Unless you're dealing with the federal government, it has long been a given that the police can't enter and search the place you live without a properly filed and signed search warrant, as guaranteed by the fourth amendment to the US Constitution, which reads thus: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
There is a lot of breathlessly sensationalistic reporting about the arrest of Senator Roy Ashburn of California. Now, while my black little hearts oh so dearly want to leap up and down for joy at this turn of events, that's not the right thing to do. Let's face facts, here: he's been humiliated. He was thrown in jail but got out on $1400us bond (wow, that's cheap for DUI). His family and especially his children are probably taking this about as well as they would a pregnancy test that says they're about to have puppies. Chances are this could be …
Running between work, home, and the bed to sleep, mostly. It's been an unusually long week (and it's not even Friday yet), and rather than write incoherent posts in the evening I've decided to catch up on sleep where and when I can. Consequently, there hasn't been much to write about in the past few days, but I can authoritatively state that there are no pin-holes in my eyelids. Battling highway traffic in southern Virginia is tiring work, though ultimately rewarding.
I've just pre-registered for The Last HOPE conference in New York City later this year (18-20 July 2008, to …
Remember my rant about people who don't get their kids vaccinated because they're afraid for the health and safety of their children? Guess what? The health and safety of kids who attend the East bay Waldorf School in El Sobrante, California are at risk due to an outbreak of whooping cough. Students and a teacher were diagnosed with the disease, which lead to the school being closed until rounds of antibiotics can be administered to everyone who came down with the disease. School officials went on the record as saying that an unusually high number of students weren't vaccinated for …
I've been sent on the road again for work, this time to the west coast, and the lovely region of California called Palo Alto. It's 0606 EST as I begin writing this from my increasingly infirm partner in crime Windbringer from one of the Z gates of Dulles International. Security was a nightmare this morning - not only does everyone and their backup seem to be hitting the friendly skies this morning, but the physical security detail seems to have changed its strategies once again. Now they are inspecting boarding passes and presented identification with both ultraviolet lamps and magnifying monocles …
Joseph Nathaniel Harris, a former branch manager at the San Jose Medical Group in California was sentenced to 21 months in prison and fines in excess of $145kus for stealing medical data. When Harris left his position after allegations that he'd been stealing money and medication from the facility, he is said to have stolen two computers and a DVD-ROM disk containing sensitive information about 187,000 patients, including Social Security numbers, medical histories, and diagnoses. The computers were found to have been sold for cash, but kept the disk containing the patient data. Thankfully none of that data got …
A couple of weeks ago, the city of Carson, California discovered that it was a couple of thousand dollars short in its coffers - $450kus, to be exact. As it turns out, the laptop computer used by Karen Avilla (city treasurer) was infected by a keystroke logger installed through unannounced means (probably a website she visited, or a malicious e-mail, though it's entirely possible that the intruders managed to get in some other way, like through a clandestine wireless access point). An unknown group of crackers managed to snaffle the access codes to the bank that the city kept its money …
I made it to the LayerOne conference safe, sound, and on a shuttle bus that runs from the Bob Hope Airport in Burbank, California to the Hilton in Pasadena. Travel tip: If you can avoid it, don't catch a cab, they cost an arm and a leg. If you can charter a shuttlebus you'll pay much less for the trip. A cab ride would probably have cost me about $70us, while I paid all of $23us for a leisurely ride to the hotel, in air conditioning (not that we needed it) and comfort. Of course, I hadn't been there for …
0814 EST5EDT - Writing offline on Windbringer, high above the state of Virginia, I believe.
Somehow I managed to get to bed at a decent time last night in preparation for my trip to the LayerOne conference in Pasadena, California this weekend. However, that should not be construed to mean in any way that I had an easy time of falling asleep... being naturally inclined to life as a night owl (professionally and otherwise), retiring before midnight is often problematic, unless I've run myself into the ground and really need the rest anyway. Still, somehow I caught a few hours of …
