Machine Test Blog

I spruced up iNove (the theme currently used on this blog) and have uploaded a new zip file. The updates are also in my GitHub repository.

This is what happens when you are so politically correct that you can't tell people to keep it in their pants:

Douglas said the increased rate of infection in blacks is not do to increased risk behavior but likely due to biological factors that make women more susceptible as well as the higher rate of infection within black communities.

Rather than point out the fact that 70% of black kids are born out of wedlock and that that is a significant sociological indicator of promiscuity (the leading cause of STD transmission) among black Americans, they "tip toe" around that by suggesting that black women are less resistent to herpes than white women. Sure, it would be blaming the victim, and we all know that that is racist too, but isn't that at least a little better than implying that black women's bodies just don't cut it at fighting disease compared to white women?

On the other hand, white people are really not much better off since a white man has a 1/6 chance that he's about to douse his crotch in viral napalm the night after he says "I do." In this race to the bottom, it's only a matter of time before we all end up "free and equal" in our misery.

Businesses will spend about 3.4 billion man-hours and individuals about 1.7 billion hours figuring out their taxes this year. That is the equivalent of 3 million people working full time year-round on tax-preparation work. This is more people than now serve in the U.S. armed forces. It is more man-hours than are required to build every car, van, and truck in the United States. [Source]

There are three things which the income tax code provides the federal government: revenue, social control and a sort of make-work program. I have seen figures ranging from the mid 250 billions to as high as 300 billion dollars as the amount of money that compliance with the federal income tax law costs in additional labor and expenses to the American people. The figures cited above are from 2003 and are probably the higher end of the compliance costs, but they should serve as a serious reminder of how much money and labor is simply wasted on complying with an inefficient tax code.

Figures like this make me shudder at the prospect of Obamacare. A government which can create a tax code so inelegant, so bloated, so indecipherable that it makes Microsoft Windows look like a case study in software engineering perfection is not capable of making something like Obamacare work.

This quick tutorial explains how to create printer-friendly entries and pages in Movable Type using Readability.

Step 1: Insert the following JavaScript into your template headers:

Step 2: Insert the following PHP code into your template headers (you must be publishing your pages as PHP files):

Step 3: Add the following Movable Type template markup to the headers:

Step 4: Add regex_replace="$rep","$rer" to each template tag that you want to reference the printer-friendly archives. For example, <$mt:EntryPermalink regex_replace="$rep","$rer"$>

Step 5: Create a .htaccess file if you don't have one already in the main folder of your blog and add the following lines to it:

Step 6: Republish.

I was messing around with how to create some JavaScript to test for the existence of a function for a new Movable Type plugin and decided to share an example (abstracted from my particular need) of why JavaScript functions are often such a mindf#$% for developers from another language:

<script type="text/javascript">
function sayHello() {
    alert('Hello');
}

function addNewHello() {
    return function() {
        alert('Buongiorno');
    };
}

sayHello = null;

sayHello2 = (sayHello && typeof sayHello == 'function' ? sayHello : addNewHello());

sayHello2();
</script>

Since function x(y,z) and x = function(y,z) are compatible statements in JavaScript (but not in languages like Java and C), the first statement is really just a variable declaration that assigns a function to sayHello. Therefore, the existence of whole chunks of functionality in JavaScript can be ascertained by a simple if statement.

This kind of power is why every once in a while I feel like a monkey wielding power tools when using JavaScript. It is a deceptively powerful language.

You know we have reached a level of decadence seldom seen in the history of the West when our women are starting to experiment with covering their vaginas in expensive crystal. It's only a matter of time before someone in China creates a $19.95 + S&H vajazzler that comes with a few dozen imitation Swarovsky crystals. At least the Romans bankrupted themselves on genuine luxuries like fine silk.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't:

JEFFERSONVILLE, IN (WAVE) - The parents of a Kentuckiana seventh grade student say their young daughter was suspended from school for doing exactly what she's been taught to do for years - to just say no to drugs.  

The girl did not bring the prescription drug to her Jeffersonville, IN school, nor did she take it, but she admits that she touched it and in Greater Clark County Schools that is drug possession.   

Barring a policy change, this will send a clear message to every student in the Greater Clark County Public School System. If you see drugs, ignore them. Forget about them. The risk is too great to yourself to even report them. If the person who brought them gets caught, better to lie and claim that you never saw them than risk getting in trouble for having even the slightest association with them. Congratulations to these fine public school employees for providing these students with a valuable lesson in why snitching never does any good (unless they are working for a fee for the DEA, at which rate it apparently pays quite handsomely).

Because militarized police forces, especially SWAT units, so closely resemble military units, the federal government can theoretically regulate them directly. Here's Article I, Section 10:

Modern militarized police forces fit the "duck test" for military service. They have the same essential hierarchy, many of the same weapons and armor and even their standard uniforms resemble military dress uniforms more than they do the normal attire of civilians. It's not uncommon to see them dressed in BDUs and driving armored vehicles that look like they could be used by military units.

But there is some good news to report here, too. The Maryland state law, as noted, is the first of its kind in the country, and will hopefully serve as a model for other states in adding some much-needed transparency to the widespread use and abuse of SWAT teams. And some Maryland legislators want to go even further. State Sen. Anthony Muse (D-Prince George's), for example, wants to require a judge's signature before police can deploy a SWAT team. Muse has sponsored another bill that would ban the use of SWAT teams for misdemeanor offenses. The latter seems like a no-brainer, but it's already facing strong opposition from law enforcement interests. Police groups opposed the transparency bill, too. [source]

In a nutshell, these police organizations are fighting for the right to send a heavily armed squad of men dressed and armed like US Army combat troops to your house for an offense that typically doesn't merit more than a few weeks or months in jail without even so much as getting a pre-battle blessing from a magistrate. They feel it is too onerous to have a judicial check on their ability to conduct military-style raids on private residences and that it is nothing short of usurpation for them to have to report annually to the state government on their use of force.

The only rational solution for the Maryland public is to demand the disbanding of SWAT units since the police organizations have demonstrated their vitriolic contempt for the public. Given their juvenile attitude toward responsibility and authority, they should be treated like juveniles and be disarmed.

iBlog2 was created by PageLines and made available as a free template (premium version here). This version may be used in accordance with the GNU General Public License per the comment in print.css of the WordPress theme with the exception of PageLines which may incorporate any of my adaptions to Movable Type without restriction into iBlog2 Professional.

To see a live demo of it for the classic blog template set, go here. To see one for the professional website, go here. You can download it, click here. Installation is the same as usual except the following:

Professional Website TS users **read below**

There are two mandatory changes that need to be made to your templates to make it work. Open "Blog Index" and "Main Index" in the template editor. Next, find the line in each that says "blog_class=" and do the following:

• set blog_class equal to "mt-main-index blog-index" in the Blog Index
• set blog_class equal to "mt-main-index first-page" in the Main Index

Optional

Open the header template and find <h1 id="header-name">. Add <div class="sheen"></div> right above that to add the "sheen" to the blog/site name. It will blur out the black at the top of it a little to make a smooth gradient look.