• Apparently, not only has Google figured out how to bypass security settings in Safari, they've been able to do it in IE as well. Micro$oft has countered by publishing a "Tracking Protection List" that blocks all Google embeds. At least, in Internet Asploder. I'm inclined to respond by saying that anyone who's still using Internet Asploder deserves what they get...and, as a Chrome user, I'm not particularly worried.


• Interesting factoid from ZeroHedge: by being perceived as hostile towards gun owners, President Obama has helped the firearms industry tremendously by driving record sales of guns and ammo. I'd almost be inclined to think Obama was pulling a Xanatos Gambit and is ready to claim credit for the "stimulus" to the gun industry...but he's probably not that smart.


• A lengthy but informative piece here on the art of salary negotiation. Via Chris Byrne, who offers some pointers of his own to supplement that article. Sad but true fact: "We [engineers] overwhelmingly suck at it. We have turned sucking at it into a perverse badge of virtue." Sigh...he's right, especially since my own philosophy is closer to "Be thankful you have a job, shut up and do as you're told."


• Valorna Edgeworth from Second Life and EVE pointed me to the things MakerBot Industries is doing. I'd read about some of their stuff on TechCrunch, this, for instance. This sort of technology will just become more pervasive; what happens, for instance, when it becomes affordable to have your own CNC milling machine in your garage? It almost is, now, if you buy a used one you can adapt to control via a standard PC...


• And speaking of disruptive technologies, how about a DNA sequencer the size of a USB key? Expensive now, but just wait. The future is now, folks.


• This Android tablet is available for $139 for a 7-inch model or $250 for a 10-inch model, runs ICS, does not have any bootloader locks or other obstructions, and comes with optional source code disk. Might be worth getting to hack around with. (Via TC)


• If you haven't followed Ken White's "Anatomy of A Scam" at Popehat, it's worth a read. It's almost a HOWTO for investigating and reporting scammers, using Google, PACER, and court records searches. Suffice to say, the principal scammers in this tale look like they're in a world of hurt...


• PandoDaily: Stop Trying to Make F-Commerce Happen. Seriously? "F-commerce" meaning "commerce via Facebook"? That's as bad as "m-commerce" meaning "commerce via mobile," maybe more so. Whoever thought to call it "F-commerce" should be F-slapped around. (FuckedCompany.com: Never forget!)


• CBS, which now owns Paramount, is putting Star Trek: The Next Generation out on Blu-ray starting this year with Season 1. I just got the "teaser" disc with three restored episodes, and boy, do they look beautiful. Any TNG fan should have it, particularly as one of the remastered episodes is "The Inner Light" from Season 5, universally acknowledged as being one of the best TNG episodes ever, and one of four Star Trek episodes to win a Hugo. The only drawback is, the episodes were all filmed in 4:3 for the TV sets of the day, and so appear pillarboxed on a modern HD set. (JMS was thinking ahead when he filmed Babylon 5 in widescreen...)

Via Michelle Malkin, I hear that Hussein al-Chicago is establishing a new "Truth Team" aimed at "responding to unfounded attacks and defending the President's record."  In other words, another left-wing snitch squad, just like Attack Watch!!! before it. Honestly, this is getting real predictable, and real old, real fast.

Somebody better point Ogabe's chief of staff, Jack Lew, at that team, because he could use a dose of the truth:

“You can’t pass a budget in the Senate of the United States without 60 votes and you can’t get 60 votes without bipartisan support,” Lew said. “So unless… unless Republicans are willing to work with Democrats in the Senate, [Majority Leader] Harry Reid is not going to be able to get a budget passed.”

That’s not accurate. Budgets only require 51 Senate votes for passage, as Lew — former director of the Office of Management and Budget — surely must know.

Of course, we know what he meant.  60 votes is the requirement to pass a cloture motion that breaks a (presumably GOP-led) filibuster. So...I guess what he meant to say was something along the lines of "You can't ram through a lopsidedly-Democratic budget in the Senate of the United States over the strenuous objections of the Republicans without 60 votes and you can't get 60 votes without peeling off a few squishy RINOs who think disagreeing with the NSDWP is 'unhelpful.'"

Of course, the Donks could try, instead, proposing a reasonable and prudent budget that both they and their loyal opposition could see the merits in and pass without needless drama...

Ha. Haha. Hahahaha. Hahahahahahahahaha! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Who are we kidding? Those numbnuts haven't managed to pass A budget, let alone anything anywhere near "reasonable and prudent," in the past three years! (And most of their attempted budgets, in the meantime, have been closer to "complete fiduciary misconduct." )

And the new proposal headed their way from the desk of King Putt isn't any better, with deficits and additional national debt as far as the eye can see.  Aside from the obvious pitfalls in this approach (see "Greece" for an example), the budget mess also, as Karl Denninger points out, makes it impossible for law enforcement to go after the banks for their systematic looting and asset-stripping of the American populace...because those same banks make it possible for the Federal Gummint to keep kiting checks, and even to keep rolling over the existing debt.  Lose that capability, and the Feds either have to quit deficit spending in a hurry (good luck with that!) or collapse, literally, within hours.  This is what is commonly known as "having someone by the balls."

And that's a bit of truth that will never be acknowledged by Sir Golfsalot and his "Truthiness Team."