Justice Antonin Scalia recently made some remarks that seemed to indicate a less-than-concerned attitude about privacy and its possible invasion:
Every single datum about my life is private? That’s silly,” Scalia [said]. . . .
Scalia said he was largely untroubled by such Internet tracking. “I don’t find that particularly offensive,” he said. “I don’t find it a secret what I buy, unless it’s shameful.”
That intrigued a Fordham University Law law professor, who then gave an assignment to his class to compile a dossier on Scalia, using just public information they could find out about him. They managed to put together 15 pages:
Among its contents are Nino’s home address, his home phone number, the movies he likes, his food preferences, his wife’s personal e-mail address, and “photos of his lovely grandchildren.”
“When the discrete bits of personal information were assembled at the end of the semester, the extent of the overall dossier and some of the particular items of readily available information on the web concerning his family and family life were astonishing to the class,” Reidenberg wrote to us.
Scalia was asked to comment and did, suddenly seeming not so insensitive about privacy matters:
It is not a rare phenomenon that what is legal may also be quite irresponsible. That appears in the First Amendment context all the time. What can be said often should not be said. Prof. Reidenberg’s exercise is an example of perfectly legal, abominably poor judgment. Since he was not teaching a course in judgment, I presume he felt no responsibility to display any.
It’s a fascinating look at what privacy might or might not be in an era when more and more is said by everybody about everybody else and less and less is thought to be off-limits for public consumption. I suspect if most of us knew what was available about us and easily obtainable, it would scare us to death. And the part about “discrete bits” from here and there being put together in a comprehensive portrait is really sobering.
I know that if I were running the Republican Party, the editorial page of The Journal Gazette is the first place I’d go to for advice. So let’s see what the editors have to say under the heading, “Specter’s defection shows need for less GOP conservatism.”
Specter was a Republican long known as an independent-minded moderate. He is pro-gun and pro-choice. Indeed, he is conservative on many issues – but no longer conservative enough for the GOP.
Well, I guess if a party stands for principles, and someone doesn’t live up to them, it makes sense for him to be kicked out.
Oh, wait. Arlen Specter wasn’t kicked out. He quit to join the Democrats because it had become clear he could not win the Republican primary, just the way he quite the Democratic Party to join the Republicans in 1965 in order to unseat a fellow Democratic incumbent. Maybe that’s what “moderate” means — the willingness to use either party as a steppingstone until opportunism calls one elsewhere.
Republicans would do well to listen to one of their last remaining voices of moderation, Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine: “Ultimately, we’re heading to having the smallest political tent in history, the way events have been unfolding. If the Republican Party fully intends to become a majority party in the future, it must move from the far right back toward the middle.”
Indeed, moving to the middle was how Bill Clinton reclaimed the White House for Democrats in 1992.
Ah, the famous “nobody wins the presidency without moving to the middle” tactic so well employed by Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama.
The reason for McConnell’s panic: Specter’s switch along with the expected election of Al Franken to represent Minnesota in the U.S. Senate would give Democrats 60 votes in the Senate. That’s enough to break the phantom filibusters that the minority parties have used to stop legislation.
So, let me see. Those silly Republicans have to give up their monolithic conservatism and move to “the middle” in order to fight the monolithic liberalism that will make all 60 Democrats vote exactly the same way? Why? So there will be 70 or 80 or 90 votes for bad policies instead of 60? So there will not be competing philosophies in government? So government will just continue to grow without restraints or accountability, and the American people can finally just stop paying attention because it won’t matter anyway? So the Journal Gazette editors can concentrate on telling Mitch Daniels and the General Assembly that they’re being far too stingy in spending Indiana taxpayer dollars?
Nerds of America, come out Mom’s basement and unite! A frightened world needs you!
Cincinnati police have a new ally in their fight against crime, whether they want it or not.
He calls himself Shadowhare, and he wears a mask and a cape to conceal his true identity. He’s Cincinnati’s own version of a superhero fighting crime and injustice where he finds it.
[. . .]
Shadowhare is not alone in his quest to fight crime. He heads up a group of men — and one woman — called the “Allegiance of Heroes.” The members communicate with each other in online forums. Among the members are Aclyptico in Pennsylvania, Wall Creeper in Colorado and Master Legend in Florida.
”I’ve even teamed up with Mr. Extreme in California — San Diego — and we were trying to track down a rapist,” said Shadowhare.
Comic fantasy meets mental illness, I suspect. The minute we laugh too hard at them, one of them will get seriously hurt or do something tragically stupid.
The new “Star Trek” movie comes out next week. It’s fiction, OK?
Food Network Magazine recently hit the road in search of the best 50 burgers in the nation — one for every state. This is the one it picked in Indiana, the “Lugar Burger,” of all things, from Bloomington:
Senator Richard Lugar has served this espresso-chili-rubbed bison burger on Capitol Hill to show off his state’s lean, grass-fed buffalo meat. The burger comes on an “everything” bun with artisanal cheese and peppered bacon. The meat is from a ranch 10 miles away.
An “espresso-chili-rubbed bison burger” with an “everything” bun with artisanal cheese and peppered bacon? Good grief. That sounds positivily un-American, and it should be an embarrassment to all Hoosiers. I happen to like bison meat — a buffalo strip steak was of the most flavorful pieces of meat I ever had — but if we’re doing “best” burgers, they have to be beef, and no fancy-schmancy cheese, either, just good old American toppings like lettuce and onions and tomatoes. But check out all 50 burgers — most of them suffer from a bad case of the snooties. Some are made from pork or salmon, and one of the “5-star” ones features pecans. A couple seem worth trying — there’s the Big Jud of Boise, Idaho, a one-pound cheeseburger with a side of fries. And who could pass up the “Heart Attack on a Plate” from Mother’s Federal Hill Grille in Baltimore?
The best burger I ever had was the cheeseburger at Redamak’s in New Buffalo, Mich., just over the state line from Michigan City, Ind. Everybody thinks there is some secret ingredient (a little sausage mixed in with the ground beef, I thought), but the owners say no. The burgers are pan fried, then wrapped in wax paper. No lettuce and tomatoes are offered, but they aren’t needed.
Indiana has had its first case of swine flu confirmed. so, naturally, drastic action is called for. The state has now activated its Emergency Operations Center.
Texas has had the first confirmed swine flu death in this country. It was a Mexican child visiting in this country, true, but we can’t be too careful, so let’s declare a flu emergency and suspend keep students home and stop competitions by schools.
Dear God, there are already more than 100 cases in about a dozens states! Run for your lives! You, there, cover your mouth when you cough, like the president says, and with your armpit, not your mouth, OK?
Since January, more than 13,000 people have died of complications from seasonal flu, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly report on the causes of death in the nation.
No fewer than 800 flu-related deaths were reported in any week between January 1 and April 18, the most recent week for which figures were available.
The report looks at deaths in the 122 largest cities in the United States.
Worldwide, the annual death toll from the flu is estimated to be between 250,000 and 500,000.
About 9 out of 10 of those deaths are among people older than 65, Currie said. Most times, they already have health problems that the flu makes worse, he said.
Yes, yes, I know. It is human to be frightened of the unknown, and this strain of flu could turn very mean, since there is no vaccine for it, so I might be making fun of people who turn out to be right. But, good lord, come on. You ever wonder why the media treat us like a herd of sheep? It’s because we often act like a herd of sheep.
I guess those who claim I’m hopelessly old-fashioned have a point. I’d argue that, when there is a law against something, the sensible thing to do is to enforce that law. But the Dutch have a much more practical idea:
A park near Amsterdam has unveiled information signs pointing out spots where officials say gay men are known to have sex, so visitors are not taken by surprise.
The signs “clearly indicate what is happening in each zone; also those where gay men are known to practice ‘cruising’,” municipal spokeswoman Manon Koffijberg said.
Cruising is a slang word used to describe the act of trawling for casual sex.
“If you don’t want to be confronted by a vision of that sort, the signs allow you to avoid specific areas,” Ms Koffijberg said.
The story goes on to explain that, while having sex in public is against the law (even in the Netherlands!), the park has been “used for this purpose for so long” that it has become “gedoog,” a Dutch word for “tolerating unwanted behaviour.”
Gedoog. Huh. We should borrow that word here, because we sure do practice its meaning.
Republicans in a funk because of the defection of Arlen Specter should take heart from a lesson of history – the last time either party had such a wide Senate margin was during the first two years of Jimmy Carter’s term:
What history shows us is that a liberal, blame-America-first Democratic President, urged on by a liberal, blame-America-first Democratic Congress, is a prescription for political self-destruction. Leave Democrats to their own devices, and they will screw themselves politically, just when they are at the height of power.
I don’t know. If a party has screwed up so badly that its best hope is that the other party will screw up even worse, that’s a pretty desperate state of events. But if the Democrats do get Franken from Minnesota and end up with a filibuster-proof majority, whatever overreaching they do do, they will own, lock, stock and barrel. If the voters do see it as overreaching, they will vote to correct it, as they usually do.
Republicans won’t come back unless they convince voters they have good ideas. Freed of the ability to play parliamentary-maneuvering games, maybe they can concentrate more on that.
Some will be pleased and some horrified that the Supreme Court let stand the Federal Communications Commission’s change of rules on bad language — especially but not confined to the “f” word and the “s” word. Even if their use on radio or TV is fleeting and unanticipated, the FCC can still levy heavy fines not just on the program where the offense originated but on all affiliates that carry the offending program.
But this isn’t the last word. The court, in a 5-4 opinion written by Antonin Scalia, merely said that the FCC didn’t exceed its authority; in other words, it acted properly given its rules and mandates. But the underlying issue is a First Amendment question, and the court deliberately skirted that. Scalia even told the lower court he was sending the case back to that it should deal with the First Amendment issue, which the Supreme Court would likely take up soon, perhaps even on this case. And given the First Amendment doubts raised by some of the justices, including some who voted in the majority, the outcome next time might be a little different.
Clarence Thomas gave those doubts a clear expression (via hit & run):
“The text of the First Amendment makes no distinctions among print, broadcast, and cable media,” Thomas wrote (quoting an opinion in an earlier case), ”but we have done so.” He said “this deep intrusion into the First Amendment rights of broadcasters” is based on rationales that never made much sense and seem more outmoded every day: “the scarcity of radio frequencies,” plus the idea that broadcast TV and radio are “uniquely pervasive” and “uniquely accessible” to children. ”Even if this Court’s disfavored treatment of broadcasters under the First Amendment could have been justified” at the time of the decisions upholding the “fairness doctrine” and the ban on broadcast indecency, Thomas wrote, “dramatic technological advances have eviscerated the factual assumptions underlying those decisions.”
The descent of our vehicles of popular culture into crudeness and vulgarity might be delplorable, but that’s the marketplace for you. There are good and bad and ugly, and the choices are ours, and they’ll keep giving us what we choose. The First Amendment, whatever we decide it ultimately means, should be applied equally to all media.
Washington Post and syndicated columnist Richard Cohen has an interesting take on torture and expresses a view that needs to be heard more often in the debate that too often focuses on utilitarianism — let’s not torture anybody, but let’s not pretend that such restraint will somehow makes America safer:
America should repudiate torture not because it is always ineffective — nothing is always anything — or because others loathe it but because it degrades us and runs counter to our national values. It is a statement of principle, somewhat similar to why we do not tap all phones or stop and frisk everyone under the age of 28. Those measures would certainly reduce crime, but they are abhorrent to us.
But it is important to understand that abolishing torture will not make us safer. Terrorists do not give a damn about our morality, our moral authority or what one columnist called “our moral compass.” George Bush was certainly disliked in much of the world, but the Sept. 11 attacks were planned while Bill Clinton was in office, and he offended no one with the possible exception of the Christian right. Indeed, he went around the world apologizing for America’s misdeeds — slavery, in particular. No terrorist turned back as a result.
If Obama thinks the world will respond to his new torture policy, he is seriously misguided. Indeed, he has made things a bit easier for terrorists who now know what will not happen to them if they get caught. And by waffling over whether he will entertain the prosecution of Bush-era Justice Department lawyers (and possibly CIA interrogators as well), he has shown agents in the field that he is behind them, oh, about 62 percent of the time.
I would probably start at a slightly different point on the utilitarian issue than Cohen but end up in about the same place: 1) If torture is not effective in getting the desired results, its use would merely be the sadistic inflicting of pain for no reason and cannot be justified. 2) Torture is most likely to be effective if the subject has reason to believe the end result might be death. 3) That would never be the end result of torture by Americans, and everybody knows it. That, in the face of 1, 2 and 3, there could still be “the squalid efforts of legal toadies to justify the unjustifiable” is not as surprising as it should be.
But what if torture could be shown to be effective more often than not? Well, that’s where the moral dilemma lies, isn’t it? For a good thrashing of the subject — people actually arguing with each other, and politely – check out the online debate at the Federalist Society. I liked this, from Douglas Kmiec, professor of constitutional law at Pepperdine Law School:
More than once in the last few days I have heard the former vice president or others advocate that President Obama release other classified materials in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of aggressive interrogation techniques. The ethical and legal assumptions under this line of argument will be troubling to many.
If torture has been declared an intrinsically evil act (i.e., wrong regardless of context), which I take it is the point of the United Nations convention which we signed, ratified, and incorporated into our criminal law, what exactly is the point of the former vice president’s argument–unless he is making Lincoln’s emergency argument into some kind of far flung general prerogative power.
The argument from utility at least vis-à-vis torture is pernicious because it seems to be a fulsome denial of law and the ethical principles settled beneath it. The best case for such utilitarian consideration to carry the day would be obtaining indispensable and otherwise unattainable actionable intelligence. I’ve noted in an earlier post, this factual indispensability and unattainability is highly disputed. What I wish to raise here is what would surely trouble an ethicist–namely, constructing a justification for what the world community has called the employ of intrinsically evil means.
Perhaps that United nations convention on “severe” pain is too vague (as argued elsewhere in the debate), which would have been a good reason not to sign and ratify it and incorporate it into our criminal law. But we did. And when we want to make a case that we’re fighting the “intrinsic evil” of militant fundamentalism, we’d better not take our eyes off the moral high ground.
In assessing President Obama’s first 100 days, I think this writer strains mightily to make a distinction that doesn’t really exist:
A new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll shows that the new president is broadly popular and seems to have produced an upswing in national confidence — but also reveals that a growing number of Americans describe him as “very liberal,” which surely isn’t what the White House wants.
In fact, Mr. Obama doesn’t quite fit the traditional definition of a liberal, but rather represents something different. He is indeed a believer in the power of government. But he differs from liberals of yore who saw government programs as the goal for most problems; he seems to see government as the way to prompt the changes he wants in the economy or society so a government program, in the end, isn’t necessary.
How is wanting to use government to bring about the ideal society different from the goals of the ”traditional” liberal? Most liberals I know don’t want to create government programs just to create government programs; they all have a vision of what big government can bring about. And the idea that a government program can create such magic, then disappear because it’s no longer needed, is a longheld liberal delusion.
Preparations are underway for the Vera Bradley outlet sale at the Coliseum.
The sale starts tomorrow morning at 8 am.
33,000 people from across the country have already registered for the event.
This is the first year tickets aren’t required, but shoppers will need to register once they get there.
My friend K has a bit of a handbag obsession and can choose from among dozens which to carry around each day. She likes Vera Bradley and has one or two. Why? “I don’t know, I just like them.” OK, fine. Handbags come in all shapes, sizes and designs, and you’re gonna like some more than others. But what is it about these particular handbags that make thousands of women travel hundreds of miles and wait in line for hours just to save a few bucks? Sounds like a cult to me.
And I thought Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard was a sensible Republican with good conservative instincts:
Recycling is one of Mayor Greg Ballard’s top priorities, and he wants to give more homeowners an incentive to reduce waste and preserve resources, Ballard spokesman Robert Vane said.
One of his goals . . . is to get curbside recycling at a drastically reduced rate as a way to promote participation in the program,” Vane said.
As feel-good nonsense that often does more harm than good, recycling is one of those annoyances we just have to put up with whenever Democrats are in charge. A Republican who goes this overboard on the concept should be dragged to a re-education camp.
If you strongly favor a state law that would right some wrong you think still exists, and the legislative process results in a bill so watered down it’s barely recognizable, do you, A) support it anyway on the theory that you’ll take what you can get now and work for more later or, B) withdraw your support because a bad bill would be worse than no bill at all? The Indiana Campaign for Smokefree Air takes the latter view, withdrawing its support for a statewide smoking ban:
As originally drafted, this bill would have protected all Hoosier workers from the proven-deadly chemicals in secondhand smoke. But as amended, it leaves too many at risk and creates classes of workers.
[. . .]
The best way to protect people’s health is to pass a comprehensive bill the first time. History shows it’s very difficult to go back and fix a watered-down ordinance once it has been passed. It took Fort Wayne 10 years to do so. It’s taken Indianapolis four years to even start the conversation again.
But Rep. Linda Larson, D-Hammond, opts for the conciliatory approach, offering weakening amendments to her puppy mill bill in an effort to save it, a move applauded by a supportive Evansville Courier Press editorial:
Abusive puppy mills are the kind that cram dogs into small quarters with little ventilation or light, no space for exercise and most unsanitary conditions. Buyers of puppies from these operations usually don’t see the inside of these places, or they would walk away. These operations that need all of the regulation that Indiana government will allow.
If that means accepting a weakened version of the puppy mill bill this year, just to get something on the books, then that is what backers of this legislation should do. In this case, something is better than nothing, if it provides the opportunity to begin the regulation of puppy mills.
If I were a strong advocate for these two bills, I think I’d probably take the opposite approach, favoring passage of the weakened smoking bill but scuttling the weakened puppy mill bill.
Banning smoking in public places has a lot of momentum, and this bill would add to it. While legislators are waiting to strengthen the statewide ban in a year or two, more non-smokers will be protected than are protected now, and even more cities will probably add their own bans, making passage of a stronger bill more likely later on. This is a case in which one of our newer cliches is true: Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
But the conditions in puppy mills are horrible, and this is a first-time effort to fix the problem. A weakened bill might make too many people think the problem has been solved when in fact it hasn’t. And the opposition from vested interests has been so fierce that some legislators might be willing to use the poor law as an excuse not to keep working for a good law. Dogs will continue to suffer whether the bill is passed or not, but more are likely to suffer longer under a weakened bill.
But those are individual judgment calls, and a lot might depend on what other battles the General Assembly has going at any given time and how much wheeling and dealing is going on behind the scenes.
The Colts keep saying “no,” but Indianapolis keeps asking the question in different ways in hopes of getting a different answer:
Rather than try to reopen its 30-year contract with the Indianapolis Colts, the city might ask the team to donate money to area arts and culture groups now supported by the struggling Capital Improvement Board.
The Colts declined to comment Monday, but the idea surfaced after team owner Jim Irsay during the weekend rebuffed the city’s hopes that the team pony up $5 million a year to help bail out the CIB, which runs the city’s sports venues and the Indiana Convention Center.
You don’t want to pay $5 million for X? Well, here’s an idea. How about if you pay $5 million for Y? Brilliant! What part of “You’ve been a fool for the Colts” don’t city officials get?
Best visual of the bone-headed “photo op” staged in New York, from the Perfunction blog. At left is the photo op, at right the real thing on Sept. 11, 2001:
Best comment about the screwup, from reader Kevin Harmon, commenting at Instapundit:
Scare the crap out of a known terrorist . . . . . it’s torture
Scare the crap out of thousands of New Yorkers . . . . . . . it’s a photo op.
Today’s quiz: How many people die in the United States each year from flu and flu-related causes? Answer later.
Remember the bird flu panic of just a few years ago? It was front-page and top-of-the-broadcast news for weeks, and I remember we did a few editorials about it. By the time 100 people had died overseas, newscasters here were in full “It’s coming, and we’re all going to die!” mode, and there was even an End-of-Days-like made-for-TV movie. Remember everybody’s certainty that there wouldn’t be enough vaccine? We all remember now, of course, how many millions of people died from that pandemic.
Now, we have the swine flu scare, and the tenative little panic feelers are being put out by people who probably should have learned better by now:
Airlines shares fell Monday as fear mounted that the swine-flu outbreak that started in Mexico could spread globally and lead to a sharp drop in air travel at a time when carriers already are struggling to cope with recession.
Governments around the world are seeking to contain the spread of the virus after outbreaks in Mexico, the U.S. and Canada. In the U.S., where 20 people are confirmed to have caught the virus, a public health emergency has been declared.
[. . .]
As with SARS, the panic over swine flu is happening at the very bottom of a sharp recession, so its impact could be felt more harshly, said Diogenis Papiomytis, consultant in the commercial and business aviation practice of Frost & Sullivan.
“It’s the worst possible time for such a crisis,” said Papiomytis, adding that the SARS outbreak postponed recovery in 2003.
But it’s not exactly a crisis yet, unless we talk ourselves into having one. The strain found in the U.S. seems (so far) to be a mild form of the flu not likely to kill anybody.
The answer to the quiz, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is about 36,000 a year. That’s a hell of a lot of deaths — flu may be the most underpublicized killer in the country. It does its dirty work partly for reasons we can’t control — it tends to pick off the old and infirm — and partly for reasons we can, like neglecting to wash our hands frequently and our disinclination to stop French-kissing those who are hacking and spewing phlegm in our faces.
So maybe a little panic is a good thing, as long as we don’t overdo it. We need to be just afraid enough to do the common-sense things but not enough to be paralyzed by it. The alternative — just ignore the whole thing and hope it goes away – would represent bad private judgment and poor public policy.
Hoosiers continue to suffer from both the economy and the ravings of the carpetbagging national press. Here, The New York Times dissects the good folks of Anderson, Ind., and discover that, by gosh, they not only love President Obama’s stimulus package, they’re staying up nights making sure some other place doesn’t screw them out of their fair share. Naturally, they’ll be quick to turn on the president if they don’t get every last morsel of what they’ve been promised:
The flood of federal money Mr. Obama has sent coursing through the economy offers a chance to begin addressing deeply rooted problems in cities like this one, a once-proud automaking center that is a study in deindustrialization. At the same time, the president and his party have the opportunity to build a political consensus around a more activist, effective government.
But those opportunities, and the high hopes raised by Mr. Obama’s fast start, carry the risks of promises unkept. Should his ambitious agenda for the economy, health care, education and energy fail to improve people’s lives — and leave behind crippling budget deficits rather than new jobs — he and his party could face substantial repercussions.
But if the president is trying to help us so much – it is pretty remarkable, after all, that he’s the first politician in the whole history of this country to try to tackle those “deep-seated problems” of American cities on the way to creating a “more activist, effective government”; what were all those other heartless bastards thinking of, anyway? — it seems pretty churlish to fault him for something as trivial as failing to improve people’s lives and leaving behind crippling budget deficits. Editors of The New York Times will find it within themselves to forgive him, I can assure you, although, now that I think of it, they’ll probably blame us for demanding so much of the poor man.
Mike Pence, who is considered by some to be one of the new voices of the Republican Party, demonstrates why he deserves to be:
Pence, R-Ind., said Democrats’ proposed cap-and-trade legislation to deal with carbon dioxide emissions would also drive more American manufacturing jobs to other countries.
I think, rightly understood, the cap-and-trade legislation represents an economic declaration of war on the Midwest by liberals in Washington,” Pence told The Star Press in a telephone interview.
Not literally war, but if trade turns out to fit the bill for what William James called the “moral equivalent of war,” then cap-and-trade might be called the moral equivalent of treason, and the casualties will be real.
Two people briefed on GM’s plan confirmed that it includes the demise of Trans Am sports car brand Pontiac, 83 years after the first Pontiac car was introduced. Within three years, half a million Pontiacs were sold, and the brand quickly grew in popularity, from early models like the Chief and the Master Six Coupe, to the Bonneville convertible, to the GTO — one of America’s first muscle cars and so popular it inspired Ronny and the Daytonas to immortalize it in song.
Many of us have had the experience — with a TV, computer or other modern device — of having a favorite toy become a sudden liability because it gets abandoned by the manufacturer. Never thought it would happen to my car. I wasn’t the type to hanker after a GTO — wah, wah! — but by the time the Bonneville came along, I was ready for it. My 2000 Bonneville has 70,000 miles on it, runs perfectly fine and is paid for. It also has leather seats — everybody deserves a car with leather seats once in his life, and this one is mine. I was looking forward to driving the thing for a few more years, putting aside the money that would have gone to car payments.
But now I have to worry. Will the increasing difficulty of getting parts outweigh the benefits of not having car payments? Will the stupid thing strand me in the middle of nowhere, and will anybody bother to come get me if it does? Will Fox & Fox abandon me, too? (I stopped going to the dealer a couple of years ago.)
The people said GM won’t have much new information on Hummer, Saturn or other brands, including Europe’s Opel. GM has indicated it wants to focus on four core brands, Chevrolet, Cadillac, GMC and Buick.
Sure, I could take a chance on a Chevy. A lot of my people drove Chevies, and they were good people. But I know what will happen:
The company had said it wanted to keep Pontiac as a niche brand with one or two models, but is buckling under tremendous government pressure to consolidate its eight brands, several of which lose money.
There will be even more pressure from the government, and, as sure as I’m sitting here, if I go with Chevy, that will be the next one to go. President Obama tries to affect the common touch, but he just doesn’t have it in him. I bet he just hates those proletariant-enabling Chevy trucks that can haul anything anywhere. Bet you anything he’ll keep the Buick, and I wouldn’t be caught Democrat in a Buick.
Three cheers for President Obama’s decision, announced quietly on Monday, to repudiate a campaign promise and not press for new labor and environmental regulations in the North American Free Trade Agreement. The last thing the Western Hemisphere needs are more trade barriers that would snarl supply chains and damage commerce.
[. . .]
But three other trade issues to watch are the unilateral U.S. ban on Mexican long-haul trucks, which has sparked a trade war with that country, the U.S. failure to ratify a free trade agreement with Colombia, and the 54-cent per gallon U.S. import duty on Brazilian ethanol. Mr. Obama has promised to discuss each one. But the real test will be his willingness to spend political capital to defeat protectionists in Congress.
Protectionism helped deepen and prolong the depression, and it’s the last thing we need in a severe recession.
The Terre Haute Tribune-Star has dropped its appeal of a $1.5 million jury award to Clay County sheriff’s deputy Jeff Maynard, who contended that two stories about alleged misconduct defamed him. Nobody at the newspaper is talking, so the natural speculation is that a settlement might have been reached among the interested parties for something less than the awarded amount, which was the largest libel award against a news media defendant in Indiana’s history. If this is so, the newspaper is abdicating its responsibility, just trying to get out with as little loss as possible instead of fighting a fight that could be and needs to be won:
Maynard in 2004 sued the Tribune-Star for publishing two articles about sworn allegations of misconduct made by a driver after a traffic stop in February of that year. Those allegations turned out to be false. Maynard said the articles also contained defamatory statements.
There are some ambiguous situations in which it is unclear whether newspapers have some protection against libel even if what they print is wrong. This isn’t one of them. Nothing is taken more seriously by the press than its duty to report allegations of wrongdoing by public officials. If the newspaper’s owners are paying off on this one, they’re going to make it harder for news outlets throughout Indiana to report on public officials.
And this should worry more people than just those in the “professional” press. News organizations have attorneys and insurance with which to handle libel cases. Individual bloggers usually don’t. If bloggers indeed get more into the reporting business and start shouldering some of the watchdog-of-government burden, they should be prepared for intimidation, legal and otherwise, from people who don’t want certain things printed.
The Indianapolis Colts, 2001, in an Associated Press story:
Three years after signing a lease to play in the RCA Dome, the Indianapolis Colts are looking for a new stadium.
Colts owner Jim Irsay intends to commission two studies by spring or summer to examine prospects for a new stadium in Indianapolis.
“We’re gathering information,” Irsay told The Indianapolis Star for a story published Friday. “We’re going to look at it and share and go from there. We’re defining the picture.”
The Colts are frustrated over the CIB’s money problems and they’re even more upset about numerous comments and statements criticizing the team for not helping.
Thursday, the Colts issued a statement. It reads, in part, “The Colts never asked for a new stadium. In 2004, the city of Indianapolis approached the Colts about the possibility of a new stadium, not the other way around.”
The team said they are proud to call Lucas Oil Stadium their home field but they only use it 19 days a year and it is open to virtually anyone else to use the remaining 346 days.
How many people were out there in the last few years trying to disabuse Hoosiers of the notion that a new stadium just had to be built or else the Colts might slink away in the middle of the night, just like they did in Baltimore? I think the answer is, “None.” As this story unfolds, I suspect a lot of lying liars are going to be running for cover. Whether they turn out to be mostly politicians or sports figures or both is anybody’s guess, but is surely ought to be interesting.
This seems to be about the right sentence to me. Any gun-rights advocates object?
The father of a young boy who police said shot and killed his 4-year-old sister with a gun he found in the family’s home was sentenced Thursday.
James Booher, 27, pleaded guilty to one count of felony neglect of a dependent and was sentenced to 10 years in prison, with two years suspended, 6News’ Derrik Thomas reported.
Police said Booher’s then-5-year-old son had a confrontation with his sister, Makayla Booher, shortly before the shooting at their home in the 6100 block of Massachusetts Avenue in May of last year.
The boy went downstairs, used a chair to reach a gun at the top of a bookcase, went back upstairs and shot his sister at close range, police said.
[. . .]
Police said the 2008 incident was not the first time that the boy had found a gun at home and fired it. Eight months prior, when the family was living at a different Indianapolis home, the boy used a chair to reach his father’s gun atop a refrigerator. On that day, he fired a bullet into a kitchen cupboard, police said.
Gun enthusiasts I know don’t advocate giving irresponsible gun owners a pass. And this guy epitomizes irresponsibility — his son had gotten the gun and shot it off before, and still the weapon was left within his reach. I don’t know that the prison sentence will deter other gun-owning parents in the traditional sense; I doubt there are parents out there now thinking, “whoops, better put that gun away; it changes everything if I have to go to prison for my 5-year-old shooting my 4-year-old.” But at least one yahoo is off the streets for a while.
If you put something out with the trash, the police can search it without a warrant. Anyone walking by can take it. Although it’s still on your property, it’s not really yours anymore; you’ve relinquished your claim to it. And that’s exactly what done with marriage. We might as well let gays have it. We’re not using it.
[. . .]
And for my fellow Christian conservatives: we haven’t got a moral leg to stand on. Our divorce rate is identical to the national average. We allow our churches to be used as elaborate stage sets for bridezilla productions, often with just pro forma premarital counseling or sometimes none at all. When our fellow church members get divorced, we do not counsel them adequately. We fail to create a culture of marriage in our youth and twenty-somethings. We have shown massive disrespect for marriage. When we demand others respect it, it’s not surprising that we’re not taken seriously.
I suspect the writer is correct that gay marriage is going to be a fact of life (this is likely to be looked back on as the year in which the dam broke) and even that polygamy is on the way because the arguments for gay marriage carry over easily to support it. The change started with courts, but more legislatures will get involved as their constituents’ attitudes continue to change.
