The MD5 hash is used for “digitally signing” data.  It is very popular and it performs an exceedingly important function in computer security.  There are alternatives to it so long term it isn't a big issue assuming the current or related flaw isn't found in them too.  But short term it's still a big deal.

http://www.arnnet.com.au/index.php/id;1503863220;fp;16;fpid;0

Researchers have discovered a flaw in the MD5 algorithm that is used to provide a unique signature for data.

Xiaoyun Wang, a Chinese expert, and three colleagues have discovered the flaw in the hash function algorithm, which is used in applications, such as EMC's Centera content-addressable file store. The flaw was revealed at the Crypto 2004 conference.

A duplicated hash value is called a collision. Such a hash function is not un-crackable. It relies for its effectiveness on the great amount of time required to break it. Until the Chinese team's work, several million hours of compute time would have been needed. They showed that it could be done within a few hours on a standard PC.

Rob Schrimshaw from Indiana Partnership to Prevent Firearm Violence (which as near as I can tell doesn't have a website) is clueless about firearms.  He claims

"I think the effectiveness was questionable when the ban was originated in 1994. It was intended to ban all different types of assault weapons. The manufacturers kind of circumvented those regulations with design modifications so these weapons that are still on the market today still have the ability to fire rapidly, still highly accurate, still can shoot over a tremendous distance and actually can carry a higher, more powerful caliber of bullet as well," said Rob Schrimshaw, Indiana Partnership to Prevent Firearm Violence.

What “assault weapon” is he talking about?  If you know much of anything about firearms the answer will floor you.  This is the lead up to that paragraph:

The groups are holding a news conference Tuesday. They will focus on high-powered rifles like the SKS assault rifle used by Kenneth Anderson in last Wednesday's deadly gun battle.

The SKS???  First off the SKS is not an assault rifle (fully automatic).  But that was the reporter saying that.  I tend to give them some slack on that somewhat fine point.  Every statement Mr. Schrimshaw made about this rifle is false.  If he is to be taken seriously by anyone he should know something about what he is talking about.  He doesn't appear to know anything.

1. It was not modified to avoid the “assault weapon ban”.  It was never covered by the Clinton Gun Ban.  It was not specifically mentioned and it does not have the “ugly features” required by the ban to qualify. 
2. It cannot be fired any more rapidly than any other semi-automatic firearm.  In fact, it has such a long, hard trigger pull that it can't be fired as rapidly as most.
3. It is not “highly accurate“.  It is the most inaccurate rifle I know.
4. It cannot shoot over tremendous distance.  It shoots a light weight (123 to 125 grain) .30 caliber bullet at a velocity that is on the low end of normal for a rifle (about 2300 fps).  The light weight bullet, for that caliber, combined with a low velocity means the range is far below normal.  And because it is so inaccurate as the range increases the usefulness of the rifle goes to zero.
5. It does not “carry a higher, more powerful caliber of bullet”.  .30 caliber bullets are very ordinary.  The cartridge used by the SKS, 7.62x39, is considered medium-powered at best.

But what do you expect?  The truth?  If they were to tell the truth then no one be interested in their agenda.  Only by telling falsehoods (I hesitate to say lie because he may simply be grossly ignorant) can they gain any traction.

Talking about banning guns the news, not just commentary, describes anti-freedom lawmakers as “moderate”.  I'm reading Weapons of Mass Distortation by L. Brent Bozell II and reading the news now takes on a new light.  What he describes enabled me to see this stuff.  It just jumps off the page at me:

If there's one issue on which Republicans usually agree, it's their strong defense of the Second Amendment. But less than two weeks before the GOP convention, moderates and conservatives find themselves at odds over the soon-to-expire semi-automatic gun ban.

The news doesn't talk about the Democrats being “divided“ or the Democrats opposed to gun control as being moderate or the gun banners as being extremists.

As I have been saying for years in general people want to be near "the center" in their beliefs.  If the perception is that banning guns is "moderate" then more people will adapt that position.  The news, not just the commentary, is incredibly biased to give an anti-freedom slant on nearly every issue.

The California Legislature banned toy guns (probably requires that you register) in public.  Okay, they sort of have a rational basis for it.  I'm all for letting Darwin take care of the problem but in a Nanny state you can't expect that.  But what really got to me was that some of the legislators reaction to the toys brought into chambers.  They were told they were toy guns before they were brought into the chambers but they still were so afraid they moved away.

Before Spitzer began speaking in favor of the measure on the Assembly floor, lawmakers were told he had permission from Democratic and Republican leaders to bring replicas to the chamber. Still, the sight of realistic-looking firearms — an M60 assault weapon and a 9mm handgun replica supplied by the Department of Justice — upset some lawmakers, a few of whom moved away from Spitzer and formally objected.

Is there a way to get these people some psychiatric help?  People this sick should be removed from public office.

Amusing. I particularly like the part about the aunt sexually abusing the guy with a tree branch.

 Officials said Mario Russo, 44, was attacked after he was spotted outside a bedroom window wearing his pants around his ankles and watching a 5-year-old girl who was sleeping outside the Bunker Ridge Apartments.

Russo was reportedly hiding in bushes.

Police said after he was discovered a group of six people, include the girl's mother, aunt and their boyfriends attacked him and brutally beat him for more than an hour.

The police report and mug shots of the attackers are available too.

With his pants at his ankles and his face swollen, Russo was found with "a twig inserted into his rectum and there was false teeth laying in the grass next to the male," according to cops. A witness told investigators that he heard a female attacker yelling, "put it in his ass, he wants it in his ass."

Yes. It was illegal for them to take the law into their own hands. Yes, they should be arrested and prosecution should be given serious consideration. But if I was on the jury I would be seeing images in my head of when my daughters were five years old and the punishment I would feel was just would be compensation to the landowner for the missing twig from the tree. Realistically I would probably go for something more harsh than that but it would be an effort to override my feelings.

Yes, the John Ross.  I had sent him an invitation to Boomershoot 2005.  In the body of the message I said 2004 although the subject line said 2005.  He was concerned about his lack of a time travel machine and after I straightend out my error we talked for about 15 minutes.  He's not certain he can make it, a long ways to travel, etc.  But he did sound very interested.  Mostly he asked a bunch of questions about the mix we use and how dangerous it was etc.  He told me stories of his shooting at dynamite (among other things -- about 1/6 of a stick in tennis balls).  Anyway, we'll see if he can make it.  It would be rather cool to have him out and to have him participate. 

I asked about the ETA of his next book. He said “Sometime in 2005.  Not early 2005, but sometime in 2005.”

http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,64599,00.html

Backed by a phalanx of civil liberties groups, civil liberties iconoclast John Gilmore on Monday relaunched his legal campaign against the federal government's requirement that airlines ask passengers for photo identification in order to board a plane.

Gilmore, who began his fight against the identification requirement in the summer of 2002, filed suit Monday in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, asking the court to force the government to reveal the requirement and to declare it an unconstitutional burden on the right to travel.

If you walk down the street to visit your neighbor you can't legally be stopped and asked for ID unless there is some reasonable belief that you are engaged in a crime in some sort.  Same thing as a passenger in a car or bus.  However on an airplane the government thinks it can require you to identify yourself.  John Gilmore is challenging that.  I am pleased.  Identification by itself does nothing to increase our safety other than as a mild deterrent to those that fear being caught after committing a crime.  In order for it to have any hope in terms for detecting intent to commit a crime you must check a database that has background information on the person.  If you have such a database it will be abused.  Politicians will use it for digging up “the dirt” on their opponents, the reglious zealots will want to use it to out gays, the anti-semites will use it to harrass Jews, just to give a few examples.  Information is power and concentrated power is always abused.  Don't tell me that line about “we just need to get good people in government”.  Power attracts the worst people.  “Good people” are either repulsed by power or scared of doing something wrong when given great power and avoid it.  Why do you think communism and socialism have been such huge failures?  It's because they give government way too much power and that power attracts evil people.  An ID system with the required database to make it really “do something useful” is an invitation to abuse.  Don't let it happen here.

Update:  I found John Gilmores web site: http://www.toad.com/gnu/.  I just did a quick scan but I didn't find anything I disagreed with him on.  He is even gun friendly.  I should sent him an invitation to the next boomershoot as a special guest.

BOSTON -- Police say they are seeing a surge in the number of gang-related attacks involving machetes, the huge knives that are a ubiquitous tool in rural Latin America, with blades as thick as an axe and nearly as long as a sword.

The troubling trend has led some departments to crack down on machetes, and not just in urban areas. Some suburban communities have also enacted new laws to ban the knives.

“Ban the knives”???  Someone who has taken even a single semester of high school shop is over educated as machete maker.  You can't successfully ban something that virtually everyone knows how to build and for which there is a ready market.  These idiots apparently are completely out of touch with reality.

The Brady Bunch are whining again.

Why wait until something's legal to order it? One Illinois company is ready to serve America's extreme psychotics right away. Have your credit cards ready.

Washington, D.C. - Tomorrow, there will only be 30 days until the assault weapons ban expires, and our nation will face a new era of criminal and terrorist attacks with assault weapons unless President Bush keeps his campaign promise and gets the law renewed. And some Americans are simply drooling at the notion of deadlier guns.

Whoo hoooo!!!  It's such a pleasure to hear them crying.  Basically they are saying that ArmaLite should be prosecuted for gathering components ready to be built on a moments notice should the ban actually expire.  I wonder where they would draw the line?  Would it be okay to mine the ore for the guns prior to expiration of the 'ban'?

And of course they can't be trusted to tell you the truth about things.  Ignoring all the garbage about “era of criminal and terrorist attacks” the link they provided in their press release and letter to the ATFE leads to a page that says this:

1.  Full pre-payment, non-refundable.  No credit cards or credit terms can be accepted.

So the Brady bunch says “have your credit cards ready” and Armalite says they won't accept credit cards for this.  So they don't even care to check for easily spotted errors.  It appears they are so wound up about losing this battle they care even less about truth and getting caught at it than normal.  I need to go do a happy dance someplace.

I think I'll send the Brady Bunch this photo of me using my 'assault weapon' when the ban expires:

What should I tell them?  Check out what I can do with my “assault weapon”?  Read all about my toys and hobbies in the October issue of Outside Magazine?  Keep sending out those press releases -- I get the warm and fuzzies and end up buying another case of ammo everytime I read one?

The communists both here and abroad support Kerry for president.  Now the Democratic Socialists of America do too:

In reaction to the administration’s record of war at home and war abroad, massive voter education and mobilization efforts by the feminist, trade union, environmental, peace, and civil rights movements are building for the 2004 elections. Their goal is our goal: to kick the Bush regime out of office. Given that only the Democratic presidential candidate can defeat the Bush administration, these movements — and the Democratic Socialists of America Political Action Committee — will work to elect John F. Kerry the next president of the United States.
...
We firmly believe that the defeat of George W. Bush and the Republicans is a necessary but by no means sufficient condition for moving the world towards a democratic and socialist future. Removing Bush from office is the next crucial and tactical step in the long march to remake the world.
...
Adopted July 17, 2004 by the Democratic Socialists of America PAC.

I keep wondering about these people.  Have they never had a history lesson?  Can they possibly not know of the millions and millions of deaths directly attributed to communism and socialism?  If they wanted to live in a communist or socialist society then why didn't they move to China or the USSR?  Anyway... John Kerry has some great people backing him.