The recent discovery that data thieves infiltrated Hannaford Bros' network and stole more than 4 million credit card numbers (see Data thieves steal credit card data from supermarket chain). According to articles related to this incident, Hannaford had some controls in place, like not associating names with account numbers. This incident is proof that basic controls are not enough.

Black hat hackers will continue to do the bidding of organized crime, regardless of the security in place. The future of personal information is bleak. At odds are the convenience of modern life and the ability of criminals to take advantage of it.

Think of all of the online services available. Many of the companies practice good security. Assuming that all involved parties are dedicated to security, as we know is not even realistic, the security is not future proof. Eventually, the best security practices will be deprecated. With the millions of servers, billions of transactions, and the march of time, your chances of being a victim of identity theft increase every day.

There are no answers. I have resisted many online services until I realized that I have no real control over my information anyway. Between the government and businesses being cavalier with my information. Unless I move into a cabin in Montana and live the rest of my life in seclusion, I'm no more able to protect my personal information than I can anyone else's. In ten years, will somebody be posting email, documents, or other files they found on a server they bought at an auction? If a company like Yahoo goes out of business, what happens to all of that information, including passwords and associated usernames?

Scary.

Earlier this week, a most excellent opinion piece was published by the Christian Science Monitor on the constitutionality of nationalized health-care: Must You Buy Health Insurance.

In making the case for her plan to mandate private health insurance, Clinton said in a recent Democratic debate that not doing so "would be as though Franklin Roosevelt said, 'Let's make Social Security voluntary,' or if President [Lyndon] Johnson said, 'Let's make Medicare voluntary.'"

In fact, under the law, there's a big difference between participation in a government health program funded by taxes and privatizing such a program, with individuals forced to purchase private health insurance.

Taxation involves representation, as when Congress appropriates money and controls a government program for the general welfare. This describes Social Security and Medicare. But government cannot simply delegate its taxing powers to private business.

What representation do we have in the insurance firms whose products we would be required to buy, at prices and terms they set? Can we vote out an insurer's board of directors for denying claims or paying its CEO a multimillion-dollar salary? Here, too, the Supreme Court has drawn a distinction between taxes imposed by government and mandatory fees set by entities with private interests.

A health insurance mandate is essentially a forced contract, in which one party (the insurer) gets to set the terms. You must buy their policies, even if you prefer to self-insure, rely on alternative medicine, or obtain treatment outside the system. In constitutional terms, such mandates may constitute a violation of due process or a "taking of property."

One of the most disturbing court rulings I've seen was handed down today in Oklahoma: Court Drops Case of 'Peeping Tom' in Target; Says Victim Was Not in Private Place.

The state Court of Criminal Appeals voted 4-1 in favor of Riccardo Gino Ferrante, who was arrested in 2006 for situating a camera underneath the girl's skirt at a Target store and taking photographs.

Ferrante, now 34, was charged under a "Peeping Tom" statute that requires the victim to be "in a place where there is a right to a reasonable expectation of privacy." Testimony indicated he followed the girl, knelt down behind her and placed the camera under her skirt.

In January 2007, Tulsa County District Judge Tom Gillert ordered Ferrante's felony charge dismissed. That was based upon a determination that "the person photographed was not in a place where she had a reasonable expectation of privacy," according to the appellate ruling issued last week.

The District Attorney's Office had appealed Gillert's ruling to the Court of Criminal Appeals.

"We agree with the district court's analysis," stated the opinion written by Appeals Judge Charles Johnson, with Judges Charles Chapel, David Lewis and Arlene Johnson concurring.

In a dissent, Appeals Judge Gary Lumpkin wrote that "what this decision does is state to women who desire to wear dresses that there is no expectation of privacy as to what they have covered with their dress."

"In other words, it is open season for peeping Toms in public places who want to look under a woman's dress," Lumpkin wrote.

He said he found the majority's finding of no reasonable expectation of privacy "interesting and disturbing."

Not only did the court say women who wear dresses are okay targets for perverts, they also said 16-year-old girls, minors, are fair game too. While the law may not have caught up with technology, as stated in the article, the spirit of existing law was shredded.

Pay attention in public places for men carrying shopping bags getting too close, especially if you are wearing a dress. Also look out in dressing rooms and bathrooms. The courts continually refuse to come down hard on these predators, using a lack of existing laws as an excuse so it's up to individuals to protect themselves. I wonder if you beat the crap out of a peeping tom with his own camera if you could get off since the laws don't specify anything about his camera. Just a thought.

After a lot of soul-searching and trying to figure out what to do with certain stories, I decided that I would create a new blog specifically for Human Trafficking. Human Trafficking Watch is focused on human trafficking without all of the fat of this scatter-shot blog. The idea is that I want to do my part to raise awareness of human trafficking. In addition, I think there is a lot of liberal politics as well as liberal activists hurting any meaningful understanding of human trafficking (think Cynthia McKinny). It's unfortunate because this is a huge, worldwide problem. One of the largest populations excusing this behavior is made up of mostly Muslims. However, I have seen so many people trying very hard to justify Islamic misogyny, honor killings, child abuse, and general oppression that Islam has become that proverbial elephant in the room. Human value is based on culture, which drives the process of having modern laws and strong law enforcement. So I don't want to whitewash many of the contributing factors that assist human trafficking in remaining a problem.

There are many sites regarding human trafficking already, but I will have opinion and I have also started seeking out co-writers for that blog.

Please bookmark the site and visit there often for discussion related to human trafficking: www.humantraffickingwatch.com

P.S.

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So I took more time off. It's one of those things I can't control. Actually two of those things. Okay, there are three. Three things I can't control. Seeing how my number one priority is to my day job and my family, I had to make some sacrifices. But as it all got too much for me and I wanted attention, I threw myself down a flight of stairs quite accidentally and broke my knee cap. Fortunately, I don't need surgery and I'm in physical therapy (read: sadism) with a guy who only knows how to increase weights on weak joints arbitrarily and then laughs at each attempt to perform his exercises.

The one thing that is overwhelming to me is the saturation of cynicism I feel as the final three blowhards duke it out for the Presidential Race. None are quality people and I had no idea what I was expecting, really. Maybe I want somebody to show a little character or backbone. How about somebody who would say, "Yes, my staffer called Hillary a 'monster'. So f-ing what? She is a monster and my staffer doesn't like her. Get over it." I pull a lever over that kind of honesty.

But alas, you can only count on the dishonesty and spin. Also there are the daily verbal snipes at each other. McCain can try to avoid it, but he can't stay at the kids table much longer. He will be eventually pulled into doing what he has to do to survive, like a high school wannabe trying to fit in with the mean girls.

The point is that the talent in the United States, all the captains of industry, all of people who know how to get shit done, and all of the visionaries who can see us in a better place have seemed to disappear in a weird Atlas Shrugged sort of way. The only people left in politics are two-dimensional sleazebags who would rather grin on TV than do real work, requiring planning and thinking. The adults left politics a long time ago and left the bullies and losers.

I didn't vote in the primaries and I think I will end up voting recklessly in the general election since it's important and there are times I like to spit into the wind just to see if really will hit me on the way back.

Both Republicans and Democrats should be mourning their parties right now. The Republicans have effectively demonstrated their complete inability to do anything meaningful after 8 years of control. No tax reform. No tort reform. No serious national security reform. The Democrats have done nothing but bitch and complain for 8 years and have proven themselves to be nothing better than indulged children fighting over plastic trucks while the rest of the playground is on fire. I find it particularly amusing that Hillary and Obama are competing to see who can tell the biggest whopper.

Obama seems to be really growing into his arrogance and it is beginning to fit like a tailored suite. He is what Bill Clinton was in 1992, but without all of trailer trash stuck in his pants.

Why so cynical? Because our country has devolved into a place where words have a shelf life of a few hours after the spin and over-management of each soundbite. The Presidential candidates are nothing more than micromanaged props and they lead the news every day.