Edgewise

Call me a kook

I honestly think the Republicans (again) stole the election. Now I realize that to gain a clear win we had to have a margin that was beyond stealing and failed to do that and the reality is that there will probably never be a consensus that Bush et al. stole two elections, let alone one, but this article reprinted in The Smirking Chimp just reinforces my initial impressions from that ugly night.

But don't worry, go back to the tv or whatever:

I find it reassuring to remember that if any of this had really happened, the Democrats in Congress would be screaming about it. I'd read about it on the front page, and it would be all over the network news. Yes, I can be sure that [evidence discussed at a conference of people sharing evidence that the 2004 presidential election was stolen] was just a bad dream. The reality is that President Bush won the election, and it's time to move on. Time to move on. It was all just a dream. Yes, it's time to move on.

Scott Chacon for Congress

Here's a candidate worth supporting: Chacon 2006 - Join the conversation. Scott is running in California's 11th District, currently represented by the horrible Richard Pombo. Scott is taking only up to $100 from supporters and is running a very open campaign, with a blog and podcasts.

Currently, he's trying to raise money to go to the Personal Democracy Forum conference in New York on May 16 (where I'll be on a panel, I should mention). Also, he did most of the fine-work in turning the East Bay for Democracy website's template into a real-live CivicSpace design.

To put it succintly, he's a mensh.

Mistah Kurtz, he dead

The Poor Man takes the piss out of Stanley Kurtz (Stanley Kurtz Wins the Wankathalon) in such excruciating detail that I'm afraid the feeble old wanker may never recover.

Bush's Proposal: Slow Death for Social Security

The Washington Post spells it out -- Bush's Social Security proposal from last night's press conference is designed to curtail Social Security for all but the poor.

On the surface, a Democrat like me might look at this new proposal and say: what gives? The President's actually looking out for the poor over the rich. But then you have to ask: why? It's just so...un-Bush-like.

Here's one theory. By and large, Americans consistently oppose wealth-redistribution. If Social Security morphs into a clear cut wealth-redistribution plan, support for the program among those who get little or nothing out of it will quickly wither.

So now that Republicans have learned that Americans aren't ready to give up on the program in 2005, how do they kill Social Security over the long-term? A little judo. Turn it into a program that, down the line, the vast majority of voters making over, say, $100K, have a reduced stake in.

It's just a theory. Or maybe I'm being too cynical and GW really does heart the poor.

JC's Unitarian Jihad

RaptorMage noted this on RaptorMagic and it was so perfect, I felt compelled to repost here. Highly recommended.

Even the Oldest Joke May Have Its Day

Dear Mr. Etiquette,

Should carrots and celery be eaten with the fingers?

--No, the fingers should be eaten separately.

The Odds Are Looking Up

"People who are overweight but not obese have a lower risk of death than those of normal weight, federal researchers are reporting today." NYT, 4/20/2005

--I think anything below 100% would be a breakthrough.

You hear it, but what does it say?

I don't know if it comes through, with so little context, but this passage from Xenophon's history is such a sweet example of the imperturbably impenetrable logic of Greek diplomatic style. A Greek army of 10,000 has become trapped, isolated thousands of miles within Persian territory. The Persian king delivers an ultimatum...

"...the king desired us...to inform you that while you remain in this place a truce is to be considered as exist­ing between him and you; but, if you advance or retreat, there is to be war. Give us, therefore, your answer on this point ...."

Clearchus replied, "Report, therefore, on this point..., that our resolution is the same as that of the king."

"And what is that?" said Phalinus.

Clearchus replied, "If we stay here, a truce; but if we retreat or advance, war."

Phalinus again asked him, "Is it a truce or war that I shall report?"

Clearchus again made the same answer: "A truce, if we stay; and if we retreat or advance, war."

I Want These Officers to Live in Terror of the Truth

NYT, 4/11/05 (My italics.)
"...the arresting officer recalled, it took four police officers to haul him down the steps of the New York Public Library and across Fifth Avenue. 'We picked him up and we carried him while he squirmed and screamed,' the officer, Matthew Wohl, testified in December. 'I had one of his legs because he was kicking and refusing to walk on his own.'

"...But one day after Officer Wohl testified, and before the defense called a single witness, the prosecutor abruptly dropped all charges. During a recess, the defense had brought....A videotape...[that] showed Mr. Kyne agitated but plainly walking under his own power down the library steps, contradicting the vivid account of Officer Wohl, who was nowhere to be seen in the pictures. Nor was the officer seen taking part in the arrests of four other people at the library against whom he signed complaints..."

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I want this officer to see years of hard prison time. How much felonious perjury is laid out right here in these paragraphs? How much casual impunity does it imply? A subculture of police-perjury, of life-threatening and career-ending lies by police against innocents arbitrarily accused.

Ironically, this is where hard-line penal deterrence can really change the way the world works--far more effectively than punishment of the destitute and drug-addicted, where deterrence can make a sadly minimal difference to the actual prospects of people's already wounded lives.

Police-perjury is manifestly epidemic in America. To return to the NYT article, as a small indication of the scale:

"For Mr. Kyne and 400 others arrested that week, video recordings provided evidence that they had not committed a crime or that the charges against them could not be proved, according to defense lawyers and prosecutors."

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Little Brother is watching them, and we must all be Little Brother to helpless people who are accused falsely of crimes.

Out of sight, out of mind

In Reason: The Pentagon's Secret Stash: Why we'll never see the second round of Abu Ghraib photos Matt Welch explains how "damage control" has trumped transparency, not that this should surprise anyone.

I guess I should be thankful that any pictures were taken at all and that even some of them got out. I hope that helped the situation, even a little. Gah.

Yikes

That's all. Just: yikes.

Caution: A Joke to Make Your Head Spin!

Based on results of the latest brain-imaging technologies, it turns out the right side of the brain does not control the left side of the body and vice versa.

It only seems that way because, inside the brain-case within the scull, the brain is actually facing backwards! (No fool, that brain.)