Musings of a Technonerd

There's news in today's local daily blab about Republican Congressman Gil Gutknecht trying to edit the Wikipedia entry about himself. That's not something unique. Many politicos from both sides of the aisle have been caught doing this. What I find amusing is that he was trying to eliminate earlier references he made at the beginning of his career that he'd self impose a limit of six two year terms. He's running for a seventh term this year.

Back when the Republicans gained control of the house, they issued the much ballyhooed "Republican Contract With America." It contained ten items they proposed legislation on. If you look at item ten, you'll see "THE CITIZEN LEGISLATURE ACT: A first-ever vote on term limits to replace career politicians with citizen legislators." The proposal was to limit Senators to two term, and house members to three terms. Now, of course, since the Republicans have been in control of both houses of congress for some time, the mere mention of term limits to a Republican will get you that "deer-in-the-headlights" look, and a swift change of subject.

The office of Gutknecht responded: “A spokesman for Gutknecht did not dispute that his office tried to change his Wikipedia entry. But he called into question the reliability of the service, which was created in 2001 and claims to be the largest reference website on the Internet.”

Or: "Yeah, we got caught trying to drive your car, but you shouldn't have left the keys in the ignition."



"The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' (I found it!) but 'That's funny ..."
Isaac Asimov