Kimbo Slice is the guy in the white shorts. He is an underground boxer, that will fight anyone, anytime, anyplace, for between $5,000 and $10,000. Backed by a Miami porn site mogul, he has these fights for a living until he goes pro. Which he is looking to do, in UFC or something. So, if you wanna throw down with Kimbo then you'd better hurry up. Otherwise you'll have to assault him or go pro to get a piece.

It has been argued that he was on PCP, or a short acting anabolic agent popular with Mike Tyson, that stimulates extreme aggression. But the guy went to prison for 10 years, and was probably raped before he got that big, so I think he just has an enormous amount of aggression and experience in fighting.

You decide. For me: Kimbo is my hero either way. He is way tough.

kimboslice@hotmail.com if you want to throw down.

Meet Kimbo Slice. Do not anger Kimbo. Kimbo is teh tough.

Graphs of political book purchasing habits of amazon readers. These graphs demonstrate echo chambers in our society wherein the left talks to itself and the right talks to itself. There are a very small number of books that people on both sides read relative to the slew of books that are only read by people on a particular side. This is an old meme, but the graph has been updated recently. I memed an old version of this, but I had trouble finding it today. So, I'm rememing.

Political Books -- Polarized Readers -- May 2004

] Since 2001, President Bush's tax cuts have shifted
] federal tax payments from the richest Americans to a wide
] swath of middle-class families, the Congressional Budget
] Office has found, a conclusion likely to roil the
] presidential election campaign.

Tax Burden Shifts to the Middle (washingtonpost.com)

] The UN imposes all sorts of penalties on all those who
] contradict its religion. It issues documents and
] statements that openly contradict Islamic belief, such as
] the International Declaration for Human Rights,
] considering all religions are equal, and considering that
] the destruction of the statues constitutes a crime...

This is long but its interesting. Someone extracted emails from a computer stolen from Al'Q and posted them in The Atlantic. Details about some of Al'Q's codes are discussed, as well as an interesting inside look at their operation. (The statues were the buddhist monuments destroyed by the Taliban in the late nineties.)

Emails from Bin Lauden

] John Young, a 69-year-old architect, was contacted a few
] weeks ago by Department of Homeland Security officials,
] who expressed concern about what he was posting on his
] Web site.

ABC news on Cryptome. A military intelligence agent once told me that Cryptome was respected in their community as the best unclassified source for "interesting" information available. Fuck Jane's.

ABCNEWS.com : Does Web Information Help Terrorists?

] The Block and Nold study, which was intended to
] economically validate the proposed sentencing guidelines,
] instead showed that the new guidelines would actually
] create more crime than they would deter. More crime, more
] drug use, more robbery, more murder would be the result,
] not less.

A little out of Cringely's league perhaps? But very interesting...

PBS | I, Cringely Why we send more people to prison then we should

] I would like to see extremely harsh sentences for anyone
] who creates or passes on a virus, worm or Trojan horse.
] They ought to be sentenced to at least ten years in
] prison with no chance of parole and a life-long ban on
] using computers. Millions suffer because of these idiots.
] It's time to really put a fright into them.
]
] Damn right he should be punished. Sends out a message to
] all those merry-making nerds.
]
] I think that these morons who send out these viruses
] should receive the same types of penalty as any other
] common thief. This idiot is no different than the thug
] who hides until after dark and breaks into your home and
] steals your belongings. By corrupting or otherwise
] ruining your computer he has cost you financial loss and
] the feeling of being violated and worrying about identity
] theft.
]
] Make an example out of him. Maybe the next punk ass
] script kiddie will think twice if you roast this one. Try
] him under the homeland security act for cyber terrorism -
] unlimited jail in maximum security.

It seems clear to me that this case has almost nothing to do with "sending a message to worm writers" and almost everything to do with providing a spectacle for thousands of computer users like these... As we watch this guy get nailed all of these people feel vindicated and rejoice! They're right, and he is wrong, and he is going down! The system works! I love big brother!

vnunet.com - Blaster B plea angers onlookers

AARP

Scott Stantis Political Cartoons in Reason Magazine

] Turning and turning in the widening gyre
] The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
] Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
] Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
] The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
] The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
] The best lack all convictions, while the worst
] Are full of passionate intensity.

The Second Coming -- W. B. Yeats

] Reason: I've been rereading some of your early
] 90s writings about the digital future, and you
] sounded a lot more optimistic then, with a much more
] "nothing can stop us now" attitude.
]
] Barlow: We all get older and smarter.

On today:

] It’s a perfect set of circumstances to give us the time Yeats
] foretold, with the best having lost all conviction and the worst
] full of passionate intensity.

Reason: John Perry Barlow 2.0: The Thomas Jefferson of cyberspace reinvents his body -- and his politics.