leaving!"
But the fighter still remains.

The Boxer, Simon and Garfunkel

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Porn spam Easter egg of the day:

Jazz came to America three hundred years ago in chains.

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I have updated my post "Here's my report on clo*(*($@#$%^@#."

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I have updated yesterday's post "Rest in peace Terri, none of us will ..."

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Happy Birthday to Rocky, Skitz and their 11 brothers and sisters wherever they are. Thank you Ilsa for this wonderful gift you left me. I miss you dearly. We'll go to the lakes and play tug again, I promise.

Rest In Peace Terri, none of us will ...

The outcome of the Terri Schindler Schiavo case will be felt for decades, if not generations to come.

1. There will almost immediately be a rush from Hollywood and the publishing industry to get the rights to the story from the participants. I'm sure talks have already started. Considering the enmity between Michael Schiavo and The Schindlers, there will no doubt be at least two authorized versions of the story, and two made-for-tv movies, if not a mini-series. Everyone will be involved in this with their hands out, from the lawyers to the reporters to the judges to politicians to the religious.

2. Because the leftists denied up and down that Terri Schindler Schiavo felt any pain during her 13 day death ordeal, death by starvation and dehydration, removing a sustenance tube from a patient will continue to be an acceptable form of the termination of a patient's life. It, in my opinion, is euthanasia's version of the pre-clinical abortion day's "metal clothes hanger." But this procedure will be allowed to continue and we'll still refer to ourselves as a "higher being" than animals.

3. It doesn't matter that the judge who ruled Terri Schindler Schiavo's sustenance tube removed, Pinellas County Circuit Judge George Greer, is a conservative Christian and longtime Republican. He was asked to leave the congregation of his local Southern Baptist church because of his decision. The religious right is incensed at the judicial approach to this case, more incensed than people are to the political approach taken by President Bush and Congress. The judge says he interpreted the law and the religious believe the law is wrong and the judge should've ruled in favor of keeping Mrs. Schiavo alive. The religious right is active, can raise a lot of money, and will pressure congress to accept every judicial appointee President Bush sends them. I doubt this would be the best for the public interest. I want checks and balances. The press release wires are already flooded with appeals from religious organizations for money and members, promising coordinated political action. The Roman Catholic Church has authorized the formation of a new religious order of priests, like the Franciscans and the Jesuits, but the new order will be highly political and vocal in its opposition to abortion or euthanasia of any type.

4. Many people will seek Living Wills, DNRs (Do not resuscitate orders), and assign medical powers of attorney because of this case. A whole new specialty practice of legal work will be formed because of this case, and people will have to hire an "end-of-life" attorney to make sure their death is dignified, quick and painless. The lawyers will get even richer. And despite all this, even with all this preparation, there will still be many cases where the death will not be dignified, quick or painless because of the national aversion to confronting the inevitable and making the best out of a terminal, non-recoverable situation.

5. The emphasis will not be on people learning CPR or on the national obsession with dieting or eating disorders brought on by negative body images reinforced by the mainstream media or on fighting media's fascination with the thin. "Thin" allows the mainstream media to reap hundreds of millions from the trillion dollar diet, exercise and fashion industry. If you appeal to someone's vanity and fears, you can sell them anything. What female would want to be viewed as the object of the type of national ridicule such at that presented by Viacom's SpikeTV and the New York Times? It's not like Terri died from plastic surgery. It was a personal problem, an "eating disorder." All this despite the fact that Terri's coma-like state was brought on by a heart attack which deprived her brain of oxygen for an estimated 10 minutes! And someone -- anyone -- with the knowledge of CPR -- a skill that could be learned in a few short hours -- could have kept the blood flowing through her body and prevented that brain damage! The heart stoppage, when Terri was 26, was induced by a potassium imbalance, the result of what the media calls an "eating disorder" in news accounts or "latest diet craze to slim down for the summer" in feature articles and morning talk shows.

As a nation we will be in agreement only when the conservatives believe that what they tried to do for people like Terri is what they'd do for Laura Bush in the same situation; and when the liberals believe what they'd do to people like Terri is what they'd do for Hillary Clinton in the same situation -- let them live with no hope of recovery or let them waste away, like a cast-off.

U.S. Army Capt. Rogelio "Roger" Manulyet knows firsthand what can happen to someone who decides to end a terminal patient's life quickly, honorably and painlessly.

Rest in peace Terri, the mania that surrounded your case has just begun and your autopsy hasn't even been completed.

[Update 4/1/2005: U. S. Army Capt. Rogelio "Roger" Manulyet, convicted of a mercy killing of a terminally wounded insurgent, will be dismissed from the Army for his actions but will serve no time in jail.]

[Update 4/1/2005: Want to find out if the writers of the news report or commentary you're reading/listening to about Terri Schindler Schiavo favors the husband's position and is pro-pulling the feeding tube? Check out the way the reporter writes Mrs. Schiavo's name -- Terri Schiavo or Terri Schindler Schiavo. I use Terri Schindler Schiavo in my commentary because she was not only Michael Schiavo's wife but also the daughter of the Schindlers. Both opinions deserve to be considered. Most of the reports I read or heard that just used her married name were heavily biased in favor of pulling the feeding tube and keeping it out. This type of bias research is well-documented, accepted in academia and is called "content analysis." Style sometimes means everything.]

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Porn spam Easter egg of the day:

Fac me cocleario vomere! - Gag me with a spoon!

Here's my report on clo*(*($@#$%^@#

I was on the road again today but I was able to listen to a great segment on NPR's Marketplace on the shortage of closed-captioners and the problems they encounter. I tried to find the script on the Marketplace website but there was none. Not only that but the segment wasn't mentioned in the brief description of today's program. [This post has been updated. Please see the update at the end of the post.]

If you'd like to listen to it, you can head to the Marketplace website and select the show for March 30, 2005. Head about 22 minutes and 30 seconds into the 28 and half minute show and the segment begins.

If you're deaf or hard of hearing, those instructions won't help you a bit. So considering the subject concerns you and Marketplace didn't furnish a transcript, here's a transcript of the show I transcribed from the website audio link:

Marketplace Anchor DAVID BROWN: "Starting next year virtually all television programs will have to be closed captioned for the deaf and hard of hearing. That's job security for hundreds of trained stenographers who do the work. The problem is there aren't enough of them to meet demand. Cathy Duchamp reports now from Seattle."

Reporter DUCHAMP: "Cynthia Hill has a job situation most of us only dream about. She gets paid to watch tv in her pajamas from the comfort of her den."

HILL: "I'm typing my shorthand into my machine, it runs through my software on my laptop, it translates it into English and then puts that English caption up on the appropriate station's television screen."

(Audio tv news in background)

DUCHAMP: "This day she's captioning local tv news from Phoenix. The national average salary for a broadcast captioner is $60,000 a year but Hill says the fast talkers and long hours make for stressful work. On Sept. 11, 2001, for example, Hill started to caption at 4 in the morning ..."

HILL: "and I didn't stop until midnight that night. I captioned al-l-l-l day-y-y-y long-g-g-g. Not for the same station but you know everybody needed captions to tell everybody in the world what was going on and you know during times like that it's painfully obvious we don't have enough qualified people in our industry."

DUCHAMP: "It would take about 3,000 captioners to do the work required under the new federal law and right now there are only about 400 people trained for this particular type of stenography. To narrow the gap, Congress has boosted funding for broadcast caption training programs like this one at Green River Community College in Auburn, Wash."

(Audio in background, woman's voice intro and man reporting the news but his delivery is slower than normal.)

STUDENT KIM ROCHELLE: "At 160 words you can only miss 16 words in a 5 minute long test and that''s very difficult to do, it's really very difficult to do, especially when you're pushing and you just start trying (not sure if this is transcribed correctly ... "start trying"... took a WAG - wild ass guess - here) every single week."

DUCHAMP: "What Rochelle may not know is that many Closed Captioning companies don't require certification for employment. That's something you may have noticed when watching captions that are riddled with spelling errors or just plain gibberish. The National Association of the Deaf is lobbying the Federal Communications Commission to enforce quality standards. Meantime television stations are looking for ways to absorb the additional costs of closed captioning. One option, replace the stenographers with voice translation software. Student Kim Rochelle says the human brain is the best computer for now."

ROCHELLE: "Our brains can process better than 500 (again, not sure if this is transcribed correctly ... something "500"... took another WAG here) words a minute and can differentiate the meanings behind them and then get that information to your fingers. It's better than the computer trying to figure out the grammar that you are trying to say but it doesn't know, you know, the English language as well as we do. So I just think that it's going to take a long time for that technology to do what everyone thinks it's going to be able to do."

DUCHAMP: "In fact, a Michigan company that developed voice translation software for tv took it off the market because of slow sales. It hopes with the new rules to get a second shot next year. In Seattle, I'm Cathy Duchamp for Marketplace."

After transcribing that audio I knew exactly what that closed-captioner must feel. Admittedly I'm not a professional and don't have the correct equipment, but what a pain in the ass! And I have no idea if the names of the participants in the news segment are spelled correctly or not.

This is another dirty little secret of the broadcasting and movie industries. They've been pulling the wool over the eyes of the deaf and hard of hearing for quite awhile. I'm sure the broadcasters will readily admit, if confronted, that the captioning of the news is sometimes very, very wrong. But it's not something they broadcast loudly or often. One might say they don't readily air their dirty laundry.

In her report for Marketplace, Ms. Duchamp mentions captions riddled with spelling errors and gibberish. While not deaf, I watch tv and movies with the closed-captioning on all the time. It's clarifying sometimes when I miss an important word of dialogue because of a bad actor's even worse attempt at an accent. There have been times, notably on the local news programs, when the captioning has been entirely 180 degrees wrong, from a misattributed quote to the misidentification of a news source. The result is that the deaf and hard of hearing who depend on captioned news are sometimes getting the short end of the stick.

Often the fault is not in the captioner but in the final edit of the series, made-for-tv movie or video. The tv show "The Simpsons" has many such errors where the characters say one thing but the closed-captioning includes information that's altogether different. I suspect that's because it is an animated show. Changing the closed-captioning after putting in the audio track is probably very expensive.

The local station or editor may censor the audio of a character's dialogue but the caption contains the words nonetheless. Last summer's release of the DVD set of "Jonny Quest" is a classic case of this audio censorship. On several segments, the audio was edited for political correctness but the dialogue on the closed-captioning was left intact.

In the episode "Pursuit of the Po-Ho," about an Amazon Indian tribe that kidnaps "Dr. Quest," there is a scene where "Race Bannon" screams at the tribe to scare them, calling them "heathen monkeys." The scene in the cartoon remains but the voice of "Race Bannon' has been edited out. However, the closed-captioning was not edited.

In the episode entitled "Monster in the Monastery," Jonny Quest's nemesis is an Asian terrorist (disguised as a Yeti) attempting to destroy a Tibetan city. When the terrorist slips on oil and falls down the stairs in old Buddhist monastery, Jonny Quest is supposed to say "Uh-oh, here comes the Oriental Express!" This comment also was edited out of the dialogue on the DVD but not on the closed-captions.

(The silver lining here is that I found this out long ago, when the DVD was first released. The audio was not edited on the VHS of "Monsters in the Monastery" and I've been collecting copies from eBay for pennies. And one day, thanks to the puritans and the political correctness police at Hanna-Barbera, those videos will be worth much more than I paid for them. "Pursuit of the Po-Ho" never made it to VHS.)

Many DVDs don't even offer closed-captioning or subtitles, and that's even worse than having garbled words or incorrect dialogue. The deaf and hard of hearing are a market with money to spend, and why would any profit-oriented entrepreneur in their right mind eliminate a market before the DVD even hits the streets?

I think it's great that closed-captioning exists. Not only for the deaf, but also for everyone else. In fact, I'd bet it would help children learn to read sooner if they watched tv with closed captioning on and could associate the printed word with the spoken word. (Students in elementary education, speech and communication needing a graduate research project, have at it.) But it's obvious that captioning's not perfect and it's got a long way to go.

I acknowledge, though, the situation for the deaf and hard of hearing could be worse. There could be a publicly funded radio program that doesn't contain transcripts of its shows on its website, ensuring the deaf and hard of hearing have no access to timely information that concerns them. Some information, even if garbled, is better than none at all.

[Update 4/1/2005: I stand corrected, sort of. I have discovered there is a specific hyperlink on the Marketplace website to this particular story, and a transcript of the introduction by news anchor David Brown. To find this hyperlink, you have to go to the primary hyperlink for the day's show, and select the "View Show" hyperlink, which is there not to view the show, but to view a partial transcript and the order of the show. There is, however, no transcript for this particular report other than the introduction. The reporter's last name is "Duchamp," not "DuChand" as I originally posted and I have corrected my error in the original post.]

[Update 4/05/2005: Last week I e-mailed Marketplace a short missive of my thoughts on their report and the lack of a free transcript of the audio of that report. They called, asked me to record my comments. And today, they broadcast those comments nationwide. As you might expect, no transcript is available from Marketplace but there is from The 6th Estate.

A transcript of their introduction, my comments, and their reply follows:

Marketplace anchor DAVID BROWN: Last week we reported on new rules to require closed-captioning on all tv shows starting next year. Truck driver Mark McBride heard the story, pulled over, hopped on our website and sent us this e-mail.

NEWS4A2, blood-sucking journalist's alter-ego MARK MCBRIDE: This was a wonderful report, and I'm sure the deaf and hard of hearing would have loved to have the information contained in that report. But there are no transcripts on the web site anywhere. The only transcripts are available for a fee. I don't mind Marketplace making a few extra dollars, but this limits the access of its news and commentary to the hearing, imposing a penalty -- financial, timeliness and otherwise -- on the deaf and hard of hearing.

DAVID BROWN: Mr. McBride is right. There is an outside company that does Marketplace transcripts for a fee. We wish we could afford to offer a free transcription service. But on our side of the dial, we can't afford to give away much more than tote bags and occasionally a t-shirt.

Hint from NEWS4A2: This is that time of year that your local public radio station is asking for contributions. Maybe that's why Marketplace used my comment. It was timely. Who cares? Instead of donating to your local station, Marketplace could probably use the funds. As I later noted in a follow-up comment to a Marketplace production assistant and reporter:

From a business aspect, Marketplace is a great product. But as a radio broadcast, it's a product that reaches only the audience that can hear. Before the web, that was understandable. Now that we have the web available to us, it opens up so many more doors. Just as newspapers can offer video and audio through their web sites, radio news doesn't have to be just broadcast; it can be printed and published as well. That's why I sent in the comment. Open the doors to Marketplace even further. It just melds everything together into true multimedia. Anyone who doesn't manufacture a video product without adding subtitles/closed-captioning automatically starts out with a reduced customer base, as does anyone who offers an audio product which doesn't include printed transcripts available on the web.

If you need another good reason to donate to Marketplace ... instead of airing the letters section of Marketplace and my golden words, my local station -- WRKF FM 89.3 -- pitched for contributions. They'll probably use the collected funds to buy more billboard advertising, something public radio stations really need. 'Nuff said.]

[Update 4/11/2005: Reporter Cathy Duchamp checked in with The 6th Estate and passed along the following info:

I'm the reporter who did the story for Marketplace on closed captioning. My employer/local station KUOW in Seattle, provides transcripts of our local field-produced stories on our website. Below is a link I did to a longer local story on career opportunities in court reporting. The closed captioner shortage story I did for Marketplace emerged from this story. Since Marketplace edited, mixed, and, essentially, owns the story I did for them, I can't provide a transcript. But I hope this longer story gives you the info you need.

http://www.kuow.org/defaultProgram.asp?ID=8525

]

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I've updated my post "Treating animals better than humans" with PETA's response to my inquiry.

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Porn spam Easter egg of the day:

In literature the ambition of the novice is to acquire the literary language;
the struggle of the adept is to get rid of it

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Must be old school: John McCaslin of the Washington Times notes that some folk might question whether there's a class structure in the liberals of the diplomatic corps. You judge for yourself. Several diplomats signed a letter asking the Senate to reject President Bush's nomination of John Bolton as the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Among the signatories of the letter: Princeton N. Lyman, Monteagle Stearns and Spurgeon M. Keeny Jr. This makes me wonder, does the U.S. even have any diplomats named "Bob?"

The Journalism Stockholm Syndrome

Lately some liberal female opinion writers have been having a hissy fit, claiming the mainstream media doesn't employ enough liberal female opinion writers. Apparently this latest grumble started with ex-Clintonista Susan Estrich's specific lambasting of Michael Kinsley, op-ed editor of the Los Angeles Times. She's a lawyer so I don't know whether she's threatening legal action or not. Maybe she's just stamping her feet trying to feign testosterone. And I don't know if she's hot for Kinsley and this is just her feminine way of getting his attention, a political batting of the eyelashes so to speak. She'd probably deny it and call me a chauvinist for even suggesting that such an occurrence could ever take place between a male and female of the species.

My advice: If you want to write commentary, just do it. Sooner or later if you promote yourself a little bit and folk are interested in what you write, the word will get out and you'll have an audience. The lack of any opinion leads to unbalance.

And it's not like writing commentary is difficult, other than having to bear your soul and innermost feelings to complete strangers. The nice part about writing commentary is that if someone else says pretty much what you believe, you can quote them and then add the part they missed. Take, for instance, the insightful commentary of Catherine Seipp from National Review Online regarding the current kerfluffle:

I think what's really missing from the op-ed pages is not more women writers but more real diversity among those writers. I can't think of any major female columnist who brings the perspective of raising children without the safety net of a full-time staff job and/or a comfortably employed husband-- in other words, someone with firsthand knowledge of life beyond the small, privileged circles of the media elite. But then I suppose that's what I would say, since that describes me. Still, I don't think I'm the only one to notice that the problem with the mainstream media is less that it's liberal and more that it's just plain elite.

Seipp couldn't have hit the nail on the head more directly if she were a union carpenter.

"Hey, I've met you. You are not cool"

The members of the media get invited to all these social functions and they start thinking they are part of the crowd they're covering, like some kind of Stockholm Syndrome particular to journalists. They wear evening dresses and tuxedoes, pin-striped suits and wingtips to blend in and then start thinking they're part of the crowd they're covering when, in fact, all they are are our observers. Some of them even marry into the political royalty, like Andrea Mitchell, the ABC correspondent who married Alan Greenspan.

If they don't cover the event as well as the elites believe it should be covered, then the human resources people must get the word from on high to start hiring the children of the swells. Like designer and heiress Gloria Vanderbilt's son, Anderson Cooper, a graduate of Yale and the University of Hanoi who moved from ABC's overnight news program World News Now to a reality show called "The Mole" to his current gig on CNN with his own show.

I saw Journalism Stockholm Syndrome (JSS) occur in an old acquaintance who covered the police beat. Before he started at the newspaper, he was virulently anti-police. I saw him a year later and he was wearing a tie-tac in the shape of handcuffs and talking about "skells," cop slang for criminals. He'd learned the language, adopted the culture and went native. Neither the virulent anti-police person or the cop lover are good for the police beat if you want the truth and objectivity. In the old days, the editors used to move people around constantly to avoid this from happening.

But JSS is more common than that. Basically, it's a problem of money and respectability. I'm not saying it started with Hildy Johnson either. The reporters put on suits, get married, start earning a decent living, want their kids to end up in nice schools like every parent does. And they essentially become middle class, maybe even marry right through a newspaper connection and become part of the elite structure, a limbo section of the almost-haves who forgot long ago about the have-nots.

When you forget what it's like to have to scrape for a living, to have doors slammed in your face, to be ridiculed for who you are or what you believe, you become comfortable. And the journalist's job, according to H. L. Mencken, is to afflict the comfortable. So there's a conflict.

Enter the bloggers. Dissidence, like life, will always find a way.

[Update 4/3/2005: Susan Estrich should take a look at the opinion columns of the Orlando Sentinel's Kathleen Parker, including one of Parker's latest lambasting the mainstream media for showcasing and legitimizing weirdo-pundit-of-the-day, convicted pedophile Jake Goldenflame. But then again, liberal Estrich would probably discount such a sane, conservative female voice.]

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Deja Vu All Over Again: I couldn't stop thinking that I'd seen a situation similar to the media circus surrounding the Terri Schindler Schiavo case. I knew it was in a movie but I just couldn't remember the name of it. I have now, it's a 1951 film noir classic directed by Billy Wilder called "Ace in the Hole."

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See no Fox, Speak no Fox, Hear no Fox: An entrepreneur, apparently very willing and ready to accept liberal money, has developed a device to block Fox news on your cable. Aptly called the "Fox Blocker," the gizmo screws into the back of the tv and lets all cable stations through except Fox. No word on whether Jack Nicholson will help hawk the device.

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Porn spam Easter egg of the day:

Hoc tempore obsequium amicos, veritas odium parit
- In these days friends are won through flattery, the truth gives birth to hate.

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Today's date is March 29.
That was then. Thank you. Welcome home.

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The U.S. Army said it has awarded the Silver Star for bravery to Specialist Jeremy Church. He is the first Army Reservist to receive the award for gallantry in action in the Global War on Terrorism. The Army said then-Private First Class Church saved the lives of nine people including four civilians, his commanding officer and four other soldiers during action April 9, 2004 in Iraq. When a convoy he was riding in was attacked by insurgents, Church returned fire, helped guide the convoy to safety and then returned to protect the civilians and soldiers, the Army said. Two soldiers lost their lives in the attack by a force of 150 insurgents and a third soldier was captured and remains missing. The Silver Star is the Army's third highest award for valor.

Update Monday

Sorry, gang. A busy Monday for me and I just don't have time for original copy today. However, that doesn't mean that what I have is unimportant.

1. I updated The Cinderella Story That Wasn't today. VERY IMPORTANT if you're a reservist, in the National Guard, or are an employer.

2. I updated Hype and Tripe late last night.

3. I found the answer(s) to the nagging question from your youth. Or at least, the nagging question from my youth.

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Porn spam Easter egg of the day:

The pen is mightier than the sword -- if the sword is very small, and the pen is real sharp.

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And last, but certainly not least, I would like to thank all the folk who dropped by today. Thanks to you, The 6th Estate experienced its first ever 100 visitor day. And, considering I started the blog Feb.21 and I haven't shown you pictures of my large naked butt or offered you anything free but for pieces of my mind, that's saying something. Time is precious, and I'm honored by your patronage of this blog. [Begin Elvismode]Thank you, thank you very much.[/Elvismode] Please tell your friends about The 6th Estate. No ads, no breaking news, just opinion out the yingyang.

When does a hobby become a business?

What's the difference between holding a perpetual "Yard Sale" every weekend and selling items on eBay? Some folk who use eBay as their storefront may find out the big difference is regulation, bureaucracy and the tax man.

eBay has grown from being a place for small time exchange of goods to BIG BUSINESS, with some 135 million users transacting business worth $34 billion last year, according to info from an Associated Press tax article circulating around. And this includes not only established legal businesses and "Mom & Pop" incubations, but also, I'm sure, other less than legal enterprises as well. Considering how often I'm sold bootleg videos of scarce movies I want, the counterfeiters must love it.

I had envisioned a need for an eBay back in 1997, when I suggested on the usenet the formation of "virtual co-operatives" and what I call "hassle free enterprise zones." The rest of the country might have been doing well, but the Louisiana economy was in the pits. In response to a comment by John Gerits, then moderator of misc.business.marketing.moderated, I wrote:

What you are talking about here is a virtual co-operative, an online mall. And a different thread undoubtedly. ;) Good idea, but a tough sell. But that's what marketers do, right? Setting up co-operatives is what the Peace Corps sometimes does overseas in 3rd World countries ... it doesn't get funding or many paid volunteers in the U.S. Central L.A. isn't as exotic as East Timor I guess.

You're going to have some resistance because one of the benefits of being 80 years old and selling your homemade pralines in front of the store, or doing ornate fingernails in your kitchen or selling holiday wreaths at the fleamarket, etc. is that it's in the underground economy. It's positive business, doesn't require extra police and it buttresses the income structure of these lower income groups ... but it's also illegal as hell, at least in the U.S.

No business license, no monthly reports to the state/locality, no corporation, no tax id, no reporting of income made from selling pralines, no health certificate, no FICA payments, no building inspections, no sales tax charged or paid, no paperwork to fill out, etc., etc., etc.

Legitimizing these grassroots operations into an online co-operative means that you draw attention from the powers that be. And just the thought of that occurring means these folk will run from you like you had the plague. As soon as government gets involved, there goes their ricebowl. The last thing they want or need is some bureaucrat sticking their nose into the tent. As soon as that happens, the whole thing crumbles. Utopia dies.

Now logically, it makes sense to let these businesses incubate and grow as best as possible without government interference. I'm waiting for a "hassle free" enterprise zone.

The more they can earn from selling pralines or wreaths without the encumbrance of bureaucracy, the less tax dollars necessary to support them, the more they can spend on their kids, etc. If they can find semi-legitimate businesses to operate instead of turning to drugs, theft and prostitution, the government ought to be happy. After a certain stage, if they make it, they have to find larger, legitimate quarters and hire employees. But since their business while incubating at the kitchen table can cut into the pie of larger businesses that are funding government, crackdown. One person pissed off and the dominoes tumble.

Main street businesses already are up in arms about the internet ... it scare the bejesus out of them. They need sidewalks, and tax dollars pay for those sidewalks. And local government needs to build sidewalks for those businesses. But if that mainstreet business is selling pralines and paying taxes, and that 80 year old lady is on the web selling pralines and not paying taxes, someone's going to be yelling about the inequity. And, since the tax dollars that mainstreet business pays also pays for police, courts and the licensing bureaus, who do you think comes out on top in the battle for king of the hill?

The social dilemma is finding a middle ground that allows small business to incubate in the eBay-like environs and then spring forth, established, while preventing the anonymity of an internet storefront to protect the criminal, perhaps terrorist enterprise. But that's going to be a tough fight. If you're running an underground internet business selling pralines for "egg money," odds are you won't stand a chance without a federal sugardaddy.

And don't count on the Small Business Administration to be that beltway protector. It's an ineffectual joke, a sham on the American enterpriser and a tax dollar sinkhole at best, a political favor payback piggybank at worst, and has been a project for pork ever since its formation:

TESTIMONY

Prepared for delivery to the House Committee
on Government Reform and Oversight
Subcommittee Management, Information, and Technology
June 6, 1995

by
The Honorable Donald H. Rumsfeld
Suite 405
400 North Michigan Avenue
Chicago, IL 60611
(312) 645-0251
------------------------------------------------------------------------

THOUGHTS FROM THE BUSINESS WORLD ON DOWNSIZING GOVERNMENT

-clip-

The Small Business Administration continues to dodge reform. It was not even ten years old during my freshman term, yet, in a 1963 article on pork barrel spending, Life magazine exposed the SBA as a new "device for soaking up money and getting rid of it." Based upon its early track record, we should have had the good judgment to close down the SBA decades ago. I hope that this Congress will have the courage to act this year. It is never to be desired, but given the current budget situation, good intentions and throwing money at problems hoping some of it will stick and do some good is unacceptable.

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I've updated yesterday's post "Yeah, you try to hide 150,000 Easter Eggs."

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He actually admitted it:

"I know I could use less gas."
Andy Rooney, 60 Minutes
Commentary, March 27, 2005

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Porn spam Easter egg of the day:

Not poetry or a joke, today's piece of literature is a nonsense short story I received in a piece of spam trying to sell me prescription drugs ...

The 84-cigar-old eminent was cassock in a impenetrable cameraman after yule fruit a sextillion batch to finnish the above alcoholic armstrong.

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