Good morning to you all.  We had a bit of snow overnight with more to come today and tomorrow.  Between 5 and 6 inches here unless the forecast changes.  And the temperatures are dropping from the high 20s to the mid teens over the course of today.  Well we still have a month-and-a-half of winter.  And I am grateful that the season has been mild to date.

I have already turned off the broadcast TV news.  They are spending way too much time on the dramatics of the nomination battle and too little on the substance--as though any of those clowns have much in the way of substance.  Huntsman was the only really serious candidate and he has dropped out.  I was nearly sick when the, again, noted that Palin has endorsed Gingrich and Newt answered that there would be a place in a Gingrich administration for her.  That alone is reason enough to pray he doesn't get the nomination and isn't elected if he does.  Under the circumstances, I don't know whether to cheer this news, if true, or be more concerned.  If Perry drops out of the race that means one less clown in the parade.  Unfortunately, his supporters would gravitate toward either Santorum or Gingrich, which is scary.

On a much brighter note--we used white vinegar for the laundry experiment, Nicola.  We keep a couple of gallons on hand because, a couple or three times a week, I boil our tap water to filter for making coffee and tea, and the vinegar takes the crusted calcium deposits out of the pot very nicely.  I use elbow grease when necessary but only when I can't find an easier way to accomplish my task.  We find that we have gone back to a lot of old (sometimes very old) processes over time.  Vinegar is a lot less toxic and equally, if not more, effective than many of the modern 'conveniences.'

Well, I would say that this is a good start but I would still like to see criminal charges.  And I think it was too hypocritical of Murdock to be supporting SOPA and PIPA while illegally tapping into phones and e-mail.

The Washington Post published this article summarizing the SOPA and PIPA debate.  I have a couple of questions about this issue.  First, the measures won't even effectively address the core problem the sponsors originally wanted to attack--foreign sources of pirated movies and music.  They already have legal remedies for home-grown pirates.  Please tell me how this would have gone after pirates located outside the U.S.  Second--Senator Leahy says he wanted to provide legal protections for 'third party' entities from legal penalties for complying with court orders.  Question--don't they already have that?  One has to comply with court orders.  Question--could people like me have their sites shut down for linking, as I have this morning, to articles, etc.  I put in the links to credit the sources for the ideas and facts, and because I think anyone who reads my comments should have the opportunity to judge for themselves whether I have dealt fairly with my sources.  If I were writing an academic piece it would be called 'footnoting.'  I can agree that piracy, whether of digital content or counterfeit physical goods, is a costly problem but surely there are more effective and less intrusive way to combat it.