Dark Bilious Vapors

Apropos of that tempest in a teapot, The Blogressive follows up on some of the Wikipedia edits that have been traced to Capitol Hill computers (no permalink yet, but it's the first item on the 2/1/2006 entry):

Having solved all of the nation's problems Congressional staffers have taken the time to abuse the honor system at wikipedia.org, one of the Internet's most popular websites, prompting engineers to temporarily block edits emanating from U.S. House and Senate computers. Wikipedia.org is an online encyclopedia maintained by ordinary citizens. Pages can be edited by anyone but records of revisions are kept.

Users at House and Senate IP addresses have removed unflattering facts such as broken promises on term limits, messy divorces, and even connections to lobbyist Jack Abramoff. They have also vandalized, deleted, and placed bogus information on the pages of political rivals.

Examples of the abuses are documented here. But the edits that caught the eye of the Blogressive weren't the obvious biographical enhancements or partisan attacks on political enemies. Taxpayer-funded Congressional computers and staff have made numerous nonpartisan wikipedia edits:

Added vital information on Whitney Houston's work on her husband Bobby Brown's reality TV show: "During the program, she popularized the phrase, 'Hell to the naw!' "

Added Press Secretary Scot McClellan as a related topic to term "douche." (Well, OK, that is a tad partisan.)

Corrected a misspelling on the topic "Asian Fetish."

Corrected a misspelling on the entry for the movie "The Big Lebowski."

Corrected the spelling of "mullet" on Billy Ray Cyrus's biography.

Added this tidbit to Jay Leno's biography: "He appeared in an episode of Good Times in which his character promotes getting tested for venereal diseases."

Made numerous additions and corrections on the topic "masturbation."

Properly attributed a murder to Freddy Krueger on the entry for the film "Nightmare on Elm Street."

Len on 02.02.06 @ 08:08 AM CST