Don’t miss an interesting thread

The comments on my post about [Saint Paul’s new smoking ban][1] are really pretty interesting. A couple of gentlemen from very different perspectives have weighed in. I appreciate the conversation. I hope it can continue to be fairly civil. Let’s not go ad hominum, please. :)

[1]: http://php.kpmartin.com/wordpress/?p=16

C. S. Lewis

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

Brilliant CSS application

[Xyle Scope][1] is pretty much everything I’ve ever wanted in a CSS app. Minus the little feature requests I’ve now already asked for. :)

A great tool for examination and troubleshooting, learning, and live editing and correcting. Exporting reformatted style sheets is sweet. I will finally be cracking open my legendarily tight wallet and ponying up for this one. Perhaps only my second shareware ever. The first? [CD Finder][2].

It beats Mozilla’s Web Developer because it shows pre-rendered CSS. It beats GoLive because it’s on live, post-PHP pages. Nice cascade display. Nice DOM views. It’s ginger peachy.

What is it about Germans and the great software? (I’m including [Adobe GoLive][3] in that, Jens, Lars, Veronika, et al.)

[1]: http://www.culturedcode.com/xyle/
[2]: http://www.cdfinder.de/
[3]: http://www.adobe.com/products/golive/main.html

Back in!

Somehow, between WebSTAR, MySQL, phpMyAdmin, and Safari, I got locked out of this blog. It wouldn’t take my password. I couldn’t get in even through a “back door”. Ugh!

Well, it’s fixed. And I’m being more vigilant to see if I can discover what happened.

St. Paul’s dirty trick

St. Paul, Minnesota has just adopted a smoking ban. I know that’s not terribly uncommon anymore, but it sure seems cowardly. Cowardly because the folks pushing these initiatives won’t do what should plainly be the Right Thing (from their perspective) and outlaw tobacco.

Of course, they would reply that Big Tobacco is too powerful; big money lobbyists. But it sure seems there are some pretty deep pockets behind the anti-smoking folks, too. And if Big Tobacco’s lobbyists are too powerful, it’s only because they are able to sway politicians.

And if politicians are easy to sway or not able to be trusted to rise above the crass temptation of lobbyists, should we be trusting them to curtail our liberties at all?

Continue reading St. Paul’s dirty trick

Global warming? If you care, kill all the plants.

> German scientists have discovered a new source of methane, a greenhouse gas that is second only to carbon dioxide in its impact on climate change.
>
> The culprits are plants.

[From here.][1] It makes me think we should maybe just slow down and keep improving our data before we go making any big changes. Besides, even if global warming really hits, it seems we have a good chance of making it another [55 million years][3]. That’s not too bad. :)

[1]: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060111/sc_nm/environment_methane_dc
[3]: http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2006/01/ancient_answers_to_current_cli.php

“Pressure Point Massage”

Today local talk radio host [Joe Soucheray][1] got his hair cut by a friend of ours, [Veronica][3]. He discussed it on-air.

[Here is the mp3.][2]
[Here’s the wav file, for those not in this century.][4]

If you have trouble with the mp3 link:

– Mac users, control-click and choose “Open in iTunes”
– PC users, right-click and choose “Save to Disk”

Note to self: It looks like WebStar messes up the mime when serving mp3s. Mimes of the world, revolt!

[1]: http://garagelogic.com/
[2]: http://www.kpmartin.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/01/joes-haircut.mp3
[3]: http://www.bleachsalon.com/veronica.php
[4]: http://www.kpmartin.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/01/joes-haircut2.wav

My MacWorld prediction

I had to get this “out there”. Everyone figures on seeing an Intel-based machine – maybe a laptop. And a more media-center-ish Mac. I’m throwing a Bluetooth-enable iPod in the mix, too. Seems like a no-brainer.

**UPDATE:** Shows what I know. :)

Grrr. Where is the Media Mac?! Well, anyway, [check out the newest][1] if you’re interested. Nice to see things get faster, but in general… I dunno… yawn.

[1]: http://www.apple.com

Get this, and get it straight: Crime is a sucker’s road and those who travel it wind up in the gutter, the prison, or the grave. There’s no other end… but they never learn.