The loose, global nature of al-Qaeda’s operations offer some advantages, but there are bound to be limitations: AP: Ethnic Rifts Tearing at al-Qaida It would be interesting to know what happens between the Arab, Central Asian, and Southeast Asian groups when resources grow more scarce.

WordPress 1.5.1 is out, and given that it included a security fix, it seemed like a good idea to go ahead and upgrade. The upgrade went pretty easily, as near as I can tell. You really can just overwrite the old files, assuming you don’t do like me and drop them into the wrong directory. The only problem I had was with a stats plugin I was using on the admin side and the fact that I really should have deactivated/reactivated the plugins during the process. ...

Lorrie clued me into this one. Who Reads What? is a collection of relatively famous people talking about the books they like, going back to 1988. Interesting and eclectic group, currently ranging alphabetically from Bella Abzug to Barry Zito.

I figured this would be happening sooner or later, but I always thought it would just be more blatant. We’re soon to have uniform standards on driver’s licenses thanks to the REAL ID Act, creating a national ID card out of identification that once was more fractious. The legislation was just passed by the House of Representatives, thanks to it being attached to a “must-pass” Iraq appropriations bill. Anyone remember Reagan being opposed to a national ID card? That was in part due to a libertarian strain in conservative politics, and in part due to evangelicals who believed a national ID card was the first step toward world government. Sure, maybe 9/11 changed “everything,” but I would think fundamental political and religious beliefs would be the last things to change, so expect some fireworks over this one by tomorrow, when it goes to the Senate. ...

I grew up in Baptist churches…and watched them split. We went to a string of churches on four consecutive Sundays where the pastor resigned while we were there. This is pretty typical, and has been so for a long time. The issues may have been politics, divorce, smoking, church funds, the pastor’s wife, pants on women, sports on Sunday, you name it, but what it usually came down to was a control-freak pastor who couldn’t see past his own nose, and it sounds like East Waynesville Baptist got themselves a real winner last October. ...

Darn it. I was hoping Fields would be getting good news, particularly with his friend Sam Mills passing away.

The eerie beauty of an abandoned Renaissance Faire. Great pictures. (Caveat: One picture of unidentified animal remains, in case you’re eating.) Link courtesy of White Noise

Here at work we’ve been watching bouncebacks flood into an email inbox, apparently triggered by the recent spread of Sober.p. The bouncebacks are coming from virus-laden emails heading out to the world with fake “From” addresses…in this case, that particular email address. Now, given the fact that we use this address primarily as an internal address inside a small, secure, virus-protected network, don’t publish it, and have only used it to communicate with a few relatively computer-savvy people, it bothers me that even the few machines where it is likely to exist outside our network are still vulnerable to this sort of thing. Email viruses have been well publicized for around a decade. Why — given the fact that this one doesn’t even look like a real message from us — are people still clicking on the attachments?!? Shouldn’t we be making the virus writers work harder now? :| ...

We were walking toward Ted’s Montana Grill in Durham to partake of some bison, and we see some tall fellows walking toward us. I think one of them looks like Marvin Williams, so I stare until I figure out that it is him. Nice guy that he is, he even moved out of the way as I wandered blankly by, gawking. After we get into the restaurant, Lorrie points out that he was with Sean May and Wes Miller. (Who looked taller in person than he does with the rest of the team.) You know, it’s not like I really need more proof that my brain isn’t exactly agile when surprised. There go my dreams of being Sherlock Holmes. :) ...

I hope people aren’t just so complacent as to easily accept unfavorable comparison of our system of government to Al Qaeda…even if that comparison was made by Pat Robertson and the Family Research Council. (And it gets worse, if you scroll down to the links near the end of the article.)