I've been playing a bit with Django, a Python-based web framework. One thing that people starting in Django seem to miss out on is the standard "how to I make model classes from my existing database tables"? That's not because you can't do this, but only because most of the newb tutorials start from the other end. It turns out that you can do this easily using "manage.py inspectdb". And you're done, at least most of your work is done. This reverse engineering is not as complete as that in Seam (actually Hibernate) - no compound primary keys, and (presumably because Python's db support is less general than Java's JDBC) it only works on a few databases (PostgreSQL, MySQL and SQL Server, IIRC), but for those database it does the bulk of the work for you.

So, this post is a bit away from my usual topics. I admit it, I'm mainly posting this here in hopes that somebody else using a web search will find the answer more quickly.

Funniest computer glitch in some years.

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I wanted to write such a thing, but Steven Horwitz beat me to it.

"The Bailout" came and went, the market dipped sharply the same day, and went back up the next day as "the market" did what it always does: balances out the interests of the many, impartially. Something governments will never be able to do; they shouldn't even try.  All the bailout would do is postpone the agony, and, enrich the few at the expense of the many, an example of government doing what it usually does.  Greenwald has a link showing that Speaker Pelosi, claiming to be acting on behalf of the people, is actually acting to save the ten million USD that she has invested in stocks of such well-managed companies as AIG and AT&T... 

But the rejection of the bailout is better than a rejection of screwing the many to benefit the few; it's a rejection of the typical big-government back-room deals that are presented to the people as fait accompli. It's wonderful that so many people took the time to write, phone, fax, and email their representatives to voice their displeasure with the bailout (and, one assumes, threaten to vote against the said congress-critters in the upcoming election if they should reject vox populi). This, folks, is democracy in action, 21st Century style.

Quoted without comment from Sheldon Richman's blog:
When it comes to separatist movements, the American and Russian governments have no principles whatever. They take whatever side advances their political interests at the moment. When ethnic Albanians in Kosovo sought to break from Yugoslavia, the Russians sided with ally Serbia and opposed independence, but the United States backed the separatists and unleashed its bombers. Something similar happened when the Bosnians did the same thing... Yet when the Ossetians and Abkhazians want to be free of Georgia, the big-power roles are reversed.
If you hold your breath waiting for a sign of integrity from any government, you will turn blue...