California Zephyr

I'm likely to be going back east on a trip this summer, and one of the ways I'm thinking about getting there is by train, in particular, the California Zephyr. Any of you have any experience with this trip? Any hints or tips? Let me know, please.

My #1 reason not to take the train is that sleeper cars (which I've been told is the only way to go) cost the same for one person as two, which means that it's twice as expensive for me to go by myself as it ought to be. Anyone up for a train trip this July to split the fare with me?

Spam Assassin Help

We need some help with Spam Assassin. Our mail vendor (Pair.com) uses it, and we've been happy with the way that it detects junk mail. Pair's implementation prepends a **JUNK** flag to the subject of junk messages. But the junk still comes through. Of course, we have our mail readers set to immediately give the heave-ho to the marked messages. But it would be nice to have the junk messages killed on the server, and never make it to our inboxes. I've heard that it's possible, but I don't know how to do it. We would also appreciate knowing how to set Spam Assassin to automatically drop any mail from Brazil in the bit bucket (Dori is endlessly tormented by people sending huge files to dori.com who meant to send them to dori.com.br). I've tried to read the Spam Assassin docs, but they're written for people who already understand how to do these sorts of things. Help, UNIX weenies, help!

Thanks, Howard

So whaddya know? Howard Dean was right when he said that the Bush federal tax cuts just led to state and local taxes and fees going up to compensate. Bush, in effect, stuffed $300 into your front pocket and lifted $600 out of your back pocket. And people weren't fooled, either. In this AP poll, by a 2-1 margin, people think that their taxes have gone UP, not down, the majority support a balanced budget over tax cuts, and 53% support repealing the Bush tax cuts for people who earn more than $200,000 per year.

Tracking Nader voters

Before and after the 2000 election, we pointed out frequently that Nader voters would, in the absence of Nader on the ballot, have overwhelmingly voted for Gore. We got what we consider a ridiculous amount of pushback on that topic, even though we consider it to be obvious on its face. To prevent this kind of pushback again, I'm going to start keeping track here of the polls that clearly show this to be the case. As my first example, from New Jersey:

Bush 48%
Kerry 44%
Nader 5%
Undecided 3%

Kerry 48%
Bush 47%
Undecided 4%

The first set of numbers are with Nader, the second are without. I think that it's pretty clear which way things break with/without Nader in the picture.

Small-town politics

We talk a lot here about national politics, so it's time to take a look at small town life for a change.

• Hospital tax passes: $150 a year parcel tax will help balance the books at Healdsburg District Hospital. Small news to almost all our readers, but it's huge news to us. We're pretty thrilled that we live in an area that's willing to raise their taxes (by a super-majority, even) to get a better standard of living.
• Congratulations to John Levine, co-author of (among other books) Internet for Dummies, on being elected mayor of Trumansburg, NY. See? Us geek writers can do useful things.

Trust me, though I'm nuts

William Saletan, in Slate, parses Bush's language in his press conference and reveals how the president is out of touch with reality. Literally.

New eMacs worth a look

Apple released new eMacs today, which throws their whole eMac/iMac alignment out of whack. Here's a comparison of the bottom-of-the-line machines in each category:

	eMac	iMac
Processor speed	1.25 GHz G4	1.0 GHz G4
Monitor	17-inch (16-inch viewable) flat CRT	15-inch (viewable) TFT active-matrix LCD
Optical drive	Combo (DVD-ROM/CD-RW)	Combo (DVD-ROM/CD-RW)
Price	$799	$1299

Given that, I have to predict new iMacs will come out shortly. But if you're in the market to buy right now, the $999 eMac (with SuperDrive) is a great deal.

Builder.com outsourcing content production to India

From NewsForge.com comes the word that Builder.com outsourcing content production to India.

It's not just programmers anymore; now it's the people who write for them too. NewsForge.com has learned that Builder.com, CNET Networks' site aimed at application developers, plans to begin offshoring authoring of many of its articles to India shortly.

We are so screwed.

Books for soldiers

Between this, that, and the other thing, I've been working on a care package for a local soldier currently in Iraq. I was surfing around trying to figure out what to put in the box, and came across this post in a forum: Office, comp, cert, web, networking books from publisher. Pearson Eduction (parent company of Peachpit, Sams, Que, New Riders, and a number of other computer book imprints) are giving away any of their books that any deployed soldier wants—all they have to do is ask. I say that's pretty darn cool, although it does mean that I won't be doing good and simultaneously clearing out my garage.

If you know of any good ideas of stuff to put in a care package (see this list as one example), please let me know in the comments. And yes, the fact that my local library has 3 large bookshelves of used paperbacks selling for 50 cents each is going to end up being a large part of the weight.