Jeff Jacoby has some more thoughts on why we should pass Question 1.

Enacting Question 1 would not wipe out state government. It would cut a $23 billion budget to $14 billion, or roughly where it was in 1993 – not exactly the Dark Ages. In so doing, it would administer a badly needed rebuke to a Legislature that routinely treats the public with contempt and thinks the best answer to every question is new taxes.

It’s funny how the truth just as a better sound to it, isn’t it?

Question 1 would abolish the state income tax. Why should you vote for it?

We have high income and property taxes; the total per capita tax burden is the fourth highest in the nation with correspondingly high per capita spending. Yet as soon as there is a slight revenue shortfall, the first move by the Legislature is to cut services for the handicapped, then start drafting a new tax package.

This drives me crazy. I’ve been saying for quite a while now that the state legislature has no respect for the people. We pass a proposition to roll back the income tax, and they basically just ignore it.

In fact, it’s worse than that. They treat us like children that they are going to punish. Have you ever noticed how the first response of the establishment is fear mongering? [According to Paul Guzzi and Michael Widmer](http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/299/oped/Vote*no”to”avoid*fiscal_chaos+.shtml,) rolling the state budget back to **$14 BILLION** would throw the finances of state and local governments into chaos. Don’t believe it.

Don’t you get the feeling that every time they are forced to cut a tax, they choose the spending to cut that they know will be the most emotionally disturbing to the general populace? It’s all about taking **our*’ money and controlling it for what ”’they”’ want. It’s time to say ‘*enough is enough**!

I remember this!

Here is a sample of my Macromedia Flash programming. Flash was designed as a vector animation tool for the web. Lately, however, it has developed scripting capabilities similar to its sister program, Macromedia Director, which is my native language.

I chose to recreate Atari Adventure with all its bleeps and bloops and chicken-looking dragons. As a kid this program fascinated and enticed me to become a programmer. It’s a joy to be able to re-create it. Note that I took the liberty to rearrange a couple of items.

Adventure was the first of its kind, the mother of all graphic adventure games from Ultima to Zelda. It was also the instigator of hidden backdoors and easter eggs (now staples in every video game).

**YEAH!**

Now, if only I can remember how to solve this [[:-)]]

Not only is it hard, it’s NP-Hard.

Technically, it’s ‘NP-hard,’ meaning that there is no efficient way to calculate the necessary moves to “win,” even if you know in advance the complete order of pieces, and are given all the time you need to make each move. At least there’s one geek classic that refuses to fall to the scrutiny of mathematicians.

Now why didn’t I think of that for a graduate thesis???

Linux will be the main operating system for IBM’s upcoming family of “Blue Gene” supercomputers–a major endorsement for the operating system and the open-source computing model it represents.

###Very cool news

I’m really pulling for Linux to succeeed, because everything that gets done to make Linux better indirectly helps the Mac and OSX.

**Yeah!**. Just one more!!!!

Bonds put San Francisco on the brink, hitting an RBI double that sent the Giants zooming to a big lead that not even these pesky Anaheim Angels could overcome, winning 16-4 in Game 5 Thursday night to take a 3-2 lead.

I think Barry has silenced the critics regarding his post season play.

The weather was perfect!

Some people where I work decided to take a hike today up the [[Blue Hill]] near our office. Take a look:

[[Blue Hill 2002]]

I think I’m going to have to take my family there.

According to this article, the answer is **sorta**.

The good news is that one-time charges are what drove it into the red. Apple wrote down $49 million for declining investments. Subtract such charges, and the business eked out $7 million in profit — a whole 2 cents a share.

This, in the face of the tech bubble burst, is incredible.

It looks M$ might just open up its file format in V11 of its office software suite. This is great if it actually happens.

The co-inventor of XML, Tim Bray, has been talking about the newly XML-enabled version of Microsoft Office, code-named **Office 11** and tells XML-Journal that when the huge universe of MS Office documents becomes available for processing by any programmer with a Perl script and a bit of intelligence, all sorts of wonderful new things can be invented that you and I can’t imagine.

When that happens, the product will have to compete based on features and stability instead of just simply customer lock-in. Then other products such as [[OpenOffice]] might have a chance to make an impact.

Let’s just hope the have the right guys.

Members of the sniper task force arrested an ex-soldier and his stepson early Thursday at a freeway rest stop. Sources told CNN the two were considered suspects in the shootings that have killed 10 and wounded three in the Washington area.

His name is John Allen Muhammad. With a name like that, you gotta wonder if he has ties to Al Queda. The scary part is that he’s an ex-soldier in the US army and a gulf war veteran!!!