Hurricane Sandy Pummels East Coast, Stresses Cities’ Weak Infrastructure

Like many, I’ve read a few stories, and seen a few pics from the landing of Hurricane Sandy on the United States Eastern seaboard.

Honestly, it’s difficult to go throughout the day not hearing at least one story about the extreme climatic conditions that’ve been wreaking havoc for thousands of miles, stretching North into Canada and South into the Appalachian foothills of Tennessee & North Carolina from the hurricane’s epicenter located in the New York City & New Jersey areas.

Though unlike many, I’ve not stayed glued to the weather news or developments.

Extreme climatic events in remote affected areas – unusually early and deep snowfall, including heavy rain – have accompanied this unparalleled severe weather event. Yet one of the odd things about this storm, is that – as hurricane strength is measured – it’s not a powerful storm.

Hurricane measurements grade storm intensity according to wind strength, and

THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING! Or… maybe not.

Believe it or else, there were opponents to air bags, seat belts and child safety restraints.

Some time, someone will oppose everything… even vanilla ice cream and Mother’s Day.

There are, I suppose, several ways to consider the following.

One could presume the psychotic Chicken Little, paranoid delusional “the-sky-is-falling” approach, or, one could suppose the device is only an extension of someone who cannot tell a lie… or, at least is very difficult to deliberately fabricate falsehood.

And then, there’s something in the middle.

I would imagine that’s where the truth resides.
—

A Black Box in Your Car?

By Sam Favate, April 23, 2012, 1:40 PM

If you thought having EZ Pass in your car would make it too easy for the government to track you, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

The Senate passed a bill in March that calls for “mandatory event data recorders” (or black boxes) to be installed in all new passenger motor vehicles, starting with the 2015 models, and which would record data before, during or after a crash, according to KurzweilAI.net.

The bill, which can be seen here, has a privacy provision but gives the government the authority to access the black box in a number of circumstances, including court order, consent of the owner, an investigation or inspection, or to determine the need for emergency responses.

The same bill would allow the IRS to