Crickets Chirping

First we find Bush reading “The Stranger” by Camus, which (in addition to likely being the shortest book his ranch library) is an existentialist novel about a guy who kills an Arab for no reason. Now we find out that Bush’s favorite painting is not what he thinks it is, but rather depicts “a smooth-talking horse thief who is caught, and then escapes a lynch mob in the Sand Hills of Nebraska.”

Oh, the irony.

That, or he’s got a very advanced sense of humor and he’s messing with our minds.

Abstract from The iPhone Meets the Fourth Amendment by Adam Gershowitz (Social Science Research Network, via infobong’s delicious bookmarks):

Imagine that police arrest an individual for a simple traffic infraction, such as running a stop sign. Under the search incident to arrest doctrine, officers are entitled to search the body of the person they are arresting to ensure that he does not have any weapons or will not destroy any evidence. The search incident to an arrest is automatic and allows officers to open containers on the person, even if there is no probable cause to believe there is anything illegal inside of those containers. What happens, however, when the arrestee is carrying an iPhone in his pocket? May the police search the iPhone’s call history, cell phone contacts, emails, pictures, movies, calendar entries and, perhaps most significantly, the browsing history from recent internet use? Under longstanding Supreme Court precedent decided well before handheld technology was even contemplated, the answer appears to be yes. This article demonstrates how the full contents and multiple applications of iPhones can be searched without a warrant or probable cause under existing Supreme Court precedent. The article also offers approaches courts and legislatures might adopt to ensure greater protection for the soon-to-be pervasive iPhone devices.

And if that sounds far fetched, this is from further down in the paper itself:

To date, fewer than a dozen courts have addressed searches of cell phones incident to arrest. The Fifth Circuit’s recent 2007 in United States v. Finley is representative. Police arrested Finley after a staged drug sale. The police then searched Finley incident to arrest and found a cell phone in his pocket. One of the investigating officers searched through the phone’s records and found text messages that appeared to relate to drug trafficking. One incoming text message said “So u wanna get some frozen agua,” a common term for methamphetamine. Another text message said “Call Mark I need a 50,” a likely reference to asking for $50 worth of narcotics. Finley was convicted of aiding and abetting drug possession with intent to distribute.

Think about that next time you text someone inquiring about the availability of “oregano.”

Also: using a passcode to lock them out may not protect you at all.

According to the wikipedia:

A scandal is a widely publicized incident involving allegations of wrong-doing, disgrace, or moral outrage. A scandal may be based on reality, or the product of false allegations, or a mixture of both.

There are a few scandals that have appeared repeatedly in my feed reader lately. I don’t care about them, but everyone else seems to. Here they are, summarized for your convenience:

Ron Paul is a racist.

Key Points:

• The hell you say. His immigration ads didn’t tip you off?
• Ron Paul is like Ross Perot (R.P. vs. R.P? whoah) but with neither the fancy charts nor meager charisma.
• I used to despise libertarians. Now I just pity them. Even the ones who support child labor.

Robert Scoble got kicked off of facebook. If you don’t follow tech blogs, here’s the skinny: Scoble is this ex-Microsoft guy who is famous for having a blog (yeah weird, I know). He got kicked off of Facebook because he gave all his Facebook contacts away to another company called Plaxo. The tech blogosphere collectively shat itself over who was in the wrong, Scoble or Facebook.

Key points:

• Facebook is like Second Life but in two dimensions instead of three.
• Scoble is like Nathan Barley but not as interesting or relevant.
• Plaxo is some kind of spam engine. Their website says they do other stuff though.

David Cross does voices for some shitty animated movie, and some other overrated comic expresses disapproval, then claims it was sarcasm, or something. I’m trying really hard to care about David Cross after Arrested Development but it’s just not working.

Key points:

• These two guys are comedians, so this exchange should be funny. It’s not. That kinda freaks me out.
• I don’t want to have kids until after I become senile. That way I can watch movies that are made for kids without losing my mind.
• Releasing some CDs on SubPop makes you “indie”, and therefore too cool to make Alvin and the Chipmunks movies.

Scrapbook queen dethroned because she used a photo that was taken by someone else. I’m baffled by the existence of this competition, and of those who compete in it.

Key Points:

• The competition rules also say you have to kill a horse to make your own glue.
• Movies made for kids these days are easier to watch if you’ve been sniffing glue.
• It’s a miracle of economics that people are able to survive by sitting around all day gluing random shit together. (I mean, you’d think they’d get weeded out by work-at-home scams, right?)

I asked a trusted source for financial advice about Berkshire Hathaway B (BRK.B).

He had this to say:

Buffet’s right hand man, who will likely survive him, is something of a wing-nut and I’ve got my doubts concerning the popular belief that he is not, in fact, retarded. I hate it when I pop open BH’s yearly letter to investors (a “must read” in the investment world) and see that he’s the one who’s penning it instead of Buffet. The grammar’s all fucked up, he bobs/weaves all over the place with his incoherent “market discussions”, and it’s almost as if he’s typing with a slur. It’s like having the waiter drop his pants and shit in your mouth after you sat down expecting filet mignon. I don’t even remember the guy’s name, and I don’t even care to bother googling it right now. That’s how little I care. I’d rather type this unimportant sentence than look up anything related to that fucking guy.

Great. Now my mornings shot to shit. Man that guy sucks.

We can’t talk about most of the really interesting things going on inside teh goog, so when I finally see something posted in public I feel compelled to link to it.

Prophit is our internal prediction market. Just having a prediction market isn’t that remarkable, but the extent to which the relationships between traders has been analyzed is.

Although the proof is in the paper, nothing quite helps like a graphic. Below you can see a snapshot of trading in one of our offices. The areas where employees are making profitable decisions is green, and the areas where employees are making unprofitable decisions is red. There are about 16 profitable traders in that big green blotch in the middle!

(don’t ask what color I am :)

See the official blog post or the research paper itself.

I took my dog for a walk this morning around 9:30am. Empty champagne bottles all over the park. Evidence of some revelers not being able to hold their liquor. I saw several groups of people who appeared to be under the waning effects of empathogens or other hallucinogenics, probably up all night. They were rubbing all over eachother, having quasi-philosophical discussions.

As I walked by I thought they looked strange, and they looked at me strangely.

We finished our walk and I took pixie back home. I got ready to shave and shower, and that’s when I took a look in the mirror. The eyeliner. They eyeshadow, and lipstick and the glitter. It was from the party I went to last night (some kind of david bowie theme).

I forgot to take it off before I went to sleep. I walked all around the park wearing makeup, and I didn’t even realize it.

Not that that’s even slightly odd around here.