Random Thoughts From Marybeth

Mmmmmm Chocolate

The Godiva store was having a sale on truffles today. Some flavors are going away and some are being redesigned. My favorite, milk chocolate truffles, are staying but were on sale anyway.

Instead of our usual purchase of a dozen or so, we got enough to fill a shopping bag. It was a very good day.

This Isn't a Chat Room

The search term "just go vote foundation" is showing second in my stat log with "just go vote" coming in third. A bit further down the list at #13 is "justgovote". What they found here were my two previous posts about the automated political telemarketers, here and here.

I'm still looking for answers.

I found an article by David Kranz in the Argus Leader (Sioux Falls). It's also reprinted in the Rapid City Journal.

If you have a telephone, you've probably heard from the Just Go Vote Foundation.

The group apparently has a presence in other states, too, and it is doing its darn-dest - and succeeding - at staying anonymous.

National Republican and Democratic officials said Tuesday they don't know who the group is. State party activists don't know either.

The group had visibility in the June 1 special U.S. House election in the form of direct mailings on issues including outsourcing of jobs, personal information risks, affordable medicine, improving schools, roads and the economy.

Those cards told people to call the candidates and express their views on the issues. They endorsed no one.

In recent days, the group has saturated the market with automated calls on issues.

Just Go Vote Foundation's direct-mail information lists a Sioux Falls street address. That gets you to Mail Boxes Etc. If you want a contact number, the foundation offers the secretary of state's office.

Kea Warne, state election supervisor, said she has fielded questions, too, but does not know who the group is.

Call up the name on the Internet and you will find only chat rooms filled with questions and frustrations.

One chat-room visitor said: "The phone has rung four times in the hour that I have been home. It's Sunday afternoon, and I do not appreciate it. These idiots are really upsetting me."

Another said: "I have received five phone calls today from Just Go Vote Foundation. I think there needs to be a do-not-call list for political campaigns. I am getting sick of the calls. I am about to unregister and quit voting."

And a third comment: "Looks like I'm in good company as I received five phone calls ... over the span of an hour."

It's nice that Mr. Krantz has bothered to report on this, I wish he had been more successful at finding information. If you look at the comments that were left for the post "Just Go Vote Foundation Away", you will see that they are the same as the "chat room" comments that he quotes. I can't find the same comments anywhere else. (This is the only forum where I have seen it discussed (more than one post). It is also mentioned here and here.

Comment Spam

I was flooded with spam comments this morning. There were 53 new comments. All with the same spammy links.

Most came from IP 200.30.149.211. But some with the same content came from:
218.219.154.125
210.254.214.210
200.62.136.145
213.56.42.4

I don't know if any of these are the actual IPs of the spammer. The really weird thing about it was that several of the comments were to posts where I had already closed the comments.

Anyway, comments are closed for now.

What's Mine is Mine and What's Yours is Mine

"Berger and his lawyer said Monday night he knowingly removed the handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket, pants and socks, and also inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio."

They think it's okay because they believe there are other copies of the documents. So, following that logic, if I worked at a bank and stuffed my clothes with $100 bills it wouldn't be wrong because there are more of them somewhere?

How does someone "inadvertently" take something that doesn't belong to him? If the poor man is that confused, perhaps he should be seeking medical help as well as legal consultation.

Just Go Vote Foundation Away

My post about the Just Go Vote Foundation has generated several comments. I don't like phone calls like this because I resent the intrusion but I almost feel bad about complaining about my one call since some people reported receiving several of them.

According to the National Do Not Call Registry site, its purpose is to give " you a choice about whether to receive telemarketing calls at home." From their FAQ:

Placing your number on the National Do Not Call Registry will stop most telemarketing calls, but not all. Because of limitations in the jurisdiction of the FTC and FCC, calls from or on behalf of political organizations, charities, and telephone surveyors would still be permitted, as would calls from companies with which you have an existing business relationship, or those to whom you've provided express agreement in writing to receive their calls.

While I'm not surprised that the politicians who drafted the Telemarketing Act did not ban calls from political organizations, I think they should have required these calls to follow the same guidelines as telemarketers: call only between 8:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. (recipient's local time) and allow their phone number and name to be displayed on caller I.D.

I think the phone message for political calls should include whether or not they are affiliated with or support/are supported by any particular party and provide contact information for those of us who would like to be removed from their call list.

It bothers me that I can't find any information about the Just Go Vote Foundation. Encouraging people to vote is a good thing but their methods and the tone of their messages are questionable...enough so that it makes me wonder what their true motive is.

On a lighter note, click on "continue reading"...

It was made worse by the call coming from a caller-bot. Otherwise I could have tried some of the 10 fun comebacks for your telemarketer. Or the 20 more ways here.

Someone has thought of a way to make telemarketing work to our advantage.

Firefox

I decided to try out Mozilla's Firefox. I haven't used it much so far so I'm still undecided as to whether it will become my main browser or not, but I like the tabbed windows. With it, I'm able to set my regular start page, my blog, and my MT page all as my homepage.

The popup/popunder blocker is good too. A problem I have with the popup blocker I usually use (the one in the Google toolbar) is that I like to play games and some of them open in a popup. Firefox lets me add URLs of sites that I don't want to be blocked.

So far, every site I've looked at appears much the same as it does in IE. My biggest problem is that I visit several sites that remember me when I'm using IE but now I have to remember the username and password so I can log in with Firefox. So far, so good, but since I use many different names and passwords (based on some random thing I was thinking about when I first signed up with the site) my memory is bound to fail at some point. If I'm lucky it won't be one that I signed up with two or three ISPs/emails ago and I'll be able to recover my info.

I hope I like it. Netscape 4.something used to be my favorite browser. I gave it up when there got to be too many sites that wouldn't work with it. (It made things a bit difficult since I spend a lot of time reviewing sites for JoeAnt.)

MichaelMoore.com

Michael Moore has a blog. There are two entries so far, one from July 4 and one from July 6. The posts aren't very interesting, about what one would expect: F 9/11 is wonderful and the people who don't like him are idiots.

There is no comments section. Too bad, that could almost have made it worth visiting.

I'd Like Ninjas for $1000, Alex

I like Jeopardy. It wasn't until today that I found out how much better more interesting different it could be with Ninjas.

Just Go Vote Foundation

The phone rings. I answer. There's a pause so I know it's an automated call and I should hang up but it's not noon yet still very early in the day and my reflexes are slow.

It sounds as though the caller-bot tells me that he's with the JessCo Boat Foundation and his friend George has been in a wreck. Then he tells me how his friend has to go door-to-door asking people if they have weapons. He wonders if he will ever be able to sit and watch TV with George again.

Someone paid for the caller-bot phone calls so there has to be a message here somewhere.

Eventually my one working brain cell figures out that he's with the Just Go Vote Foundation and George is in Iraq. The call was to tell me to register to vote. (I'm already registered, have been for more years than I care to think about. My husband is also registered and my kids are too young to vote.) Does he think I should register again? Where does he think I live, Chicago? It was also to inform me that this election (I assume the presidential election) is important. No kidding, I would never have figured that out on my own.

If the idea is to encourage me to vote in a way that will make sure he and George are safe to sit and watch TV (always my top priority), then it's clear I need to vote to re-elect George Bush. Both he and the caller-bot's friend George are working to keep us safe. The caller-bot, on the other hand, is pestering me at home.

I checked several search engines for "Just Go Vote Foundation" and found nothing that tells me who they are. I had expected to find something since the "Do Not Call" list doesn't seem to apply to them. Anyone know who is behind this group?

Update: The September 2004 phone call from the Just Go Vote Foundation.

Next Poll: Ask Me If I Care

A poll found that over 40% of Canadian teens think the U.S. is evil.

Another source says "60% of those 15 to 17 years old say they use contraception each time they have sex." I'm sure the 40% who are too stupid to bother are an entirely different 40%.

I noticed there are a lot of Canadian polls asking what people think about the U.S. I had a hard time finding any U.S. polls that asked what Americans think about Canada. We must be too busy planning evil deeds to bother.

If It Feels Good...

While Conor, Emma, and I were sitting at a table near the pool's snack bar today a woman was at the window placing her order. She had a young girl (about 6-years-old) and a small boy (about 3-years-old) with her. The boy began making loud screeching squeals. It was a horrible, high pitched sound...try to imagine nails on a chalkboard at civil defense siren volume.

The little girl told her brother to stop it. Being a normal child, he ignored his sister. She asked her mother to make him stop making the noise. Their mother told the girl that she wasn't going to stop him because he was enjoying himself.

That's a fine philosophy for child rearing. Forget how your actions effect others, just as long as you're happy. Teach your children that and the only people who will be happy a few years from now will be the criminal defense attorneys that you hire to defend your precious little darlin'.

Twilight Zone Should Have Been a Clue

Link via Paul.

Working Vacation

"VocationVacations is the ultimate vacation adventure for people yearning to explore the job they’ve always dreamed about – but have never had the chance to try."

That's what they say, anyway. My dream job would involve me getting paid large sums of money, not me paying to do work. Still, there are some interesting jobs to choose from:

Brewmaster ($599 for one day) I've made beer at home for much less and it turned out quite well, so this one's not that tempting for me.
Cattle Rancher ($999 for two days) You get to ride a horse and do basic chores (feeding, grooming, saddling the horses; mending fences; and work in the Inn). Riding horses is the only part that interests me here and I could board a horse for months with that same $999 and get to do all the scut work every day!
Horse Trainer ($999 for two days) Involves exercising, training, and riding, feeding, grooming and cleaning stalls. No doubt I could learn a lot from them, but except for the training I could do the rest much cheaper at home - see Cattle Rancher.
Sports Announcer ($1,299 for two days) it's a bit more pricey than the others but you get to give sports color commentary for the Tennessee Smokies baseball team over the public announcement system and over local radio station, you will have the chance to pull the tarp off the field, if necessary! You will also get to manage the scoreboard!
Cheesemaker ($699 for one day or $999 for two days) I can think of one person who might be interested in this one.
Wedding Coordinator ($999 to $1,299 for two days) Unless the bulk of the fees goes to providing me with Valium, I'm not paying to spend any time dealing with brides or (this can be worse) their mothers. I would probably want to be paid that much just not to laugh at the dresses the bride has chosen for the bridesmaids to wear.

When they add Pampered Princess to their list, I may reconsider. Until then, I already have my dream job (except for the large sums of money part.)

Wictory Wednesday

"I will say no." -- John Edwards, asked what he would say if he were offered the Vice Presidential nomination of his party, 2/01/04.

At least he will fit right in with the waffle campaign. If you don't like what either of them say, wait a few months. If the polls agree with what you want, you can be sure they will change their opinions too. Being open to differing ideas and opinions is a good thing but changing what you claim to believe to suit whomever you're speaking to doesn't tell me what you think.

Espousing the views of the majority is fine when it comes to day-to-day business. Because the president has to work with the House and the Senate, what the majority wants is (usually) what will happen anyway. I want to know what a presidential candidate really thinks. Knowing what a man thinks will give an indication of how he thinks. This will help me decide if he is the one I want making decisions if there is a crisis.

In November you will have a choice, president and vice-president who have shown true leadership or a pair who just echo back what you want to hear.

If you're a blogger, you can join Wictory Wednesdays simply by putting up a post like this one every Wednesday, asking your readers to volunteer and/or donate to the Bush campaign.