There was a day in August, around the time of the 2008 Democratic National Convention, when I was approached by a man while we were both riding Boston's blue line. At the moment he approached me, I had been casually yet enthusiastically discussing some of the things about the convention- and, of course, Barack Obama's candidacy- that had me particularly excited.

The man had a worn face, and was wearing work clothes - a dirty hoody and scuffed jeans. It was clear he was a hard working man, presumably a member of the 'working class' that I keep hearing about. He approached me courteously yet assertively and asked simply "Do you think Obama can win it?"

I was secretly delighted to have a soapbox thus thrust underneath me. I first answered a resounding "YES!" to the man's leading question. The follow-up was the expected: "Why?" For that answer, I recall briefly and enthusiastically talking about minimum wage and health care, and how Barack Obama not only supports raising the levels of both, but has specific, well thought-out plans for doing so.

I hurriedly left the train at my stop, shaking the man's hand, surrounded by the grunts of approval and some disapproval of the patrons around me. It was an altogether electrifying moment, and it made me think "Yes, I could be a part of politics" and "Yes, I could do canvassing".

Since then I've lost a lot of enthusiasm for the campaign. It seems the television ads and the debates have boiled the Obama campaign, for me, down to a bunch of 'talking points'. And although I can recite many of them, I don't feel passionate about any of them. Obama is still my candidate, and I'm still going to vote for him if at all possible. But I'm not considering joining the Democratic party as much as I was a couple months ago. <sad_face/>

Dear boxoffail,

Thank you for performing an anonymous, unrequested security audit of my personal blog website. I appreciate the obvious thought and effort that went into your test cases/attack scenarios.

In the future, we would appreciate it if you contacted us in advance before performing any such audits. Although we here at boxofmonocles.com consider the security of our website and our customers' private data our highest priority, random, unannounced testing such as this is neither welcome nor helpful. As an esteemed member of the online security community yourself, I'm sure you understand that these sorts of activities, even when conducted in a "white hat" manner, can undermine our own security practices. Furthermore, your queries look strange and confusing to our legitimate users, and may give the false impression that we have been 'spammed' or 'compromised', even when no such breach has occurred.

We will further address this issue in the coming days.

Sincerely,
The boxofmonocles.com Security Team

Internet Trolls....now available in hardcover!

A few days ago the 24-hour mainstream news networks seem to have decided that it was the correct day to discuss the new Jerome Corsi book, The Obama Nation. Presumably, this was prompted by the near laughably warm reception Corsi received from Sean Hannity on his television and radio programs that day. I wonder if Sean Hannity ever realizes that his public persona is a caricature as ridiculous as that of Stephen Colbert.

Anyways, I found out quickly that the book was simply a political attack book, and found out that it had reached New York Times #1 bestseller status within two weeks of its release. At first, I assumed this was simply a sad reflection of the American appetite for sensationalism. But later, I learned that the New York Times was reporting "bulk sales" as a contributor to this apparent success. Without getting out my tinfoil hat, I think it's reasonable to believe that so-called right wing 'think tanks' are buying the book in large numbers simply to inflate the best-seller numbers. People are then susceptible to statements such as "...according to the #1 bestseller", and may confuse notability with creditability.

Obama has released his lengthy criticism, Unfit For Publication, in PDF format. Good for him. After Abigail let me read her copy of Al Franken's now-slightly-dated Lies (And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them), I realized what wimps the Democrats had been for letting people like Corsi and Hannity get away with their hateful attack politics. I'm glad to see that Obama won't necessarily stand for this kind of crap.

Unfortunately, the Wikipedia article for this book isn't fairing particularly well. When I first visited it last week, it seemed like an evenhanded discussion of the book's content, as well as some well cited criticism of its allegations. I was particularly impressed by the talk page where, although disputes had arisen, they had been discussed and resolved in a civilized manner. But now, not even a week later, the article is under protection because of edit warring. And the talk page is an unapproachable mess of the same tired allegations, over and over again, along with an alphabet soup of Wikipedia policy appeals (WP:RS, WP:BLP, WP:SOAP, etc...). I'm starting to believe that some people simply have an agenda, and aren't particularly interested in creating a neutral, accurate, freely-accessible reference work.

Anyone interested in an unbiased treatment of the subject is likely to be disappointed. And maybe that's the point. Maybe that's Corsi's real objective in publishing a book like this. An Orwellian attempt not to create debate, but to destroy it in a trivial shouting match of allegations. Corsi has stated that "voters can make up their own minds." I can't help but wonder if Corsi hopes that the electorate will do so in lieu of seeking out researched and established facts.

Someone needs to invent a simple word/phrase that means "wow, this is my first blog post in a while..."

Anyways: I left Pawtucket, RI at about 9 AM EDT Friday morning, and journeyed to beautiful Chicago, Illinois. The trip was hellish; the combination of layovers, delays and 'missed flights' (apparently you can't arrive at 11:20 for a 12:05 flight) caused me to arrive at Chicago Midway at 9 PM CDT.

Despite that, my trip has been absolutely awesome. I've been staying with my friend Sarah, and I've managed to attend a Red Sox game, which they won 6-2, and go to the top of the Hancock Building/Tower/Center (I'm not sure which is the official name...). It actually kind of creeped me out that there is a giant Hancock building in both Boston and Chicago.

Tonight I went to a couple of blues clubs that were in walking distance from Sarah's apartment. I had an amazing time. One cover charge grants you admission to both clubs on Sunday, which was completely serendipitous from my point of view. I met a few bona-fide blues musicians who were hanging out at the clubs on their off days (aka non-performing-days), as well as a couple from Kentucky and a couple from the UK. None of which would have been at all worthwhile if the music had not been absolutely wonderful! Seriously better than anything I've heard in Boston, and I've gone to some authentic blues clubs/nights in Boston.

One thing that sort of caught me by surprise this trip was finding out that I had happened to arrive exactly in time for Terminus, a Harry Potter convention that I had first learned about on 07/20/07 while wandering around what had become "Hogwart's Square". I was discussing my fandom with some folks when I was given a promotional pin and an invitation to invite. "Yikes," I thought, "A Harry Potter convention, and more than a year away. I can't imagine I'll be attending." And I was right, I only actually heard about the conference again through a local news station I happened to be watching, and then only after it had, ahem, terminated.

All in all, my trip was fun and exciting, and probably exactly what I needed to help me climb out of the 'funk' that I've been in the past couple weeks. Thanks again to Sarah, who was a gracious and welcoming host.

Looks like moveon.org is giving out free Obama stickers, no strings attached:
https://pol.moveon.org/obamastickers/