June 2007 Archives

Growing up in the 1960s meant living with the very real possibility that the governments of the "superpowers" would literally destroy the world with nuclear weapons. Science fiction movies shifted from the campy monster movies where a bug would become irradiated, grow to a ridulous size, and destroy a city to truly contemplating the unthinkable-real nuclear war. Military and SF novels addressed every aspect of life after The Bomb, and most of the time, the picture was bleak.

Still, this bleakness inspired other authors to reject the notion that the human race would really be so stupid as to blow ourselves up. Authors embraced the tradition of Jules Verne and speculated on man going to the stars. When the US and USSR were staring each other down daily, thousands of Koreans were poised to kill each other, and nobody really know what the hell the Chinese were going to do, the escape that space operas offered a kid like me was important.

From a future-tech perspective, the use of nuclear power in space was widely accepted. Something so powerful that it could destroy a city could certainly be harnassed for the good of space exploration. The Russians made science fact out of this science fiction concept when they sent up exploratory satellites that contained functioning nuclear reactors. This sort of thing totally freaked the anti-nuke crowd, as did NASA's Cassini probe, lauched in 1997. Their position was not totally irrational, of course; they had Three Mile Island and Chernobyl on their side.

Still, I agree with the conclusion of this article from El Reg, that we're going to need some kick-ass propulsion systems if we're ever really going to achieve the dream of true interplanetary travel. The first step here is a functioning commercial orbital platform and a permanent base on the moon. Using nuclear power to meet those goals makes perfect sense to me, so it's good to see that NASA is talking about it again:

But Howe reckons that there's more to nukes in space than just providing electricity. He says that nuclear power should be used for propulsion, too. According to an article in New Scientist, his plan is to update a 1960s design called Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application (NERVA) to carry payloads from Earth orbit to the Moon.

NERVA-type rockets use a fission reactor to heat up hydrogen and blast it out of the thrust nozzle at extremely high speed, faster than can be achieved by normal chemical-powered boosters. This allows a nuclear-driven spacecraft to achieve more with a given amount of liquid fuel, or "reaction mass." The NERVA test programme had its problems - not least the fact that the reactor tended to come apart and fire itself out of the exhaust - and was terminated in 1972 during NASA budget cuts.

This makes a LOT of sense. These nukes would be used in space, we're not talking about a Chernobyl-style disaster. It's time we get our heads out of the sand on the issue of nuclear power. It's an incredible source of energy that we need to nurture and develop NOW, not after we burn up all the oil we have in our Hummers.

Science fiction does not become science fact overnight, but it does happen. Verne wrote about going to the moon in the 1880s. Heinlein postulated mobile phones in the 1950s, and yesterday was the release of the iPhone. "Atomic drive" spacecraft were a staple of the space opera genre from the 50s to the 70s. We need to let NASA and the Idaho National Laboratory run with this sort of research.

This is a great article in Salon, about the current minor trend whereby brides rebel a bit against society by doing a post-wedding photo shoot where they "trash" the wedding dress. The method varies, such as standing in the rain, jumping into a lake, dancing in a fountain, rolling in mud, but the net result is to break away from classic wedding traditions.

While I think the photos are neat, I don't have an opinion one way or the other on the trend. Being a history buff, I understand the desire many women have to preserve their dress for a future daughter or granddaughter. I also know many women who wore antique dresses or would have, had they been able to find the right one. Having a friend who's been a wedding photographer for years, though, I've seen what brides have to put up with to get married, and fully relate to the desire to totally trash the primary symbol of the wedding once the deed is done.

Two things in the piece struck me, though. First, was a comment about wedding photography:

The last big trend in wedding photography was photojournalism, a reaction to the stiffness of posed family shots. For a while photographers revered candidness and recoiled at the idea of staging a shot. That style doesn't always yield the best pictures, though, so more and more couples are hiring people who would rather play fashion director than news photographer. Most photographers view trash-the-dress sessions as a bonus and don't charge for it unless a different person shot the wedding. They tend to love the sessions because it gives them a rare chance to be creative with a bride; often, they're the ones who bring it up, once the traditional shots are all finished.

Oh, dear, I truly hope that the "photojournalism" trend is on the way out. Having celebrated our 25th anniversary last month, I'm more than happy to say that's a trend we missed. Our wedding photos are an album of totally posed and staged shots, and I'm all for it. Reality photos (and worse yet, videotaping a wedding) are just too real. You spend all that money on a wedding, I'm all for it being remembered in the best terms possible. I don't want a video of my friends gatoring on the dance floor, trashed women line dancing, or worse.

The other thing that stuck me from this article was my dose of snark for the day:

These sessions take place after the wedding. Sometimes the groom is around; sometimes he's not. The resulting photos often exude a gentle gothiness, like album covers from bands playing the second stage of the Lilith Fair circa 1997.

yeahyourite. :-)

Don't you think that asking for money for Sen. Landrieu in the same week as all these 5-4 SCOTUS decisions impacting progressive causes is a bit inappropriate? After all, it's the Libermann-Landrieu wing of the Democratic Caucus in the Senate that's responsible for Samuel Alito being on the Court, giving the conservative wing a majority. I'm sure black kids in underfunded, segregated schools are really appreciative of Sen. Landrieu today.

Also, "Dear comma" isn't all that high-tech greeting for an e-mail in the year 2007. E-mail's been around for decades now. You guys look like hillbillies when you do things like this.

Cheers,
YatPundit

There is no way the Big Dog's image and/or presence can hurt any of the Dem candidates, unless they run away from him.

Only to the Drudge-addled brains of our elite press corps would this question even occur. It is, by the way, the topic of tonight's exciting installment of THE SITUATION ROOM with WOLF BLITZER.

Bill Clinton is probably the most popular man in the country. The 90s were a period of growth, optimism, wage growth across the board, declining unemployment and declining poverty. America got its groove back.

Like the guy or not, the idea that he'd be anything but an asset for Hillary Clinton is absurd.

[via Eschaton]

Obviously, Hillary's got Bill's support now, but that support will translate to Edwards when he wins the party's nomination.  Hopefully he'll have the good sense to go to NYC on his hands and knees and beg Bill to stump for him.

Marcotte rants about Brazilian waxes and makeup compulsions from a generational perspective:

The growth in popularity of the Brazilian wax really points to how unnecessary the mandatory disgust-avoidance feminine rituals can be. Im fascinated by the rise of this practice, because it seems to have become mandatory for a certain set of women born after 80-85 seemingly overnight. To me and most people my age and older than me (anecdotal evidence to be sure), the practice seems really odd, and kind of disgusting in itself, due to the pain and bleeding. (And infections that swell your vagina shut.)

"infections that swell your vagina shut?" Huh? OK, those of you out there who shave or wax, are complications really that common for the average woman?

What weirds me out is how Amanda tries to spin a cautionary tale about an Australian woman who developed severe complications from a wax job:

Now, it was kind of an odd thing, so Im not trying to imply that this is common (though buyer beware) or that this is due punishment-far from it. It seems the young woman had a specific set of circumstances that made her likely to get streptococcal cellulitis and toxic shock syndrome-she had herpes and type I diabetes to begin with, leaving her immune system compromised.

I'm not going to re-post the details of this gal's situation, because even the bit that Amanda posts is pretty gross. What concerns me is how limited and anecdotal this appears to be. Trying to turn the medical issues of a woman with diabetes and herpes into some sort of social commentary on hair-removal in general is more than a stretch. It's the sort of thing that makes you wonder if the writer isn't just some sort of goofball in general. Honestly, if Marcotte is going to be this disingenuous on this topic, it makes me wonder if I should process more of her writings through a wacko-feminist filter.

Narrowing down the location of the anon commenter who is low enough to call my kid a "pussy." This is where the IP address was assigned:

story developing...

Oklahoma sinks to a new low today, executing a terminally ill man. The federal death penalty came under scrutiny on Capitol Hill, as a former US Attorney testified about Abu Gonzalez' insistence on putting people to death, no matter how circumstantial the evidence.

In OK, they really excuted a man who had terminal cancer:

Jimmy Dale Bland, a two-time killer who shot his 62-year-old employer in the back of the head 11 years ago, became the second person executed by the state this year.

Bland, 49, was terminally ill with advanced lung cancer that spread to his brain and his hip bone, according to his attorney, David Autry. Bland received radiation and chemotherapy treatment, and his doctors said he had as little as six months to live.

Autry had warned that Bland's execution could have been a catastrophe if the veins in his arms were compromised by his chemotherapy treatments before a lethal dose of chemicals were injected as part of the execution process.

The part about Bland's veins is just disgusting. Talk about an 8th Amendment violation.

On the federal front, listen to the NPR story. The government is seeking the death penalty for a man, but they haven't bothered to dig out the victim's body from a landfill. Why not? Because the body may actually turn out to be exculpatory evidence.

...in this case, one of the basic tech premises of Starship Troopers is coming to life:

A former Nasa flight surgeon who lost his astronaut wife in the Columbia space shuttle disaster has teamed up with a self-described "bad boy" space commentator to mount trials in which humans would descend from orbit skydiver-style.

Laurel Clark, a mission specialist, died along with her fellow crew members when the shuttle Columbia broke up during re-entry in 2003. But her loss didn't dent husband Jonathan's enthusiasm for the space industry - in fact, it has inspired him to develop a novel new plan for re-entering the Earth's atmosphere.

The one-time Navy doc, Nasa medic and spec-ops-trained parachutist has joined swashbuckling aerospace analyst Rick Tumlinson's company, Orbital Outfitters. The men intend to develop space suits, parachutes and other accoutrements that will ultimately allow a suitably equipped human to skydive - or "space-dive" - safely to Earth from orbit.

It's always neat to see classic SF tech come to life. I remember the first time I read Heinlein's Space Cadet and its concept of personal phones, and now iPhone is almost here.

So long as the RIAA acts like Tony Soprano, I see downloading music without paying for it as a form of civil disobedience. Let free downloads continue until these people learn to act civilized:

An unemployed single mom with health problems has renewed her legal challenge of the Recording Industry Ass. of America (RIAA) with unseemly new details. They include accusations that the cartel's goons tried to contact the woman's 10-year-old daughter at school by impersonating the girl's grandmother on the phone.

RIAA agents pursuing bogus copyright violations also called the apartment of Tanya Andersen looking for her daughter Kylee and demanded they take the girl's deposition, according to a complaint filed last week in federal court in Portland, Oregon.

Later, during settlement discussions, the RIAA told Andersen she had to abandon all legal rights she may have in a countersuit or the association would once again demand to "interrogate and confront her little girl at the offices of the RIAA lawyers," according to the suit.

The RIAA accused this woman of downloading some really vile gansta rap. She's countersued, and now they're trying to get to her by going after her 10-year old.

These aren't plantiff-leaning "ambulance chasers" doing this. These tactics are being used by corporate defense attorneys.

World O'Crap gave a great smackdown to Townhall asshole Dennis Prager's contention that name-rape is as bad as real rape:

The rape of a name can be as vicious a crime and as destructive an act as the rape of a body. Sometimes the rape of a body is worse, sometimes the rape of a name is worse. But they are both rapes.

Scott at WOC's response:

Yes, nothing is sadder than a name huddled on a gurney in the ER with a black eye, a broken collarbone, and severe vaginal tearing. A body, on the other hand, pretty much deserves what it gets for wearing provocative clothes and being corporeal.

One of the reasons we have such a problem preventing rape and dealing with the aftermath of rape is that assholes like Prager try to reduce the seriousness of the crime with these Very Silly analogies.

Crooks and Liars has the video of EE calling into yesterday's "Hardball" show, challenging AnnThrax. It was a thing of beauty, listen to it.

There's a gal in pink standing behind AnnThrax whose nipples are getting hard as EE asks AnnThrax to stop with the attacks on her family. The end of the segment is telling--Tweety actually sounds like he regrets having this slime on, because she's just so intellectually dishonest.

AnnThrax's stock response to all of this is her usual, "you're trying to deny me my right to free speech" line.

Tweety asks her, "why do you make fun of Hillary Clinton's chubby legs?" AnnThrax responds by demanding he show her the sentence in context rather than giving a direct answer. You authors out there know how dishonest this is--you know full well she knows why she wrote everything she's written.

Olbermann named AnnThrax WPITW last night for her performance on Hardball. He should have given it to Tweety Matthews for giving this piece of crap a soap box.

Reynolds:

AN ARMORED SUPER-HUMVEE: Armor's nice, but there's a big sacrifice in cost and mobility to up-armoring everything.

If it was his son or brother in that HMMWV, he's be singing a different tune. Slow and solid would have a totally different meaning/feeling. How about we go ask the Marines and soldiers who'll be driving those vehicles what they think about up-armor?

What a piece of shit this man is.

but this time, "Netscape" isn't a company that MS has already crushed:

Google has escalated its legal tussle with Microsoft over search features built into the Vista operating system. It has asked a federal judge to extend a 2002 antitrust consent decree to ensure Microsoft fulfills its pledge to fully resolve the stand-off.

Google made the request in a legal document filed in US District Court in Washington on Monday, a day before Microsoft attorneys and federal and state prosecutors are scheduled to appear in court for a regularly scheduled hearing on progress in enforcing the sweeping agreement. The consent decree is scheduled to expire in November, but its terms allow for the expiration date to be extended.

by the time Netscape went to court against Microsoft, the company was a shadow of its former self. Teh Google is in a whole different league, with money, resources, and lawyers capable to standing up to The Borg. Why is this important? Because Microsoft often tries to operate outside of the law:

"Given Microsoft's history of aggressively minimizing the impact of court-ordered relief, it is appropriate for the court to use its authority to extend the final judgment so that it can verify Microsoft's compliance with commitments it has made to resolve this important issue," the brief said. "Without an extension, the court may not have effective means to oversee Microsoft's implementation of thee changes and determine whether they are effective in meeting the requirements" of the decree.

Teh Google is in a position to call bullshit on Microsoft's antics.

OK, it's one thing for military or quasi-military contractors to do anything from stretch the truth to outright lie about performance metrics related to their projects. Usually you don't see agency heads lying for them, though. But then again, this is BushCo, and they're used to telling Congress whatever they want and not being called on it. This time, it's over a surveillance system to be used along the US border:

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials have been lambasted by Congressmen after apparently attempting to conceal technical problems and programme slippages. ... The first trial of SBInet was to have taken place on June 13 at a 28-mile sector of the Mexico/Arizona border designated "Project 28". Boeing and DHS functionaries reported on SBInet to the Congressional Homeland Security Committee on June 7, and apparently everything was hunky-dory at that point.

But then, according to a report in Aviation Week, the SBInet scallywags apparently tried the old "oh, just one more thing," gambit. The next day they phoned the committee staff and said that, sorry, they'd forgotten to mention it, brain like a sieve, forget my own head next, erm - actually Project 28 won't go live on the 13th. It'll be the 20th, though, never fear.
...
In a letter to DHS head honcho Michael Chertoff, committee chairman Bennie Thompson (Democrat, Mississippi) and border subcommittee chairwoman Loretta Sanchez (Democrat, California) expressed their displeasure.

"It is difficult to believe that with problems of this magnitude, delays were not foreseeable at the June 7 hearing," grumbled the legislators. They asked Chertoff to come clean regarding SBInet, citing "failure to be forthcoming and the repeatedly slipping project deadlines".

(emphasis mine)

But the problem here is that Michael Chertoff, DHS Secretary, is the same piece of shit that lied point-blank to CNN during the storm, telling the world they didn't know about all the people stranded at the Morial Convention Center with no food, water, or shelter. Chertoff is used to living in this Cheney-induced "1984" universe where he can do and say whatever he pleases and nobody will call bullshit.

Paris Hilton released from jail

XM Radio's home page (www.xmradio.com) tells me I can "Celebrate Black Music" all June.

What the hell do they think I do the rest of the year, listen to white, hispanic, and asian music?

It's triangulation in reverse. While Clinton and Obama go after each other, and while the punditocracy keep pushing those two closer so they fight, Edwards is making a lot of smart moves. The most recent move was made by his wife:

Elizabeth Edwards, starring at the kickoff event of San Francisco's signature Gay Pride Parade, came out in support of legalized gay marriage today -- taking a position which she acknowledged is at odds with her husband, presidential candidate John Edwards.

"I don't know why somebody else's marriage has anything to do with me,'' she said. "I'm completely comfortable with gay marriage.''

I heart Elizabeth Edwards.

Let's face it, EE doesn't say something like this without hubby's full knowldege. She wants the White House as bad as hubby. This is straight out of the Bill Clinton playbook. It keeps the base interested, and when you're the white male running against a woman and a black guy, it's important to let them know you're there for when the other two let you down.

(via Pandagon)

WTF is it with these idiots?

AMITE, La. -- Tangipahoa Parish officials said the assistant fire chief of the Cullen Fire Department has been arrested on child porn charges.

He's accused of sharing explicit images to someone he thought was an underage girl.

According to investigators, Assistant Chief Mark Eubanks contacted a detective posing as a child via the Internet.

The 38-year-old Eubanks sent a picture of himself, officials said.

Eubanks' fire department office was searched, and investigators said they found images of child pornography.

i swear, anybody who is so bloody stupid as to download cp to their work computer deserves to be put away to protect the rest of us from the next incredibly stupid thing they're going to do in their life.

And if i'm ever approached on-line by someone claiming to be an underage girl, my usual response is, "should I call you 'officer,' 'detective,' or 'special agent?'"

It's a good thing nsingman's kids are older now, but he better look out once they start making grandbabies. I'd like to say that this could happen only at Wally World, but that's not true. It's just more likely to happen there, given the collective lack of intelligence at those stores:

But Lino -- who is white -- thinks someone looked at him, looked at the dark-skinned girl, and assumed the worst. He's tired of this kind of drama, but it hasn't stopped him from taking care of his daughter on a daily basis since last June, or from taking her shopping and to the park to skate.

Still, some people look at the father and daughter like he could be be a sexual predator -- which is what Lino thinks happened earlier this month when he went shopping at the Wal-Mart at 167th and Torrence.

If this could happen in Chicagoland, it can happen anywhere in the country, and double for Arkansas, NC, or TN.

SCOTUS came down 5-4 for censorship today in the "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" case. the background: During the 2002 Winter Olympics, the torch run passed through Juneau, Alaska. A student, Joseph Frederick, held up a sign that got on teevee, saying "Bong Hits 4 Jesus." The school administration disciplined him; he sued. The case went all the way up the line, and Chief Justice Roberts and his gang of thugs thinks this is speech that should be censored.

Justice Stevens points out Roberts' blatant hypocrisy in his dissent, and TalkLeft covers this nicely, no need to repeat here. What's scary is Slappy Thomas' concurring opinion:

In my view, petitioners could prevail for a much simpler reason: As originally understood, the Constitution does not afford students a right to free speech in public schools.

So Thomas thinks students have no free speech rights. I'd love to see a biology teacher who doesn't believe in Creationism test this in the South. When an outraged fundigelical student speaks up, let's see if the teacher can throw Thomas in the principal's face and have the student suspended.

And then I woke up.

In a post about Peggy Nooner's latest ramblings inspired by the bottom of the cocktail glass, TS over at Instaputz links to a related post from yet another oddball law perfesser, one Stephen Bainbridge of UCLA. I'll let you follow through to Instaputz if you want to read more about Nooner and her deranged Clinton fantasies, but what caught my eye was the shot TS takes at Perfesser Bainbridge:

Hey, I heard Rowling's got a new book out! Let's hope it's not as venomously anti-American as the last one, eh Steve?

OK, so that piqued my curiosity. Rowling anti-American? I'll admit you draw some comparisons between OOtP's Ministry of Magic and the Bush Administration, but they're pretty broad comparisons. So, let's see what this guy's beef was:

More to the point, however, I can't help wondering whether J. K. Rowling is as anti-American as the evidence seems to suggest. Consider page one of book six, for example, in which the Prime Minister is waiting for a telephone call from a President of an unnamed "far off country" whom the Prime Minister regards as a "wretched man." Three guesses which President she had in mind.

Well, Steve, for openers, one can think Bush is "wretched" and not be anti-American. I guess you don't teach Constitutional Law at UCLA. But it gets sillier:

Just so, there's a American dog in Harry's world that doesn't bark. In Harry Potter's world, there are no Americans. Uncle Vernon doesn't have business deals with Americans. The United States doesn't seem to compete in Quidditch world competitions. There are no American exchange students at Hogwarts. And so on. hence, I speculate, the absence of references to the US is the curious incident in the night. (I'm told by true addicts fans that at least one of the ancillary books refers to American wizards, but I don't recall any references in the main canonical books.

I guess this ass didn't read "Goblet of Fire," where there was an American contingent at the Quidditch World Cup. Dumbass.

As for Quidditch itself, let's face it, the US does not fare all that well in World Cup soccer competitions. Since English football appears to be the (loose) organizational model for Quidditch, it would require a greater suspension of disbelief to include the US in the World Cup final.

Asshattery!

Creating a new persona for yourself in Second Life is all the rage these days. Looks like the gubmint thinks virtual worlds have potential as well, to simulate real-life world events, crises, and disasters. They call the system Sentient World Simulation:

The DOD is developing a parallel to Planet Earth, with billions of individual "nodes" to reflect every man, woman, and child this side of the dividing line between reality and AR.

Called the Sentient World Simulation (SWS), it will be a "synthetic mirror of the real world with automated continuous calibration with respect to current real-world information", according to a concept paper for the project.

"SWS provides an environment for testing Psychological Operations (PSYOP)," the paper reads, so that military leaders can "develop and test multiple courses of action to anticipate and shape behaviors of adversaries, neutrals, and partners".

SWS also replicates financial institutions, utilities, media outlets, and street corner shops. By applying theories of economics and human psychology, its developers believe they can predict how individuals and mobs will respond to various stressors.

What's concerning about this is where they'll get the data to accomplish such simulations. The article says that the DoD already has granularity down to the individual for the US Army. That makes sense, given how much personal information one has to give up to join the military. The Army can now use SWS to identify potential recruits.

But I'm a fat, 48-year old liberal. A lot about me is in the public domain, but a lot isn't. There's no way the DoD will ever get my permission to use detailed data about me in such a simulation system. That fact isn't going to stop them, however.

Which begs the question, from where will they steal it?

Let me say at the start that I'm a huge Glenn Greenwald fan. His blog on Salon is #2 on my list of Things To Read each day. (Dr. Black's #1, but that's mainly because he's become more of a meta-site, and he invariably points me to Greenwald's daily thoughts.) I just ordered Glenn's new book, A Tragic Legacy, which he discusses in a blog entry yesterday.

Greenwald considers references to Bush's religious beliefs to be "ancillary" to the main themes of his book. He goes on to explain this by saying:

(a) By all accounts -- including his own -- George Bush had a severe addiction to alcohol for many years. Yet he was able, suddenly and with great resolution, to conquer his alcoholism and give up drinking entirely. At the same time, he transformed his life quite fundamentally -- from a carousing drunken hedonist into someone who, again by all accounts, began attending church very frequently and focusing on his businesses and career (usually with very little success, but his priorities nonetheless clearly changed). Whatever you think of George Bush, however many insulting adjectives you want to hurl at him, those are just facts.

I disagree strongly with Greenwald that Bush's "conquest" of alcoholism is a "fact." All we know for a fact about Bush and alcoholism are two things: First, it's clear that he is indeed an alcoholic. Empirical evidence and his own admissions support this. Second, he appears to have stopped drinking at public functions. I have a problem with logically extending his public behavior to what happens in private, either in the White House, or at his home in Texas. Bush's inner circle have been so protective of him that there's no way to be sure that he has indeed stopped drinking.

Greenwald goes on to say, "People do not easily overcome severe addictions like alcoholism and change their lives." Again, where is the evidence Bush has "overcome" anything? One of the crucial tenets of Alcholics Anonymous is that one can never be "cured" of alcoholism. That's why an alcoholic who speaks at an AA meeting introduces themself, "I'm XXX, and I'm an alcoholic." Greenwald makes a huge leap in logic here, that Bush has used going to church, consulting with ministers, and "evangelical fervor" to change his life. He asks, "So, if he is not really religious, what accounts for the fundamental changes he made to his life?"

What fundamental changes? He's flipped the bird at TV cameras. He's taken more days off than any other president in history (including Reagan, who got shot). He needed to be wired with an earpiece to put on a coherent performance at presidential debates. His history of drug use/abuse has never been fully explained. Further, many argue that Bush exhibits the classic symptoms of a "dry drunk."

Is all this a big deal? In spite of this disagreement I'm having with Greenwald's thoughts on Bush the Alcoholic, I'm still confident I'll enjoy his book. What concerns me is the lack of critical thinking and discussion the Left Blogosphere has on these subjects. If you stroll over to Media Matters and do a search on "Jeff Gerth," you find 81 posts on their site debunking "Her Way," Gerth's attack monograph focusing on Hillary Clinton (written with Don Van Natta, Jr.) The expanding mushroom cloud that originates from Media Matters spreads out to every corner of the blogosphere.

As it should, Gerth is a hack and his "work" should be debunked and mocked. When those on the right attack Greenwald, however, are we being totally honest with ourselves when we come to his defense?

To sum this up, an anonymous commenter to Greenwald makes a valid point:

Honesty is the core value of sobriety, and Bush has not been honest with us. This is what makes me wonder if he is honest with himself. The saying "To Thine Own Self Be True" means being honest with one's self. To me, that means taking an objective look at my actions and the underlying motives and the outcome of those actions. I just don't see Bush doing that at this point in time.

Greenwald so totally misses this point that it jeopardizes his entire thesis. Why isn't this discussed while we promote sales of his book?

The day before landfall, out in San Diego:

The infamous speech a week later:

Since he did such a "heckuvajob," it begs the question:

and his usual response is:

...even if the district attorney has decided to not press charges. I'm trying to figure out how this is wiretapping:

Kelly, 18, of Carlisle, was arrested on a felony wiretapping charge, with a penalty of up to 7 years in state prison. His camera and film were seized by police during the May 24 stop, he said, and he spent 26 hours in Cumberland County Prison until his mother posted her house as security for his $2,500 bail. Kelly is charged under a state law that bars the intentional interception or recording of anyone's oral conversation without their consent. ... Kelly said his friend was cited for speeding and because his truck's bumper was too low. He said he held the camera in plain view and turned it on when the officer yelled at his pal.

I've got two problems with this use of a wiretapping statue. First, in general terms. Wiretapping laws are designed as protections to privacy. If a traffic stop is taking place on a public street, where is the expectation of privacy?

This reminds me of an incident back in the 80s involving the old Mississippi River Bridge Authority Police. By way of background, we used to call these guys "Bridge Pigs," and they were the only police officers I've ever called "pig." The reason for that was simple, they really were pigs. One night, a WDSU-TV news crew videotaped a couple of bridge pigs beating the crap out of a guy they stopped for a traffic violation. They not only ordered the crew to stop taping, they started beating the crap out of the cameraman! I can't think of any circumstance other than undercover operations where sunshine on police activities is a bad thing.

My second issue with this PA case is that the cops had their cameras running! There appears to be an exception in the PA wiretapping law for police videotaping traffic stops.

If you read the article, the cases cited really muddy the waters. In the other cases, wiretapping charges were dropped because the cops had the accused on other charges. When the case involves parties to divorce proceedings, they've been allowed to plead out to lesser charges. Makes sense, if you've got other legal actions pending, you don't need this to deal with as well.

At least the Cumberland County DA has more sense than his cops do, refusing the charges and setting a firm policy:

When police are audio- and video-recording traffic stops with notice to the subjects, similar actions by citizens, even if done in secret, will not result in criminal charges," Freed said yesterday. "I intend to communicate this decision to all police agencies within the county so that officers on the street are better-prepared to handle a similar situation should it arise again."

I'd like to think that this was a situation where the lawmakers in PA intended to pass legislation to deal with amateur private investigators in divorce cases and such, but the mention of a specific exemption for cops making traffic stops makes me wonder. In this age where our civil liberties are under assault from the Cheney administration, every action that favors law enforcement at the expense of citizens' rights must be scrutinized.

via /.

via dark_christian comes this gem:

A South Carolina library system has closed down its summer programs for young adults after receiving threats and allegations that it was trying to promote "witchcraft" and "drug use."

The Pickens County Library System’s half-hour summer programs for middle and high school students were supposed to take a light-hearted look at the topics "Secrets and Spies: How to Keep a Secret by Writing in Code or Making Invisible Ink" and "What’s Your Sign?" Another program was to examine astrology, palmistry, and numerology; and others were to feature tarot cards, tie-dying t-shirts, how to make a Zen garden, and yoga.

Now the programs are cancelled in the wake of phone and e-mail threats from the community, believed to emanate from a single local Baptist church. The astrology program was labeled as "witchcraft" by callers, while the Zen garden and yoga programs were objected to as "promoting other religions." The t-shirts workshop? "Promotes the hippie culture and drug use," callers said.

Seriously, let's just let South Carolina become Jesusland. They can't bomb Fort Sumpter again, and any group of people who would call in bomb threats to a library during summer reading hours is just sick. These poeple have no respect for basic human decency, much less for their god and the US Constitution.

...and Amanda is upset, rightly so, that CBS and Fox won't run the ad. It's kinda neat, since most of us men are pigs anyway:

The problem with the ad as far as the networks are concerned? It doesn't emphasize disease prevention enough. If the focus of a contraceptive ad is pregnancy prevention, all the fundigelicals get lit up.

Where Amanda gets it wrong is the motivation for keeping an ad like this off the air:

The good news is that the gloves are off. The networks are cowering because they’re scared to death of anti-choicers writing in and bitching about the idea that sluts should escape their due punishment for having sex. Make no mistake, this is not about the fetuses. Not even the most crazy anti-choicer can convince himself that condoms kill babies. The idea of preventing unwanted pregnancy—and therefore preventing abortion, actually—is the source of the angst. Once more with feeling: It’s not about the babies, it’s about punishing women for having sex.

Most of this is true, but Amanda's conclusion is that it's OK for men to have sex, but not for women. The idea that it's OK for a man to use a condom to avoid getting the clap is acceptable, because he's deciding when to have sex. If a woman demands that a man use a condom so she doesn't get pregnant, the man's control is out of the picture. This is a classic example of a secularist applying a skewed view to religious folks.

Fundigelicals don't want anyone to have sex. This is a lot bigger than simple misogyny. One of the basic tenets of Christian belief is the notion that we should suffer and sacrifice on earth, so we then get our heavenly rewards. If people are having sex, whether it's straight, gay, or solo, they're not sacrificing. If people are happy on earth, they don't have anything to look forward to in the afterlife. If there's nothing to look forward to, we don't need preachers, ministers, priests and/or pastors to reassure us that things will be better in heaven.

This is one of the reasons why Dominionists are able to fly under the radar: Secular liberals like Marcotte don't see past the more-obvious attack on reproductive rights. This isn't about abortion. The movement behind this is Orwell's "Junior Anti-Sex League." Dominionists need people to be miserable to succeed. Happy people aren't going to be willing to live by Leviticus. If there's a good chance you'll get the clap or worse from having sex, or you'll knock up your girlfriend and totally disrupt your lifestyle, you'll be more hesitant to have sex. If all it takes is a rubber machine in the men's room to remove these obstacles to happiness, nobody in their right mind is going to listen to Father or Pastor on Sunday morning.

There's a certain amount of logic in letting a blogger like Marcotte run with these issues from a strictly secular perspective, but it's important to not lose perspective.

InstaPutz is going back and forth with Altmouse over her comments about onion rings. In round two, Instaputz points readers to this YouTube vid:

i'm still trying to decide if i'm amused or disturbed by this.

...that's because good onion rings are better than sex. I guess Altmouse has only eaten Burger King onion rings during her pitiful stint on this planet this time around, else she wouldn't try to stretch a onion ring comment by Bill Clinton into a sexual reference:

4. Bill says "No onion rings?" and Hillary responds "I'm looking out for ya." Now, the script says onion rings, because that's what the Sopranos were eating in that final scene, but I doubt if any blogger will disagree with my assertion that, coming from Bill Clinton, the "O" of an onion ring is a vagina symbol.

William Jefferson Clinton is a passionate man. He loves life. He loves food. We damn sure know he loves sex. He's a smart guy. Unlike Altmouse, he's not going to confuse an onion ring with a vagina.

Ellenese Brooks-Simms was one of those politicians who just didn't play the "race card." She'd play the entire deck in one sitting. The thing is, the Orleans Parish School Board has been such a hotbed of corrpution and mismanagement that it's hard to swallow the notion that white folks wanted to push out black members like Brooks-Simms simply because the white men wanted the Eebil Colored Children to fail and not get a good education.

Brooks-Simms was doing her best, she'd argue, to do right by the children, to smoke out corruption, and to make the OPSS a better system.

Yeah, right:

Former Orleans Parish School Board president and self-styled corruption fighter Ellenese Brooks-Simms will plead guilty in federal court today to charges that she accepted more than $100,000 in bribes from Mose Jefferson -- the eldest brother of indicted U.S. Rep. William Jefferson -- in exchange for supporting a multi-million dollar math curriculum contract, according to sources close to the case.

Brooks-Simms, 67, will be charged in a bill of information to be filed by U.S. Attorney Jim Letten's office and will cooperate in the probe, her lawyer, Ralph Capitelli, confirmed.

She's a thief who stole from children.

Back during carnival time this winter, we went to a parade in Metairie. I noticed several of the JPSO deputies carrying not only their regular sidearms, but taser guns. Two of these deputies and their rank (a captain) were so obese that I seriously doubt these men would be capable of subduing a drunk female teenager, much less a seriously violent criminal.

Now, I've always had a problem with giving guys fatter and more out of shape than me deadly weapons. Should one of them ever get into a situation where they're forced to choose between running after a bad guy and shooting him, they may pull the weapon way too fast. Those same fat guys now have non-lethal taser weapons. We're talking about guys who can't see their shoes when they look straight down, mind you, so I'm not joking when I say they can't subdue a thirteen year old girl if she struggles.

When I read stories about taser abuse like this one, my thoughts flash back immediately to Carnival in Metairie:

Allen Nelms, 52, was suffering said seizure "during the early morning hours of April 28 when his girlfriend, Josie Edwards, called 911 to request paramedics".

A police officer duly turned up at the house on Waxahachie's east side, "inquired as to what was going on", then called for back-up. Shortly after, and as Nelms was "in his bed in the couple's bedroom", cops "burst in with their guns drawn and yelling at him to get on the floor".

Edwards recalled "about six or seven police officers kicked the front door in and stormed the back bedroom where she said she could hear one telling Nelms to get on the floor". Her statement, which forms part of an written complaint made by Nelms to the Waxahachie police department, says: "Allen was shouting, 'Please don't do me like this. I just need help.' Next thing I heard some 'zing' noise and Allen was shouting. I asked what were they doing to him. One policeman replied, 'We just took care of him.' ... After they did their shooting and laughing, they came out [of] the rooms. The paramedics had to pull out the Tasers."

this is just sick. It's just the sort of thing I can see three fat JPSO deputies having a laugh over.

The worst since 9/11:

Nine firefighters killed in furniture store blaze

CHARLESTON, South Carolina (Reuters) - Nine firefighters died battling a blaze that raced through a furniture store and warehouse in Charleston, South Carolina, on Monday night, triggering a rolling ball of smoke and flames that destroyed the roof and pelted onlookers with hot ash.

The warehouse was packed with furniture and the blaze "rolled through it like a fireball" while the firefighters tried to put it out, said Pam Blevins, secretary to the Charleston city fire chief, Russell Thomas.

"All we know is nine firefighters, all at once ..." Blevins told Reuters by telephone on Tuesday, choking up with emotion. "The building collapsed on them."

The dad of one of Kev's friends is a firefighter, and a bunch of firefighters are regulars at our restaurant. When cops go into harm's way, they usually do it with kevlar vests and drawn guns. When firefighters do their job, they go in with so little protection.

My heart goes out to those families.

You know, I really shouldn't read the things that Antonin "Fat Tony" Scalia says, because then I start thinking that the basic premise of John Grisham's novel The Pelican Brief starts looking more and more attractive.

via dark_christian comes a very compelling story about Don Larsen, a Christian Army chaplain who became a Wiccan, and was dismissed from the chaplains' service as a result.

The community post is entitled "Wiccan chaplain kicked out of Army," which is more than a little inaccurate. If one reads the source article from WaPo, a different tale is told:

Larsen's private crisis of faith might have remained just that, but for one other fateful choice. He decided the religion that best matched his universalist vision was Wicca, a blend of witchcraft, feminism and nature worship that has ancient pagan roots.

On July 6, he applied to become the first Wiccan chaplain in the U.S. armed forces, setting off an extraordinary chain of events. By year's end, his superiors not only denied his request but also withdrew him from Iraq and removed him from the chaplain corps, despite an unblemished service record.

Sounds terrible, huh? If that were the entire story, it might be, but there's more:

Once chaplains are accepted into the military, they are paid, trained and deployed by the government. But they remain subservient to their endorsers, who can cancel their endorsements at any time.

Larsen's "endorser" is the Chaplaincy of Full Gospel Churches, an association of Pentecostal churches located in Dallas. Since Larsen no longer represents that group, they pulled his credentials. According to the WaPo article, churches usually don't pull a chaplain's endorsement immediately, allowing him smoothly transfer to service with another denomination.

Now we get to the crux of the problem. Had Larsen switched from a Pentecostal denomination to say, SBC or Catholic, no biggie, both of those are recognized by the Pentagon. Wicca is a different story--there are currently no Wiccan chaplains. Prejudice got the better of Full Gospel Churches, and there is no Wiccan church with ties to the military to step in and take up Larsen's cause.

So, why no Wiccan chaplains? The answer isn't as sinister as you might think. Some stats:

By the Pentagon's count, there are now 1,511 self-identified Wiccans in the Air Force and 354 in the Marines. No figures are available for the much larger Army and Navy. Wiccan groups estimate they have at least 4,000 followers in uniform, but they say many active-duty Wiccans hide their beliefs to avoid ridicule and discrimination.

OK, there are 22 rabbis in uniform to minister to just over 4,000 Jews in the military. But the Jews most likely have no qualms about openly identifying themselves as such. The differences between Wiccan covens, along with pagan/neo-pagan circles, groves, churches, and solitaries make this much more complicated than, say, those Catholics who agree with Vatican II and those who don't. The Catholics would most likely all still go to a Mass said by the closest available priest. Wiccans won't be so easy to motivate. After years of being in the broom closet, military personnel may still prefer to be solitary. They don't rely on the chaplains' service for official assistance, so they don't miss not having one of their own in that position. It's a bit tough to minister to a flock unless that flock comes a bit more out in the open.

Still, it's good that Wiccans are trying to become military chaplains. The chaplains' service in all branches of the military are being overrun with fundigelicals, so anything that stems that tide is a good idea. Will the military continue to block them? No doubt, but the Army is not an institution that accepts change easily. Go read Colonel Charlie Beckwith's book Delta Force if want a taste of Army intransigence. If they can be that unreasonable on the subject of counterterrorism, it should come as no surprise that the Army is acting foolishly on the subject of religion. Like Col. Beckwith, Wiccans need to be patient and tenacious.

So, HM the Queen has knighted author Salman Rushdie, and predictably, some in the Islamic world are going bananas:

Iran's foreign ministry summoned the UK ambassador in Tehran and said the knighthood was a "provocative act".

Pakistan voiced similar protests, telling the UK envoy in Islamabad the honour showed the British government's "utter lack of sensitivity".

Britain denied that the award was intended to insult Islam.

Sir Salman certainly deserves the honor, just as Sir Paul and Sir Elton did for their music, Sir Alex Ferguson for his contributions to sport, etc. Given how much Sir Salman has cooperated with British security authorities over the years, I've no doubt they see him as one helluva good sport.

Now let me put on my cynic's hat for a moment, though. The rhetoric from Iran is pretty predictable:

"This insulting, suspicious and improper act by the British government is an obvious example of fighting against Islam," Iran's Foreign Ministry Director for Europe, Ebrahim Rahimpour, was quoted as saying by the state-run Irna news agency.

"It has seriously wounded the beliefs of 1.5 billion Muslims and followers of other religions."

Mr Rahimpour added that Iran held the British government and Queen Elizabeth II "responsible for the circumstance of this provocation".

hmmm..."provocation." Britain is "provoking" Iran at a time when BushCo would love nothing better than a solid reason to sink their teeth into Iran. A series of terrorist attacks targeting our staunchest ally would certainly be enough to justify a very strong response by the US government.

You know, the kind of reaction that, oh, say Austria did against Serbia in 1914. Or the US did against Japan in 1941.

Forget the fact that our military is overextended as it is. An openly hostile Iran would be just what George W. "29% Approval Rating" Bush needs to re-create the fall of 2001.

...has always scared the heck out of me. Too many two-lane roads, too many drunk teenagers driving SUVs, too many possibilities for things to go wrong, like falling trees and people driving into you head-on:

Two motorists were killed Monday night after their vehicles collided head-on on U.S. 190 near Northshore Square mall, authorities said.

Roberto Deleon, 40, of Slidell, was driving west at about 11 p.m. when his 2001 Nissan pickup swerved across the center turning lane and into the eastbound lane, striking a 2001 Volkswagen Jetta driven by Lindsey Miramon, 18, also of Slidell. Both drivers had to be extricated from their vehicles by firefighters.

Deleon was pronounced dead at the scene. Miramon was pronounced dead at Slidell Memorial Hospital.

What's really scary is that this accident ocurred on the wide part of the road.

There's a push to have New Orleans host one of the presidential campaign debates next year. Mitch is right that bringing the candidates to New Orleans makes sense:

Louisiana Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu said the committee tries to locate debates in places relevant to the race. He said he couldn't imagine a better place than New Orleans -- not just for questions about disaster response, but transportation, education, health and commerce.

There's no way the Republicans will agree to this, no matter who their nominee is. All any Democratic candidate with a spine has to do is say something like this:

"I'm surprised my opponent had the balls to show up in this city. Unless he is willing to totally repudiate the policies and decisions of the Bush administration with respect to how they've handled New Orleans since Hurrican Katrina's landfall, his presence in this city is offensive and objectionable."

Of course, there isn't a Democrat in the race with those kind of balls. Pity.

Amanda at Pandagon found this vid about "purity balls"

one of the comments the young girl makes is how being homeschooled protects her virginity more than a public school girl.

"doing things that are not right, like kissing."

Great good goddess, kissing? KISSING? This is the shit that really scares me as the father of two boys. The stats are in on this, and these girls just don't "stay pure" as they vow to. They're becoming impure with boys. Parents of boys need to be extremely vigilant, lest we become grandparents before our time. These girls are going to be jumping into backseats of cars absolutely clueless to the consequences.

But the part that so totally weirds me out is the father that "dates" his daughters and the mother that approves!

ew. Just ew.

The implications and issues behind MySpace's decision to cooperate with law enforcement by identifying registered sex offenders who create MySpace profiles are interesting. My initial, knee-jerk-liberal reaction is that privacy wins out here. There are so many people who are listed on "registered sex offender" lists that have no business being there that wholesale cross-referencing scares me.

But then there's the notion of Social Darwinism. MySpace identifies sex offenders to Texas, and look what happens:

In Texas, a total of seven convicted sex offenders have been taken into custody. Six were registered sex offenders, arrested for parole violation. All six had MySpace profiles, despite the terms of their probation barring them from using the internet.

A seventh man was arrested for failing to register as an offender after his profile turned up on the social networking site.

None of the six men arrested has been charged with any new sexual offences, but between them have convictions ranging from aggravated sexual assault, to molestation of a child, and indecency with a child by exposure. The youngest victim was just four.