Time: Tue Nov 12 00:19:21 1996
To: boydk <boydk@wrq.com>
From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: Re: computers and the Constitution
Cc:
Bcc:
At 09:18 AM 11/11/96 -0800, you wrote:
>I for one agree emphatically that the tools we use are vital to our
>cause. However, a file system discussion is damned esoteric. What's
>important here?
Dear Boyd,
In my opinion, responsiveness
and rapid communication are two
very valuable capabilities.
When the ambulances were headed
to Justus Township in Montana,
I was being fed eyewitness reports,
which motivated me to file a
Petition for Temporary Restraining
Order against the FBI, who were
about to use lethal force against
the Montana Freemen. I do not
take anything but a single percentage
point of credit for saving their
lives, because lots of other people
contributed to that accomplishment
too. The point I am making is that
this would not have been possible
without the Internet, and fax
machines. My knowledge of a large
existing textual database, and a very
fast text search function, have helped
to shift the balance of power. As it
stands right now, the Plaintiff "People
of the United States of America" have
sued the Respondent "United States et al."
in what promises to be an history-making
case of law. We are kidding ourselves
if we think that fiddling around with
overly complex partition structures
is a good use of our time. There are
only so many minutes in the day; computer
problems can and do become real time
consumers. The simplest solution is always
the best (Occam's Razor). A single DOS
letter drive ("C:") is the ONLY way to go,
even if the database gets rather large.
With a single letter drive, like C:, you
can point your search software to a single
point of departure, and let it rip. You can
also do very efficient incremental backups,
and prevent unnecessary duplication much
easier. All of these things save time
and simplify what can become a rather
awkward task, i.e. navigating multiple
letter drives. Now, let's see, on what
partition is X at the present time?
This is not a rhetorical question,
particularly when your mind is somewhere
else, and it must "interrupt" a perfectly
good train of thought, to do another
mundane search task. Then, what do you do
if you are wrong about the partition where
X current resides? Go search some more.
This is called "trial and error", and it
can be shown to be THE most inefficient
method, particularly when you are using
optical methods (i.e. eye balls).
/s/ Paul Mitchell
That you have a computer with faxmodem and perhaps
>access to some consitutional data? Or, that you buy a particular software
>bit to accomplish that? It's what you can do with the tools that counts,
>not how they accomplish it. Leave that stuff to the individual.
>Just my .02, Boyd
>
>On Sun, 10 Nov 1996, Paul Andrew Mitchell wrote:
>
>> Dear Harry,
>>
>> If the pen is mightier than the
>> sword, then computers just might
>> be instrumental in restoring
>> our Constitution. Do you agree,
>> or not? I agree that, sometimes,
>> the technical jargon gets difficult
>> if not impossible to understand.
>> I submit to you that the field of
>> law has become no less technical,
>> and quite a bit more difficult to
>> fathom, particularly when our
>> vaulted Congress has repeatedly
>> resorted to duplicitous language.
>> Huge text databases may be just
>> what the doctor ordered to recover
>> our lost wisdom, and restore order.
>> Just my opinion, mind you. It sounds
>> as if we might have to disagree here.
>> What do you say about these points?
>>
>> /s/ Paul Mitchell
>>
>>
>> At 12:20 PM 11/10/96 -0800, you wrote:
>> >On Sun, 10 Nov 1996, Paul Andrew Mitchell wrote:
>> >
>> >> It certainly sounds to me as
>> >> if Windows 95 with FAT32 is
>> >> well within his talents, and
>> >> I for one would like to hear
>> >> more from him.
>> >
>> >Then you, for one, tell him that. Don't tell me.
>> >
>> >> When I read
>> >> his statement about "the lay
>> >> of the land", I took that to
>> >> be a rhetorical statement about
>> >> not joining or "crashing" the
>> >> list until he got a feel for
>> >> what was going here. I admire
>> >> the sentiment, but I would never
>> >> want to hold anyone to their
>> >> promise to remain silent when
>> >> there is so much to say about
>> >> America today, as it does the
>> >> slow death reserved for all
>> >> democracies ever since time began.
>> >>
>> >> /s/ Paul Mitchell
>> >
>> >You, of course, are free to do whatever you please, including
>> >encouraging boorishness, or behaving boorishly, if that fits your
>> >pistol.
>> >
>> >Invading a forum having as its charter the discussion of "Restore Our
>> >Constitution" with 5K worth of technical discussion involving disk
>> >directory structures, for which there couldn't be more than several
>> >hundred more appropriate forums, fits the category of "boorish", IMO.
>> >
>> >-----
>> >Harry Barnett <harryb@eskimo.com>
>> >-----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> >
>>
>> ===========================================================
>> Paul Andrew, Mitchell, B.A., M.S.: pmitch@primenet.com
>> ship to: c/o 2509 N. Campbell, #1776, Tucson, Arizona state
>> ===========================================================
>>
>>
>
>
Return to Table of Contents for
Supreme Law School: E-mail