Category: music

it’s almost worth the bad news

The intensity of Josh Marshall’s writing matches the news he writes about: he’s generally insightful and perceptive, but it’s stuff like this that stands out.

Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall: May 09, 2004 – May 15, 2004 Archives:

But here you have Jim Inhofe lumbering out of his cave and on to the stage, arguing that we can do whatever we want because we’re America. Inhofe’s America is one that is glutted on pretension, cut free from all its moral ballast, and hungry to sit atop a world run only by violence.[my emphasis] Lady Liberty gets left with fifty bucks, a sneer, a black eye, and the room to herself for the couple hours left before check out.

parsing

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Just Trust Us:

Did top officials order the use of torture? It depends on the meaning of the words “order” and “torture.” Last August Mr. Rumsfeld’s top intelligence official sent Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, the commander of the Guantánamo prison, to Iraq. General Miller recommended that the guards help interrogators, including private contractors, by handling prisoners in a way that “sets the conditions” for “successful interrogation and exploitation.” What did he and his superiors think would happen?

Anyone remember Bill Clinton wiggling on the word “is” during the Starr witch hunt?

Anyone recall the murder of Becket in his cathedral by four knights who took Henry II’s “who will rid me of this troublesome priest” as a call to action?
Continue reading “parsing”

Geneva convention: it’s not just for soldiers

I heard an interesting conversation this afternoon on my local NPR affiliate: a former Air Force attorney and current law professor at Duke was discussing the Geneva Convention and its applicability to the situation in Baghdad.

It occurred to me that the whole “End of official hostilities” declaration on 1 May 2003 may have been intended to take the Geneva Convention out of the picture. The speaker made it quite clear that while torture is not defined in the Uniform Code of Military Justice — the rule of law for uniformed personnel — Article 3 of the Geneva Convention is applicable to anyone.
Continue reading “Geneva convention: it’s not just for soldiers”

improving Safari’s Services -> Mail option

The letters page in MacWorld (oh, what a thin little book that is these days) had a contributed bookmarklet that improves on the all-but-useless Services -> Mail option.

To use it, create a new bookmark and populate the address field with this (yes, there is a hard return/newline before SUBJECT).

What this will do is create a new mail message, put the title of the page in the Subject, and put the href and any selected text into the body of the message.

javascript:location.href='mailto:?SUBJECT='+document.title+'&BODY='+escape(location.href)+'\r\r'+window.getSelection()

Or just drag this to your bookmark bar . . . .
mail it

people who are hiding things must have something to hide

At least, that’s what the president said during his last press conference . . . .

Salon.com News | Bush’s flight from the Guard:

Unlike lawyers, journalists pay little attention to concepts like chain of custody for evidence. In the case of the president’s Guard records, whoever possessed them and had the motive and opportunity to clean them up is a critical question. When Bush left the Guard about a half year early to attend Harvard Business School, his hard-copy record was retained in a military personnel records jacket at the Austin offices of the Texas Guard. Eventually, those documents were committed to microfiche. A copy of the microfiche was then sent to the Air Reserve Personnel Center in Denver and the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis. Those records are considered private, and they cannot be released to anyone without the signature of the serviceman or woman. The White House has never indicated that Bush has signed the authorization form. And this is what prompts unending suspicion.

According to this article, we don’t know if the president has authorized the release of his full record: all we know is the bits and pieces his handlers have delivered. Since Senators McCain and Kerry have released theirs, we now know what to look for — the report on why he quit flying after absorbing a million dollars on taxpayer funded training, his pay stubs, his retirement points — all of which are missing.

a grateful nation, continued

Communications From Elsewhere » FOIA coffin photos update:

Are NASA astronauts US military personnel? I don’t know. In any case, here’s an easy way to tell the difference between the Columbia crew and casualties of the war in Iraq: the Columbia crew photos are the ones shot during the day, with an honor guard in full dress uniforms and a high-ranking NASA official saluting them; the Iraq war casualties are the ones being unloaded from cargo planes at dawn or dusk by people in camo fatigues

Makes you wonder if the war dead were a surprise to anyone . . .

surplus strawberries

The gentle California spring has favored us with a bumper crop of red, juicy strawberries these past two weeks, so bumperous we can get them 4 lbs for $5.00. Ordinarily, I wouldn’t buy so many, but I havehad 3 lbs in the house and as ripe as they are, there’s only one thing to do with ’em.

* for one pound: hull and slice into 1/4 inch slices, or whatever you like: just halve them if they’re small (these ones are mammoth).

* put them in a glass bowl and sprinkle with 1 tbsp sugar.

* cover with cling film, and shake gently but thoroughly to get the sugar everywhere.

* put them to stand at room temperature or in gentle sunlight for a few hours. Shake them around once in a while.

Serve with a dash of balsamic vinegar in a bowl by themselves or over shortcakes, dessert cups, or ice cream.

Sometimes too much of a good thing is just right.