Kelly Ayotte looking and sounding good on TV

Our new senator, Kelly Ayotte has only been in Washington for two years.  But she won some important committee assignments, and has established a useful relationship with the TV news.  She has been on the air repeatedly, commenting upon various matters.  On air she speaks well and knowledgeably.  And she leads the discussion, unlike the usual pol who just responds to the TV  people's questions.
  Good work.
   And Kelly shows up a lot better than Jean Shaheen, our other senator.

Eurovising the Euro Banks

Both the Wall St Journal and the Economist are calling for this.  Right now a Euro bank is chartered . regulated, and insured by a national government.  Some governments do a good job (Germany) and others don't (Greece).  The idea is to create a European Bank Regulator with power to regulate all Euro banks.  This would make banks in shaky countries look stronger and reduce incentives to pull deposits out of shaky countries and put them in Germany.
   Probably not a bad idea, especially if you believe in creating a United States of Europe, which a lot of Euros do.
   Such a Euro Bank Regulator would have a lot of power.  It could set bank capital requirements, set pay of bank officers, set what businesses banks could invest/gamble in.  It would audit bank books and manage a Euro Deposit Insurance Corp.
    Was I a Euro citizen I'd like to know who will run such a thing.  Would this Euro Regulator be answerable to Euro voters?  Or would it be a Brussels bureaucrat appointment deal, with lucky bureaucrats serving for life?
    Of course the Euro's are often oblivious of such issues.  I was in Europe on business back when they were putting the Euro together.  None of the Europeans I chatted with at the time had the slightest  idea of the power of what they were creating, or any interest in who would control it.  None of the Euros understood that the second most important official in America, right behind the president, is the chairman of the Federal Reserve. 
    I guess I'd be a little more enthusiastic about the idea if I thought there was anyone in Europe smart enough to do a good job running it.

How long will 100 billion Euros last?

Somebody has volunteered to give/loan/print 100 billion Euros for Spanish banks.  Spain's basic problem is the Spanish government is spending a lot more than it takes in via taxes.  They have been borrowing the shortfall.  Except that nobody will lend the Spanish government any more money, 'cause no body believes they can ever pay it back. 
   This 100 billion goes to Spanish banks, but there is little difference between bank and government.  When the government borrows money, it borrows it from banks.  Spanish banks find it difficult to refuse loans to the Spanish government.  Any right thinking bank surely worries about encounters of the unpleasant kind with bank examiners, taxmen, and stock market regulators if they don't do the patriotic thing and loan their government money.
    So Spain has another 100 billion to keep things running.  How long before it runs out?  A year?  Two years?  Anyone see any signs of Spanish economic reforms that might reduce their deficit?

AdvertiseFail #3

TV ads for a Jetski. They show the happy jet skiers zipping around in blue water.  Then we get to the meat of the ad, brakes.  On a boat?  They show their Jet ski slowing to stop in much less water than competitor jet ski.  Cool.  But why do I care? 
   You slow a boat by putting the prop into reverse and using engine power.  To get into reverse you have to throttle back to idle.  Shifting at full power makes that ugly grinding noise.  Throttling back is likely to make the engine stall, leaving you with NO reverse thrust at all.  I learned many summers ago, never to depend upon reverse thrust being there when you need it.  Approach dock slowly, to avoid ugly bumping sound should reverse not be there. 
   Anyhow, I ain't buying a Jet ski just a cause it excels in reverse thrust.

Adventures in E-books

Favorite Daughter has been raving about the Kindle she received for Christmas.  So, I though I'd see what was out there that could be read on my humble hardware, namely Antique Laptop running Windows XP.   Actually quite a bit.  Ultra tech savvy son was able to find the latest George R.R. Martin "Game of Thrones" novel.  Then I found Walter Scott's Ivanhoe.  Yesterday I Googled for an old E.E. Smith space opera.  It was there, long out of copyright and thus free and legal, complete with cover art and illustrations from the 1920's pulp magazine in which it had first been serialized. 
   Only one small hitch, the file had extension was .EPUB and none of the software on Antique Laptop knew what to do with that.  Googling for .EPUB came up with a history of the breed, and a most helpful post comparing  about 10 different EPUB readers.  Of the reviewer's top picks, one from Adobe required the Adobe flash player to work, the other was a straight Windows program.   I'm not a Flash fan, that program gets patched on a weekly basis, and usually patches break programs.  So I downloaded the Sony Reader, all 40 Mb of it. 
   And it works.  Clicking on the ebook file launches the reader.  Comes up with a nice readable font, and a one button page turner. 
   I suppose I need to go all the way,  download a for pay Kindle E-book and a Kindle reader program.  That's still on my to-do list. 
   Actually,  I prefer reading a paperback to reading on Antique Laptop.  Paperback works in bed, outdoors in bright sunlight.  Antique laptop runs hot, and feel hot and heavy in the lap, where as a paperback is next to weightless. 

President should not check off targets on kill list

Van Jones was on ABC's Sunday talk show with George Stephanopolis making this point.  Jones clearly felt that fingering Al Quada leaders for a drone strike was unconstitutional and we ought to be giving them benefit of due process of law. 
    Since when has due process of law been necessary before the military can shoot at the enemy?   I agree the president of the US shouldn't be doing the targeting.  That's Lt. Colonel work.  Far below the presidential pay grade.
    But it is perfectly moral and legal to kill the enemy leaders.  Much more so than slaughtering enemy grunts who are just following orders.  The leadership that gives the orders is a legitimate target. 

Windows Services Fax Services to Protected Storage

BTW.  Sorry about the format.  This data was originally a spreadsheet.  Converting it to something acceptable to blogger was only partly successful.

Fax Service	The name says it all. Fax sending works in Man	Man.
File Replication	Keeps Files updated between multiple file servers	Nohave
File Server For Macintosh	The name says it all.	Nohave
FTP Publishing Service	Sends files to clients	Nohave
Gateway for Netware	Support for obsolete networking protocol	Nohave
Human Interface Dev. Access	USB keyboards/Mice/Etc	Nohave
Help And Support	Used for Help&Support center.  Not system critical and can be disabled.	Nohave
IIS Admin Service	Modify workings of Internet Info Service (IIS)	Nohave
IMAPI CD-burning COM Service	Drag&Drop CD burn	Nohave
Indexing Service	Supports fast file finding at expense of slow boot. Worthless Resource Hog. Use Add/Remove Programs to kill Indexing everywhere.	disabled
Internet Authentication Service	Pass word checker for remote clients	Nohave
Internet Connection Sharing	Small home network sharing of a single internet connection (dialup. DSL, cable modem)	Nohave
Intersite Messaging	Sends mail from server to server	Nohave
Ipsec Services	Special Internet Security not widely used. Not system critical and can be safely disabled.	Nohave
IPSec Policy Agent	Internet Security>	Man.
Kerboros Key Dist. Center	Enables user logon via kerborous	Nohave
License Logging Service	Logs Client access as Licensed or Pirate	Nohave
Logical Disc Manager	Reports new drive installation. Needed for USB storage devices. Otherwise can be disabled.	auto
Logical disc Manager Admin Services	?	Man.
Message queueing	? Needed for Com+ WMI, MSMG
Messenger Service	Spam gateway	disable
Net Logon	Processes net logons	disable
Net Meeting Remote Desktop  Share	Supports MS net meeting. Bad security hole	disable
Network Connections	Supports dialup and tcpip connections	auto
Network DDE	Dynamic Data Exchange	disable
Network DDE DSDM	Supports Network DDE	disable
Network Location Awareness	Provides services the computers that share your internet connection (ICS)  If not using ICS on a home network it may be disabled.	Nohave
Network Nets Transfer Protocol NNTP	Be a usenet news server	disable
NTLM Security Support Provider	Enables user logon via NTLM	disable
Online Presentation Broadcast	Real Time PowerPoint over the networkl	Nohave
Performance logs and alerts	Collects performace data from other computers	disable
Plug & Play	Loads hardware drivers. System critical. Do not disable.	auto
Universal plug7Play Host	Device host detect and Upnp support
Print Server for Macintosh	The name says it all.	Nohave
Print Spooler	background printing	auto
Process Control Service	?
Protected Storage	Secure storage for cryto keys? System critical do not diable.	auto