A REVIEW OF the new Harry Potter movie.
And stay tuned for a review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, as soon as it’s out.
Archive for 2007
July 14, 2007
OVERJUDGED: A case about nothing.
IN THE MAIL: Ward Farnsworth’s The Legal Analyst: A Toolkit for Thinking about the Law.
STANDING UP AGAINST FREE SPEECH:
Senate Democrats on Friday blocked an amendment that would have prevented the return of the Fairness Doctrine, a federal rule requiring broadcasters to air opposing views on issues. . . .
The subtext of the debate over the Fairness Doctrine is talk radio’s perceived dominance by conservative voices.
In a telephone interview, Coleman said his motivation was to preserve the First Amendment. But he added: “I do have a strong objection to folks wanting to cut off talk radio because it’s conservative. Let the people be able to make the choice.”
Thune agreed.
“Having the bureaucrats dictate the content of the airwaves isn’t much different from what we are seeing in places like Iran and Russia where they are rolling back freedom of the press,” he said.
Nice to see such a robust commitment to robust discourse. As noted earlier: “This is all thinly-disguised posturing for what’s really bothering the senators: They don’t like that people are allowed to criticize them on public airwaves.”
UPDATE: Reader Brian Hollar notes that the article linked above has been taken down. Here’s a cached version.
A key Congressional committee dealt a major blow to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s campaign against illegal firearms yesterday, refusing to allow police departments broader access to data that tracks guns sales.
The bill restricting release of the information, approved by the House Appropriations Committee, must still be passed by the full House and reconciled with a similar Senate measure. But since the Senate bill is considered even more beneficial to the gun industry, the Bloomberg administration appeared resigned to defeat.
I’m always happy when Bloomberg loses one.
UPDATE: Read this, too. And Pro-gun Democrats played a key role. Bravo.
IMPORTANT POLITICAL ADVICE: When making an attack ad, be sure you have the right mayor.
OPTIMUM COPYRIGHT PERIOD determined by math.
Turns out the folks in the first Congress were pretty smart.
A NEW A.P. POLL ON CONGRESS:
In the eyes of the public, Congress is doing even worse than the president.
Public satisfaction with the job lawmakers are doing has fallen 11 points since May, to 24 percent, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll. That’s lower than for President Bush, who hasn’t fared well lately, either. . . .
The 24 percent approval rating for Congress matched its previous low, which came in June 2006, five months before Democrats won control of the House and Senate due to public discontent with the job Republicans were doing.
Just two months ago, 35 percent of the public approved of Congress’ work.
But what a big two months it’s been.
PEACE ACTIVISM meets al Qaeda.
BUSH WILL VETO ANY EFFORT to reinstate the “Fairness Doctrine.”
HOUSEHOLD ITEMS AND DEADLY ARMS: “Leaf blowers, laser pointers, and speedboat hulls. Right now, they are the cutting edge in American military might.”
July 13, 2007
IOWAHAWK FOR PRESIDENT: He’s got my vote!
QUEEN ELIZABETH MEETS WITH TWO OF ENGLAND’S three surviving WWI vets. (Via Dave Hardy).
MEXICAN DRUG GANG threatens foreign journalists. And as usual, it works.
CAPTION OF THE DAY: Are you there God? It’s me, Hillary.
However, I should note that I was writing about Hillary’s religious streak years ago.
GOVERNMENT-SPONSORED CHILD PORN IN GEORGIA:
“We have to protect our children from district attorneys,” Sen. Emanuel Jones said Friday. If state law allows the distribution of the tape, he said, it or similar material could be available to anyone who filed a public records request — even if they wanted the material for nefarious purposes.
“I believe state laws have been violated,” Jones said. “I believe federal laws have been violated.”
He said he plans to call the legislation, which he will introduce next year, the McDade Act.
District Attorney McDade is likely to be unamused. Here’s more from the Sex Crimes Blog:
I still doubt that the U.S. Attorney’s office has the political will to prosecute a sitting state prosecutor for child porn crimes related to the tape distribution. However, this particular prosecutor has made some dumb moves in the past . . . .
I just can’t help but think of the incongruence that the Adam Walsh Act so severely limits a defendant’s access to examining child pornography evidence used against the defendant while a prosecutor may get away with distributing the tape to the public. The very clearly stated rationale for limiting the defendant’s access to child pornography evidence is that to do so is a form of revictimization. If a single defendant viewing child pornography evidence (that a guilty defendant would have already viewed many times previously) is revictimization enough for adopting a very suspect restriction on defense access to evidence, then surely a prosecutor who allowed dozens or hundreds of people to view such evidence has revictimized on such a greater level that some legal sanction is required.
Seems that way to me. Otherwise people will be saying that we have to protect our children from District Attorneys! Oh, wait . . . .
UPDATE: More from Doug Berman:
The saddest part of all this, of course, is that McDade continues to wreak havoc on Georgia justice while Genarlow Wilson remains behind bars. It is a sad shame that Georgia’s Attorney General and Governor are far less concerned about the unjustifiable activities of rogue prosecutors than about teenagers’ consensual sexual activities.
A shame, and an embarrassment for Georgia.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Charges of racism.
JOBS AMERICANS WON’T DO — In response to my earlier post on lost handyman skills, reader Chris Anderson — not this Chris Anderson — sends this email:
Just an anecdote dealing with your recent article regarding the lack of handiness in general. In 2001, I was laid off of my job as a Director of Technical Services for a software company. This was at the height of the dotcom bust. I had an MBA, and an MS in Computer Science, but couldn’t find a job for love or money in my area. Thankfully, I had also built 2 houses from the ground up with my father as a teenager, and had never been afraid of handyman work over the years. I didn’t realize it, but apparently I had skills that most people lacked.
Flash forward a few months… still couldn’t find a job in my industry, but I was working full-time being a handyman. I just fell into it by accident, having decided to replace my roof at the behest of the insurance company. I couldn’t afford a professional roofer, so I did it myself. Two neighbors noticed, and over that summer, I replaced 7 roofs in my neighborhood. I was making more as an unskilled roofer than I was as a Director.
That winter, I painted, installed appliances such as garbage disposals, refrigerators, stoves, and dishwashers. I replaced windows and rebuilt fences. I fixed sprinkler systems and installed ceiling fans. I installed dimmer switches and repaired water damage.
None of this is difficult. In fact, it doesn’t even require any real skills beyond following directions and not being afraid of the problem. Yet people were willing to pay me — an uncertified and unlicensed guy off the street — to do these things. My income was limited by the number of hours I was willing to work per day, and I had more work available than time to do it in.
Eventually, I got back into the computer industry. What’s funny is that my income is less now than it was as a handyman.
The moral of the story? I think that people are so used to farming out these kinds of jobs that they don’t develop any kind of appreciation for how easy they are. Fear of screwing up, more than anything else, holds people back and they never develop any skills as a result. I think that the concept of methodically tackling a problem and solving it one step at a time is the biggest skill that my father ever taught me. It’s a pity that people can do this in their workplace, but can’t manage to bring that home.
Interesting.
NRO: The President is Surging Ahead:
Forget the leaks and the speculation, President George W. Bush is not looking for a way out of the surge and the Iraq war. In a session with about ten conservative journalists Friday afternoon, a confident and determined president made it clear that he is going to see the surge through, and will rely on General David Petraeus’s advice on how to proceed come September, regardless of the political climate in Washington.
Meanwhile, Dan Riehl looks at Congressional Republicans who are waffling and asks why can’t Republicans learn from experience?
UPDATE: How to become a “Key Republican Senator.”
WELL, “FRIENDLY SKIES” ISN’T Continental’s slogan, after all.
PERFECT FOR FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH: Wizardology.
I’M SURE THERE’S MORE KUDLOW GLOATING GOING ON:
Wall Street extended its gains Friday, with the Standard & Poor’s 500 index breaking through a trading high set in March 2000 and the Dow Jones industrials passed the 13,900 mark for the first time.
I credit the new Democratic congress!
IF YOU TARGET LIBERTARIANS, you might get Crash’d.
THOUGHTS ON WEATHER, CLIMATE, and “global coldening.”
JEEZ: “Churchill dropped from England’s history syllabus.”