Posted 9:52 PM by Gerald Klaas
I recently bought a used Chevy S10 pickup and found out that it is capable of running on 85% ethanol (E85). There are a couple of fueling stations nearby that sell E85, so I can use E85 if I can get over an ethical dilemma. TIME magazine ran a story in March 2008 titled The Clean Energy Scam suggesting that burning E85 might actually be more harmful to the environment than burning gasoline.

I must admit, I do think that making ethanol from corn is stupid, but there are better feedstocks for making ethanol.

I do believe that the environmental science is squarely in favor of using ethanol as a motor fuel, but only if you use the right feedstocks and production processes to create it. I put the blame for the unintended environmental consequences mentioned in the TIME article directly on the U.S. Congress who distort the feedstock market with sugar subsidizes and import quotas and corn subsidies.

If Congress wants to encourage energy independence, they should tax petroleum and subsidize biofuels research, and stop manipulating the ethanol feedstock markets.

Posted 9:40 AM by Gerald Klaas
So today the Supreme Court Justices meet to decide whether to hear the case regarding Obama's birth certificate (Donofrio v Wells). It still amazes me that there is more coverage of Obama's blackberry than there is about questions of whether his executive orders and future appointments will be valid. There is huge potential for a Constitutional Crisis, but not a peep from major media. Luckily, individual citizens and the world still watch.....

From UK: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/dec/04/barack-obama-citizenship-supreme-court
From Canada: http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/6654
From India: http://www.domain-b.com/people/in_the_news/20081204_barack_obama%20.html
From Ghana: http://news.myjoyonline.com/international/200812/23568.asp
From Caribbean: http://www.caribbeanworldnews.com/middle_top_news_detail.php?mid=1784

Where's the US media on this?

Posted 10:12 AM by Gerald Klaas
I'm amazed at the lack of any media attention to the lawsuits filed seeking Obama's birth certificate. Regardless of whether or not Obama is a citizen, the lack of verification standards among Secretaries of State and the fact that there are 17 similar lawsuits filed around the country would seem to make the story newsworthy.

This blogger is pretty close to my own view.
http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2008/nov/23/my-turn-obama-birth-lawsuits-should-be-covered/

• If Barack Obama is allowed to become president without proof of being a naturalized citizen, then our U.S. Constitution has become a living document subject to any and all interpretations. This will lead to a state of anarchy and will be a sad day for a once-great nation.

On another note, it's a scary thought if this story is true, that Google might "sandbox" bloggers because of their political flavor. This blogger believes she was blacklisted because of stories about Obama's birth certificate. http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2008/11/sandboxed-black.html

Posted 7:40 PM by Gerald Klaas
Alan Keyes has filed a lawsuit in Superior Court to prevent California Secretary of State Debra Bowen from certifying the State's electors until the Secretary verifies the qualifications of candidate Obama. (See Keyes v Bowen, Superior Court, Sacramento) Read it here.

Aside from the question of whether or not president-elect Obama is a natural-born citizen, there are multiple interesting questions here:

• What is the level of due diligence required of our Secretary of State in verifying the qualifications of a candidate?
• Suppose the Secretary is found to have failed to meet this level of due diligence, and is unable to do so before December 15th, is not certifying our electors the appropriate remedy?
• If it's not the duty of individual Secretaries of State to verify a candidate's qualifications, then who does have that controlling authority?
• If there is no controlling authority, then why wasn't Arnold Schwarzenegger on the ballot?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a pissed-off Republican looking for any reason to disparge our president-elect, I'm actually a Libertarian very intrigued by the question of controlling authority for compliance of government with our Constitution. In my view, there are multiple other instances today where we, the people, look the other way at clear violations of the Constitution. Our Constitution requires presidential candidates to be natural born citizens at least 35 years of age, so if not the Secretary of State for the 50 individual states, then who does have the responsibility to ensure that our presidential candidates are so qualified?

When you can tell me who does have that authority, let me know, there are a few other questions I'd like to ask.............

Posted 12:50 AM by Gerald Klaas
I've been working in San Diego since February 2006 on a large migration team moving a data center and all of its hosted applications. Been a wild ride, with plenty of work (read opportunity for personal and professional growth).

In my spare time I've worked with the X-ASVP committee on a new proposal that could make life a lot tougher on spammers. The idea is to create a URL search path for every e-mail address, that defines three possible places that an end user could post an authentication token, or a description of which of the various existing protocols (DKIM, SPF, PGP, etc) he requires to get mail into his Inbox. The Internet-draft document and supporting data flow diagrams are posted at http://www.x-asvp.org/

BTW: The following secondary (top level domain) providers are also active.
http://www.x-asvp.COM
http://www.x-asvp.NET
http://www.x-asvp.ORG
http://www.x-asvp.BIZ
http://www.x-asvp.INFO
http://www.x-asvp.MOBI
http://www.x-asvp.NAME
http://www.x-asvp.AG
http://www.x-asvp.AT
http://www.x-asvp.BE
http://www.x-asvp.BZ
http://www.x-asvp.CC
http://www.x-asvp.CN
http://www.x-asvp.DE
http://www.x-asvp.DK
http://www.x-asvp.ES
http://www.x-asvp.EU
http://www.x-asvp.FM
http://www.x-asvp.GS
http://www.x-asvp.IN
http://www.x-asvp.LA
http://www.x-asvp.MS
http://www.x-asvp.PH
http://www.x-asvp.SC
http://www.x-asvp.TC
http://www.x-asvp.TK
http://www.x-asvp.TV
http://www.x-asvp.TW
http://www.x-asvp.US
http://www.x-asvp.VC
http://www.x-asvp.VG
http://www.x-asvp.WS

Posted 7:32 PM by Gerald Klaas
Back to work after a great Thanksgiving week. Some of my in-laws stayed with us for several days, and we had a great time eating too much, drinking too much, gambling at the Indian casino and braving the cold, rainy weather in order to enjoy bonfires on Souhern Oregon coastal beaches.

One thing I learned from having three teenagers share my house for a week, is that the current generation is using a blogger-on-steroids application called MySpace to share digital pics and have a kind of open doodle-board chat among friends. Since I'd like to get back to teaching again sometime, I figured I should do some poking around to see how this thing worked, lest I get another one of those know-it-all students trying to play stump-the-instructor with me again.

Can you imagine my surprise when I happened upon a site featuring a girl my stepson used to date? Funny thing is, three years ago her parents told him that she had died of cancer. How f*cked up is that? For three friggin years my wife and I have helped him deal with his grief, and tried to counsel our young Marine about how a loving God could take such a precious gem from this earth. Now we find out they lied. Yeah, can you believe it? I'm thinking of suing the bastards for inflicting mental anguish, and the cost of counseling, and the time spent trying to find a grave that didn't even f*cking exist. I think the Marine doesn't have to worry about seeing her in an afterlife anymore. She and her bastard parents better take their sunscreen.

Posted 5:26 AM by Gerald Klaas
The President's Panel on Income Tax Reform has issued it's report. While I still believe that the income tax is unconstitutional, this would be a step in the right direction.

On a personal note, I'm currently on a business trip in Herndon, Virginia. This weekend I'll be going to Punkin Chunkin in Millsboro, Delaware.

Posted 12:35 PM by Gerald Klaas
There's an interesting story from WESH-TV today on prison inmates collecting bogus tax refunds:

After first refusing to answer any questions, the IRS admitted to congressional investigators that the problem is worse than many imagined. Last year alone, IRS records show almost 500,000 prison inmates nationwide tried to file a tax return seeking a total of $758 million.

And these guys go after a guy like Joe Banister?

Posted 12:20 PM by Gerald Klaas
Here is a copy of a letter to the editor I sent to The Sacramento Bee in
response to a blatantly biased article on the Joe Banister trial in federal court last week.

RE: Verdict Cheered by Tax Evaders (Business 6/25)

Does The Bee intend to show such an obvious bias
when reporting that a former IRS agent who claims
there is no legal authority to force employers to
withold "income" taxes is acquitted of all charges?

As one who actually attended the trial, and didn't
see The Bee's reporter in attendance, I was amazed
that the IRS's own witness, Robert Gorini, was
unable to cite any law that required Banister to
pay income taxes.

Maybe instead of vilifying those of us who care
about the rule of law by calling us "Tax Evaders",
(and by the way, I do pay income taxes), The Bee
could do us all a service by asking the IRS why
their case failed?  Maybe the jury was right?
Maybe Mr. Banister is right?  Maybe the IRS uses
a different definition of "income" than what
the Supreme court applied in the Stapler decision?


Gerald Klaas 

Posted 5:58 PM by Gerald Klaas
Once again the problem with DCMA handing too much power to the recording industry is shown as the recording industry sues an 84-year-old dead woman.
At some point, the Digital Millenium Copyright Act needs to be reformed.

Posted 9:25 PM by Gerald Klaas
It seems to me that the salient point of Schulz v. IRS is not only that "IRS summonses apply no force to taxpayers....until that summons is backed by a federal court order", but that while this will certainly raise the enforcement overhead of the IRS within the 2nd Circuit states, I think a more interesting question is:
Will banks and employers who comply with IRS garnishment "requests", without a court order, become liable for acting without proper authority?

Posted 7:34 PM by Gerald Klaas
Interesting article on the California secession movement and Move On California organization:

Those benefits would be both financial and political: "For every dollar Californians give to the federal government we see only 78-cents come back," the group's website says. It also expresses concern about "the diminishing voice of Californians in national politics" and "national trends that are tipping the balance in the direction of the religious conservative agenda."

Posted 4:03 PM by Gerald Klaas
I've been in Indianapolis (snapshot) on a business trip for the last week. I've been very impressed with this city. I enjoyed going to mass at the historic Saint John the Evangelist Catholic Church right across the street from the RCA Dome, and spent a few hours today at the Indiana War Memorial. I also enjoyed walking on the Canal Walk ( snapshot ). Yesterday I visited the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum.

Posted 8:06 PM by Gerald Klaas
In all too predictable lockstep, the federal judiciary has dismissed the lawsuit
against federal agents for use of excessive force in the kidnapping deportation
of Elian Gonzalez in April 2000. From Reuters:

The family said the federal agents who raided their Little Havana
home and snatched Elian on April 22, 2000, broke down their door without warning, sprayed gas in the house and broke furniture and religious artifacts.

Posted 10:10 PM by Gerald Klaas
It was an exciting day in my household. Not in any particular order, my excitement was marked by 1) the receipt of my order of 861.info mini CD's; 2) I sent out my notarized complaint for the We The People Foundation lawsuit, and 3) my stepson moved out of the house at age 20.

I'm not completely sure where they all rank, but I have a silly grin and am enjoying a nice glass of Merlot to celebrate at least one of them. :-)