The recent furor generated by comments from the Federal Election Commission on weblogs linking to candidate web sites may have more to it than meets the eye.

Robert Novak appears to believe that the changes in Social Security being pushed by President Bush will not survive passage through Congress without major changes. Is he misunderestimating the President, as has been done by so many others before? Possibly… but Social Security is referred to as the “third rail” of politics for a reason. Could it be that despite the current positive trends in the MidEast the Bush administration could fail on the domestic front? It would be an...

A centrist finds fault with both the left and the right in the online article Iraq, The Boy Who Cried Wolf, And The Couch Potato’s Burden: A Muscular Centrist Attack On The Pro-War Position. I don’t necessarily agree with all the assertions made, but it is often good to have assumptions challenged even if simply so that thought does not become caught in a box.

Are we focusing on “fixing” the wrong social program? While Social Security is expected to exhaust its reserves in 2042, Medicare should deplete the trust fund financing its hospital benefits in 2019, the latest forecasts show. In addition to the timing, what about the magnitude? Social Security, which Bush has hoisted atop his domestic agenda, is $3.7 trillion short of what it will need for benefits over the next 75 years, under the latest federal projections. Medicare, the health...

Bill Gates is receiving something from the Queen of England: The king of computer software Bill Gates has received an honorary knighthood from the Queen. Mr Gates, 48, the world’s wealthiest man, said it was “a great honour” to be recognised for his business skills and for his work on poverty reduction. The Queen had spoken to him about using computers, he said after a private audience with her. As an American citizen he cannot use the title “Sir” but will be entitled...

…you can go here, and find something else to groan about, but in a good way (is there a good way to groan???).

To paraprhase what Mark Twain was supposed to have said: Reports of the death of the West are greatly exaggerated.

…when not only is our private information for sale without our explicit consent, but the buyers of that information are not vetted properly by the sellers and prove to be criminals? This incident raises a series of questions that merit discussion. What is private information and what is public information? What permissions should be required for selling that information for profit? What restrictions are necessary to protect people from loss of both privacy and from identity theft, especially...

A very sharp, pointy satirical piece provides an opportunity for some mental exercise.

Pennywit makes a proposal and asks for comments. You can’t say he’s not thinking outside the box.

Jonathan, posting at The Noble Pundit (another blog at which I post on occasion), has some opinions about the effects that reactions to a series of bombings in the Phillipines are having in there on calls for a national ID system. Examples from other countries are being used to justify it. The debate is eerily similar to recent efforts in the United States to start some form of national ID system, including the wording of some of the statements. Globalization isn’t just about trade any more.

From the Associated Press via MSNBC.com: GLENDALE, Calif. – A man accused of killing 11 people by parking his truck in a train’s path intended to get his estranged wife’s attention by causing “a horrific tragedy,” not to kill himself as originally thought, police said. Authorities also said Juan Manuel Alvarez told them he had poured gasoline on the SUV before the Metrolink struck it Jan. 26 as it carried commuters to downtown Los Angeles. Police initially believed...

…exist that echo through centuries.

…until you dig deeper.

…at least not from his owner. From MSNBC.com: J.D. the Labrador retriever meant well, but he’s landed his owner in a mess of trouble. Police say his owner was playing Frisbee golf with two friends at a suburban Dallas-Fort Worth course Monday when a police officer arrived. The officer thought he smelled burning marijuana, so he asked the men for identification and began checking for outstanding warrants. J.D., apparently sensing the party was over, waded into nearby Bear Creek, retrieved...

…wait until they infect things other than your computer.

I can’t reconstruct the entire link-chain that got me to this discussion by Anil Dash on the direction of blogging in light of recent events with respect to both the Jordan and Gannon imbroglios, but regardless of how I got there, it is well worth reading. A brief excerpt to tempt you to go there and read: And about Eason Jordan: More myopic blogger triumphalism. Dear political bloggers, most people, even in the blogosphere, have never heard of the whole kerfuffle, let alone the one surrounding...

…falls the Faith Based Initiative. The question is asked at Centerfield, and the comments make interesting reading.

Instead of merely throwing rocks at proposals that we don’t like, at which blogworld has shown it can excel, it is far more constructive to make alternate proposals. In that spirit, here are some alternatives to the plans being put forward by the administration on Social Security, which is being used as a lever in creating the “ownership society” that President Bush says is his vision for the nation. — A technical note: Joe was a bit mistaken that he could not link to my...