Everyday I Learn

2008-04-04T12:01:00.000-07:00

Check out my latest project at www.cashwaltz.com

2006-05-12T12:53:00.000-07:00

Is it legal that banks sort deposits
to optimize the amount of fees they assess your account?

I want to start a class-action lawsuit and get this practice made illegal. Six transactions come in on a single day. Irrespective of how they are received by the bank, they are always sorted before they are posted against my account, from the highest dollar amount to the lowest. This, many times, allows the bank to collect a $25 charge for every item, instead of the item or two that they are really due. So the $7.00 transaction ends up costing $32.00, when had the transaction been processed in the order it was made, over $150.00 in overdraft protection charges would have only been $25.00 for the single item which I didn’t have enough to cover.

Why do banks practice the sort optimization for increased revenues? Because nobody has every pushed to have a fair practice policy by a bank. In most cases, you can call the bank and they will drop one or two of the overdraft charges just by asking. Is there any other instance in banking that this is true? Absolutely not, with the exception of getting a better interest rate on your credit card because they are raping you for 21%. They give back some of the money because they don’t want anybody making a big stink about just how much money they are making over and above what they are reasonably and legitimately due. If some legislation were made that, say, made banks sort all transaction posted in batches for the day be sorted from the lowest to the highest, banks would reduce their revenues by hundreds of thousands or even millions a day (in the case of the top 10 largest banks).

I’ve been told everything as for the reasons why the banks do this. “We pay the largest bills first since they are likely mortgages payments and the like”. That’s absolute bull. They pay the bills largest to smallest because it makes them more money, (3 to 5+ times more) and it comes out of the pocket of you-know-who.

To answer my own question: Yes, it is legal for banks to sort deposits from largest to smallest, but not because of some sound reasoning or logic. It’s just that nobody has said it’s unfair, and probably should be against the banking laws. The banks wouldn’t lose any money by practicing a friendly and fair policy, they just wouldn’t be making so much so fast at the financial demise of their customers.

2006-05-04T14:51:00.000-07:00

MORE STUPID COMPUTER TRICKS

So I went online with my bank today, and discovered a dispute, which I’ll write more about later, but thought I would work to resolve it by using the Live Help link, whereby an employee of the bank can text-chat with me about my access.

Hello, my name is Juan. How can I help you today?

Hi Juan, I noticed that an overdraft charge was applied to my account before I actually over drafted? I noticed this yesterday, and thought it suspicious. Could you take a look please?

I’m sorry, but since this is over an unsecured communications method, I cannot discuss specifics regarding you account information. I’m sure you can see how this is for your protection.

Well, yes. I could, if it actually was for my protection. See, I logged onto the bank using my user ID and password over a 128-bit encrypted communications channel. I had my account information up on the screen as I was chatting with the agent. I could have cut him a check if I wanted to, so what gives? Thanks for wasting my time. Somebody put a notice up on the website that the Live Chat is only for idiots who don’t know how to use a mouse to click on their account number, not for anybody that actually wants to conduct some business.

Experimenting with Speech Recognition

2005-11-25T17:54:00.000-08:00

Every day I learned something I just didn’t know when to know
About speech recognition.

the following is unedited speech to text translation...

And when to begin using the software to do all my blocks from here on out in an effort to try and see just how good speech recognition technology has become. This will be entirely the role the terminal. I wanna see if people are able understand what is that I’m saying as he is the increasing accuracy of the computer’s ability to translate my words into type written characters.

So, it from this point forward, you’re not able to understand what it is and I am writing about, is because I am no longer writing anything. I want to get very good at dictating to this computer, and eventually, be able to translate my thoughts into a book that I’m certain everybody would be interested in reading. I also want to see that the computer cannot understand what my words are, how is it that anybody else would be able to understand what it is I’m trying to say. So hopefully, this will help me in my enunciation of the words the land Lani and to use.

But I’ve discovered so far is that in order to translate like fonts to computer screen through the speech recognition software and must begin to talk much like the character captain Kirk from the star trek series. That in itself is a very strange feeling. Taiwan refuse to speak like captain Kirk. I’m afraid somehow this system may actually end up in salting somebody without even knowing that. If for some reason I find it necessary to accurate type something on the screen, I will use the I a talent characters. This way I can add some commentary that Baxley makes sense as opposed to bearded towards controlling ball into the computer.

I am amazed at just how did this actually it’s. It’s kind of like trendy get a bald to walk on its hind legs. You just gotta be impressed that it could do it at all. One of the biggest problems is that it’s yeah she watched the screen after you’ve said what is your same any rebooted is on stream it can’t help but laugh which it then interprets is being tried to talk. All all I can say is all I can say.

Morale- potato store Bertrand and tease award of the big O. own and toward the onus begun stream of all been exe all about with that Diego. Correctly. But the instead about five and it’s lasted about gloves sensitive skin of the stream. Sun that all come up with the topic and say that of the could trigger, and if that topic is not the ward and she said then I’ll use whatever awarded eggs the principal as green at startup it.

Against a diesel time I get it takes a little plan time for the computer to enact we understand polls bead speaking. But but the other jeez Archie’s a dozen be able to cope with its.

Well, that’s all for now.I hope you have In Joliet this little block. Stay tuned for many more as this is much easier than typing.

Can You Be A Hopeful Nihilist

2005-11-24T21:48:00.000-08:00

Can You Be A Hopeful Nihilist?

On occasion, I take great pleasure in seeing the unintended failure of systems, which I did not create, for if I were king, things would be better.

Nihilist: The belief that destruction of existing political or social institutions is necessary for future improvement.

Okay, I’m a nihilist.  See, what I’ve come to realize over the last several years is just how little most people know about the life that they are living out.  Our money is a farce; prices we pay are not based on any set or subset of calculated reality because what we are paying with (the federal reserve note) isn’t based upon anything except the fluctuation of depreciable value (interest owed).  This came to mind with President Bush recently visited China and on his agenda was a discussion that the Chinese have over-valued their money.  What’s that?  Can I do that?  “I hereby proclaim that my dollar is worth five of your dollars!”  Did it work?

Once you find out that your money you worked so hard to earn can be hyper-inflated to be much worse than worthless at the shift of some delicate but arbitrary balance of numbers, everything else is pretty insignificant.  We have put our faith in the Federal Reserve to say what our labor is worth in tangible assets.  That means we work for the Federal Reserve twenty-four seven, and we buy everything from them ultimately, and they get to set the price. (By the way, the FED is neither Federal nor do they have any Reserves – they are a private institution that sell us our money at face value, but can purchase it back on demand at 1 dollar irrespective of the note denomination, plus they get to set the interest rate on everything we buy on credit).

But things are looking up!  GM is about to file bankruptcy, the housing bubble is about to burst, the stock market is leaking peoples hard earned savings, and when oil goes back up in price (and it will), we’ll get the chance to find a new way of doing things better in the future.  Isn’t it great!

About Words

2005-10-30T19:30:00.000-08:00

About Words - Censured and Admonished

Words like these are often used when someone in our higher-legislative capacity are found to be doing something wrong and sometimes, even illegal.  All throughout the 1980’s and early 1990’s, a number of scandals were revealed, and looking back in history, the punishment was only in the form of Official Words.

Who doesn’t go to Prison for being bribed?

In the 1989 Keating Five scandals, Senator Cranston of California was officially reprimanded for his involvement in what amounts to legal bride taking.  During the scandal, he received $865,000 Keating.  So what is a reprimand?

     A severe, formal, or official rebuke or censure

Good job!  I’m sure he regrets receiving somewhere between 840,000 and 1.2 million dollars in campaign contributions in the wake of getting a verbal, albeit, public censure.  Actually, he didn’t regret it at all.  In 1996, he is quoted as saying, “I don’t feed a need for redemption” In 1996, he became chairman of the Gorbachev Foundation USA, a San Francisco-based think tank founded by former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev to promote world peace and nuclear disarmament.

Before politics, Cranston was a foreign correspondent for International News Service from 1936-1939, then later became the state comptroller for two terms for the state of California.  Cranston died December 31, 2000.

Who doesn’t go to jail for having sex with minors?

In 1983, the Page Scandal came to light; Representative Crane and Studds were found to be having sex with Congressional pages, both pages being 17 year-old minors.  The House censured them.  Censured?

     To express official disapproval of:

Check out this

http://www.digitalrag.com/iqbal/support/images/studds.jpg

(image placeholder)

Isn’t it great that Mr. Studds was against exploitation of child labor?  It’s obvious that he felt that children had other purposes in life. He was outted as a homosexual having sexual relations with a minor in the 1983 House Page Scandal.  Studds got married to his 21 year-younger same sex partner in May of 2005 in Massachusetts.  He had been re-elected 12 times before leaving the House of Representatives in 1997.

Reps. Dan Crane, Illinois resumed his Dental Practice after failing to be re-elected to the 99th Congress.  Crane was 47 years-old and married with six children at the time of the censorship he received.

Every Exercise is a Success

2005-10-24T14:44:00.000-07:00

Every Exercise is a Success

An act of employing or putting into play; use: the free exercise of intellect; the exercise of an option.

The discharge of a duty, function, or office.

Activity that requires physical or mental exertion, especially when performed to develop or maintain fitness: took an hour of vigorous daily exercise at a gym.

A task, problem, or other effort performed to develop or maintain fitness or increase skill: a piano exercise; a memory exercise.

An activity having a specified aspect: an undertaking that was an exercise in futility.

exercises A program that includes speeches, presentations, and other ceremonial activities performed before an audience: graduation exercises.

ex·or·cis·es

To expel (an evil spirit) by or as if by incantation, command, or prayer.

To free from evil spirits or malign influences.

Enough with the definitions, the fact is, if you every hear that an exercise has been completed successfully in government, it means that they managed to appear for the exercise, and didn't actually accomplish anything except to discover that all the people they intended on saving that day in the mock senario were easily killed by a flow of paperwork required to help them.

Every Exercise is a success.

A thought on Sickness

2005-10-15T07:22:00.000-07:00

A thought on Sickness

Okay, I’ve been sick the last 24 hours. Not just feeling bad, mind you, but really sick with the puking, fever and hole nine yards. With so much time on my hands to do nothing but wallow in my own misery, I thought I’d consider what symptom I hated most among all the symptoms I had.

Throwing up – If I had thrown up as much as my body wanted me to, I’d have spent hours hugging the porcelain thrown. When I refused, my body creatively threw me a twist. The acid-reflux hiccup fit. Burp, hiccup, hiccup, ouch. Bla-gurggle. Spew. Not my favorite symptom, but definitely a contender for the worse.

Cold Sweats – What is this? I can be simultaneously burning up and freezing, which seems like a physical impossibility without the use of quantum physics. If it weren’t for the fact that I have both laughed and cried simultaneously while in a state of sexual bliss, cold sweats could be a symptom of a larger problem that might actually make me go see a doctor. But as I have never gone to the doctor as a result of a massive orgasmic fit, I can see no reason to go because cold sweats are just another way the creator has played a joke on us.

The Runs – Aptly named because that is what you end up doing a lot of, running. Sitting in your easy chair, then wham, time to take a shit. There isn’t any debating it, or trying to pinch it off, you have the thrust of a titan rocket about to exhaust out your sphincter valve. If you don’t get to the porcelain-launching platform, there is no telling what direction you will go.

Combinations – Throwing up while expelling your guts should be classified as an Olympic event, like figure skating. Anybody who successfully manages to do this shows extreme agility and quick decision-making skills.

Grogginess –You don’t know where you are, and you don’t really care. Walking is a task, but trying to stand will result in one of the other symptoms overwhelming you.

I hate being sick.

A Day in the Life of a Government Webmaster

2005-10-03T14:32:00.000-07:00

A Day in the Life of a Government Webmaster

Probably the most important thing you should know about communicating to the government in the form of e-mail is, if you have been involved in a crime, directly or indirectly, your e-mail will be forwarded to authorities.

I just received an e-mail where a distraught citizen has been victimized by her now ex-boyfriend of 5 months. In this e-mail, she is seeking guidance, but while trying to explain herself, she also admitted to committing a crime herself, out of rage, in the form of property destruction and intent to commit bodily harm to her victimizer, now a victim in the eyes of the law. As I received this e-mail, it would be illegal for me to ignore the admission of guilt. I had to forward it to the authorities so they can investigate if there has been criminal behavior. If I did not, I could be charged as a co-conspirator in the act of a crime.

There are lots of resources people can turn to when in situation like the one described. Always seek assistance through a Family Justice Center first if you are possibly involved in a crime due to the coercion of a partner or being blackmailed to do or not do something because they will turn you in to the police if you don’t. A family justice center provides additional buffering between official law enforcement authorities and domestic assistance programs, such as legal aid, battered women’s shelters, etc. While the webmaster of a government website can be a vital resource for obtaining information otherwise difficult to discover, it should not be for anything in which law has been obviously broken.

The Influence of Disease Prevention Including Influenza Over the Last 100 Years.

2005-10-01T20:32:00.000-07:00

Affects of Changes in the Technology of Medication During the Period of 2001-2100

“The Influence of Disease Prevention Including Influenza Over the Last 100 Years."

          Today, it is hard to imagine when the human body was viewed as purely magical, supporting our spirit until the spirit was called back to which it came.  Suffering was viewed as the just deserts from descending from original sin, living spiritually un-pure lives, or not being of the right faith.  It was not until the end of the 19th century that philosopher’s reconciled that we were mechanical and not magical that advances in medicine and medication took root slowly.

          The birth of pharmacology and physiology brought about new views to the inner working of the human body.  Disease took formal and separate definition from its root; dis-ease, which encompassed every illness, feeling, cramp and matter of general discontent of human lives.  Through biology and chemistry, the first indications of organisms and bacterium, which infested and destroyed our bodies, were reveled.  Armed with new understanding, the first medication in the prevention of disease was created in 1789 against the highly contagious, and usually deadly Smallpox.

          Since the introduction of vaccinations, the hope has been that medical technology could rid the world of disease through artificially manipulating our own immune system.  Several significant steps were made during the twentieth century to help this process move forward, and through the advancement of technology, real, safe and efficient medications have been created against twenty-one known infectious diseases in the form of vaccines.

          For most of the twentieth century, medication in the prevention of disease has been in the form of vaccines against disease causing viruses and antibiotics against bacterial infections.  Vaccines prime the immune system to destroy a specific disease causing agent or pathogen before it has time to spread throughout the body.  Antibiotics are primarily only effective in the treatment of an infection, although post-exposure, pre-toxicity use of antibiotics has reduced the full-fledge infections.
          Around 1930, a significant advancement was made through the creation of heat killed, or weakened viruses increasing their safety and increased production.

          Major revisions to the advancement of vaccines took place in the early 1980’s when subunit vaccines that contain only selected fragments of the virus, and have no way to produce an infection, were created.  Currently hepatitis B vaccine is such a subunit vaccine.  In development using this process are vaccinations for prevention of diseases such as dengue fever, genital herpes and hemorrhagic fever caused by the Ebola virus.  It is hoped that the process can lead to the prevention of HIV, although significant hurdles must be overcome since HIV rapidly mutates.

          While infectious diseases have been on the decline since the wide-spread distribution of vaccinations, the shift in medical research and medication has been made to Pharmocolgenics, a recent development in the medical profession, that recognizes all diseases are interactions between genetics and the environment by way of infectious agents, toxins, or injury.

          Through understanding of how the immune system and viruses are comprised, alterations can be made to compensate and correct against the potential disease.  Advanced virology has lead to understanding some effective means of treatment, leading us to the potential cure and the prospect of immunity in the future through the engineering of antiviral drugs.

          Nucleoside and Nucleotide inhibitors disrupt the enzymes that duplicate the viral DNA, prevent the process of reverse transciptase, or synthetically induce mutations into viral genes preventing the viral replication.  Each of these methods operates after the virus is uncoated, meaning the virus has already penetrated the cell membrane and its protective capsid breaks up.

          One promising development is in the creation of monoclonal antibodies, which attach to specific viral surface protein, effectively marking the virus for destruction by the immune system.  Monoclonal antibodies combined with cell-to-cell inhibitors and may result in effective “in-host” quarantine while allowing for strategically targeting the live, unattached virus.  The difficulties to overcome are not insurmountable, as research in pharmacology has already pointed us in this direction.

THE DISTURBING STUFF

          Disturbing is the knowledge that cures for some diseases exist, but such a small percentage of the population has contracted the disease that no money or resources are devoted to the implementation of a cure, or the development of new cures.  A few cases have been profiled on investigative news programs like 20/20.

          Equally disconcerting is the recognition that the approval process for new drugs by the FDA is notoriously slow, holding back promising treatments and preventative measures.  Although methods to expedite the approval process for some drugs have been made to address the failure, viruses such as HIV rapidly mutate and thus render the new anti-viral drug ineffective.

          The rapid development of new drugs by pharmaceutical companies may also help to clog the process and add confusion to the prioritization of human clinical trails.  New drugs are not researched according to a managing body, which directs the pharmaceutical companies efforts.  The motivations to pursue a cure or preventative medicine against disease are solely at the discretion of the company, its board of directors and their motivations as directed by the stockholders.

          Consider also that the eradication of the smallpox worldwide resulted in the discontinuing of inoculations and vaccine production in 1977.  Until this year, smallpox was no longer considered a serious threat, but the prospects of bio-terrorism has yielded a new potential for release, not to mention the deadly weaponized bacteria and engineered viruses resistant to current medicines.

          Though technology has increased our abilities to address the methods of curing disease, it has contributed to the distribution as well.  Incursions into previously uninhabited areas of the world have released microbes and viruses that have laid dormant for thousands of years.  The methods to expedite packages worldwide and overnight have made the potential for deadly contagions to travel with the same efficiency.  Even the advances in airflow through ventilation and ducting have contributed to air-borne virulent infections with great speed.  No longer does it have to take days or weeks for hundreds or even thousands to become infected in a single outbreak.

Old and new forms of medication are not introduced without their opponents.  It has been the claim of many that while inoculating against one disease, we expose ourselves to the risk of contracting another.  Though not intentional, the methods by which we synthesize and create serums could well contribute to the infection if not creation of more dangerous, mutated viruses.  The emergence of multi-drug resistant strains of viruses and bacterium is cause for grave concern, as we discover the abilities of microbes to adapt and mutate more readily than humans can ward off their infections.

Conclusion

          The advances in virology through sequencing of the virus genetic makeup has lead to important new discoveries in the development of disease preventative medication.  The new hope is that anti-viral products will benefit humans for centuries to come.

          Antiviral drugs are engineered fighter against infection, replication and spread of disease causing agents.  Through synthetically creating harmless versions of the deadly, real viruses, we may trigger immunity to infection without the prospects of infection and do so for any virus that we sequence.

          Since 1981, the complete sequencing of fifteen viruses has been completed with many more in process.  Work is already underway in the development of new anti-viral drugs and subunit vaccinations for the sequenced viruses.  Technologically, we can quickly sequence any virus at extraordinary speed, and ultimately produce custom medications in the prevention and treatment of the resulting viral disease.

          Computers are used in the prediction of virus mutations allowing for speculative inoculations to be created against expected virus strands and treatment through drugs.  As the program models become more accurate, and the underlying knowledge of disease causing agents, as well as our immune system increases so do the prospects for eradicating more diseases.

          The greatest hurdles to overcome may not be technological advances we must make, but the process required in assuring quality control procedures.  Regulatory bodies such as the FDA must develop adequate protocols that expedite trials and approvals of new medication, but do not increase the risk to public health and safety.

          The basis of new medication is still in its infancy of understanding. Over 100 years transpired from the creation of the first vaccine to the first major accomplishments in safety and production came about.  Fifty years went by until we could create synthetically pure and safe vaccinations by way of subunit vaccines.  Today we stand the risk of viewing the modern drugs against viral infections as a magic bullet, yet this is not the first time in history we have so believed.  Optimistically, though, this time, we may well be on the right path. Camberidge Illustrated history, Medicine
Roy Porter
Cambridge University Press, 1996
ISBN: 0-521-44211-7

Scientific America, Nov 2001
Beyound Chicken Soup, P56-63
William A. Haseltine

2001-2100 Medication in the prevention of disease

2005-10-01T20:17:00.000-07:00

2001-2100 Medication in the prevention of disease

Computer modeling of your environment, your DNA and habits will allow for the custom creation of drugs for you. Researchers already know that customization of medication is needed, as interaction between drugs and your chemistry for properly prescribed medication has resulted in 2 million people being hospitalized in one year alone, and the deaths of one-hundred thousand, making properly prescribed drugs the fourth to sixth leading cause of death.

The future of medication is customized pharmacology, and the driving elements are computer modeling and molecular sciences probing the essence of the structure of life itself. Imaging attending a kiosk in a local mall, having a touch screen asks you a few questions, and giving a small blood or tissue sample, or potentially non-invasive sampling. The computer inside analysis your current condition, diagnosis your ailment, and issues a custom prescription to your pharmacy of choice.

Once your drug is created, and ingested, the biologically tuned drug goes to work on your symptoms, attacking the invading organism or infected cell, and custom boosting your immune system by providing the balanced requirements your body is in need of, such as deficient vitamins and minerals.

Near term the “bio-analysis” computers may reside in your doctors’ office, the samples taken through traditional means, and the analysis performed in a few minutes. Incorporating the necessary reagents for DNA sequencing and access to a database of knowledge, along with your medical history numerous tests could be performed thoroughly analyzing every possible condition. The customization of medication, at first suggesting the prescribing from one to many drugs to address your ailment, and suggesting the physicians coarse of action would be available in minutes.

Long term, the “bio-analysis” computer could be an appliance in your home, perhaps integrated into your weight-scale, connected securely to your doctors’ office through the Internet, and provide you with a real-time health analysis. Simple shower, weigh yourself and your doctor reviews the analysis of your profile, approving medication and intervening in the process if required.

This possibility is not far fetched, since technology has rapidly evolved to these levels of sophistication, and research projects are underway by the National Institutes of Health in the creation of custom medication. With the advent of monoclonal antibodies, antibodies which are tuned to attach to specific virus protein casings, viral inhibitors which render the virus irreplaceable and cell-to-cell inhibitors preventing the spread of diseased between cells, we are only a synthetic polymerizer away from the custom created prescription machine.