Month: March 2008

Armageddon Pills

While traveling around the world as a family, we attempted to cross the Bolivian salt flats and got stranded with no more than a bag of peanut M&Ms. How they saved us is how they came to be known as Armageddon Pills. Take a look at our round-the-world journey

Beyond FOIA

Abolish the Freedom of Information Act. Turn it inside-out. Why should we be asking for information about and from our government? The government should have to ask to keep things from us. Government information — every act of government on our behalf — should be free by default. We must insist on an aggressive ethic of openness. The exceptions should be rare: the personal business of citizens, national security, ongoing criminal investigations and court cases (while they are ongoing), and little else.

argues that all gov data should be public by default, and all gov meetings videoed. now this would be a reasonable policy.

Fake Victims

On a personal level this is a tragedy, and there seems little doubt her agent committed fraud, but it is closer to farce. I mean, c’mon: This is someone who couldn’t speak the language, and yet got no advice when making the biggest financial decision of her life. She had to know she was taking immense financial risks (numbers are numbers, whether in Spanish or English), but did nothing to ameliorate her obvious risks, and is now being presented as a victim.

hard to be sympathetic. just like the infatuation with cars, the ‘own your home’ fetish needs to be overcome before real progress can be made.