First stop was the Villiage of Payne. An invitation for a comedy about the training camp if I ever saw one, the Payneans belong to a city a few hundred people larger than South Dakota’s City of Scotland. Sadly, its quirky restaurants were closed.

Next up: Paulding. As I learned from Wikipedia, Paulding was part of a complicated land speculation that would have made a fortune if the county seat was moved there. The ornate town hall is a testament to this dream…

… and its failure, as the town hall is just that and the county seat is down the road. Still, they had extremely filling food and good specials at the 401 Kafe. A board on the now asked patrons to right down the name of those serving, so they can be in the town’s prayers.

Small lakes / large pools where everywhere in Ohio. Why? My best guess is that the Fort Wayne area, on both sides of the state line – was once home to the Great Black Swamp. The swamp was left by ancient glaciers and was extant for generations after the nation’s independence.

The remains of the Black Swamp are preserved here and there, and are often used by fisherman. (This fishing hole / swampy remnant is outside of Paulding)

Instead of friendly signs asking visitors to visit again, or even just noting the city limit, Ohioan communities blast passers-bye with a legalistic “Exit Corp.” The impersonal monsters.

“Chickens, Eggs, & Connectivity,” by Stephen DeAngelis, Enterprise Resilience Management Blog, 14 July 2006, http://enterpriseresilienceblog.typepad.com/enterprise_resilience_man/2006/07/chickens_eggs_c.html.

“Report: Indian gov blocks Blogspot, Typepad, Geocities blogs,” by Xeni Jardin, Boing Boing, 17 July 2006, http://www.boingboing.net/2006/07/17/report_indian_gov_bl.html (from Digg).

In a prescient article last Frday, Enterra cofounder Stephen F. DeAngelis criticized the proposed law Global Online Freedom Act of 2006 that is currently in the House of Representatives. The bill would begin firewalling the Old Core, particularly the United States, away from the New Core, especially China. It would make disconnection in one area (technological freedom) as an excuse to roll-back connectivity in other market arenas. It’s a bad idea all around — it will isolate America from her allies in this Global War against Terrorism, it isolates American businesses from their partners abroad, and by imposing regulations on technology companies it will lesson our nation’s advantages over competitors.

Steve’s post is worth reading, especially this bit where he emphasizes the need for economic growth. Economic development enables freedom, or as he says

Not only is such a bill likely to make the U.S. even less well liked abroad, it is unlikely to achieve the goals it desires. While some may see it as a chicken-and-egg discussion (which comes first freedom or capitalism?), historically economics have had a greater impact on the politics than vice versa. Whatever Tienanmen Square represents symbollically, Shanghai is the real face of change in China and it is driven by economics. For all intents and purposes, Shanghai is developed, capitalistic, world-class city despite the controls the central government has tried to impose on Internet content.

Don’t believe it? Then compare China to India — both are developing states, but China is a party dictatorship and India is a multiparty democracy. A perfect test case is blogs, and thus it is no surprise that India is attacking free speech on blogs:

India’s Department of Telecommunications (DoT) passed an order to ISPs Friday to block several websites. The list is confidential. Indian ISPs have been slowly coming into compliance. SpectraNet, MTNL, Reliance, and as of Monday afternoon, Airtel. State-backed BSNL and VSNL have not started yet but likely will soon. The known list of blocked domains is *.blogspot.com, *.typepad.com and geocities.com/*.

The Indian Empire: Freer Under the Crown?

Anyone who believes that a bill that restricts trade with countries that censor information will only hit dictatorships is misguided. Underdeveloped countries generally begin turning on themselves, from China to India to France. Slapping de facto sanctions on those states only hurts their economies — and their citizens’ freedoms — more.

Support freedom. Support economics. Oppose the Global Online Freedom Act of 2006.

The fireworks were watched by a large crowd on the square between the Lincoln Tower and the government building in downtown Fort Wayne. The reflections off the buildings were beautiful.

No words can speak for these images, so I will now thank my hosts for this wonderful time and send attention over to the images themselves.