Archive for August 1st, 2012

DEFCON 20 updates.

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

Posted in DEFCON 20, Geek | Comments Closed

Yes, we have more bananas.

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

The House Ethics Committee has recommended that Rep. Laura Richardson (D-Long Beach) be reprimanded for pressuring her congressional staff to work on her political campaign, dealing a severe blow to her reelection bid.

…

In a scathing report issued Wednesday, the ethics panel’s investigative subcommittee found Richardson improperly used House resources for campaign and personal purposes, compelled congressional staff to work on her campaign and obstructed the committee investigation “through the alteration or destruction of evidence” and “the deliberate failure to produce documents.”

Obstruction? “deliberate failure to produce documents”? “…callous disregard for her staff and the resources entrusted to her by the American people”? And she gets a reprimand?

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

You’re doing it WRONG!

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

A suspect in a Smart Car led authorities on a high-speed chase from west Houston to northwest Houston Wednesday afternoon.

(Video of the “high-speed chase” at the link.)

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law | 1 Comment »

Banana republicans watch: August 1, 2012.

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

Tyrone Freeman used to be the president of Local 6434 of the Service Employees Industrial Union (SEIU).

Then things started happening. The LAT did a series of reports on Freeman’s spending as head of the local. The federal Department of Labor, the FBI, and the IRS started investigating.

Last month, his wife, Pilar Planells, pleaded guilty to an income tax charge in connection with more than $540,000 she received in consulting payments from the union. She is expected to be sentenced to three years’ probation and must pay about $130,000 in back taxes, interest and penalties, according to court records.

And now Freeman has been indicted on 15 counts:

Freeman was indicted on federal charges of stealing from those workers to enrich himself — even billing the union for costs from his Hawaiian wedding. The 15-count indictment, which also contains allegations that he violated tax laws and gave false information to a mortgage lender, carries combined maximum prison sentences of more than 200 years.

Oddly enough, I see no mention of strippers. Freeman was apparently big on cigars and cognac.

Still pending in state court is a civil lawsuit the union filed against Freeman and Planells over more than $1.1 million they allegedly pilfered. The suit contends that the money financed Freeman’s lifestyle of $175 glasses of cognac, $250 bottles of wine and a $3,400 trip to the NFL Pro Bowl.

Yeah, Hawaii is nice and all. But, dude, the Pro Bowl? Seriously?

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Law, NFL | Comments Closed

Quote of the day.

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

If you have a few, shall we say, indiscretions in your past, don’t be alarmed. You shouldn’t automatically assume you won’t be hired. If you’re really interested, you owe it to yourself to give it a shot.

(I love that “shall we say, indiscretions“.)

Posted in DEFCON 20, Geek | Comments Closed

Noted for the record.

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

The two NSA pamphlets I mentioned previously, “Solving the Enigma – History of the Cryptanalytic Bombe” and “The Cryptographic Mathematics of Enigma” are available from the NSA website as free downloads, along with quite a few other publications related to WWII cryptography. There are also publications available on cryptography in other eras: Korea, Vietnam, Cold War, etc.

I personally like having the printed versions to have and to hold (and you can request them by email), but this is a gold mine for the impatient person who really wants to know the “History of the Cryptographic Branch of the People’s Army of Vietnam 1945-1975“.

Posted in DEFCON 20, Geek, Museums | Comments Closed

Bring the NYT the brown trousers (and other random notes for August 1, 2012).

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

Last year, NYC sold 28,000 pounds of spent brass to Georgia Arms, which reloaded the casings and sold re-manufactured ammunition.

The sale of shell casings to Georgia Arms is perfectly legal and not uncommon; other police departments sell their used casings. And many of its “factory loaded” bullets, as the second-generation rounds are known, are sold in bulk to police agencies for use on their own firing ranges. They are less expensive than new ammunition.

Not surprisingly, the NYT has issues with this.

Meanwhile:

It is against that backdrop that Georgina Geikie, a 27-year-old English barmaid, will approach the firing line at the Royal Artillery Barracks here Wednesday. She is the first British athlete to compete in an Olympic cartridge pistol competition since 1996, and she will be doing something that is illegal for nearly everyone in the country — and until recently was illegal for her as well.

More:

Citing a regular and steady tally of gun fatalities in Britain that have not drawn as much attention as massacres like the one in Dunblane and a more recent rampage in Cumbria, [Chris] Williamson [Labor MP] says additional restrictions are needed, if not an outright prohibition on all guns. Among the rules he is pushing is a ban on keeping guns at home, more aggressive regulation of air guns and yearly mental fitness tests for gun owners.

“It’s not working! Do it harder!”

Interesting:

Austin’s two Sushi Zushi restaurants have temporarily shut down and might not reopen for a week or more after a number of employees reportedly walked off the job when they learned the business was the focus of a federal immigration audit, a company spokeswoman said.

This appears to be a breaking story:

Indonesia’s Olympic team leader says eight female badminton doubles players have been disqualified from the London Games after trying to lose matches to receive a more favorable place in the field.

Posted in Clippings, Food, Guns, Sports | Comments Closed

Obit watch: August 1, 2012.

Wednesday, August 1st, 2012

Noted author and William F. Buckley foe Gore Vidal. (NYT. LAT. WP. No A/V Club yet: when they post it, I’ll add it here.)

Posted in Books, Clippings, Obits | Comments Closed