“Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule—and both commonly succeed, and are right.”  – H. L. Mencken

Howdy!  This site is mainly for my own use, but it’s also a good way to get to know about me and my interests.

I moved from Texas to St. Louis to begin work on a doctoral degree in computer science at Washington University under Dr. Ron Cytron.  My doctoral research is on Declared-Strategy Voting and other topics in computational voting theory.

Cricket is a pastoral bat-and-ball game that originated in England.  CricInfo is an excellent resource for both historical and current cricket information, including live scores, results, players, news and the Laws.  BBC Sport’s cricket site is also useful.  Between April and September I follow England’s County Championship closely.  Since 1995 I’ve been a fan of Surrey County Cricket Club, the 1999, 2000 and 2002 County Champions.  When the English season is over, I follow New South Wales in Australia, Western Province in South Africa and Auckland in New Zealand.

I enjoy playing a card game called Armchair Cricket so much that I created a computer game out of it; my game is listed as freeware at Cricket Web and CricketGames.com.  I also own another cricket card game called QUICKSingle.  I sometimes play Stick Cricket online.

I sometimes organize cricket matches on the Wash. U. campus when the weekend weather looks good.

Modern classical music is one of my greatest pleasures.  My preferences lean towards the complex and challenging:  My favorite composers are Per Nørgård, Einojuhani Rautavaara and Olivier Messiaen.  My CD collection is one of my most prized possessions.  You can help me indulge in my obsession by using my Amazon wish list; other good online stores are ArkivMusic and H&B.  Since I don’t know many folks who share my love for modern music, I usually have to rely on CD reviews in books and on the Web.  Gramophone, ClassicsToday.com, Fanfare Magazine, MusicWeb International and BBC Music Magazine offer large collections of reviews.  The All Classical Guide and Classical Net have information on composers and their works.  The labels BIS, Chandos, Dacapo, Naxos and Ondine have all sorts of information.

I also love original and experimental modern popular music, especially progressive rock, post-rock and IDM.  The Gibraltar Encyclopedia of Progressive Rock has everything a prog fan would want to know; reviews can also be found at the All Music Guide and Rough Guides Music.  Brian Eno, Peter Gabriel, Genesis, Gentle Giant, Steve Hackett, Peter Hammill, King Crimson, Mike Oldfield, Rush, Van der Graaf Generator and Yes all have sites devoted to them.  Calyx offers information on the Canterbury substyle of prog.  The Artist Shop and Wayside Music have large catalogs of progressive rock albums; also worth checking out are the labels Constellation Records, Cuneiform Records, Discipline Global Mobile, Fatcat Records, Real World Records and Seventh Records.

No school inspires so much pride as the A&M College of Texas (now known as Texas A&M University) in College Station.  Texas Aggies are renowned for their spirit, honor and loyalty.  I’m a proud member of the Fightin’ Texas Aggie Class of 1998 and former four-year resident and webmaster of Schuhmacher Hall.  While I was at A&M I built the hell outta Fightin’ Texas Aggie Bonfire and participated in other Aggie traditions such as Muster, Replant and Big Event.  I also studied computer science with a minor in mathematics, graduating in summer 1998, and stayed another year for a Master’s degree under Dr. Jianer Chen and Dr. Bob Blakley with an interest in cryptography.  I was even in the Fightin’ Texas Aggie Corps of Cadets (Talon 12) for a while . . .

I still yell for the Fightin’ Texas Aggies in baseball, football and basketball.  Watching the nationally famous Fightin’ Texas Aggie Band win halftime at Kyle Field gives me chills, but there’s nothing like an Aggie baseball game at Olsen Field.  I’m a member of the Association of Former Students and of the Gateway A&M Club.

I’m a member of the Libertarian Party in Travis County, Texas, even though I spend most of the year at school in St. Louis County, Missouri.  In 2002 I ran for Texas State Representative in District 50.  Libertarians value individual rights and responsibility and strict limits on government; see Libertarianism.com or LibertyGuide.com for a general introduction.  The only major-party politician left whom I respect is Rep. Ron Paul, who is now running for president.  I was a member of the 2004 presidential campaign team of Libertarian Michael Badnarik, now teaching his Constitution class and hosting his own radio show, Lighting the Fires of Liberty.  I admire the goals of the Free State Project and Free State Wyoming.

Get a rough idea of your true political orientation at the World’s Smallest Political Quiz, Politopia, the Party Matchmaking Service or the Political Compass, then visit Project Vote Smart to figure out how you should vote accordingly.  You may surprise yourself!

Why should we have to vote for a lesser evil over a favorite candidate?  The unfortunate domination of the two tax-supported political parties in the U.S.A. is originally a product of our plurality voting system.  Plurality, Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), Borda and many other voting systems are vulnerable to strategically insincere voting, but voters should be free to express true preferences without fear of regret.  I am a co-founder of Citizens for Approval Voting, a single-issue organization that advocates the use of Approval Voting in public single-winner elections.  I also support the Center for Range Voting and Condorcet.org.  Unfortunately, many electoral reform groups seem to prefer demonstrably inferior systems such as IRV.  I subscribe to the ApprovalVoting, RangeVoting, Election Methods, Ranked Pairs and instantrunoff-freewheeling mailing lists.

I look forward to reading The Onion every week; MojoNews is also good for some laughs.  My favorite comedians are Doug Stanhope, Bill Hicks, George Carlin, Richard Jeni, Steven Wright and Brendon Walsh.  I don’t read fiction often, but I love Douglas Adams’s absurd sci-fi novels.  Dave Barry writes hilarious columns that often have a libertarian bent.

I try to make time for daily comic strips like Dilbert, Get Fuzzy, Monty, Frazz, FoxTrot, and The Duplex.  I wish Calvin and Hobbes, Bloom County and Peanuts were still being written.  I also enjoy less traditional comics such as The Perry Bible Fellowship, Achewood, Bob the Angry Flower, Dinosaur Comics, xkcd, Hyper Death Babies and Left-Handed Toons (by right-handed people).

I love movies.  I survey the latest reviews with Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic and the Movie Review Query Engine; my favorite reviewers are Roger Ebert, James Berardinelli, Planet Sick-Boy, Mr. Cranky, Bad Movie Night and Miss Liberty.  I use Fandango to decide where to see a new movie.  The All Movie Guide and the Internet Movie Database are handy reference guides.

Yahoo! is surely the most useful single site on the Web.  When I can’t find something there or I need a broader search, I try Google or Clusty.  Most of my friends who used to blog have given it up, but I still write my own blog.

This document was hand-coded using Vim.  It was made to be viewable with any browser, but I recommend using Opera or Firefox. I can be reached through e-mail at rob@approvalvoting.org or honky98@aggienetwork.com.  If those addresses don’t work, try honky1998@yahoo.com or legrand@cse.wustl.edu.  Fight spam! Gig ’em! Robert Hampton “Honky” LeGrand III ’98