Saturday, August 29, 2009

RIP Senator Kennedy

As I'm writing this, I'm still having trouble finding the right words. When I was born, Edward Kennedy had already been the Senator from Massachussets for twenty years. His brothers John and Robert had long since been laid to rest, and the only Camelot I knew was in the stories of Arthur and his Knights. To me, a kid growing up in Georgia, the Kennedy name was a name in the textbook in History class, something remote and distant, with no connection to me. I had no frame of reference for Ted Kennedy, or his brothers.

Ted Kennedy was one of a dying breed of politicians in America. He came from a different era, a different time. It was a time when you could disagree without being disagreeable, where personal feelings about a subject didn't mean you took someone's opposition to your position personally. It was a time when people could still talk to one another, and come to a compromise.

If you want to take measure of Kennedy's work as a politician, you could look at his fourteen thousand roll call votes, or his accomplishments like the Voting Rights Act. I choose to look at all those people, Democrats and Republicans alike, who came to pay their respects at his funeral. I choose to look at long time rivals who counted themselves amongst Kennedy's friends, despite their political differences. I choose to look at the crowds of people who stood in front of the Capitol for three hours, patiently waiting for a colleague, mentor, friend to make his final stop there.

There are no lions in the Senat now, only sheep and chickens, while pigs roll in the muck. Farewell, Senator. You will be missed.

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Do people really fall for this?

The old addage of fools and their money comes to mind when I see some of the email scams out there. Here's a little gem I got today, completely unedited.
-------------------------------
fromGraves, Jim
to
dateSat, Aug 1, 2009 at 1:47 AM
subjectYour Email Address Has Won:Contact Your Claims Agent Via Email At (garry4baldwin008@live.com)
mailed-byttu.edu
BRITISH NATIONAL LOTTERY HEADQUARTERS:
28 TAN FIELD ROAD,
CROYDON, LONDON.
CUSTOMER SERVICE
Ref: UK/940X2/68
Dear Winner,
We are pleased to inform you of the final announcement of the
UK National Lottery Online Promo Programme held on the 30th of May 2009. The
draw was done electronically with several email addresses provided to this
office by microsoft to enhance the utilization of the internet.
Your email address was attached to Reference Number UK/940X2/68 and was
picked as one of the ten winning email addresses.
This has qualified you to claim the total cash prize Of £753,437 in cash
credited to file KTU/9023118308/03. This is from a total cash prize of
£7,534,370.00 shared amongst the first ten (10) lucky winners in this category
B.
Your winnings will be issued to you as soon as our claims department
verify your winning after you might have filled the
payment processing form below.
Payment Processing Form for filing of claims.
1.Name in full.
2.Address in full.
3.Age.
4.Phone No.
5.Occupation
6.Winning Email Address
Assigned Claims Agent: Mr. Garry Baldwin
Email;garry4baldwin008@live.com
Phone; +447031874347,+447031903483
Congratulations once more from all our members of Staff.
Yours Sincerely
Graves Jim
(Online Promo Co-ordinator)
-------------------------------

When you read this thing, you should have alarm bells going off all over the place. NO ONE SIMPLY GIVES AWAY MONEY! If you win a lottery you don't remember entering, that should be a major red flag.

Second, look at the email addresses provided. One is a ttu.edu address. That domain belongs to Texas Tech University. If you think a British lottery is going to send out notifications through Texas Tech, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you in Brooklyn.

The other address isn't any better. Live.com is a free email provider. Never trust anything coming to you from a free provider, unless you personally know the person behind the address. This includes things like gmail and yahoo, too. Anyone can simply sign up for an account, and say they are whoever they like. Unless you know the person behind the screenname, don't trust it!

Lesson is, don't be stupid. If its too good to be true, it probably is.