USB File System Corrupted -- US Government at Fault?

My laptop was running a bit slow today even after closing off nearly all my applications, so I decided to reboot it. Some of the applications would not close off even though I attempted to kill them via Process Manager. I lost a lot of work that I was doing in Visio thanks to this. I finally had to power off the machine to get it to reboot. When it came back up, the system decided to check the 1.5TB USB drive and it said that it was corrupted and proceeded to 'fix' it. It did not give me the option to cancel this 'fix'. Well, after it finished, the drive is basically useless now. The files appear to still be there, but they cannot be opened with any of the programs associated with them. The photos apparently have missing headers in the image files, the music files are also not playable. All in all, everything that was on that filesystem is now crap.

So, I have to wonder now... Was this some sort of attack by the US Government against me? The coincidence is just a bit too much for me to ignore the possibility since when I was visited by the two US Treasury Agents the other day, they explicitly said that they would be watching me. Is it just paranoia on my part? Then again, is it really paranoia when they really are out to get you?

I lost a lot of family photos and such that I had taken, but not backed up to anywhere else. To think that they can do this sort of thing and get away with it really pisses me off. I guess a bit of verbal intimidation wasn't enough for them, they needed to escalate the issue.

I'm not so naive that I don't think that the government spies on us, whether it is legal for them to do it or not. I just wish that they would write their spy software better so that it doesn't destroy the data on the machines that they are spying upon.

Is Anyone Actually Reading My Rants?

Thanks to my recent visit by two US Treasury Agents, I have received verification that at least someone actually reads these rants that I post here. Actually, I'm quite surprised. Considering the fact that no one posts in response to any of my posts on this blog, I was pretty sure that I was basically just talking to myself. Obviously, I have ONE person/group out there who actually reads my rants -- the US government. Apparently, they are also the only ones who are reading it. Should I be concerned? Maybe... They really could make my life miserable if they wanted to. I like to think that the 1st Amendment applies here -- Freedom of Speech, Freedom of the Press. I have to wonder though -- am I part of the Press if no one actually reads what I write?

As I look back over the time of my life, I have to think that our country has gone down the tubes over the last 50 years. Things that used to be legal are no longer legal. Does that mean that what we used to do was wrong? Personally, I don't think so... I think that what we have is a bunch of legislative idiots who think that everything can be solved by simply creating another law with respect to it. It's like, someone gets killed while walking across the street while not paying attention to traffic, so the legislative idiots decide to create a law against jaywalking. Perish the thought that we could just expect people to have a bit of common sense, right?

I guess what this really amounts to is that our rights are getting slowly eroded by the idiots that we elect. For some reason, they think that their job description is to create laws. Sometimes the laws that they create are not that bad, but most of the time, it seems that they are just creating them solely for the purpose of being able to say that they created one. I guess no Congress-Critter ever managed to make himself famous by the laws that he helped to revoke. Kind of sad, isn't it?

Texting While Driving

I read an article today where it stated that a study had shown that about half of all cell phone users send text messages while driving. Considering the amount of distracted driving that I see from day to day, I can believe it. I'm not about to say that I don't sometimes send a text message when I'm in the car, but I know my limits and as such, I only do it if I'm stopped at a light. I find it too irritating to be constantly switching my focus from something close up (like the cell phone) to something far away (like the view of the road). My old eyes just don't like it, so unless I'm stopped at a light, I don't do it. Too many people try to multitask and do both at the same time though. The end result is that they do neither all that well.

Having said that, I will have to admit that I wish that there was a way to more easily text while actually driving, but I don't see it happening when you are limited to a small handheld device. Perhaps this might consist of some sort of heads-up display where the text was displayed at the windshield level instead of on a separate device that you needed to look down at. Input could be accomplished by way of a keyboard that was part of and somehow oriented along the perimeter of the steering wheel so that you could type without taking your hands off the wheel and without having to look at where you were placing your fingers.

Visited by US Treasury Agents Today

I had an interesting experience today... I was visited by US Treasury agents. They had a printout of what was probably every post that I had ever made of a political nature in addition to photos of the various firearms that I had saved off in a private area of Picasaweb on Google for insurance purposes and reference. They did not like the fact that I was a pilot, an aircraft owner, and had made statements critical of the government. They did admit though that what I had said was totally legal since I had not crossed the line. I was pretty sure that I had not crossed the line and it is good to have that confirmed. It is perfectly safe to say that you wish that a planet killer meteor would drop on Washington and rid us of the jackbooted IRS thugs and the congress-critters, but unless you have a way to control the orbit of the meteors, they realize that it is still harmless talk. It is also apparently acceptable to say that you hope that one day you get the chance to piss on Bama-Boy's grave as long as you do not say that you want to hasten that opportunity or encourage someone else to hasten that opportunity.

Memorial Day

As we get ready for our Memorial Day celebrations, we should reflect upon what this holiday is really about. We use it to mark the start of the summer vacation season, as an excuse for BBQing, drinking beer, and shopping, but that is not what it is really about. It is a time for remembrance of those who have made the ultimate sacrifice in defense of this country. We might not like what our country has become over the years, but that does nothing to belittle the ultimate sacrifice that our service men and women have made over the years in defending our country. These are the true heroes of our country. Many of us went in one branch of the military or another. Some did so with more honor and bravery than others. Some just served their time and got out. That is not what this day is about though. It is about those who paid full measure in their service of this country and for this, I salute them.

IRS Building Crash

I read today that someone by the name of Joe Stack crashed a small private plane into the IRS building in Austin. From all the news reports, it appears that he has had a bit of a history with the IRS (in other words, the jackbooted thugs there had been harassing him for a long time). Although I have to commend him for taking action, I have to take exception with his manner of doing it. If you look at the damage to the building in the photos that have been published, it is quite obvious that the damage to the building was superficial at best. Although there are quite a few windows that will need to be replaced, the actual structure of the building was not really damaged. One thing that I noticed is that on the office right beside the point of impact, the sheetrock was still intact. I guess that just goes to show you how minimal a weapon a small aircraft makes. The fact that he only managed to kill one of the jackbooted thugs just proves this point. Hell, I would hazard to guess that he could have killed more people if he had just entered the building with an ice pick.

I suspect that the people who have a problem with what Stack did would have also stood by and done nothing while our Founding Fathers were standing up and doing what was necessary to free us from British oppression. The government that we have now does not reflect the will of the people. It reflects the will of the special interest groups. "Best government money can buy"... Although Stack made a noble gesture (in that he gave up his life for what he believed in, no matter how futile), in the grand scheme of things, it is probably worth nothing since he managed to only get rid of only a single IRS agent. Still, as far as symbolism goes, he definitely did a number cosmetically on that building. It should take them at least a couple of months to replace all the glass he broke. The IRS will just move everyone to another building and they will be back to harassing the taxpayers just like before soon enough. Although I would hope that this would be enough to get people to rise up and get the government afraid of us so that they could straighten out this mess of a tax system that we have, I doubt it...

What the IRS should learn from this experience is that if you harass someone enough, sooner or later that person will reach their breaking point. I guess the IRS is lucky that Stack did not realize how ineffective of a weapon a small personal aircraft might be. Maybe they'll realize that if you push someone so far that they feel that they have nothing else to lose, bad things can come of it. Somehow, I doubt it though...

There are those who defend the jackbooted thugs at the IRS by saying that they are "just doing their jobs" or "just following orders". Well, that's the same excuse that the death camp commanders and guards in Nazi Germany used when they were brought up on war crime charges at Nuremberg. They also claimed that they were only implementing the decisions of the people higher in the chain of command. Well, that excuse didn't work at Nuremberg and it doesn't work now.

Natural Born Citizen?

There have been those who question whether Bama-Boy was qualified to run for President because of his birth certificate. There are those who say that if he truly was born in the US, why doesn't he release his true birth certificate. Personally, I don't care what his birth certificate says since from my reading on the subject, given just the information that he has made public, there is no way that he meets the requirements to be President of the US since he is not a NATURAL BORN citizen. Look up what the Founding Fathers were wanting to ensure when they used that phrase. They wanted to ensure that the Commander in Chief of the Army had no possible allegiances to foreign powers like might occur if one of his parents was the citizen of another country. They wanted that the Commander in Chief of the Army to be the product of two citizens of the US. Since Bama-Boy's father was Kenyan and held Kenyan / British citizenship at the time of Bama-Boy's birth, there is no way that Bama-Boy qualifies as a NATURAL BORN citizen. So, where does that leave us? Exactly who is legally President right now? If the Democrats wanted to run a black for the office of President, they should have run Colin Powell. He tends to be a bit too far to the left for my taste, but assuming that his parents were naturalized before he was born, at least he is legally qualified for the office (unlike Bama-Boy). Powell's parents were from Jamaica in 1920 and 1923 and Powell wasn't born until 1937, so there is a good chance that they were citizens by the time he was born.