Obama seems to understand how to make the Internet work to his political advantage.

There’s a risk in being too paranoid about terrorist attacks. Paranoia itself can be an attack vector.

Health Savings Accounts don’t really fix the problems with our healthcare system.

The NSA may be spying wholesale on Americans—illegally—but how useful is the data?

If the goal of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law was to create a better-informed and more meaningful debate about political issues, then it has failed utterly. This is the first Presidential campaign under McCain-Feingold, and it is easily the dirtiest, loudest, and least issue-focused campaign in recent memory. Judging from the sound and fury emanating from the campaigns, the most important issues this year revolve around the Vietnam war. Funny, I thought that war ended 30 years ago.

The Twin Cities recently inaugurated its first rail transit system in decades with the opening of the Hiawatha line, currently connecting downtown Minneapolis and Ft. Snelling, and soon to connect Downtown with the airport and the Mall of America. By any measure, the line is a hit. They've been far exceeding daily traffic projections for 2005 despite the fact that a quarter of the line and several high traffic stations have yet to open.

Apparently Rep. Phil Krinkie, a state legislator from the western suburbs, hasn't gotten the memo yet, since he continues to fight a quixotic battle against the light rail system despite having lost in the legislature five years ago. On opening weekend, Krinkie posed for a photo-op with a luxury SUV, claiming that the cost of the line would have bought a fancy new truck for every new transit rider. The "truth" of this claim depended on a somewhat creative interpretation of a "new transit rider," on ridership being at the low end of projections (already far exceeded), and ignoring the fact that the rail line can be expected to last 20+ years whereas a new car would need to be replaced much sooner. Whatever.

I had been planning to write an article laying out what Bush could do to win my vote back, now that I've decided to vote for Kerry. After all, there's still half a year before the election, and a lot can change.

Then I read an article in today's Minneapolis Star Tribune, which is basically a roundup of activity at the state capitol yesterday. Our state legislators are spending taxpayer dollars arguing about basically two issues: state-funded construction projects (aka The Bonding Bill), and gay marriage. But the thing which struck me was the part about Sen. Sheila Kiscaden of Rochester being kicked out of the Republican caucus.

I saw Bowling for Columbine last night. This was a much-reviled movie among right wing bloggers when it came out, supposedly chock-full of factual errors and anti-gun left-wing bias. What I saw surprised me.

I can't comment on factual errors, but this was not an anti-gun movie at all. There was an anti-NRA element, but that's far from the same thing as anti-gun. In fact, there was a lengthy segment discussing the fact that guns are as common (perhaps more common) in Canada, yet the murder rate is far lower.

Some interesting fatality statistics. Most of these are from 2000, but I used 2001 statistics where I could find them. These are the number of deaths in the U.S. for various causes per year.

Scooter is going to be entering Kindergarden a year from now, so that means it's time to look at schools. We are fortunate to have several viable choices, since we live (literally!) on the line between two good school districts, and there's an outstanding private school only a short distance away. We've visited the private school and one of the two public schools, and some of the things I saw surprised me.