#254 ef bee eye

It occurred to me yesterday, while I was writing about government and the internet, how little I know about what they are capable of. Somewhere along the line, government isn’t going to be run by the inept baby-boomers that came to technology late in life. At some time, the hacker generation is going to be in a position turn their power to evil. You see, personally, I think it’s a little odd how long it takes me to even get on the internet these days. Kind of like in the sixties when J. Edgar Hoover was at the height of his paranoid crimes. Back then it took a little longer to connect the phone to the person you were calling when illegal wiretappers were online. Hmmm...
So I’m in the actual library the other day. I’m looking up a book. I look all over for the Dui Decimal card file and it’s just not there. There’re computer monitors everywhere but the only free ones are next to squalling kids or nodding homeless folks, come in to warm their hands against the CPU. I finally dart in at an open one and intuitively grasp what I need to know to look things up. Now here’s the thing. Back in the old days of Dui Decimal categorizing, if you didn’t find the card on the book you needed you could at least find two or three other cards on roughly the same subject next to them. Not so now. The book I wanted, called “The FBI Nobody Knows” by Fred Cook, had been in the library at one time but now was mysteriously “withdrawn.” When Fred Cook wrote this book in the sixties, he created quite a stir, much resentment and retaliation from J. Edgar Hoover, and generally blew the top off the illegal excesses of the “security”-checking FBI who had been harassing and vilifying ordinary citizens like you and me whenever J. personal-vendetta Edgar Hoover wanted. He cowed congressmen and senators and presidents. Fred Cook took him on. So, interested as I am in the abuse of power, I thought I’d give old Fred a read. History repeats itself to those who refuse to read it .
Nothing doing, Dui Decimal not present. So I couldn’t find the FBI section in the card file. I went over to the actual shelves. I refuse to believe computers, maybe there was a copy hiding on the shelves somewhere or I figured I could at least find the section. In the process, I discovered the section on presidents. And that was very interesting. There were like 4 books on Washington, 3 on Lincoln. 1 big one on James K. Polk, 2 Clintons and about 25 books on GW Bush Jr. Pro and Con. Amazing. Most of them had come out right before the last election. So the last election wasn’t all about talking heads. Someone took the time to write all that crap down. 25 Bush books. Jay leno would ask if he’d ever read that many? Anyhow I never did find the FBI. Maybe if just knew how to trace a back link on my blog...
America, ya gotta love it.