SEC Watched Porn As Economy Crashed

I try to stay clear of politics on this blog, but every once in a while something happens that I just can't let slip by. This is one of those times.

The AP is reporting that the SEC's inspector general is conducting probes into 31 of its employee's charged with downloading and viewing porn on government time, using government equipment, while the economy crashed.

Here are a few highlights from the report:

● A senior attorney at the SEC's Washington headquarters spent up to eight hours a day looking at and downloading pornography. When he ran out of hard drive space, he burned the files to CDs or DVDs, which he kept in boxes around his office. He agreed to resign, an earlier watchdog report said.

● An accountant was blocked more than 16,000 times in a month from visiting websites classified as "Sex" or "Pornography." Yet he still managed to amass a collection of "very graphic" material on his hard drive by using Google images to bypass the SEC's internal filter, according to an earlier report from the inspector general.

● Seventeen of the employees were "at a senior level," earning salaries of up to $222,418.

For more details, see the original story here.

 

Aqua Satellite Project, Update 8 Released. Now With More She-Hulk!

Update 8 for the Aqua Satellite Project is ready. You can download it here. This update is part 2 of a 2 part release that adds some spit and polish to the graphics, charting, and platform-independant font engines. Highlights for this release include:

● Added event handling to all shapes classes. These classes can now respond to mouse, keyboard, touch, and command events.
● Added anti-aliasing capabilities to shapes and FontManager. Anti-aliasing is turned on by default. It can be turned off by setting a flag in the various graphics and text calls.
● Added font scaling capabilities to the FontManager. The built-in fonts can now be used at any desired font size.
● Added histogram, bi-linear interpolation, equalize, threshold, grayscale, edge detection, translation, rotation, scaling, and erosion filters for use with bitmaps. These filters are located in the new Filters.h and Filters.cpp files in the Graphics folder.
● Made significant enhancements to the DrawingContext2D and Color classes.
● Fixed several bugs in the Chart class.

The code has been placed in the public domain.

Samples

Edge Detection

Equalize

Grayscale

Threshold

Rotate

Translate

Scale

Scaled, Anti-Aliased, Platform-Independant Text

Erosion

Bi-Linear Interpolation

Original Text Image (For Comparison)

Anti-Aliasing

Area Chart

Bar Chart

Line Chart

Pie Chart

Point Chart

NASA Responds To FOIA Request

NASA has responded to my FOIA request.

In a nutshell, they provided me with a link to the AMSU-A Radiative Transfer Algorithm documentation and said they had no information on the scan depths for the footprints of channel 5 on the AMSU and didn't have the vector data they use to synthesis AMSU channel 4.

Both of the claims of "no information" seem impossible to me, as they're needed to process AMSU data the way NASA JPL does.

While I mull over my next move, here's their response.

Your Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for release of information from the files of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) received in FOIA processing at the NASA Management Office-Jet Propulsion Laboratory on April 8, 2010. You requested the following:

"...(1) Documentation on how the AQUA AMSU-A Radiative Transfer Algorithm works. (2) Atmospheric scan depth for each footprint on channel 5 of the AQUA AMSU. (3) In references to the creation of synthetic readings for the AQUA AMSU channel 4, the 230000 cases used to create the values for the vectors Ai and Theta Bar i, or the values of vectors Ai and Theta Bar i themselves if the 230000 readings are no longer available. These values and readings are referenced but not actually provided in the document AIRS/AMSU/HSB Version 5 Modification of Algorithm to Account for Increased NeDT in AMSU Channel 4 available online at http://disc.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/AIRS/documentation/v5_docs/AIRS_V5_Release_User_Docs/V5-Modification-for-AMSU-Ch-4-NeDT.pdf..."

This is to advise you that responsive records to part (1) of your request may be found at the following web site:

http://eospso.gsfc.nasa.gov/eos_homepage/for_scientists/atbd/docs/AIRS/atbd-airs-L2.pdf

This is to advise that NASA has no responsive Government records at JPL for parts (2) and (3) of your request. Additionally, pertaining to part (3) of your request, we have no responsive records because the specific research and development was performed by the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC). Therefore, it is possible that GSFC may have responsive records.

You have appeal rights concerning these actions.

And I do want to thank them for not charging me for this request. :)

Previous Posts In This Series
Quick FOIA Update
The Government Way
FOIA Request Filed With NASA

Aqua Satellite Project, Update 7 Released

Update 7 for the Aqua Satellite Project is ready. You can download it here. This update is part 1 of a 2 part release that adds some spit and polish to the graphics, charting, and platform-independant font engines.

This release adds all the functionality that wasn't yet written for the Chart class and removes the need for external files from the font engine (although you can still use such files to add your own fonts, they are no longer required for the fonts shipped with the font engine). It adds a FontManger that manages the built-in fonts, using less memory, less disk space, and runs faster than the old method. As before, the built-in fonts are Arial, Courier, Helvetica, Times New Roman, TrebuchetMS, and Verdana in sizes of 10, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48, and 72. A bug in the Courier font bitmaps was also fixed.

The LiveGraph application no longer has a -font parameter as it can now use the FontManager to produce the fonts it needs.

All code has been placed in the public domain.

Draw2D V1.1 JavaScript Graphics Engine Update Released

Version 1.1 of the Draw2D JavaScript Graphics Engine has been released. This is a minor update that adds speed improvements to all the curve drawing classes (Quadradic Curves, Cubic Curves, Round Rectangles, Ovals And Arcs) and fixes a bug in the rendering of Cubic Curves.

You can get the source code, several example HTML pages, and a Programmer's Manual here.

The code has been placed in the public domain.

Previous Posts In This Series
Draw2D JavaScript Graphics Engine Released

Quick FOIA Update

Just dropping a note to update the status of my FOIA. In the previous post I noted that NASA JPL wanted me to state up front how much I was willing to pay for the information.

Having no idea what these fees are for, I figured the next step is to ask why they charge these fees. That way I can give some sort of reasonable answer on what I'd pay. Here's my resonse:

Dear Mr. Mahon,

As I mentioned in my previous e-mail, this is my first FOIA request, So, if I may, I'd like to ask the purpose of the fees. Are they to cover mailing costs? Will I be actually paying the salary of the person looking up the information? Are they arbitrary fees designed to prevent "fishing expeditions? The reason I ask is so that I can provide you with an answer that is sensible for the purpose of the fees. If possible, providing an "average fee" for obtaining one document would be useful.

Previous Posts In This Series
The Government Way
FOIA Request Filed With NASA

The Government Way

I got a response back from NASA JPL regarding my FOIA request. They want to know up front just how much I'm willing to pay for the information. Gotta love how our government operates. :)

Here's the text (emphasis mine):

Greetings:

Please respond with your complete postal mailing address, phone and fax numbers. Also, you must state your willingness to pay fees that may be assessed in processing your request. Please reply stating your willingness to pay fees and the amount you are willing to pay so we may proceed with your request. Thank you.

So now I'll have to mull over just how much I'm willing to pay for information my taxes already paid for.