Trent Lott, Republican of Mississippi, has announced that he will resign as Majority Leader of the United States Senate and will serve out the remaining four years of his six-year term.

The Secretary-General of the United Nations says that the inspections for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq are proceeding well. The President of the United States says that they are not. Iraq is expected to provide their "declaration" of weapons systems on Saturday. We should be able to get a pretty good idea from it if the dictator of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, is serious about avoiding war.

Yesterday, Tom Daschle, the soon-to-be minority "leader" of the Senate of the United States of America, spoke out against talk show hosts that disagree with him and with the ideology of the Democrat party. Basically, he is setting the stage for his party's assault on the talk show hosts of America, the vast majority of whom are critical, and rightly so, of the objectives of the Democrat party.

They will do so with a so-called "campaign finance reform" measure and/or an attempt to revive the discredited, so-called "Fairness" in Broadcasting Act of 1993, which is, in truth, another way that they think that they can silence their critics.

Talk radio shows that espouse the principles of the "nanny state" generally fail. They fail because the argument for the nanny state cannot stand up to scrutiny. Implicit in this argument is a disdain for "the people," who, it is assumed, do not have enough sense to know what is in their best interests; therefore, the poor, misguided citizens need a "nanny state" to take care of them and prop them up. Since talk shows favorable to their ideas generally fail, it it only "fair" to the Democrats that talk shows critical of their ideas be censored!

The Democrats in the United States House of Representatives elected Nancy Pelosi to be their leader today. This is a good thing for the Republicans. Pelosi is such a radical liberal that she will further marginalize her party.

The Associated Press has a story by Sarah el Deeb. She writes, in part:

Egypt's foreign minister said Saturday that he expected Iraq to accept the U.N. resolution to disarm but that Baghdad had not yet made a formal decision.

"I think we can expect a positive position by the Iraqis," Ahmed Maher told reporters after Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri explained Iraq's position to the foreign ministers of the 22-member Arab League.

I think that we can be fairly sure that Saddam Hussein will say that he will accept the resolution to disarm, but that will only be a delaying tactic. That's my prediction. We'll have to wait and see what actually happens. However, we do know this for a fact: Saddam Hussein has defied the United Nations, in the past.

Also, it seems fairly certain that, if Saddam Hussein defies the United Nations this time, he will not defy it again.

Many Republicans are hoping that Representative Nancy Pelosi will replace Dick Gephardt as House Minority Leader. They feel that her election would signal that the Democrat party will position itself even farther to the left, a move which, Repuplicans feel, will marginalize it even more.

The Washington Times newspaper reports on the results of yesterday's election.

Jesse Ventura, the Governor of Minnesota, appointed an Independent to fill the vacancy in the United States Senate caused by the death of Senator Paul Wellstone. Ventura had stated that he was leaning toward appointing a Democrat, because Wellstone was a Democrat, until he was outraged by the Democrats shamelessly turning an event billed as a "memorial service" for Wellstone into an unabashedly political rally.

In 1991, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia allowed troops of the United States of American into their country to defend it against Iraq. Now, when the United States of America considers it essential that it defend itself against Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's ability to distribute weapons of mass destruction to terrorists targeting their country, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said in an interview broadcast Sunday that the Kingdom will not allow bases on its soil to be used for an attack on Iraq even if the United Nations authorizes military action.

Time magazine has called Foreign Affairs "the most influential periodical in print." In the November/December 2002 issue of Foreign Affairs, Barry Rubin, Director of the Global Research in International Affairs Center and Editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs, writes:

Arab and Muslim hatred of the United States is not just, or even mainly, a response to actual U.S. policies -- policies that, if anything, have been remarkably pro-Arab and pro-Muslim over the years. Rather, such animus is largely the product of self-interested manipulation by various groups within Arab society, groups that use anti-Americanism as a foil to distract public attention from other, far more serious problems within those societies.

CNN.com reports some good news: there are a few programs throughout the country that are mobilizing physicians to make house calls, a practice which once was common.

This is just too awesome! I just updated w.bloggar to v3.0. It is an excellent tool to use to update one or more weblogs, and it has some great, new features.

Yesterday, I bought a copy of FranklinCovey Planning Software from CompUSA. I had previously downloaded a trial edition from the FranklinCovey web site and liked it so much that I decided to go ahead and make it legal. We'll see where this goes.

IMHO it is unconscionable that the major television networks chose not to air the President's speech about the danger of Saddam Hussein.

Update on the amazing, disappearing web site content: it is back!

It is not a good thing when you try to visit your web site and find out that it no longer exists. That is what happened to me this morning. I was maintaining three weblogs at 0catch. My sites appear to no longer exist. Judging from the comments in the user forum, quite a few other people have experienced the same problem. There is a possibility that the lost content may be restored, if the situation is due to some glitch that the host techies can fix. Here's hoping!

This being a typical Saturday, I took my Mom to (1) the grocery store, (2) the pharmacy, and (3) the library. In other news, it seems as if tropical storm Hanna may be bringing some rain our way. I don't mind--I mowed the lawn last weekend, and the grass is still fairly short; the only thing that I have to go out for tomorrow is to wash the clothes at the coin-operated laundry (it has been three weeks), so I can't complain.

What the Supreme Court of the United States has done with religion makes me angry. The founding fathers would be appalled that the government they created now forbids prayer in its schools. The idea was to establish freedom of religion, not a ban on religion. Banishing prayer, and any reference to religion, from the government schools amounts to a tacit repudiation of religion and, by extension, a repudiation of the morals that religions are, in part, designed to convey to the younger generation in their formative years. In my opinion, unless, and until, we, as a country, are able to come to grips with this reality, the much-commented-upon breakdown of morals in this country will continue, and even accelerate, which will necessitate the building of ever more prisons. However, to judge from past experience, and from the rate of recidivism of paroled and discharged prisoners, prisons, which are far from being "correctional institutions," are definitely not the answer.

It is difficult to believe that it is already September. This year seems to be passing so quickly, and I don't know why, unless it is because I am getting older. Yes, it is September, but the high temperatures are still in the nineties! Lows are in the lower seventies and the upper sixties. Today, I took my eighty-one year old Mom to a local mall, to walk. We didn't go very far, but it was a lot farther than she has been walking. Most days, she doesn't even get out of the house at all. I have told her that I would be glad to take her to walk every day, after work. We'll see.

Sheesh! There were not one, but two, bank robberies in my home town yesterday. In the first one, two robbers herded customers and employees into the bank vault and then cleaned out the tellers' cages. The local news reported that, in terms of the amount of money stolen, it might have been the most successful in the city's history. The second robbery occured at a branch bank that I use. Somehow, the money was recovered, shortly after the robbery.

The weather was actually rather pleasant this afternoon when I got off work. A "cold front" passed through the area, and the humidity is lower, compared to the past few days, so, instead of feeling like a blast furnace, it felt nice. When I say that a "cold front" passed through the area, I mean that in a (very) relative sense. The temperature, right now, is eighty-six degrees Fahrenheit, and the humidity is fifty-nine percent, which makes it feel as if it is ninety degrees. Some "cold front!"

Our delivery personnel had some time on their hands this afternoon, and the lead furniture installer asked me if one of my customers was ready for a desk that they had ordered from me. We had originally scheduled it for delivery tomorrow, because the customer was returning a desk that she had bought from a competitor of ours, and the competitor was supposed to pick it up today. I telephoned her anyway, but the competitor had yet to pick up their desk. My customer said that our people could go ahead and deliver her new desk today, but they would have to move the competitor's desk into another office. Knowing how the boss dislikes our delivery personnel doing anything for free, I told her that we'd probably have it delivered tomorrow, as originally planned, thereby giving the competitor time to pick their desk up. However, my customer said that the competitor is giving her the run around about when they are going to pick up their desk.

Update on the story of the two missing girls in Oregon: Two sets of remains have been found at the home of a suspect. One set has been identified as that of Miranda Gaddis, one of two girls who disappeared from the apartment complex early this year.

Typo3 is a free, full-featured content management system that rivals commercial programs costing thousands of dollars. I do not have any experience with installing it (yet), but I understand that the installation is not as simple as some.

STAY AWAY FROM 'SKEETERS!

For free blogger templates, check out BlogSkins! Hey, that's where the global industries template came from.

The following is the text of an op/ed piece entitled "The Anthrax Files," by Nicholas D. Kristof, from the August 13, 2002 issue of "The New York Times:"

"It's time for me to come clean on "Mr. Z."

Since May, I've written periodically about a former U.S. Army scientist who, authorities say privately, has become the overwhelming focus of the investigation into the anthrax attacks last fall. I didn't name him.

But over the weekend, Mr. Z named himself: He is Steven J. Hatfill, 48, a prominent germ warfare specialist who formerly worked in the Army labs at Fort Detrick, Md. Dr. Hatfill made a televised statement on Sunday, describing himself as "a loyal American" and attacking the authorities and the media for trying "to smear me and gratuitously make a wasteland of my life."

The first thing to say is that the presumption of innocence has already been maimed since 9/11 for foreign Muslims, and it should not be similarly cheapened with respect to Dr. Hatfill. It must be a genuine assumption that he is an innocent man caught in a nightmare. There is not a shred of traditional physical evidence linking him to the attacks.

Still, Dr. Hatfill is wrong to suggest that the F.B.I. has casually designated him the anthrax "fall guy." The authorities' interest in Dr. Hatfill arises from a range of factors, including his expertise in dry biological warfare agents, his access to Fort Detrick labs where anthrax spores were kept (although he did not work with anthrax there) and the animus to some federal agencies that shows up in his private writings. He has also failed three successive polygraph examinations since January, and canceled plans for another polygraph exam two weeks ago.

So far, the only physical evidence is obscure: smell. Specially trained bloodhounds were given scent packets preserved from the anthrax letters and were introduced to a variety of people and locations. This month, they responded strongly to Dr. Hatfill, to his apartment, to his girlfriend's apartment and even to his former girlfriend's apartment, as well as to restaurants that he had recently entered (he is under constant surveillance). The dogs did not respond to other people, apartments or restaurants.

Putting aside the question of Dr. Hatfill and the anthrax, there are two larger issues.

First is the F.B.I.'s initial slowness in carrying out the anthrax investigation. Why did it take nine months to call in the bloodhounds, or to read Dr. Hatfill's unpublished novel, "Emergence," which has been sitting in the copyright office since 1998 and draws on his experiences in South Africa and Antarctica to recount a biological warfare attack on Congress?

Second is the need for much greater care within the U.S. biodefense program. Dr. Hatfill's résumé made claims (a Ph.D. degree, work with the U.S. Special Forces, membership in Britain's Royal Society of Medicine) that appear false, but these were never checked.

Moreover, what was a man like Dr. Hatfill who had served in the armed forces of two white racist governments (Rhodesia and South Africa) doing in a U.S. Army lab working with Ebola? With a new wave of funding for smallpox and anthrax research, we must be doubly careful that the spread of pathogens to new labs solves problems rather than creates them.

The White House is putting strong pressure on the F.B.I. to solve the anthrax murders. Top administration officials would love to find an Iraqi connection, but would settle for solving the case. The F.B.I. director, Robert Mueller, is pushing back, saying that nothing would be worse for the bureau than a premature prosecution that would fizzle in court.

To its credit, in the last few months, the bureau has finally picked up its pace. Its experts in Quantico are belatedly examining anthrax hoax letters sent in 1997 and 1999 that bear fascinating resemblance to the real anthrax letters. Investigators are looking at another hoax letter with intriguing parallels to the real one; that hoax was sent to Senator Tom Daschle from London in mid-November, when Dr. Hatfill was visiting a biodefense center in England.

Partly because of the newfound energy, the F.B.I. has lately been enjoying genuine progress in its anthrax investigation. People very close to Dr. Hatfill are now cooperating with the authorities, information has been presented to a grand jury, and there is reason to hope that the bureau may soon be able to end this unseemly limbo by either exculpating Dr. Hatfill or arresting him."

U. S. to begin fingerprinting aliens--The Justice Department has chosen Sept. 11 as the starting date for a new program that will require tens of thousands of foreign visitors to be fingerprinted and photographed at the border, U.S. officials announced Monday.

There has been a new development in the investigation of last Fall's anthrax attacks. A field swab test on a mail collection box from Princeton, New Jersey, returned a positive result. Since late last year, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service has been checking every mail collection box ? the blue boxes on the street ? that feed into the central mail processing center in Trenton, where the anthrax letters were postmarked. This is the first such box to test positive.

This program, w.bloggar, is great! I've just learned how to use it to post to multiple blogger blogs!

Small-town police think it's funny to give a man with a learning disability a fake lie detector test; are sobered up by one million dollar lawsuit man slaps on them.

The two teenage girls that were abducted this morning in California have been found unharmed. The man who snatched them was shot to death by a sherrif's deputy.

In yet another example of a problem endemic to our society, a fat man sues four fast food restaurants, claiming that they made him fat, as if he bore no responsibility for having made the personal choice to eat their food, even though they have been publishing nutritional information for years.

From "The Government Can Take Anything and Mess It Up" department: The Transportation Security Commission is way behind in hiring employees. According to an article in USAToday, "At three New York airports, 61% of applicants [for the position of airport screener] failed a test of English proficiency and overall aptitude skills [emphasis added]." Incredibly, officials estimate that one-third of the applicants are no-shows for meetings with recruiters!

Further, the government wanted fifty percent of the screeners to be female. So far, they've only managed to entice enough women to reach twenty-five percent of the total. Duh! Do you suppose that the problem is that few women even want the job?

All this, and the real problem wasn't even the airport screeners at all. It was the Immigration and Naturalization Service that dropped the ball. But instead of reforming it, which might hurt the feelings of some foreigners who want to come here, the government federalized the airport screeners! Just what we need: more big government!

String of hamburger joints sold for $2.26 billion.

msnbc.com reports a story in The Wall Street Journal, which reveals that "[f]ederal prosecutors in New York plan to seek indictments against two former top financial officers of WorldCom Inc. [Bernie Ebbers and Scott Sullivan] as early as next week for their roles in the company?s accounting scandal."

The city commission of Chiefland, Florida put their police force's seven officers on indefinate leave, with pay, after someone discovered that the city's charter didn't give them the right to make arrests or issue tickets.

The Rev. Al Sharpton places the value of his reputation at $500 million.

Apparently, it is a vast right- and left-wing conspiracy that brought Traficant down.

Seven year old kidnapped Philadelphia girl chews through her bonds and escapes. The Nando Times has the story.

Intresting: A woman has a flat tire, catches a ride with a trucker, disappears. Turns out she just liked the trucker and was riding with him for two weeks. The Clarion-Ledger has the story.

"The Devil made me do it," says convicted killer.

Apparently, Def Leppard has finally found their audience. The band is scheduled to perform a free concert at the new Fayetteville, Arkansas Wal-Mart Supercenter at 6:00 p.m. on July 31.

It seems that WorldCom's financial misdeeds have been an open secret for over a year, since it has been that long ago that a class action lawsuit, brought by former WorldCom employees, sought to bring the wrongdoing to light.

A Wall Street Journal article, reported on msnbc.com, says that WorldCom filed for bancruptcy protection and that the actiion "will almost certainly wipe out common shareholders."

An ABCNEWS story reveals that WorldCom will file for bankruptcy protection.

In Maryland, the battle against a carnivorous Chinese fish continues. For the time being, at least, a twelve-member panel thinks that the most effective method of control would be to asphyxiate the fish with a non-toxic chemical that would dissipate within two to six days.

Global Industries is hosted, for free, on Tripod. Another, good, free host is 0catch. They have one, non-intrusive banner ad at the top of each page. It is easy to sign up, and their serving up of web pages has been fast, for me.

There's a new button at the bottom of the page that signifies that I'm using w.bloggar, a free blog interface tool by Marcelo Cabral. w.bloggar has some really nice features, such as bold, italic, and underline. One of the neatest features is the ability to preview your post before uploading it to your blog host. Thanks, Marcelo!!

In the United States, at least, the first day of the "work" week for most of us is Monday, yet most, if not all, of our calendars start the week on Sunday. Why is that? A quick search on Google turned up "Calendars Through the Ages," which gives the following explanation:

The Bible clearly makes the Sabbath the last day of the week, but does not share how that corresponds to our 7 day week. Yet through extra-biblical sources it is possible to determine that the Sabbath at the time of Christ corresponds to our current 'Saturday.' Therefore it is common Jewish and Christian practice to regard Sunday as the first day of the week (as is also evident from the Portuguese names for the week days). However, the fact that, for example, Russian uses the name "second" for Tuesday, indicates that some nations regard Monday as the first day.

In international standard ISO-8601 the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has decreed that Monday shall be the first day of the week.

Governor says he won't stop cop killer's execution.

I am learning CityDesk by Fog Creek Software. It is Content Management Software (CMS) for web sites. It has gotten some really good reviews, and the sites which I have seen that use it look good.

Twenty-seven year old woman goes hiking in Alaska. Sees black bear. Tries to shoo bear away. Instead of leaving, bear attacks. Woman whips bear's ass.

Another unusual twist in the WorldCom scandal is reported by Financial Times.

I've added Bottin, an address book, to my page of outstanding freeware.

My home town records thirty-first murder of the year. A thirty-six year old wife and Mother of three, who worked at a check cashing company, was shot once, execution-style, in the back of the head.

Latest WorldCom accounting scandal "news:" at Congressional committee meeting, former CEO Bernie Ebbers announces that he is innocent, then repeatedly asserts his fifth amendment right not to answer questions, so as not to incriminate himself.

Something happened to my computer at work. I installed PGPfreeware. I decided that it was too complicated for my purposes, so I uninstalled it. Then I couldn't get on the Internet, nor could I use my email. Our ISP sent a technician, who worked on the problem for two hours, with no success. So, I reinstalled the OS, and everything was fine.

I had a dream, the other night. A co-worker and I were making a sales call on a federal government agency. We had to show a photo ID, but, for some inexplicable reason, there was a photograph of a house on my driver license, not a picture of me. I tried to telephone someone who could help me by either vouching for me or by furnishing a photo ID of me; however, the battery in my cellular telephone was dead. Then, I tried my co-worker's cellular telephone, but its battery was dead, too. By this time, the people who we were supposed to make the sales presentation to were very suspicious of me. I don't know how the dream turned out.

In other crime news, a local man threatened to set off a pipe bomb. He didn't, and, now, he's in jail.

There has been another murder in the city that I live in. It is the second of the Fourth of July weekend and the thirtieth this year. An argument between a woman's boyfriend and ex-husband resulted in one of them being shot once in the back with a large caliber weapon. Police are not yet sure which man was the victim and which the shooter.

Four men allegedly gang-raped an eighteen-year-old Pakistani girl to punish her family. Why? Because her younger brother had an affair with a woman, considered to be higher caste, from another tribe. Local police stood by and did nothing. cnn.com has the story.

In Mexico, a student tries to use a subway pass he found on the floor of the terminal, because he doesn't have twenty cents for the fare. He spends two months in jail, before paying an exorbitant fine to get out. In other news, in Mexico, a man steals forty-five million dollars. He doesn't go to jail. Can you spell C - O - R - R- U - P - T - I - O - N ? Story at msnbc.com.

The city that I live in (population 184,256) has just recorded the twenty-ninth homicide of 2002. A wife and mother of five was shot multiple times as she sat in her car outside the family home. Her husband is being held without bond in the local lock-up. Sad.

I have been fascinated by Nietzsche, ever since I read in Durant (The Story of Philosophy), "His inexpungable merits dwarf all criticism." The online edition of "The New Statesman" has an article about Nietzsche, which includes a review of two books about him.

"[T]he Islamic world, far from catching up with the West, is going backwards," writes Peter Watson in "How the East didn't win" on The Times website.

Here is a follow up to my entry of 5/30/2002, about the murder that occurred across the street from where I live. Under the headline "2 sought in fatal shooting," this is how the local newspaper reported what happened:

A 19-year-old man shot to death Thursday morning was [name of town]'s sixth killing in a week [emphasis added], raising the city's homicide total to 23 so far this year.

Michael Banks, of 137 Taylor St., was pronounced dead on the scene at 1:55 a.m. by Sharon Grisham-Stewart, the . . . county coroner.

Murder warrants have been issued for Chad Harris and Anthony James, occupants of a gray Chevrolet seen parked at a Conoco station in the 3700 block of North West Street, where the shooting took place.

The motive is still unclear, but drugs may be involved [emphasis added], said Robert Graham, a . . . [police] spokesman.

"Both individuals wanted in connection with this murder should be considered armed and dangerous [emphasis added]," Graham said.

The incident began around 1 a.m. after Harris and James allegedly flagged down Banks as he drove south on North West Street in a brown Chevrolet. The three got out of their vehicles and spoke for a while. They got back in their vehicles and Banks allegedly rammed Harris and James' car. They, in turn, allegedly backed up and smashed into Banks' vehicle. Harris and James got out and opened fire on Banks, Graham said.

Banks was struck in the arm, leg, shoulder, groin and head, said Grisham-Stewart.

Banks was raised by his grandmother in . . . [a nearby town], but his mother and sister live in . . . [the town where the killing happened], the coroner said.

Today was a typical Saturday: I took my Mother to the grocery store and the post office. After lunch, I took her to the pharmacy and the library. Later, my Mother telephoned my brother. His wife is recuperating from an operation.

There was a murder, right across the street from my house. Not across the street and down the block. Right across from my house. I woke up at 1:00 am. I heard the sound of a car crashing into something. At the time, I didn't know what it hit. Then, I heard several gun shots, in rapid succession. I looked outside and saw what looked like an abandoned car in the parking lot of the convenience store. The hood was crumpled. I went back to sleep and woke up again at 3:00 am. This time, when I looked out the window, I saw four police cruisers, an ambulance, and a car belonging to a private security company. I still didn't know that there had been a killing. This afternoon, when I got home from work, it was on the news: a nineteen year old male had an argument with two other men, he rammed his car into their car, and they shot him multiple times, killing him.

Once again, a suicide-homicide bomber has targeted innocent civilians. This is barbaric.

On the fifteenth of this month, I wrote that I was going to work on fixing the archives feature on this site. I lied.

The National Education Association is slapped with a warning for violating the civil rights of its own members.

Slate has an article which concludes that President Bush could not have prevented the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

The mystery illness has been identified as "winter vomiting."

Mystery illness hits British troops in Afghanistan

Everything seems to be working O. K., except for the archives. I'll work on that.

I am experimenting with a new template. Please bear with me. Thank you.

Today, I bought two pair of Rockport "Halton" shoes: one pair of black and one pair of "sport white," i. e., light gray. Thanks to my Mom! I used the money that she gave me on my birthday.

As a follow on to yesterday: I prepared my Mom's lunch and supper and washed the dishes after each meal. My brother telephoned her from Georgia. I think that she had a nice day.

Pakistan reluctant to pursue al Qaeda

I must have tried a dozen application launchers, but I have finally found one that seems just right: not too simple and not too complicated, and it is freeware, to boot! You can download it from the program's home page.

Today is Easter Sunday, and His Holiness the Pope addressed his Easter Message (Urbi et Orbi) to "Men and women of the third millennium!"

The widow of one of my first cousins had quintuple bypass heart surgery last month. She lives in a town about three and a half hours away. I couldn't get in touch with her Thursday or Friday, and I was becoming concerned about her. After getting no answer this morning and this afternoon, I finally got through to her this evening. She said that she was fine and had been out running errands. Whew! What a relief.

This morning, Mother and I went to the cemetery to change out the flowers on Father's and my sister's graves. The last time that we put new flowers out was several months ago. I got together a lot of old newspapers, some twine, a pocket knife, a folding chair, two plastic bags, and a large wrench. Then, we drove to the cemetery. When we got there, Mother sat in the folding chair and arranged the flowers. I tied the stems together with twine, using the pocket knife to cut the twine. Then I wrapped the stem-bunch with newspapers, to make a snug fit in each vase, which is a part of the bronze marker. Wrapping the stem-bunch with newspapers was something that my Father used to do, when he and Mother would put flowers on my sister's grave. Making the flowers fit down snugly into the vase keeps them from blowing out when it is windy. It was windy today, so I used the large wrench to weigh down the newspapers, to keep them from blowing away. The two plastic bags were for the old flowers, until I could get to a wastebasket at the cemetery. When we were finished, the vases were filled with new flowers and looked much better. I am so glad that we went.

I can't remember where I happed upon it, but I found a commenting system that I'm going to try out. Also, a web counter, which will track the number of visitors, and other statistics.

Apparently, it's not very active, though.

This is just to make it known that this blog is, now, officially active, again.