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Throughout history, good has always triumphed over evil.

Doesn’t this strike anyone as rather odd?

It makes sense, not because good is inherently more powerful than evil, but because what we call history occurs at the confluence of three important facts:

1. “Good” and “evil” are self-reflexive terms. Each can only be usefully defined in negation of the other.
2. No one ever thinks of themselves as being “evil”. Evil is instead performed in pursuit of some goal, often to a perceived benefit.
3. History is written by the victorious.

The practical application herein is religious. No group ever sees itself as “evil”. Yet evil is performed daily; violent and destructive deeds committed to prove that “God is on our side”.

All this stands in stark contrast to an overwhelmingly obvious fact: The infinite Universe, in its mind-numbing complexity and overwhelming scope, contains all that we are, were, will be, or could possibly imagine.

Why would anyone think that the Creator of such a Universe, by whatever name given, would have a “side”?

So you may have noticed that I’ve added the ability to digg articles on my blog, based on a request from a reader (who may have simply been a spam-bot, I still don’t know).

The reaction thus far has been underwhelming. I submitted a trio of articles myself, just to bootstrap things, but I feel dirty afterward. :)

I’ll likely just leave them for a few days, and see if any activity shows up. But they’re kind of distracting, so if nothing seems to be happening, it’ll be time to fire up the old e-chainsaw [yinnnggg yINnnnnng chug chug chug chug chug chug]

*Update:* I changed from digg to StumbleUpon, as the topics seemed more appropriate to the forum.

One has to be careful criticizing laws that are meant to protect law enforcement personnel.

But Florida’s Move Over Act, to paraphrase Creighton, is one of the worst ideas in the long sad history of bad ideas.

I don’t mean the intent is bad, of course. I mean the law will never achieve the intent, and therefore the law is bad. Motorists cannot be blamed for violating the law if the hazard appears too quickly for them to react.

Rather than attempting to legislate what should be common sense, the public and the law enforcement community would be better served by creating better visibility of local emergency events, such as a vehicle blocking a lane of traffic.

One way to do this might be to erect a bright flashing red and blue light on a portable, retractable tower, perhaps something akin to the towers used by remote television broadcast vans, or perhaps on a standalone tripod support.

Another way might be to raise such a light with a quickly-inflatable balloon, tethered to the law enforcement vehicle.

It might even be conceivable to combine the two ideas, to provide maximum visibility.

The point is to give motorists more than a few seconds’ notice that they are approaching a temporary hazard.

That will do far more to protect the public and law enforcement than an impractical, unpublicized, and nearly-unenforceable law. “Move Over” should be relegated to the scrapheap of history, as soon as possible.

Former Gator David Ross (that whole is his official name, I had it legally changed, despite his protests) hit a homer Monday night to take a lead over the Cardinals, but it wasn’t enough cushion for the Reds’ struggling bullpen, as the Reds lost 11-7.

To me, you score seven runs on a team, you oughta beat ’em.

Apparently the ownership agreed with this assertion, and Reds manager Jerry Narron was uncermoniously showed the door.

Now the rumour mill is churning up potential replacements. But they’re all former managers, and they’re going to run into the same issues that Narron did– lethargic team captains, a bullpen about as stable as a newborn giraffe, and a comparatively shallow experience pool.

It’s time to shake things up, to snap baseball out of its love of management musical chairs.

An icon, such as Johnny Bench, might be able to come in and trade on his achievements to motivate the players. Pretty much, if baseball still means anything at all, when someone like Johnny Bench says you ought to do something, you ought to do it, and everyone on the team knows it.

Or here’s another idea: Make Ken Griffey Junior or Adam Dunn the player/manager. Either of these laid-back team leaders might benefit from a new perspective, from having his name prominently associated with a team on track to lose 100 games this year. And if they’re trying hard, the team follows suit.

Or you could even go all out and say, “Pete Rose is the Reds manager again”. Banned from baseball? Too bad. Kick us out if you dare. The publicity alone would be worth it, and at the rate things are going, there’s little to lose.

Sure, that’d be a rotten thing to do to Barry “Better Living Through Chemistry” Bonds during his assault on Aaron’s home run record. But who wants to go through life with an asterisk stuck to his last name, anyway?

Just as an aside, the “wave” is about the most annoying, disrespectful, useless things ever created by a herd of people.

Looking back at runaway housing inflation, and seeing the breadth of spec development that it spawned, and wondering how severe the impact is going to be when it all collapses, I came up with what is in retrospect a brilliant idea:

Tie development impact fees to the prime lending rate.

The lower the lending rate goes, the higher the impact fees. That would help put a governor on the misperception of instant riches to be found in unrestrained development.

There’s some applicable saying about “hindsight”, but there’s another one involving a barn door and a horse.

Is it just me, or are the remote ATM charges spinning even further out of control?

Last one I saw was $3.50, not counting what my own bank would charge me. Since we’ve allowed the definition of usury to be inflated beyond any practical use, technically it’s even legal.

The worst part is when they ask you if it’s all right to charge you. Often people needing cash don’t have the option of saying “no” at that point– they’ve bought groceries, or perhaps found themselves short of cash after a purchase or hotel stay, and their native ATM isn’t accessible.

But why do they only give you two options? You know some bean-counter is taking this to senior management to justify the fees. “See, boss, 99% of the people approve of the fee!”

I think that if the menu option read like this:

Leech America Bank will deduct a $3.50 service charge from your account. This is in addition to any fees your institution may charge you. Do you agree?

• Yes, proceed. I understand that a $3.50 service charge will be deducted from my account.
• No, cancel my transaction.
• Hell no. Give me my money, you bloodsucking vultures, and stuff your “service charge” into any orifice that causes you pain.

there would be a much more accurate accounting of how people really feel about it.

The world sometimes seems hell-bent on keeping me up-to-date on the lastest melodrama concerning Paris Hilton.

My assertion is that she is simply a personal hallucination, a la Harvey, and therefore not an appropriate topic for polite conversation.

I’m the first to concede that there might be a few holes in that theory, but you have to admit, it does do a good job of clearing some of the clutter from one’s mind.