It's not the concept that people would BUY this that gets me. Not completely, anyway. It's the idea that he could talk a record company into selling the thing. And as a two CD set, yet. (Why were they recorded in the first place?)
@ 09:17 AM CST [Link]
Well ... it's different, anyway. (Socks? Corn cobs? I just don't know ...)
@ 08:52 AM CST [Link]
"They burnt some of us alive." It was almost the first thing he said to us. In the dust and squalor of a refugee camp, Salahuddin told yesterday how the Taliban burnt an entire family to death in their own home in revenge for the American bombing.
@ 08:23 AM CST [Link]
I see the head of the Department of Justice continues not to have a clue what the word "justice" means. The concept that the federal government would monitor such conversations is abominable, as well as unconstitutional. The idea that it would monitor such conversations and then not report what was said to itself is utterly laughable.
There are already over 1,000 people in custody, most of whom the government admits have nothing to do with anything; most of them were arrested for visa infractions that INS wouldn't even have noticed before. Most have lost jobs, homes, access to friends and family, and now they get to have what's left of their rights eviscerated.
And, of course, the fun part will start when those people are, eventually released -- one assumes that eventually, challenges under the rule of habeas corpus will make their way through the system to someone who recognizes that these detentions are unreasonable on their face. (Besides, the utility of holding innocent people for indefinite amounts of time is fairly limited.) They'll be out and about, but the rule will remain. The rule itself, after all, is quite broad; it's not limited to those who whose arrests had something to do with September 11.
@ 08:17 AM CST [Link]
Well .... that would be a fun thing. Especially at work, during a conversation with your boss, and suddenly your computer starts displaying ads for hardcore porn sites all by itself ... Microsoft does keep trying to hand off market share for its browser, doesn't it? (Oh, and the Microsoft Technet page cited in the article crashes Internet Explorer 5.5. Seriously, it does. You'd think they'd avoid that sort of thing.)
@ 07:59 AM CST [Link]
Teachers warn of occult dangers in Potter movie magic.
Oh, for the love of ... you'd think teachers, of all people, would know better. Nobody's going to get into arcane aspects of the occult who wouldn't have found themselves going there anyway, and Harry Potter is fiction. FICTION, people. Yeesh.
@ 05:32 PM CST [Link]
... there was nothing to smile about when Magic delivered the most important message of his life on Nov. 7, 1991, the day he told the world he was retiring from professional basketball because he had contracted HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. He explained that he likely had done so because of his promiscuous lifestyle as a well-traveled, popular athlete. That the temptations that fell upon him because of his celebrity were too overwhelming to resist. [...] But in a survey of several recent and current NBA players, coaches, and team and league officials by ESPN and ESPN.com, the subject of whether Magic's message is still being heard was not always an agreeable topic. [...] "I would imagine so," was all Portland Trail Blazer forward Shawn Kemp would muster for an answer. Kemp was a subject in a 1998 Sports Illustrated article on professional athletes fathering children out-of-wedlock. In the article, Kemp is said to have had seven children with six different women and had been the subject of at least one paternity suit.
So ... apparently actually hearing that message somehow translates into "boink as many women and father as many children as I can because it won't happen to ME!"
I swear, I don't understand people. Not one bit. How can someone like Kemp hear the ceaseless parade of statistics talking about AIDS roaring through blacks and not understand that, yes, it's possible that these women may be infected, even if they "look" OK. That they may not know until it's too late. (And even if they are uninfected, what sort of idiot runs around fathering children like that just because he can?) That even if they don't get The Big A, there's herpes and all sorts of other nasty things out there that they can't get rid of.
I just don't get it.
@ 05:06 PM CST [Link]
... and music music music. (Actually, the U2 song off their most recent release that strikes me as most apt these days is "Stuck in a moment you can't get out of." However, I take the writer's point.)
@ 01:31 PM CST [Link]
Has United finally gone completely and corporately INSANE? A company you hired fails so spectacularly and publicly that the FAA is threatening to hit you with a major fine ... so you give them MORE responsibility? They're under investigation for violations of federal law -- they've already been fined for violation of various laws -- so you give them MORE to do? What can United be thinking? CAN they be thinking?
(You know, I don't understand why the government doesn't hand airport security to the military. Either that or give states targeted block grants, provide specific training and tell them to give it to the state police. But either way, this subcontracting to private companies paying minimum wage employees MUST end.)
@ 12:29 PM CST [Link]
Well, well, well. I've never been quite so glad to be so thoroughly wrong.
Of course, there's still Houston... but then, there's also Miami Beach. (Miami Beach? Conservative Florida? .... well, you never know, do you?)
@ 12:23 PM CST [Link]
What does your score mean? You seem to have found a balance between absolute asceticism and utter hedonism.
I have? I mean, of COURSE I have!
@ 11:44 AM CST [Link]
Well. This is interesting. Not because Terry Glenn is seeking to sue the NFL, as such, or even for the grounds (although we'll get to that). It's interesting because players never ever EVER sue the NFL using the EEOC or other labor laws.
Many have long held that NFL players should be entitled to, for example, disability compensation because the game itself tends to destroy the body; the disabilities are a clear and direct consequence of playing the game. The problem is that the pension and injured reserve provisions of their contracts tend to bar such suits -- in order to claim later disability, for example, a player would need to file an initial disability claim every time they were injured enough to miss a game or even significant practice time. This would entitle them (eventually -- the process is not swift) to claim workman's compensation ... which would be far less than they get under the injured reserve provisions as negotiated by the NFL Players' Association, and would take so long to wind its way through the system that many players would be in action again by the time their claim was adjudicated. Without an initial workman's compensation claim, in most states, a later disability claim is usually rejected.
All of THAT said ... what on earth does Glenn think he's doing? Why on earth should the team have had to take his chronic depression into account? Not that I'm terribly sympathetic to The Man generally (or NFL team management specifically -- they perpetuate some monstrous abuses against their players, and then facilitate their players' misbehavior), but surely the team is entitled to say, "This is a claim after the event. If he was under treatment for depression, he should have been able to meet his obligation; if he wasn't under treatment, then he shouldn't have been playing anyway. In either case, we were required by the terms of the player contract to take the actions that we did."
It's all about leverage, of course. If the Patriots stand their ground -- and, really, they should -- then Glenn takes them into court for what would be a long, tedious case, win or lose. If they cave, then he gets his money. Of course, at this point, the Patriots are also stuck. Owners are no doubt pressing them to stand their ground; if they give in to Glenn, owners fear that players all over will be making all sorts of claims about why they miss tests or shouldn't have to take them, and so forth. (And, of course, there's the horrendous example to be set if Glenn is actually right.)
@ 01:04 AM CST [Link]
My my my. Seems the old hometown U has gotten itself in quite the kerflaffle.
To be honest, I find the fact that the library dean was placed on administrative leave slightly surprising under the circumstances, but not otherwise worthy of notice; he doesn't sound like the most prudent of individuals. The notable part is this:
[controversial professor Richard Berthold] is currently under investigation by the university for saying "Anyone who can blow up the Pentagon has my vote," on Sept. 11 when terrorists attacked the Pentagon and World Trade Center.
Why would you investigate someone for that? However reprehensible the statement may be, he certainly has the right to say it; he even has the right to say it in front of the class -- I dare say it would be part of the educational experience, if not a particularly desired one (but then, nobody said education is only that which you would want). Moreover, as a state employee, he has near-absolute protection in his right to say it; that part of the Bill of Rights does apply to the states -- however unwise the statement may be, it certainly isn't treason, and the lawsuit will, I hope, be dismissed with prejudice. (Anyone notice that legislators across the country are remarkably unlettered in the law? Does that bother anyone? I'm not saying that legislators should only be lawyers, but shouldn't they at least have a clue?) In any event, the university concedes that the statement is protected speech; almost by definition, protected speech by a state employee cannot constitute professional misconduct. Any action taken by the university against the professor would almost certainly be actionable.
The university president said, "We are, of course, mindful of the First Amendment protection of freedom of speech . . . and the faculty's guidelines for professional conduct in the classroom." Well ... no, they aren't, actually, or none of this would be happening. There can't be any possible circumstance in which faculty guidelines would constitutionally reach what Berthold said in that class; any such guideline would be unconstitutional on its face.
At this rate, I dare say that New Mexico will be joining New Mexico Highlands University on the AAUP list of institutions under investigation, and will be joining a great many institutions on the AAUP censure list -- or, to be more accurate, I expect that list to grow by a great many institutions as war hysteria seizes university administrations and they clamp down on what they consider appropriate for their faculty to say. (To be sure, it's uncertain what effect that would have in the current economy. In a more robust season, it would make it harder to hire; professors understandably prefer to teach somewhere they feel that the administration is less likely to act against them. These days ... won't be long before faculty are grateful to have any job anywhere, even if the AAUP says, "These people are vile scumvermin! We pronounce them under AAUP Interdict! they are considered outcast!" ... which is pretty much what they say about Catholic U, actually, if just a shade more politely; in fact, most of the longtime enduring censures are against parochial institutions, which shouldn't come as any sort of surprise.)
@ 04:57 PM CST [Link]
Hum. I suppose it is easier to worry about human rights in general when you don't have to worry about having a job, being poor, being addicted, being sick and the rest of it. (I will admit to being surprised that recreational facilities was so high on the list; it makes me wonder exactly how many teenagers there were in this sample of people from 14-35.)
It's sad, really. For some reason that I've never understood, everyone seemed to believe that once apartheid was gone, South Africa would suddenly become the economic powerhouse of Africa and all would be well for everyone, ignoring the fact that the people who actually had the economic know-how would flee in droves. (Although that could have been predicted; it's what happened to Zimbabwe, after all, and that country had been through considerably less.)
Instead, you have a country with desperate poverty, in which murder and rape have reached rates that would have produced a police state in this country -- their murder rate is eight times ours, their rape incidence even higher. We worry about having enough teachers because the job is so difficult and underpaid; they worry about having enough teachers because they're all dying in their 30s. As Archbishop Tutu says, South Africa is now being run by "people who, apart from having never voted at all, had no experience of government." That's pretty much a textbook design for a badly run, corrupt government.
The archbishop's idea for an African "Marshall Plan" is lovely ... if unworkable. The problem is, what he seems to want is for the US to dictate nation/state building, as well as expenditures, in all of southern Africa, which we would never do. After all, we've been so wonderfully successful in all our proxy state building attempts: Liberia, the Philippines, various and sundry places south of the border, various and sundry places in Asia ... About the only place we've been what could be called successful at state building was in Japan-- and they at least had had a central nation state before, they had a relatively educated populace, and we were in a position -- however ethical or proper one may consider it -- to say, "This is what you WILL do." We wouldn't be in that position in southern Africa. (That said, things are so bad in southern Africa that we're actually giving funds to help them prevent AIDS in their armies; the armies are going about, collecting and spreading disease on their routes as armies will, and we're hoping to make it slow down a bit. And elsewhere, they're looking to US prison policy to guide them in handling AIDS in their prisons -- good grief. That can't be helpful. Although I would love to see what would happen if our federal government did as the article suggests and made states liable for HIV transmission in prison. I expect that it would immediately end all testing programs; the states' positions would be, "If we don't know, then we can't be liable." But I digress from my digression.)
@ 03:50 PM CST [Link]
My, but this country is getting awfully biblical lately. Not that I'm particularly on the side of sex offenders ... but if you can demonstrate (by lack of offending and psychological testing, one assumes), that you are no longer an offender or particularly at risk of offense, you still have to register for the rest of your life? Even if the state agrees that you're no longer a threat?
And how does the government plan to cope with a state like Texas? Its legislature doesn't meet again until 2003; they received notice about the time the legislature disbanded and face a deadline that occurs before the legislature meets again.
I guess some crimes are so egregious that society has decreed that you must be punished for them until the end of your days. Even when society in your state has said no such thing.
@ 02:47 PM CST [Link]
You know, if I were in charge of that county's government, I would be doing everything in my power to make this suit go away. Even if they win, they lose; it seems unquestioned that the threat was made and it's certainly unquestioned that the young man died because he thought the threat was made. And I'm baffled as to how "parental overtones" would diminish one's expectations of privacy, even if the right of the sheriff to act as parent is conceded (and I can't imagine that any sheriff's department really wants that responsibility). If the officer said something to the parents about the underage drinking, that's one thing -- they were caught actually breaking the law in that situation -- but he certainly had no right to say one word to anyone about their sexuality, nor to badger them in the first place into admitting that they were there to have sex.
Of course, in the ideal world, if he were so misguided as to make that threat, the ideal response would be "Yeah? So?" But this isn't the ideal world, is it?
@ 02:02 PM CST [Link]
You know ... I'd be more worried about the drugs than the sex. Although perhaps a library isn't the best place for either one. (Though one does hear stories ....)
@ 01:43 PM CST [Link]
Surgeon general to leave office. Have to admit, I'll be sorry to see him go. And the sad thing is, Dubya's administration kind of needs someone like him. Someone not afraid to say things in public that will piss off the administration.
(Despite the fact that I have an intense dislike of Dubya and his administration, it is notable that, in an almost directly equivalent situation, Dubya didn't do what Clinton did and fire the Surgeon General. In fact, it could be said that what Satcher did was in some ways worse; he issued a document that, whatever Dubya may say about it, went out as an official document of his administration, and yet Satcher kept his job. Joycelyn Elders merely voiced an opinion, and found herself fired.)
@ 11:57 AM CST [Link]
You know, when you start empathizing with a cow even though (1) it's not real and (2) you're not a rock star ...
But that mixer is totally kickass. (Them Swedes, they're demented people. In a good way. I think it must be all that winter....) And Tai-Chi is much more interesting than Aerobics. (Although the voice is more fun in Aerobics.) And if you sit there long enough, a window will pop up and tell you something in Swedish. On the English side. Yes. Well.
via terribly-happy.com
@ 11:05 AM CST [Link]
Copyright © 2001, Iain Jackson, after-words.org
[Archives: 2001 and after]
Archives before February 5, 2001
Search entries:
12/19/2001: vive la france
12/19/2001: princess, redux
12/19/2001: yemen and rumsfeld
12/18/2001: you're NOT in the army now
12/18/2001: interesting donation
12/18/2001: shame on winn dixie, indeed
12/18/2001: saudi princess
12/17/2001: new resolve
12/17/2001: a victim of the attack ... yeah, right
12/17/2001: polluters ho!