If it quacks like a duck... A Supreme Court justice going duck hunting with the Veep while there's a case against Cheney pending just might be -ahem- a conflict of interest perhaps?
You just gotta marvel at Europeans being... well, so European. Their official anthem now has a hip-hop remix.
The Washington Post exposes the many fuck ups committed by Army investigators in the Yee and Halabi cases. The Justice for New Americans organization has a press archive.
Copyrights were intended to foster creativity by allowing content creators to profit from their work. It's becoming too much of a good thing. More from the copyleft movement.
Dick Cheney's speech at the World Economic Forum was articulate and on point (as far as White House priorities are concerned). Too bad the other bigwigs there actually wanted to address economic problems than sit through another lecture on terrorism.
Schlick dug up a pretty erudite list of 50 essential books for anyone who wants to be a military historian.
Is this how Bob Novak keeps getting his scoops? Senate Republicans admit stealing files from Senate Democratic computers. Guess they learned nothing from Watergate.
90 years after the fact, nobody can say definitively who killed the Red Baron, Germany's most infamous WWI flying ace.
You gotta believe! Even a flunky of the conservative New York Post has to give Bubba props as one of America's articulate elder statesmen.
Right now, Bruce Ratner, Lewis Katz, Alan Landis, and Raymond Chambers are the most hated men in New Jersey. Why? For selling out hometown Nets fans in exchange for a cushy skybox in Brooklyn. Look, Brooklyn, the Dodgers are gone, and at least you've got the Cyclones. You think using eminent domain and city subsidies to bring the Nets over will leave anyone besides Ratner better off? I've got a monorail or maybe a bridge to sell you. Complete coverage from The Star-Ledger.
Holy cow! I thought the Chinese and the American Indians were efficient in using every last scrap of an animal carcass, but modern technology has really invented the cash cow.
Unlike some of the folks who troll Eschaton (check his blog comments), I managed to stomach most of the State of the Union. OK so I had the sound turned way low so as not to hurt my ears. Nothing more than the same shrubbery we've heard since 2001. To think that Bush is supposed to have experienced, pragmatic people running his show. First it was the "Axis of Evil" crap, then 16 words on African yellowcake. Now it's marriage on steroids? Bleh.
-In the great American economy, there are those who are visible - corporate titans and such. And then there are those who actually generate the wealth for those moguls, some getting less back than they put in. More on what else is wrong with America.
VX is probably the most potent nerve agent ever developed by the US Army. Thankfully, none has been produced in the US since the Nixon administration, but tons of it are still around. Now the Army wants to ship inert VX to New Jersey for final disposal. All together now, NIMBY!!!
Maybe it was the sight of Brandi Chastain ripping off her jersey after the US won the women's World Cup in '99. Whatever it is, FIFA head Sepp Blatter wants female soccer players to show more skin.
Meet Chris Lehane, the hatchet man deep inside the Clark campaign.
How'd ya like them apples? The Straight Dope reports on the life of the real Johnny Appleseed.
Yet another article on the precarious situation facing low-income students who want a college education. The problem isn't necessarily tuition hikes, it's the federal and state system of financial aid and savings plans.
When convicts are released from prison, one would think that they're now fit to rejoin society with all the associated rights and privileges. But what of the franchise?
Enter the Clintonistas. Now out of government for the most part, former members of Clinton's Cabinet and White House staff have flocked to the Democratic 8.
Speaking of the economy, all that news of growth may mean nothing in the long term if the federal deficit doesn't come back down from the stratosphere.
Coolness! Labor and enviros come together to form the Apollo Alliance to push for sustainable energy! Finally, labor is realizing that green policies don't have to mean job cuts.
In matters of higher education, the measure of a student isn't academics or "well-roundedness". It's still where mommy and daddy went and how much they gave to the alumni fund.
How the other half lives. Far away from the "gold-rush" markets of Shanghai, Beijing, and Guangdong, China's northeast rustbelt is sagging under the weight of its own Communist legacy. China's government will soon launch a major investment drive to pump capital into the region, which has the country's highest unemployment rate. How? Fuzzy "creative accounting" from the big 4 state-owned banks, as usual. By now, even Beijing apparatchiks realize that the banks badly need to restructure bad loans written to finance previous major investment drives, and to stop using banks to finance corrupt political posturing. But these Enron-like changes in the banks' capitalization are still merely cosmetic and will only delay the inevitable choice. China's banks must genuinely reform or they'll drag the rest of the economy down with them.
Monday is Martin Luther King Day. It'll be the first MLK Day that I don't have the day off probably since Kindergarten. Damn.
Also, Monday night, January 19, is the premiere of Court TV's Chasing Freedom docudrama about the work of the Lawyers' Committee for Human Rights and the plight of asylum-seekers who are locked up indefinitely, for sometimes arbitrary reasons, by Homeland Security. Lotsa good stuff on the LCHR website.
Howard Dean has won his first election of this election cycle. Which has me wondering... Dean's support is still high in Iowa and New Hampshire even though he chose to participate in the non-binding DC primary. So doesn't that pretty much blow an Enron-sized hole in the argument by Kerry, Edwards, Gephardt, Clark, and Lieberman? They stayed away from DC cuz they didn't want to look like they weren't supporting Iowa's and New Hampshire's traditional roles of having the first primary/caucus. Cowards.
Subarus have an image that resonates with the latte-sipping, tech-savvy, eco-conscious crowd that would probably vote for Howard Dean. Too bad the new Subaru Outback is a step back on fuel emissions.
It's BACK! New episodes of Family Guy may soon air on Fox or Cartoon Network, or both! Seth MacFarlane on the good news. "VICTORY IS MINE!"
If it's too much for Dubya to answer 20 questions, perhaps he can answer a measly 5? C'mon, Mr. President. Even someone as knuckleheaded as you should be able to do this.
For kids who grew up in New Jersey, Long Island, and Westchester County, New York City is a magnet of "adult" experiences. Maybe this is why I insisted on going to college in the city and why I'm still drawn to it...
-This year's GOP convention might have promised to be a little less mind-numbingly boring if only Dubya had to run in a primary. Thankfully, New Hampshire Republicans aren't gonna let him off that easily.
-Iraqis can file grievances for wrongful death, destroyed property, etc. with the parent state of whatever coalition unit did the damage. Except that coalition forces have immunity from local due process.
The latest Brandt Travel Guide has a section on visiting North Korea. Little does John Fund know, however, that one can find plenty on the DPRK from the Pyongyang Metro website and of course Kim Jong-Il's blog. =P
Are you Asian, Arab, Black, or Hispanic? Been dissed by A&F lately? Join the club.
Mayor Mike "I live here too" Bloomberg sounds like a new man in his State of the City address.
With the repeal of anti-Asian, particularly anti-Chinese, immigration laws in the 1960's, Mandarin usage by new mainland and Taiwanese immigrants is poised to dethrone the traditional Cantonese strongholds of Chinese-American society.
Hey Arnold! California's new budget depends on a mammoth $15 billion bond issue that voters gotta approve. Plus, the "Governator" adopts Davis-esque tactics to help shore up finances.
Cool! Everyone's favorite fat cat Garfield is gonna be in a live action movie coming out in June, starring Bill Murray! =P
Some guardians of literary respectability decry the colon cancer that's seeped into the titling of academic books. Speaking of punctuation, Eats, Shoots & Leaves is the sleeper bestseller of the season.
Eliot Spitzer wants to be the next governor of New York. He also wants to revitalize the state's Democratic Party. And he's taking no chances with either task.
When an oil tanker goes down, causing a spill, who can be held responsible? What a naive question...
I've had to read Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War for 2 different, but related, classes in college. Both focused on the Athenians' use of their power, one couse on Athens' hubris and the other on Athens' realpolitik.
Operator: "Thank you for calling Pizza Hut. May I have your..."
Customer: "Hi, I'd like to order."
Operator: "May I have your NIDN first, sir?"
Customer: "My National ID Number, yeah, hold on, eh, it's 6102049998-45-54610."
Operator: "Thank you, Mr. Sheehan. I see you live at 1742 Meadowland Drive, and the phone number's 494-2366. Your office number over at Lincoln Insurance is 745-2302 and your cell number's 266-2566. Which number are you calling from, sir?"
Customer: "Huh? I'm at home. Where d'ya get all this information?"
Operator: "We're wired into the system, sir."
Customer: (Sighs) "Oh, well, I'd like to order a couple of your All-Meat Special pizzas..."
Operator: "I don't think that's a good idea, sir."
Customer: "Whaddya mean?"
Operator: "Sir, your medical records indicate that you've got very high blood pressure and extremely high cholesterol. Your National Health care provider won't allow such an unhealthy choice."
Customer: "Damn. What do you recommend, then?"
Operator: "You might try our low-fat Soybean Yogurt Pizza. I'm sure you'll like it"
Customer: "What makes you think I'd like something like that?"
Operator: "Well, you checked out 'Gourmet Soybean Recipes' from your local library last week, sir. That's why I made the suggestion."
Customer: "All right, all right. Give me two family-sized ones, then. What's the damage?"
Operator: "That should be plenty for you, your wife and your four kids, sir. The 'damage,' as you put it, heh, heh, comes $49.99."
Customer: "Lemme give you my credit card number."
Operator: "I'm sorry sir, but I'm afraid you'll have to pay in cash. Your credit card balance is over its limit."
Customer: "I'll run over to the ATM and get some cash before your driver gets here."
Operator: "That won't work either, sir. Your checking account's overdrawn."
Customer: "Never mind. Just send the pizzas. I'll have the cash! ready. How long will it take?"
Operator: "We're running a little behind, sir. It'll be about 45 minutes, sir. If you're in a hurry you might want to pick 'em up while you're out getting the cash, but carrying pizzas on a motorcycle can be a little awkward."
Customer: "How the hell do you know I'm riding a bike?"
Operator: "It says here you're in arrears on your car payments, so your car got repo'ed. But your Harley's paid up, so I just assumed that you'd be using it."
Customer: "@#%/$@&?#!"
Operator: "I'd advise watching your language, sir. You've already got a July 2006 conviction for cussing out a cop."
Customer: (Speechless)
Operator: "Will there be anything else, sir?"
Customer: "No, nothing. oh, yeah, don't forget the two free liters of Coke your ad says I get with the pizzas."
Operator: "I'm sorry sir, but our ad's exclusionary clause prevents us from offering free soda to diabetics."
The No Child Left Behind Act was supposed to implement national accountabilty standards for public schools. Riiiiiiiiiight.
"Why do you want to buy Chinese banks — what makes you think these guys will do anything any differently in the next four years?" More on China's banking house of cards.
Yolk Magazine is just the latest Asian-American rag to bite the dust. Why is it so hard for English-language pan-Asian-American media to reach critical mass? Erg.
This is cool, and deeply sobering at the same time. The idea that the US had 50 years of "peacetime" from the end of World War 2 to the current "War on Terror", with the execptions of Korea, Vietnam, and Persian Gulf 1, is really a fallacy. The US has been, at least peripherally, involved in some way with all of these conflicts. Arms sales, diplomatic cover for autocratic regimes, "advisors", even direct engagement. Orwell said it best. "We are at war with Eurasia, we have always been at war with Eurasia.."
Live from Mordor, it's MC Smeagol! I downloaded this a while back just before Return of the King came out. It's a Flash music video of Gollum being all gangsta up in this Middle Earth 'hood. Featuring Sauron the Dark Lord! =)
