It seems to me that CISPA is a great deal more limited in intent than SOPA/PIPA. There are no direct references to piracy or site-blocking. In theory, it addresses a very specific problem: the inability for government agencies in the intelligence community (CIA, DOD, DHS, NSA, etc.) to easily hand off security data to private companies in dealing with online security issues. For instance, an agency may discover a new type of computer virus and want to transmit the virus’s signature to an ISP for filtering. I don’t really see a problem with this.

I do have an issue with the vague language of the bill. Terms like “cybersecurity” are used and their definitions are either vague or extremely broad. In particular, I find the “notwithstanding any other provision of law” clauses in Sections 2.b.1.A and 2.b.1.B to be extremely dangerous. My understanding is that this essentially allows this law to override *any* other restriction on information sharing. This provides a level of immunity for such information sharing that I think is unwarranted, and I don’t think it’s necessary for this clause to be present in the bill.

Thus, I feel I must oppose the bill as written, not because I disagree with the fundamental goal but because I feel the specific language is too broad. I realize that all legislation regarding security issues must be inherently vague to some extent, but I believe this legislation is just over the limit of what is reasonable. If the “notwithstanding” phrases were removed I could probably support it, but there may be other clauses that need restriction as well.

I’ve read a good bit of the written transcript, and the conversation is remarkably accessible and lively, with discussion ranging at times from health care to health insurance, burial insurance, car purchases, and even broccoli. There are many facets to the arguments, including some (such as the tax vs. penalty issue) that I’m not really interested in. There are some questions that I feel are particularly important, though, and I wanted to mention them.

The first question is this: who is in the healthcare market? Must a person have current health needs to be considered “in” the market?

The administration’s answer (as argued by Solicitor General Donald Verrilli) was that *everyone* is in the healthcare market, regardless of whether they currently need healthcare, and indeed regardless of whether they are even aware they are in the market. This argument hinges on the observation that refraining from purchasing insurance drives up the premiums for everyone else.

However, Paul Clement (who argued against the mandate on behalf of the state of Florida), observed that this is not a unique aspect to the healthcare market: “These are economic decisions, they have effect on other people; my failure to purchase in this market has a direct effect on others who are already in the market. That’s true of virtually every other market under the sun.”

The administration makes it clear that they are not asking for the power to regulate ANY market, and Verrilli asserted that the difference is grounded in a social norm: “In the health care market, you’re going into the market without the ability to pay for what you get, getting the health care service anyway as a result of the social norms … to which we’ve obligated ourselves so that people get health care. … I can’t imagine that that the Commerce Clause would forbid Congress from taking into account this deeply embedded social norm.”

Justice Scalia (rightly, I think) challenged the assumption that this social norm is actually something we should obligate ourselves to, at least with formal legislation. As I’ve mentioned on this blog in the past, I believe that it is the proper place of the church, not the government, to ensure that people don’t languish in poverty or sickness. I realize that this is a subjective belief, however, and I feel the American people are moving in general towards a situation in which the government is indeed in the business of universal social welfare. I’m undecided regarding if or when I will cease resisting this movement.

A second interesting question is this: does the mandate merely regulate a method of payment, rather than a market itself?

Both sides seemed to be amenable to the concept of requiring health insurance at the point of service, and I think I’m also in agreement with the constitutionality of such a mandate. This would bring it in line with something like car insurance, which must be purchased before or at the point of an action initiated by an individual (e.g. buying a car in the latter case, or going to a hospital in the former). Verrilli observed that payment WILL be made when a person receives health care; he argued that the only issue under consideration here is the timing of that payment. Should the government require the payment ahead of time, for instance by requiring the purchase of health insurance?

Justice Roberts responded to this argument at one point: “Unless I’m missing something, I think you’re just repeating the idea that this is the regulation of the method of payment. And I understand that argument. And it may be a good one. But what I’m concerned about is, once we accept the principle that everybody is in this market, I don’t see why Congress’s power is limited to regulating the method of payment and doesn’t include [other aspects] as it does in any other area.”

I agree that this argument seems to be sidestepping the issue. Regulation of payment timing doesn’t seem to be a special case of the regulation of commerce, and it is perhaps less important than the first question I mentioned, which is the question of the size and makeup of the “healthcare market.”

This brings me to the final question I’d like to comment on, and that is this: is there really a *single* healthcare market? This question seems to me to precipitate many of the others, and I wonder if it’s a question to which the answer may provide a compromise that both sides of this issue can accept.

It seems to me (and several of the justices alluded to this in their comments) that there are multiple “levels” of health care. The sort of care that we wish to guarantee with our “social norms” certainly stops short of encompassing every medical procedure and treatment possible. I’m fairly certain that no one would argue that elective plastic surgery should be a part of the mandated health insurance coverage, for instance. Almost everyone would argue that emergency resuscitation and trauma care should be a part of this coverage, however.

In between are hundreds and thousands of “grey areas,” and my question is whether we can partition these procedures and treatments in such a way that we can agree on the constitutionality of mandated insurance for a particular portion, given adequate evidence that the overwhelming majority of people will require a treatment from that portion at some point in their lives. If that argument could be made, I think I would be comfortable accepting Verrilli’s assertion that this mandate is a special case which is justified by our social norms.

Otherwise, I believe that we must conclude that this mandate exceeds the powers of congress as enumerated by the U.S. Constitution.

I’ve included all three texts, and a couple of notes at the bottom regarding choices I made with the hybrid.

Apostle’s Creed

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
    the Maker of heaven and earth,
    and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord:

Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost,
    born of the virgin Mary,
    suffered under Pontius Pilate,
    was crucified, dead, and buried;

He descended into hell.

The third day He arose again from the dead;

He ascended into heaven,
    and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty;
    from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Ghost;
    the holy catholic church;
    the communion of saints;
    the forgiveness of sins;
    the resurrection of the body;
    and the life everlasting.

Amen.

Nicene Creed

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.

Who, for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary, and was made man; and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate; He suffered and was buried; and the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father; and He shall come again, with glory, to judge the quick and the dead; whose kingdom shall have no end.

And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life; who proceeds from the Father and the Son; who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified; who spoke by the prophets.

Hybrid Creed

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
    the Maker of heaven and earth
    and of all things visible and invisible.

I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord:
    begotten of the Father before all worlds, not made,
    being of one substance with the Father,
    by whom all things were made.

I believe that Jesus Christ was made man,
    conceived by the Holy Spirit
    and born of the virgin Mary.
He was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
    died and was buried;
    he endured the full wrath of God’s punishment for sin (*).
On the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures;
    he ascended into heaven,
    and sits on the right hand of the Father.
He shall come again with glory
    to judge the quick and the dead,
    and his kingdom shall have no end.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
    who proceeds from the Father and the Son,
    who is with them together worshipped and glorified,
    and who spoke by the prophets.

I believe in the holy worldwide (**) church,
    the communion of saints,
    the forgiveness of sins,
    the resurrection of the body,
    and the life everlasting.

Amen.

Notes

(*) The original text “He descended into hell” from the Apostle’s Creed is the subject of much controversy. Personally, I find the scriptural support shaky, and it seems to delve more deeply into mechanistic speculation than is appropriate in a popular creed. I of course do agree with the theology behind the statement, which maintains that Christ bore the full wrath of God’s judgement against sin. I have attempted to capture this with the given phrasing, but I’m quite open to other suggestions.

(**) The original language “catholic church” from the Apostle’s Creed has become ambiguous and slightly confusing in modern times, because of the tendency to omit the word “Roman” when referring to the “Roman Catholic church.” The word “catholic,” when not capitalized and used by itself, simply means “universal” or “of interest to all.” I wanted to avoid using the term “universal,” however, because that word also contains overtones of universalism, which is the belief that eventually all people will be saved and go to heaven regardless of their acceptance of Jesus Christ as savior. Thus, I have decided to use “worldwide” for now, hopefully emphasizing the “all-encompassing” sense of the original word “catholic.” Again, I am of course open to other suggestions.

Observant readers will also note that I omitted the “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God” phrase from the Nicene creed. I do not see the significance of this tautological assertion, and don’t believe it really says anything beyond what the other phrases already communicate. If anyone wishes to argue otherwise, I’m willing to listen.

Otherwise, I believe the hybrid captures all of the points made in both creeds, while presenting with more modern language and better flow than either. If you have thoughts, suggestions, or criticisms, please let me know.

Soli Deo gloria!

Web Browsing

This was perhaps the hardest issue to get clear answers on before I purchased the device. Here’s the real deal: you CAN’T browse anything except Wikipedia on 3G. No Gmail, no Facebook, no wiki besides Wikipedia. Yes, you can browse Wikipedia on 3G, but it’s slow. You CAN browse any website on Wifi. Obviously, you can browse the Amazon Kindle store and purchase books on both 3G and Wifi.

Account Sharing

You can share a Kindle account with multiple devices. This is particularly useful for spouses to avoid paying for two copies of the same book if you both plan to read it on your own device. However, there are caveats.

1. First, the system will synchronize progress across devices unless you manually de-sync that book. This means that without the effort to de-sync, only one person can read the book at a time. You could also manually keep track of your progress, but that seems to defeat part of the purpose of having the book on an electronic device.
2. Subscriptions CAN be shared, but they can only be auto-delivered to a single device. To access issues on any other devices, you have to find it under “Archived Items” and download it manually.

PDF Viewing

You CAN view PDFs. In addition, you can transfer them very easily by setting up a special @kindle.com address. After you set it up, you can just attach the PDF to an email and send it to that address, and the PDF will be delivered to your device. However, this transfer is free ONLY if you do it over Wifi. You can enable a feature that allows you to do it over 3G as well, but that costs a nominal fee for each transfer.

After the PDF is on your device, you can read it just like any other book. However, it will not automatically re-wrap and resize text. Each page in the PDF is resized entirely to the size of the Kindle screen. You can zoom and pan, but this process is tedious and you must zoom back out before moving to the next page. This can make reading PDFs with small fonts painful or impossible.

Newspapers

The newspapers range from $5-$20 per month for a subscription. Most of them provide 14-day trial versions. Generally, the papers I’ve tried do NOT include the comics or classifieds. If you cancel a subscription after being charged for a particular period, your credit card IS refunded the pro-rated amount.

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I got the ad-subsidized version, which means that it was $40 cheaper at retail. It displays ads on the home screen and full-screen while the device is switched off. You can customize the types of ads to a certain extent using the online account manager, and you can also pay $40 to remove the ads permanently.

Conclusion

I have philosophical disagreements with Amazon’s restrictive content licenses (that’s a topic for another day), so I can’t really recommend the Kindle for building an extensive book library, unless you’re only interested in reading the classics (most of which are available for free).

However, the device has proven useful for reading the newspaper ($12/mo for the Washington Post), which saves a lot of paper and doesn’t suffer (in my opinion) from the same content license issues since newspaper articles are pretty much single-consumption goods. It has also proven marginally useful for reading papers as PDFs, although the zoom issue is annoying.

Basically, the hardware has a lot of promise, but the choices made by Amazon have not really endeared the system to me yet. We’ll see how things develop over the next year or two.

I won’t bother writing extensively about this since there is already a wealth of information available. Suffice it to say that I agree with those who are of the opinion that PIPA/SOPA represent a legitimate threat to internet freedom. By adding my blog to the blackout, I hope to lend my voice (as minor as it may be) to support their cause.

The instructions on their OSX build website are quite good, with the exception of the fact that (at least with this version) you have to manually set up some dynamic libraries. This process is described in a bug report in their Trac system. With the links established, the latest alpha (version 8 “Haxāmaniš”) works (albeit without sound) on my iMac. W00t! Kudos to the team, and I await further development with eager anticipation.

WARNING: This is pretty technical.

Any x86 assembly programmer is aware of the PUSHF/POPF instructions. They save and restore the FLAGS register to the top of the stack, respectively. When inserting instrumentation, you will want to do this around every bit of code you insert so as not to perturb the original program. However, this can become quite expensive in terms of CPU time.

Luckily there is a faster alternative if you only care about saving a specific subset of commonly-used flags, specifically OF (overflow), SF (sign), ZF (zero), AF (auxiliary), PF (parity), and CF (carry). This alternative uses the LAHF and SAHF instructions to load and save the flags to AH (the high-order 8 bytes of AX); it also uses SETO to save the overflow bit and an additional trick (described below) to restore it.

Here is the saving sequence:

9f          lahf               ; save lower-order flags
0f 90 c0    seto %al           ; save OF
86 c4       xchg %al, %ah
50          push %eax

And here is the restoring sequence:

58          pop %eax
86 c4       xchg %al, %ah
80 c0 7f    add 0x7f, %al      ; restore OF
9e          sahf               ; restore lower-order flags

The XCHG instructions aren’t strictly necessary unless you want the saved values to reflect the correct byte order of the original FLAGS register. If you’re just saving and restoring the flags around a bit of code and don’t plan to modify those stored flags yourself, you don’t care what byte order they’re saved in.

The OF restore is the only part of this that isn’t entirely straightforward: basically, it performs an in-place 8-bit addition that is designed to overflow only if the overflow flag was set in the EAX-stored value. The addition won’t modify the higher bytes of EAX even if the overflow occurs, so this is safe.

The only other caveat is that these excerpts assume that EAX can be clobbered. If you can’t make this assumption, you can just add an extra push/pop of EAX around these excerpts to save and restore that register as well.

I hope this is helpful to someone besides myself.

• Random players seem to virtually disappear at the higher leagues, reflecting the generally-accepted difficulty of playing all three races well.
• Terran percentages seem to dip in the middle leagues, rising at the higher and lower leagues; this probably reflects the current perceived “over-powered” nature of this race.
• Zerg percentages seem to peak in the middle leagues; it seems like a hard race to play, both at very easy and very difficult levels.
• Protoss player percentages are nearly identical across all leagues, rising just a tad in grandmaster; perhaps it is currently the most balanced race?

Makes me glad to be a Protoss player!