The Chucksphere

Title says it all.

On Wednesday the 23rd, the Senate Judiciary Committee will begin debating renewing portions of the PATRIOT Act. Senator Russ Feingold of Wisconsin introduced a bill recently to limit the potential abuses of power and invasions of privacy that characterize the PATRIOT Act as it exists. Feingold and his co-sponsors are looking to safeguard our basic constitutional rights in a way that doesn’t neuter our national security apparatus. Write your senators.

JUSTICE Act Summary

Text of the Bill (S 1686)

Track the Bill

A Battle Looms Over the Patriot Act

About a week ago, Paul Krugman had this to say about the necessity of the public option:

“Remember, to make reform work we have to have an individual mandate. And everything I see says that there will be a major backlash against the idea of forcing people to buy insurance from the existing companies. That backlash was part of what got Obama the nomination! Having the public option offers a defense against that backlash.

What worries me is not so much that the backlash would stop reform from passing, as that it would store up trouble for the not-too-distant future. Imagine that reform passes, but that premiums shoot up (or even keep rising at the rates of the past decade.) Then you could all too easily have many people blaming Obama et al for forcing them into this increasingly unaffordable system.”

—-Why the Public Option Matters

He’s absolutly right. With the idea of an individual mandate the most likely part of the reform package to pass, the public option is the only thing seperating a sensible attempt at healthcare reform from a massive handout to insurance companies. If there is no public option, there is no incentive for insurance companies to become more competitive price-wise, and yet they will still recive an influx of 50,000,000 customers.

I while back, I started work on a comprehensive May Day Mystery Timeline. It should be more than done by now, but various things got in the way, and the project grew in scope. As I combed through my notes to find my source material, I realized that my notes documents need some serious revision. That has made the project triple in size, and so take much longer to get through. I project that the project will be finished by the end of the month, but take that with a grain of salt.

In the interim, I’m going to post the addendum to the current note-set fairly soon.

[EDIT 13-September-2009 12:36am -- I uploaded the new notes documents to the index, and I submitted the following clues which can be found on the Contributions page.]

Letter [105]

The bottle cap ties into an ad from 2001.

“In Binary congruence with 3/8/89, Chemnitz has provided a zabra…for the initial transfer.” – ADW 17-January-2001

As Jessica Augustsson notes, Zabra could be a misspelling of “sabra,” which is both a type of boat or a Jew born in Palestine. In the context of the ad, it could either mean the furnishing of a small boat to transfer something that the Arbella is unable to, or the provision of a bottle of Sabra Chocolate Orange Liqueur as part of a transfer.

The question at the heart of this is: “Is this cap a clue to deciphering 17-January-2001, is it supposed to draw your interest back to that ad for some reason, or is the Orphanage just messing with you?”

Freaks 214

The “cancel” he is talking about is the cross-shaped marker-lines on this envelope (http://www.maydaymystery.org/mayday/offsite/delivery05202009/envelope.jpg) from ~20-May-2009 (the one with the bottlecap in it). While the Orphanage would point this out because it follows the cross shape they made with the stamps, it was probably the result of the cancellation machine being broken or something of that nature. Or, they could have a man on the inside at the Post Office.

Freaks 215

This email to you references a group called the Zion Rangers “walking through walls.” This could be a reference to ADW 1-May-2006, which includes a refernce to the book “Walking Through Walls: A Presentation of Tibetan Meditation” by Anne Carolyn Klein.

1-May-2009

To Anne,

I had the same reaction to that map that you did. However, I went to elementary school in Michigan, so I think the U.S. Map pattern must be fairly widespread, at least enough so that a cold-identification of the particular school in question will be all but impossible.

Never let someone you don’t trust have control over something important to you.

Two radio related mini-posts.

Rush Limbaugh is a frakin’ idiot. Nobody forced anyone to watch Obama’s speech. Not a soul. Schools chose to show it. Nothing in his message was the least bit controversial, and it wouldn’t have been. They’re kids for fuck’s sake.

Text of Obama’s speech.

Also, a weird thing. I don’t like cars (other than my pimp-mobile), and I don’t fancy auto-repair. However, I love Car Talk on NPR. Love it. It’s so entertaining.