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NYTimes: "How Bush Took Florida: Mining the Overseas Absentee Vote" "Their goal was simple: to count the maximum number of overseas ballots in counties won by Mr. Bush, particularly those with a high concentration of military voters, while seeking to disqualify overseas ballots in counties won by Vice President Al Gore.

A six-month investigation by The New York Times of this chapter in the closest presidential election in American history shows that the Republican effort had a decided impact. Under intense pressure from the Republicans, Florida officials accepted hundreds of overseas absentee ballots that failed to comply with state election laws. "
posted by owillis at 9:44 PM PST - 71 comments

I've been looking for a new charity. Of course I support the Internet's greatest resource (Thanks Matt) And, I click here from time to time, but I want to do more. Are there any charities that you support/don't support? Why or why not? I'm leaning towards Literacy Volunteers of America by the way.
posted by willnot at 6:50 PM PST - 32 comments

The end of an era, and now I can't trust *any* of my neighbours.

"After 33 years, PBS' longest-running series, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, is signing off. Fred Rogers, one of TV's most familiar faces, says it's time to say goodbye. "

Thank god he's going into syndication. The world will always need a beacon of positive thought.
posted by jcterminal at 5:17 PM PST - 17 comments

So maybe rolling blackouts are a good thing. "Light pollution" means we don't see the universe today that we saw it when we were kids. What's the balance between being able to see that hazy something we know as the milky way (aka "us") and safe streets, aesthetics and convenience?
posted by dchase at 5:13 PM PST - 9 comments

Bush people considering making all Mexican illegals citizens. Three million Mexican illegals to be made citizens under this possible move. Guess who they will vote for?
posted by Postroad at 4:09 PM PST - 58 comments

Compulsory HIV testing: Hadn't considered that
See also: This, or this ... What's up?
posted by rschram at 3:13 PM PST - 7 comments

These guys are still around, but it seems they're the exception to the rule. Suck, etc seem to be with the vast majority. Does anyone know of any commercial independent web content ventures that are still kicking?
posted by owillis at 1:07 PM PST - 16 comments

But What Will Come of the Singing Senators? The most shocking part of Senator Jefford's switch is not that the senate turned Democrat, but that there will be no deep-thoated Repblican heavyweights to raise gobs of money singing 'Gonna Take a Lot River' to adoring Republican donors BSSN speculates that Bono may have had a role in the Singing Senator's demise.
posted by brucec at 12:25 PM PST - 1 comments

What do you want?
We keep hearing about this "who owes what to whom" now that Assembler has closed, and Kaliber and Dreamless are closing.

But what of it? What does it mean? Are we so closed minded to think our Web world is the only one and that somehow the rest of the universe revolves around those of us privileged enough to be able to embark on it as a daily journey?

All of us feel one way or another towards this debate. Either we hate it, or love it, and what of that too? What *do* each of us want from this virtual world? Is there something here worth redeeming and at least arriving at a point to agree to disagree? Discuss?
posted by sixandone at 11:46 AM PST - 10 comments

I for one am getting fed up with ICANN's bureaucratic muddle and the slow pace at which they do everything, not to mention their fundamentally anti-user attitude towards things. Now they've declared that they're in charge. Horseshit! It is the users who are in charge of the Internet. You don't have to limit yourself to the top level domains that ICANN is dribbling out; you can go to new.net and install their plugin (Mac version available), and enable such domains as .travel, .mp3, .sport, .club, .tech and (hoo-hah!) .xxx. Strike a blow for freedom, and tweak ICANN's nose! They need to learn that they'll have to move fast or become irrelevant.
posted by Steven Den Beste at 8:21 AM PST - 11 comments

This sad chronicle was just emailed to be by a friend. I found it interesting reading the day-by-day account of the horrible ordeal this kid is going through. Cancer is a terrible thing :(
posted by Maxor at 8:17 AM PST - 5 comments

Gary Condit's Gov't Website
Ok, there are some bizarre things on Gary Condit's site like this creepy page titled *intern opportunites* (including handy form) -- and then throughout most of his site, he's got a logo linked to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children down in the left corner... which is, needless to say, ironic, if not down right repulsive. Anyway, maybe it's just me, but he's got some kinda Freddy Krueger thing goin' on. Oh yeah, go here to email the freak! [state:CA / zip:95354]
posted by blackholebrain at 1:40 AM PST - 47 comments