Civil Liberties

Kim du Toit notes that the Justice Department wants to build a DNA data base of anyone "arrested, facing charges, or convicted" who gets their fingerprints taken.

Like Kim, I can see compelling convicted felons to give up DNA samples, but to compel it for every person arrested?

So if you get pulled over for speeding, and refuse to give a breathalyzer sample, that's reason to put you permanently in the DNA database. Or how 'bout this, you get arrested because an officer thinks you are someone else. I worried about this once, a buddy of mine and I got pulled over and surrounded by three squad cars, because he was driving a "black SUV" and I matched the description of one of a pair of guys in a "black SUV" that had been doing break-ins that morning. (After the officers looked at our ID, they gave it back and apologized, saying that we were way to old to be the perps.) And of course, your local DA would never issue an arrest warrant for somebody based on flimsy evidence (sudden cough that sounds like "Nifong!").

This is a bad bad idea.

Here is the contact info, where you should let them know, politely that this is unconscionable.

DATES: Written comments must be submitted on or before May 19, 2008.

ADDRESSES: Comments may be mailed to
David J. Karp, Senior Counsel,
Office of Legal Policy, Room 4509, Main Justice Building,
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW.,
Washington, DC 20530.


To ensure proper handling, please reference OAG Docket No. 119 on your correspondence.
You may submit comments electronically or view an electronic version of this proposed rule at http://www.regulations.gov.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: David J. Karp, Senior Counsel, Office of Legal Policy. Telephone: (202) 514-3273.

Thanks Kim!

But remember, the worst threat to our civil liberties is the evile Bush Administration tapping the cell phones of terrorists...

UPDATE:Bioephemera notes that GINA, the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act passed the Senate unanimously. More at Scientific American. So write to your Senators and Congresspersons, they may actually be in the mood to deal with stuff like this appropriately.

'NETFEED/ART: Artistic Suicide Challenge
(visual: Bigger X at Toronto arraignment)
VO: A guerrilla artist known only as No-1 has challenged the better-known forced involvement artist Bigger X to a suicide competition. No-1’s broadside against Bigger X, which calls him a “poseur” because “he only works with other people’s deaths,” suggests a suicide competition between the two artists, to be broadcast live by “artOWNartWONartNOW.” The one with the most artistically interesting suicide would be judged the winner, even though he or she would not be around to collect the prize. Bigger X, who is wanted by the police for questioning in a Philadelphia bombing, has not been available for comment, but ZZZCrax of “artOWNartWONartNOW” called it “an intriguing story.” '

[Fictional news blurb from the beginning of chapter 21 of “Mountain of Black Glass” copyright 1999, by Tad Williams (Volume Three of “Otherland”, a four volume SciFi novel).]

There has been a lot of commentary about the Aliza Shvarts/Yale Shock Art Thesis incident. Roger Kimball has an essay well worth reading, Yale, Abortion, and the Limits of Art. There is another piece at The American Digest. The Volokh Conspiracy has an excellent post on Yale's attempt to close the barn door after the horse left.

One thing in the comments section on that last really struck me. "Dre", responding to an earlier commenter, posted the following;

"I think this Yale thing is terrific. The artist's work has provoked wild-ass reactions all over the place, just as much of our art must do. "

It is only a short distance to this:

Karlheinz Stockhausen on the 9/11 attacks: “What happened there is—they all have to rearrange their brains now—is the greatest work of art ever. . . That characters can bring about in one act what we in music cannot dream of, that people practice madly for 10 years, completely, fanatically, for a concert and then died. That is the greatest work of art for the whole cosmos. . . I could not do that. Against that, we composers are nothing.”
http://www.bilkent.edu.tr/~jast/Number14/Minor.htm "

The passage at the top of this post is from a science fiction book written in 1999, but is a follow-up on a passage in an earlier volume of the series (I think volume one, [I'm not sure, I lent it out] City of Golden Shadow released in hardback in 1996) where Bigger X causes a car wreck with fatalities as a type of "forced involvement" performance art. This fiction predates the Stockhausen quote by at least five years.

The nihilistic direction of modern performance art (and the avant guard in general) has been easy to predict for a long time. That knowledge has in fact been a part of the popular culture.

Too bad that the artists haven't noticed it. It tends to put the lie to their "groundbreaking" and "transgressiveness" if everyone can see it coming.

Saddam Supported At Least Two Al-Qaeda Groups: Pentagon Report

When the mainstream media reported earlier that "Report Shows No Link Between Saddam and Al Qaeda" were they reading the same Pentagon report as everyone else?


How can you tell when a Network News reporter is lying? Their lips are moving.

Another of the Infinite Number of Reasons Why We Home-School

Student Suspended For Buying Skittles In School

Lets think about this... we'll ruin the school record of a kid, who looks to be pretty bright (honor student, class vice president), negatively impact his chances of getting into top colleges (maybe even impact his chances of getting scholarships), thus potentially lessening his potential career options and/or earning potential...

...all for a bag of skittles.

You know, I don't like Tort lawyers, they're pretty much all vultures and ambulance chasers in my book. But if somebody puts together a class action suit against all these draconian, zero-tolerance, all-kids-must-be-punished bureaucrats, I will stand up and cheer!

"If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons." - Winston Churchill

Snow in Bagdad, First Time in Living Memory

The Far Left gets stuck in an infinite loop as they can't choose between blaming the administration's Iraq War policy or Anthropomorphic Global Warming.




Al Gore was found stationary in a corridor, staring blankly ahead muttering, "global bushing... george warming... global bushing...."

Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't

Charles Johnson put up a quote of Euripides last night, Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.

That quote put me in mind of two verses from the Book of Proverbs.

Proverbs 26:4-5

4 Do not answer a fool according to his folly,
or you will be like him yourself.

5 Answer a fool according to his folly,
or he will be wise in his own eyes.

This is as close as the Bible comes to saying that, in dealing with the folly of men, there are indeed "No-Win" situations.

I am tempted to make snarky remarks about politics, but I will refrain.... (No you didn't! ed.)

Can the Press Actually Think and Do Their Jobs?

Watching the 10:00 News, and they are covering Oprah's backing of Mr. Obama.

Some reporter goes out on the street and asks a woman (only person interviewed, gee, no stereotyping or sexist thinking here) if Oprah can "tell her" how to vote.

Oprah is endorsing a candidate. She's not commanding anyone how to vote! There are candidates I like. If I share that with people, does the press think I'm telling them how to vote? Does the press think that Oprah has some strange magical compulsion over the people who watch her show? What kind of idiot asks such a gotcha question thinking that they are going to reveal some sort of truth by it?

I don't agree with Oprah, but after watching the news, I feel I have to defend her.



Well, that's one upside to the corruption and ineptitude of the press. It creates bipartisanship!

UPDATE: image added

UPDATE: scroll to bottom of post.

The State of Massachusetts Cares For You, So Get Insurance, Or Else!

Just got a postcard from my wonderful state, the Peoples Republic of Massachusetts.

"ACT NOW TO AVOID TAX PENALTIES!

"The Health Care Reform Law requires most Massachusetts residents age 18 or older to have health insurance. To avoid a penalty of $219 per individual when you file your 2007 Massachusetts income tax return, you must have health coverage by the end of the year. You should enroll in a health plan by November 15th to make sure you do not miss this important deadline. (emphasis in the original ed.)

"The penalty for being uninsured will increase significantly in 2008, accumulating each month you do not have health coverage....

"...The time to act is now!

"If you already have health coverage, please disregard this notice."



Thank you RomneyCare! Remember, there are poor people without health insurance. We need to take care of them by threatening to take their money if they don't do as the wise and benificent state decrees.

It's for the children!

Women and minorities hardest hit!

Insert inane bureaucratic trope here!

I hope Thompson or Giuliani gets the nod, ‘cause I ain’t voting for Romney. He’s Hillary with better hair.

UPDATE: OK, I admit, that last isn't fair. Mr. Romney is (IMHO) vastly more honest, and much more personable that Hillary. He is very politically opportunistic, and he is certainly not what I would consider conservative. He did saddle us with "universal health care". What bothers me the most is the mindset that criminalizes non-compliance.

The first thing I look for when considering a new home is the existence of home owners associations and historic districts.

This is why.

My wife and I want to get out of the People's Republic of Kennedy-Kerry-Catsup.
Badly.
Communities that prevent me from doing reasonable improvements to a house WILL NOT GET MY TAX DOLLARS OR INVESTMENT.


Sorry to shout....

I grew up in a 250 year old post and beam New England farmhouse. In order to heat it (in the middle of the woods with no winter road access for at least a half a mile) my dad used coal and wood. I love old houses, and if I get to buy one, my hope is to return it to its original glory in as practical a manner as possible. 17th or 18th century drafts and entrances for mice and other vermin, as well as smoke and soot belching heating systems are right out.

I'm sorry. If you want to legislate moral behavior, you gotta choose between saving the world from pollution and anthropogenic global warming or keeping your neighborhood a perfect example of 18th century building techniques. You're not going to get both.

Many zoning regulations end up being anti-home owner. You add "historic preservation" and homeowners associations on top of that, and you have (a not very) soft totalitarianism.

No, I don't want a strip mall or a strip joint right next to my house. I don't blame anyone for fighting those in an established residential only neighborhood.

However, I don't want drafty windows and the constant smell of burning oil or sulfur either.



Somebody go out and slap these people, please!

Predictable

Just watched the second episode of "Simon Shama's Power of Art" on PBS. This episode was about Picasso. In talking about the painting "Guernica", Mr. Shama couldn't resist sniping against the Iraq war.



He related how a copy of Guernica, arguably Picasso's greatest masterpiece, was covered up during the press conference after the US made its case before the UN that force should be used to overthrow Saddam. The reason being that the painting would have been "too disturbing." (It actually sounded to both my wife and I that Mr. Sharma blamed the press corps for this request.)
Mr. Sharma finished up with something to the tune of, you may be the greatest power in the world, capable of toppling dictators, but don't mess with great art. (paraphrased, ed.)



I don't know, but maybe somebody from the US delegation should have asked that it stay uncovered...





...I think the Kurds of Halabja would have thought it an entirely appropriate backdrop to an announcement of the plans to topple the fascist who had killed them.

Idiot Science

Channel 4 in Boston just did a piece on how the government is talking about intervening to force gas stations to monitor the temperature of gasoline, because gasoline (like just about anything) expands when it gets warmer. So the government is worried that consumers are getting ripped off because hot, expanded gas contains less energy per gallon.

Somebody must do something to stop the madness!


Oh, wait...gas is stored underground in big tanks where the temperature is pretty much constant.


How do we get idiot bureaucrats to say, "Never mind!?”

WBZ Channel 4 in Boston just announced that Governor Deval Patrick has signed a bill which (starting emediately) will require private developers to calculate the amount of 'greenhouse gasses' that will be released by their construction projects, and provide offsets.

It's not like Massachusetts hasn't put the screws to business enough...now the construction industries are burdened with another bill. Housing costs will go up. Jobs will be lost. More people and businesses will leave the state.



Yep, the Massachusetts Miracle!

What a bunch of yahoos...

UPDATE It appears from this Globe story that this is about major projects. However, I think there will still be some negative economic effects. Also, if by "large scale projects" they include any multiple dwelling construction (if for example a developer is building 5 or more units at a time, or even 10 or 20), there will still be a negative effect on housing costs. I'm not quite as incensed as I was, but we'll wait and see how this plays out.

A serious theatre program at Yale? Not so much

When I graduated with my BA from the Northeastern theatre program in the early 80's, Yale's graduate theatre program was considered to be one of the best. We were very proud that out of our little department (20 something graduates, including all of the disciplines - acting, tech, stage management, design and directing) we sent two people on to Yale, one for directing and one for lighting design.

Now there is this. (Via HotAir.)

"In the wake of Monday’s massacre at Virginia Tech in which a student killed 32 people, Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg has limited the use of stage weapons in theatrical productions.

"Students involved in this weekend’s production of “Red Noses” said they first learned of the new rules on Thursday morning, the same day the show was slated to open. They were subsequently forced to alter many of the scenes by swapping more realistic-looking stage swords for wooden ones, a change that many students said was neither a necessary nor a useful response to the tragedy at Virginia Tech.

...

" 'Red Noses' director Sarah Holdren ’08 said she first heard about the changes in a phone call from a friend as she arrived at the Off-Broadway Theater on Thursday morning. At the theater, technical director Jim Brewczynski told her about the new regulations. The pair then met with Trachtenberg, who initially wanted no stage weapons to be used in the show, (emphasis added,ed.) Holdren said, though she later agreed to permit the use of obviously fake weapons.

...

"Brandon Berger ’10, who plays a swordsman in the show, said the switch to an obviously fake wooden sword has changed the nature of his part from an 'evil, errant knight to a petulant child.' "

Director Holden's money quote, "Here at Yale, sensitivity and political correctness have become censorship in this time of vital need for serious artistic expression.”

You know that PC has destroyed the serious of the Universities when a member of the Humanities is calling it out.

And I have to disagree with young Mr. Berger, the 'petulant child' is not his stage character, it's Dean Trachtenberg. And as for evil, where does this coddling nannyism lead but to this,...as the erosion of intellectual self-defense goes, so goes the erosion of physical self-defense.

the Glenn opines...

...Interestingly, I think that the more Pelosi acts like a wannabe President, the worse it is for Hillary. And I think that Pelosi knows that.

I wonder though, if Pelosi's precocious peregrinations won't be so damaging to the whole Democratic Party that it overcomes any potential intra-party tactical gain the Speaker or her candidate-of-choice may get over Ms. Clinton.

Is it just me, or are both political parties intent on self-immolation?

Now that I've jumped to the defense of an atheist (possibly shocking any readers who think I'm an intolerant Bible-thumping Neanderthal), let me weigh in on the "Pelosi Jet Scandal."

OK, I haven't read every quote on this, and it's possible that Ms. Pelosi's staff (or herself) has made this brouhaha worse by making ill-considered responses (which would only make them akin to any other person who has been verbally attacked), but what the heck is everybody thinking here?

The lady is third in line of succession to the President! What, you want her to fly commercial and be a target for any goon with a box cutter and a messiah complex? You want turn her into a target by sticking her in line at Dulles for two hours waiting to get wanded by the TSA? You want to make all the passengers with her (or on a flight some terrorist imagines her to be on) a target?

The office of the Speaker deserves respect and security. Some say she asked for too extravagant a plane. From what I've been able to read, it sounds more like she just asked for something that could non-stop to the west coast, and somebody lower down inserted a particular model into the discussion, because it was the only thing that they knew that could do it. From all accounts Ms. Pelosi's responses have been very reasonable.

No, I don't like Ms. Pelosi's politics, and I don't agree with her on a wide range of things, but she is the Speaker of the House. She got to that position by the properly working mechanics of our Republic. She deserves the protection that my tax dollars pay for!

For those of you who think I've suddenly converted to the left side of the aisle, that ain't happening. I still have no time for the typical stupidity from the Democratic Party. I have no time for the typical stupidity from the Republican side of the aisle either.

I plain don't have time for stupidity.

Well, this stinks!

"YouTube: ... the Google property has recently banned the popular atheist commentator Nick Gisburne. Gisburne had been posting videos with logical arguments against Christian beliefs; but when he turned his attention to Islam ..., YouTube pulled the plug, saying: 'After being flagged by members of the YouTube community, and reviewed by YouTube staff, the video below has been removed due to its inappropriate nature. Due to your repeated attempts to upload inappropriate videos, your account now been permanently disabled, and your videos have been taken down.' "

Glenn Reynolds notes that Mr. Gisburne is up and running again.

Like another blogger that Mr. Reynolds mentions I find this appalling. To those of you who read here, I obviously don't agree with Mr. Gisburne's views on religion. However, atheism is not an incitement to violence, nor is it pornography. What was done to Mr. Gisburne is censorship, pure and simple.

It would be bad enough if YouTube had pulled his account because he was making atheistic statements. The fact that they caved because of pressure from one partictular imperialistic religion (he was quoting from the Koran, and not adding any commentary) is totally craven.

Mr. Gisburne replys to Google If they can remove MY account (I don't think you can call me the most controversial atheist here!), which atheists are next?

Frankly, the question is not just about atheists, but is who else of us is next?

It has come to this...


...that it is less insulting to the intelligence to watch the Simpsons instead of the Nightly News.

Duke University says, "Come back, all is forgiven!" to Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann

Durham-In-Wonderland has info, and many interesting replies in the comment section.

I generally dislike foul language and the US culture-of-litigation, but if I were Collin Finnerty or Reade Seligmann I would tell Duke a resounding "NO!" probably in foul language, followed up by a defamation suit.

If the anti-culture of the universities is to be overthrown, then Duke needs to be disassembled brick-by-brick by the tort attorneys, until alumni across the nation realize that their credentials are in jeopardy if they don't come down hard on PC-foolishness wherever it rears its ugly head.

Time to break out "the Brothers Grimm"

(via Michelle Malkin)

"Parents could be forced to go to special classes to learn to sing their children nursery rhymes, a minister said.

"Those who fail to read stories or sing to their youngsters threaten their children's future AND THE STATE MUST PUT THEM RIGHT (emphasis mine), Children's Minister Beverley Hughes said."

Another quote from the original article...

"Tony Blair has backed the idea of 'fasbos' - efforts to identify and correct the lives of children who are likely to fail even before they are born - and new laws to compel parents to attend parenting classes are on the way."


The last of the Jane Tennison mysteries Prime Suspect 7 just aired here in the US on PBS. (WARNING, spoiler) In the show, one of the main suspects in the murder of a schoolgirl was a young black man from the wrong side of town. The true murderer was the white daughter of the white Headmaster of the school. Under the thinking behind this law, the first would be permanently marked as a problem from before birth, and the latter would never have been on the radar. Of course, this type of reasoning is not new at all, and is even a central part of the plot of the show. However, carving it in stone and carrying it down from on high does not strike me as progress in Civil-Rights. This is class warfare by the (now true in name and function) Nanny-state.

Anyone still questioning the idea of 'slippery slope?'

I've been mulling a post on John Kerry's appalling statement but I find that there is something much better than what I could have written by Kobayahi Maru.

For anyone reading this who is outside New England, KM gives an excellent view into the Majority Massachusetts Mindset.

The title puts it bluntly, "The Mind of John Kerry -- Second-Rate Clinton Clone."


If you liked Bill, you like John. If you think there is more to the truth than spin and triangulation, then you're not much for either.