The Names Project states that it

…is going to scope the requirements of UK institutional and subject repositories for a service that will reliably and uniquely identify names of individuals and institutions.

The trick is that a name is not usually unique - names are always context sensitive and when their context expands they can become ambiguous. My name, Sean Reilly, was unique within my immediate family but is far from unique on the internet or even in my city.Identifiers on the other hand, are always unique. You might say that identifiers are names in a certain context that ensures that a name can’t refer to two different things.My guess is that the Names project is actually looking for a system of identifiers to use in place of names.There is no shortage of identifier systems on the net, such as Handles, DOI, OpenID, XRI and, of course URI.I’d suggest they use Handles for the Names project, but I’m biased. I’d at least recommend changing the name or stated purpose of the project to something with more of a focus on identifiers instead of names.

When the USA first came into existence, the bill of rights and constitution were an attempt to guarantee that the government could never take away the basic rights of individuals. The problem is that there’s nothing preventing corporations from gaining and abusing power over individuals. Any hope for the government to keep a check on corporate power was lost when Reagan was elected, if not earlier.Take the health care system in the US. It is run by private corporations, is inefficient, expensive and doesn’t provide the best care available. The cost of simply being insured in the US has skyrocketed in the last 6 or so years. The UK has a national health care system in which:

• Everybody is covered
• Per person, it costs less than half what people pay in the US
• Private health care is available if you want it.

I’ve recently lived in both systems. I had a high quality employer-provided health care plan in the US until April 2006. Since then I’ve lived in Scotland and take part in the National Health Service (NHS). Due to living a daring and dangerous lifestyle, and recently having had baby daughter, both my wife and I have had our fair share of visits to medical professionals in both countries. We couldn’t be more pleased with the level of care we’ve gotten and dread the day that we have to go back into the US system.The UK health system is so much better than the US system that I am shocked when I hear people in the US rant that they don’t want the government in charge of their health care. Would you rather your health care be run by corporations whose sole purpose is to make money and whose only way of making money is to prevent you from getting health care?What is it that makes people think government run services are so inefficient? Maybe it has something to do with the fact that 95% of broadcast news is filtered through the same corporations that are raking in big bucks doing things that the government would otherwise be doing (usually more efficiently).Is it efficient for the US military to outsource things like truck driving and mess hall operations in Iraq? Hell no - it is wildly more expensive. Yet the taxpayers are shelling out a (starting) salary of $125k for KBR truck drivers when it used to pay $17k for US military drivers. Which option do you think is more efficient? Makes it easy to understand how the US is blowing $30 BILLION dollars a week in Iraq. It also makes it obvious that this war is nothing but a transparent profiteering opportunity for companies like KBR (Halliburton), Blackwater, etc.Health care in the US is currently run by the domestic equivalents of KBR, Blackwater, etc. I don’t think there’s much hope that more politicians can or will stand up to the corporate media whose favor they need in order to get elected. My greatest hope is that change can come from the bottom up. If one US state can provide a real health care system then there might be a chance at sanity.[random note: MarsEdit makes it way too easy to put your personal rants onto a public weblog]

Please excuse the redundant title.How stupid would we have to be to allow Bush/Cheney to repeat the Iraq war in Iran given that:

• The financial health of the USA has been decimated by vastly increased spending (trillions of dollars being spent in Iraq)
• The US military is already stretched thin dealing with the mess in Iraq
• The national health care/insurance crisis is leaving more people without health care

I don’t see how we can afford another war either financially or logistically. Not to mention the cost in human life which is conveniently ignored by most of those who are not at risk.Of course, it does seem that every action made by this administration has benefited either Cheney’s former employer (KBR/Halliburton) or large donors to their campaign. Another, larger war would certainly be a boon to the likes of KBR, Blackwater and gang. Have they done anything to make life better for the average US citizen?I also don’t understand why the President of Iran was denied permission to pay his respects at the site of the world trade center, so maybe I’m just out of touch.

Do it now. Or feel the wrath of Mike Lee.