On your rights - yes, Virginia, there is a right to privacy.

Okay, so I promised y'all a look at privacy rights, so here we go. As a non-lawyer, I invite any and all of my ConLaw friends and trolls to call shenanigans on mistakes I might make in my interpretation of the law.

This was all spurred on by an appearance by Senator Rick Santorum on NewsNight with Aaron Brown, specifically the following exchange:

BROWN: Do you think there's a right to privacy in the Constitution? . . . For example, if you'd been a Supreme Court judge in Griswold versus Connecticut, the famous birth control case came up, which centered around whether there was a right to privacy. Do you believe that was correctly decided?

SANTORUM: No, I don't. I write about it in the book. I don't.

. . . BROWN: Why would a conservative argue that government should interfere with that most personal decision?

SANTORUM: I didn't. I said it was a bad law. And... They had the right to make it. Look, legislatures have the right to make mistakes and do really stupid things...but we don't have to create constitutional rights because we have a stupid legislature. And that's the problem here, is the court feels like they have a responsibility to right every wrong. When they do that, unlike a Congress, that if we make a really stupid mistake and we do something wrong, we go back next year or next month and change it, and we've done that. Courts don't do that. They only get cases that come before them and they have to make broad, sweeping decisions that have huge impact down the road.

That's what happened in Griswold. It was a bad law. The court felt, we can't let this bad law stand in place. It's wrong. It was. But they made a -- they created out of whole cloth a right that now has gone far, far from Griswold versus Connecticut.

To begin with, I do have to point out that Santorum makes one mistake (well, plenty, to be sure, but this one jumps out at me): one job of the Supreme Court is to correct things when the legislature is stupid, specifically, when the legislature passes stupidly unconstitutional legislation. In such a case, the SC has to say, "Hey, stupid that law vioaltes a constitutional right." Does the court get to create constitutional rights, pull them out of thin air? Of course not. But if there's a right in there, and it's being violated, the court has to overturn the law.  That's what it's there for. And sure, it's really the responsibility of the legislature to go back and correct its mistakes when it makes them. But how long do we give the lege to realize it's made a mistake, and then correct it? How long would Jim Crow have been on the books before the legislature went back to get rid of it, without the federal judiciary pushing at it?

That having been said, does the Constitution really outline a right to privacy? Well, to begin with, we know that it doesn't not allow it. The Ninth Amendment states that "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." So it's certainly left open that we could have one. And if you want to argue original intent, you can look back as far as the Federalist Papers, where Andrew Hamilton argues against a Bill of Rights on the grounds that listing the rights that the people do have almost makes it easier for the government to start listing the rights that they don't have. But some politicans won't take "step off my Ninth Amendment rights" for an answer, so we look to caselaw.

The case in question, Griswold v. Connecticut, actually centered around a Connecticut law banning contraceptives for married people. The Supreme Court ruled that the law was unconstitutional, citing a right to privacy found in the "penumbra" of the Bill of Rights and supported by the Ninth Amendment (two judges filed a concurrent opinion that overturned the law via the Due Process clause in the 14th Amendment). Basically, the ruling boils down to the fact that while the Bill of Rights doesn't explicitly outline a right to privacy, that right is implicit in the Amendment I freedom of belief, expression, and association; Amendment IV right to security in your person, home, and property; Amendment V freedom from deprivation of life, liberty, or property without due process; and Amendment IX, which says only that such a right can exist because the Constitution doesn't say it can't. The first ten amendments outline the various ways that people have control over their own lives. The "right to privacy" doesn't need to be expressed in so many words because it's implied in everything the Bill of Rights stands for.

Griswold isn't the only case where privacy becomes an issue. Later, in the 1967 case Katz v. United States, the Supreme Court further upheld a right to privacy by saying that the Fourth Amendment protection from unreasonable search and seizure applies to the person, not the personal property, and that what a person "seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public may be Constitutionally protected."

But hey, don't take my word for it; ask Justice Louis Brandeis. In his Harvard Law Review article, The Right to Privacy," published in 1890 - 75 years prior to Griswold, Brandeis says that basic human rights naturally extend beyond life, property, and person safety to issues of human emotions and relationships and even intellectual property. Said Brandeis, "Thoughts, emotions, and sensations demanded legal recognition, and the beautiful capacity for growth which characterizes the common law enabled the judges to afford the requisite protection, without the interposition of the legislature." While his article starts by looking at the effect of unwanted media attention on privacy, it extends that right to all areas of private life, saying that

the protection of society must come mainly through a recognition of the rights of the individual.  Each man is responsible for his own acts and omissions only.  If he condones what he reprobates, with a weapon at hand equal to his defence, he is responsible for the results.  If he resists, public opinion will rally to his support.  Has he then such a weapon? It is believed that the common law provides him with one, forged in the slow fire of the centuries, and to-day fitly tempered to his hand.

In my eyes, though, the biggest defense of the right to privacy is the entire damn Constitution. In case you're unfamiliar with it, it's the document in which the people of America outline the rights that they'll allow the government to have. I'll repeat: it's where the people tell the government how far it can go and how much authority it has over our lives. Somehow, we've started to move away from the real original intent of the framers of the Constitution, that the government should serve at the will of the people, that the government's rights arise from the willingness of the people to give them authority. In cases like this, cases where our personal and private activities and decisions become fodder for a controlling legislature, we have a responsibility to tell the government so far, but no further.

On almost agreeing with Rick Santorum, revisited

Okay, so it appears, on closer examination, that I don't agree with Rick Santorum after all. Not even a little bit. But it's okay, see, because it turns out that he doesn't agree with himself, either:

Did little Ricky just say on Aaron Brown what I thought he said? That Griswold was wrongly decided, and that therefore the state has the right to regulate the use of birth control by married couples?

Aw, man, for serious? This is what I get for turning off CNN when CSI comes on. Did anyone actually get to see it? What did Aaron have to say?

Wow, Santorum must be all ticked off about this new book that just came out. It talks about how great Griswold was for supporting marriage and establishing a zone of privacy around it:

With respect to sexual conduct, not abortion, the Court had recognized a zone of privacy around marriage. In other words, married people were treated differently under the law with respect to their sexual activity with one another than unmarried people. In its left-handed way, the Court in Griswold gave deference to marriage between one man and one woman as the building block for society and the legitimate purpose for sexual activity and thereby protected it from state regulation.

Rick, you'll want to check that book out, like, right away. I think it's called It Takes a Family. You're going to want to talk with that guy about family values.

Update: Kos has been kind enough to provide a transcript of the conversation in question:

BROWN: Do you think there's a right to privacy in the Constitution? . . . For example, if you'd been a Supreme Court judge in Griswold versus Connecticut, the famous birth control case came up, which centered around whether there was a right to privacy. Do you believe that was correctly decided?

SANTORUM: No, I don't. I write about it in the book. I don't.

. . . BROWN: Why would a conservative argue that government should interfere with that most personal decision?

SANTORUM: I didn't. I said it was a bad law. And... They had the right to make it. Look, legislatures have the right to make mistakes and do really stupid things...but we don't have to create constitutional rights because we have a stupid legislature. And that's the problem here, is the court feels like they have a responsibility to right every wrong. When they do that, unlike a Congress, that if we make a really stupid mistake and we do something wrong, we go back next year or next month and change it, and we've done that. Courts don't do that. They only get cases that come before them and they have to make broad, sweeping decisions that have huge impact down the road.

That's what happened in Griswold. It was a bad law. The court felt, we can't let this bad law stand in place. It's wrong. It was. But they made a -- they created out of whole cloth a right that now has gone far, far from Griswold versus Connecticut.

So Griswold is good, good for protecting marriage. But it was bad, bad for raising the issue of privacy. Because only marriages are private. Except for gay marriages. And the Supreme Court was bad for making sweeping decisions that lay judicial precendence for privacy rights, except for the part that protected marriage, which was good.

I hope we're clear on that.

I think I'll use this opportunity to take a look at the Constitution and our right to privacy. Except I smell banana bread in the kitchen, so privacy rights will have to wait until tomorrow.

On the ideal family

Okay, so few things in life scare me more than almost agreeing with Rick Santorum.

The kindly junior senator from Pennsylvania was sporting enough to appear on the Daily Show last night (and yes, at this point I do get the vast majority of my news from Comedy Central, 'cause the real news makes me sad), and he made some good points with regard to the American family in general (vis a vis his new book, It Takes a Family, which is not getting an Amazon link from me, sorry Rick).

Senator Santorum said that society is based around the idea of a family with one man and one woman married for the purpose of having kids. I do kind of disagree with that; anthropologically speaking, the "traditional" nuclear family is kind of a new development, what with plenty of less-advanced and/or aboriginal societies living in all different kinds of arrangements and being just fine with it. Regardless, I will stipulate that the ideal family involves a kid having two parents (although I won't insist that they have one parent of each gender; see this post for my feelings on same-gender parenting). Once again, for the record, it is my person, unscientific opinion that any two-parent family, regardless of gender combo, is the ideal, and any discussion of the effect of gay parents on kids is just going to happen on another blog.

Here's where Rick and I significantly part ways, though: he feels that the government's job is to support that ideal situation. Well, okay, yeah, I actually do agree with that, too (isn't this scary?). But I don't agree that we need to support the ideal at the expense of reality. 'Cause reality isn't ideal. Reality is single mothers, sometimes single fathers, divorces, remarriages, stepfamilies, blended families. And while government certainly does need to support and even promote the ideal of two parents with a whole passel of kids, where at least one parent is available for those kids at all times, it's counterproductive to do anything that would prevent the other types of less-ideal families from thriving. Why would the sanctity of the traditional man-woman marriage be threatened by similarly loving marriages of same-gender individuals? While there's certainly nothing wrong with encouraging families to work through their difficulties, if a woman is in an abusive relationship, shouldn't the government also support her in her single motherhood when she makes the difficult decision to take the kids and get out? It's fine to place a special value on traditional families, but why does doing that mean that you also can't take a child out of an orphanage and place it with two men who love each other deeply and would make great fathers?

The problem isn't even that the Republicans are so far off in their thinking. When it all comes down to it, we want the same things. Democrats and Republicans both think that abortion is a bad and tragic thing. We both want every child to grown up in a supportive and loving family. We both want world peace (and tougher penalties for parole violators, Stan). But while so many (not even all) on the conservative side, particularly the Evangelical Christians, are unwilling to support anything outside of the Biblical ideal for society, those of us on the other side recognize that you have to work toward the ideal, but you also have to recognize that in the meantime, you have to abide in the society that you have, not the society that you want or would like to have.

On another odd search

Okay, so today's Weird Yahoo! Search of the Day has to go to "'josh massey' apocalypse."

Um, Josh? Something you'd like to tell the class?

Update: The Strange Google Du Jour is "threat ACG." Now, come on, y'all. Is that really necessary? Is that nice?

Or maybe they're implying that I'm a threat. That my hands are lethal weapons. That my mind is as a sharpened stiletto...

On winning the hearts and minds of people whose hearts and minds you already have

Okay, so today, President Bush makes his first visit in two years to Atlanta to sell us deep-southerners on his plans for Social Security. Except that the event is invitation-only, meaning that, as usual, his audience will be limited to those people who already agree with him anyway.

Not that I would ever dare criticize our president or second-guess his political strategery, but if he's going to take the time to come down here with so much else going on in the world, wouldn't it make more sense for him to try and sell his SS plan to the people who actually need convincing? Just thinking about efficient use of time, is all.

On my Friday Random Ten

Okay, so it is Friday, right? Day after Thursday? Tomorrow, then, would be Saturday?

Just checking.

1.Norah Jones, "One Flight Down"
2. Guster, "California Dreamin'"
3. Lauryn Hill, "Ex-Factor"
4. J.S. Bach, "Ich ruf' Zu Dir, Herr Jesus Christ"
5. The Beatles, "Yellow Submarine"
6. Serge Gainsbough, "Generique"
7. The Beatles, "I Feel Fine"
8. Joss Stone, "Chokin' Kind"
9. Elvis, "Love Me Tender"
10. John Coltrane, "Central Park West"

Yours go below.

On resiliency

Okay, so I recently got an e-mail from a close friend of mine in England; he wasn't in London the day of the bombing, but he was there the day after, and he made a lot of really insightful points about the whole thing. I won't post the entire thing, 'cause it's personal, y'all, but I don't think he'd mind me sharing this part, which made me smile:

"Today Britain is burning in fear" says an Islamist website.

"Today Britain is cheesed off and slightly late for work" would be closer to the mark.

Always good to hear from a friend.

On flip-flop fashion

Okay, so I was going to just leave this alone, but having been branded a "fashion commentator" by several individuals, I thought I'd at least use my power for some kind of good.

The biggest fashion-related to-do came when Northwestern University's national-champion women's lacrosse team were rewarded with a visit to the White House to meet the president. The girls got themselves all pretty, behaved appropriately, posed for pictures with the pres and went on their merry ways.

It was when Kate Darmody got home that she read the e-mail from her brother: "YOU WORE FLIP-FLOPS TO THE WHITE HOUSE???!!!" Aly Josephs's mother was "mortified" that, in fact, four of the nine girls in the front row of the picture were wearing flip-flops.

Whoop de fricking doo.

The news is all over it. Mothers have been interviewed to tell how embarrassed they were at their daughters' choice of shoes. Shoe experts, and apparently there are some, people who write books on shoes have been called in for heated debates over whether or not the footwear was appropriate.

Well, let me say first that the first thing to catch my eye was the length of their skirts. The fact that none of the girls had their butt-cheeks hanging out below their hemlines was impressive, as was the fact that none of them were wearing casual denim, tiered, or broomstick skirts.

The shoes should be a non-issue. It's not like they were wearing jelly sandals or rubber flip-flops with three-toned soles. The fact is, flats are in this summer, which comes as a great relief to those of us whose arches need a break from high-heeling it around town every day. I wouldn't even say that these girls were wearing flip-flops. I'd probably call them flat-heeled thong sandals.

Now, I probably wouldn't wear flat-heeled thong sandals to the White House; even the nicest flats are still more casual than a cute pair of heels, and a low-heeled, open-toed mule would be almost as comfortable as a flat. But to all of the "shoe commentators" who are up in arms over these girls wearing flp-flops (gasp!) to the White House (choke!), remember that this is the home of a man who makes a distinction between casual and formal cowboy boots. I seriously doubt he took it personally.

On the Woodward and Bernstein reunion tour

Okay, so Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein were on the Daily Show last night, and yes, they were shilling for their new book, but they were also commenting on the mushroom scandals that keep popping up and the media coverage thereof. If we're going to be completely honest, we'll have to recognize that it was it was a seriously heavy chunk of luck that made the guys "Woodward and Bernstein" instead of "Some Nebbish Guy and Hey, What's Up With That Other Guy's Hair," in that without Nixon's poor judgment as to which offices to break into and which conversations to tape record, there wouldn't have been a scandal to cover. On the other hand, though, they contributed to their own fame there by simply being better-than-average reporters; it could be posited that lesser reporters wouldn't have been so successful at digging deep, asking the right questions and talking to the right people. And that's why people like me, people who aspire to be Real, Grown-Up Reporters someday, look to W&B as the gold standard. At this point, they're almost more of an archetype than anything else.

Bob Woodward told a story about doing an interview at the White House and being met at the gates by an anti-Bush protest group, one protester of whom demanded to know what Woodward was doing in there and whether he was giving Bush a blow job. Twenty yards down Pennsylvania Avenue, he was accosted by a woman who asked if he was just trying to take Bush down the way he took down Nixon. And that's the way it is, really - no one trusts the press; they just distrust the press for different reasons. Jon Stewart (who sometimes seems more like a real reporter than anyone else these days) asked the pertinent question: should the public trust the press, really? And Carl Bernstein said no, but not for the reasons that people think. It's not about bias, because everyone is going to see bias where they want to; it's about journalists not doing their jobs properly.

And they totally, totally aren't. Reporters are so afraid of pissing off sources and losing access that they won't write anything more controversial than the school lunch menu, much less ask actual followup questions. The recent press corps assault on Scott "Rainman" McClellan was amazing because it was unusual to see reporters being so damned assertive at a White House gaggle, but to quote Chris Rock, "What do you want, a cookie?" That's what reporters do, you lazy punks.

The sub-story that ended up overwhelming the Jim/Jeff Guckert/Gannon scandal was that it was broken, for the most part, by the non-"real journalist" community. The serious, in-depth reporting was done by World O'Crap and Americablog, and they did it without depending on special, magical, Press Club-only insider sources; they did it with Google and a willingness to spend a little time finding out what the hell is actually going on. Bloggers got their due, which I thought was cool, but I couldn't help but wondering: Aren't you journalists ashamed?! All of you "real" journalists should be ashamed! This story was out there, the bald dude was standing right freaking next to you in the press gaggle, and the story was broken by some folks with computers and a basic recognition of when things just don't smell right.

Unequivocally, our generation's Woodward and Bernstein will be bloggers (assuming the FEC doesn't manage to shut them all down, but that's a whole other post). I don't know what scandal will be there to help them, because frankly, the White House has adopted Ronald Regan's Teflonicity; Gannon didn't touch them, the Downing Street Memos got less than "meh," and the ongoing Puppetmastergate doesn't seem to fluster the administration nearly as much as it should. If it's not the Bush White House, it might well be the next president.  But it's going to happen, and "real" journalists had better be sufficiently chastened.

The funniest comment in recent memory was Jon Stewart's whispered comment on the video of Scotty McClellan's shellacking: "The White House press corps has secretly been replaced with real reporters." Let's see if they notice. Hell, let's see if it lasts.

On new love

Okay, so I'll always love Barack Obama. A love like that never really ends. But love does change, and lovers change, and John McCain did Leno last night. So down-to-earth. So clever. So self-aware. So charmingly dimpled when he smiles...



Seriously, Barack, you'll be okay. You're a strong guy, you've got a lot of purpose to your life, and you've got Michelle and the girls to comfort you. As for me, I've got a new boyfriend. John, call me. For serious.

On Random Ten omens

Okay, so when we were at UGA (Doug went from '95-'99; I went from '99 to '03), my brother and I had this superstition about the drive from Athens to Columbus. The drive down I-85 takes you right under the flightline for the Atlanta airport, and the idea was that if a plane landed on you on your way home, it's a good omen, and the weekend is going to rock.

Josh over at Martians Attacking Indianapolis (man, I love that name) has a different theory. He looks to his Friday iPod Random Ten to see how his weekend is going to go. I'm going to be heading down to Columbus this evening for some quality time with family and friends; what does my Random Ten predict for my weekend?

1. Carmen Consoli, "Fino all'ultimo"
2. Etta James, "The Very Thought Of You"
3. Ella Fitzgerald, "Slow Boat To China"
4. Madonna, "Remember"
5. Worldscapes, "C'est Si Bon"
6. Abbey Lincoln, "A Part Of Me (There Are Such Things)"
7. Johhny Cash, "I Still Miss Someone"
8. The Rivieras, "California Sun"
9. Otis Redding, "Try A Little Tenderness"
10. Evanescence, "Lies"

Not so bad, actually. Some nice, easy jazz (Etta and Ella), liking the sound of things being bon, some sunshine, a little tenderness, and... lies? Lies.

Maybe a plane will land on me on my way down to Columbus.

On a return to better times

Okay, so I might well be the only person in the southeast to actually care about this, much less celebrate it, but it looks like pro hockey is back, baby. Don't get me wrong - the Gwinnett Gladiators aren't exactly pansies, especially as far as the ECHL is concerned. But just as arena football will never truly compete with the real deal, there's nothing like the speed, skill, and let's face it, sheer violence of national-league ice hockey. As far as I'm concerned, tank top weather can't end soon enough.

SEC football. NFL football. And now, the return of NHL hockey. This is going to be the best fall ever.

On bad language

Okay, so I promise to get back to real news and significant goings-on in a minute, but first, an open letter to Matt Lauer.

Dear Matt Lauer,

Every time you use "impact" as a verb, an angel gets a communicable disease.

Much love,
ACG

On serious reportage

Okay, so I don't hate my job. "Hate," after all, is a really strong word, and there are actually a few things out there in the world right now that are worthy of such a word. Really important things. Things more important than bitching about my job. But I'm gonna, just for a minute.

This morning, I got one of those drop-everything crash assignments where someone tosses a press kit on your desk and tells you to turn it into a story. No problem, said I, flipping it open to discover that - gasp! - Badgley Mischka is launching a new bridge eveningwear line, to preview in August at the Atlanta apparel mart.

For those of you unfamiliar with Badgley Mischka, just think red-carpetness. Think Beyonce in a lavender silk mermaid dress with lace and silver beading, or Halle Berry in a silver satin gown with ruching and crosshatching on the bodice, or Cynthia Nixon in navy blue chiffon with gold beading and her boobs down to her knees. Jenna and Not Jenna at the presidential inauguration in 2005? Both in Badgley Mischka. Think about them, and then think about selling your car, and possibly your kidney, to pay for their dresses.

The huge deal, of course, is that fans of the line must no longer mortgage their homes in order to pay for his couture! The new bridge line makes Badgley Mischka fashion accessible to the average consumer with retail price points ranging from $400 to $1,500. As the PR chick told me, "The couture line targets women ages 30-50, but the bridge line is going to bring it down to 20 because it's so much more affordable." Yeah, I totally thought Badgley Mischka was out of my reach, but I can totally drop $400 for a silk charmeuse ruched halter top with chinchilla trim. My life has meaning once again.

I don't mean to get preachy, I realize that this isn't a revolutionary thought, and I realize that the glory of capitalism is that people like Mark Badgley and James Mischka can sell thousand-dollar hand-beaded satin cocktail dresses and people who have the money will buy them, but holy backflipping crap. Children are starving in Africa, people of various nationalities are dying in the Middle East, London just got its shit blown up, and the focus of my life is an "affordable" $1,500 French lace evening gown. Sometimes, I just want to go home and cut myself.

/ self-flagellation

On a crazy little thing called love

Okay, so today I offer an open letter to my readers, apropos of nothing more than a lengthy 2:00 a.m. phone call that I've had more than once with a friend who shall remain nameless. And, until further notice, dateless.

Everything in life is fleeting, love included. People cheat, people stray, people turn out to be not the people you thought they were. And even if you are lucky enough to find a soulmate, that one true love, you've got , what, sixty or seventy years together before that big old bucket of meat breaks down and one of you is searching match.com for a new shuffleboard partner.

My point here isn't to downplay the importance of the committed relationship; on the contrary, if you're in one, you hold onto it with everything you've got, and if you're not in one, you go into it only with the appropriate respect and reverence for such an institution. Life's too short to halfass a marriage.

But if you find yourself single, dumped, divorced, or otherwise unattached, take a beat to chill out about it. Single, dating, distraught, single again, it all comes and goes, and the people who die miserable and alone are the people who push everyone else away. That dick who dumped you over Instant Messenger might have been a one, but he probably wasn't the one or he wouldn't have turned out to be such a dick.

And one final note: try not to torment your dear friends with endless tales of The One Who Got Away. We all have one, we'll surely have more in the future, and the constant retelling doesn't make you any less dumped than you were six months ago when we still had sympathy for you. Oh, and lay off the "too wounded to ever love again" crap. We know melodrama when we hear it.

Much love,
ACG

On Friday Random Ten

Okay, so...

1. Sting, "Why Should I Cry For You?"
2. Serge Gainsbourg, "Intoxicated Man"
3. Madonna, "Don't Tell Me"
4. Guster, "Rocket Ship"
5. Hector Berlioz, "Les nuits d'ete: Absence"
6. Blossom Dearie, "More Than You Know"
7. Annie Sellick, "Gravy Waltz"
8. Green Day, "Boulevard of Broken Dreams"
9. Athenaeum, "Radiance"
10. The Smiths, "What Difference Does It Make?"

Yours go below.

On a nation in mourning

We are all British.

Okay, so there's no snark for this. My sympathy and prayers go out to the families of those injured and killed. God willing, the world will finally turn its attention back to the monsters responsible for this.

On one sneaky little clause

Okay, so I've spent the past few days trying to come up with something to say about Justice O'Connor's impending resignation - something more profound than "oh, shit." I don't fault her for a minute for wanting to spend more time with her husband, whom I understand to be in poor health. That doesn't stop me from peeing myself like a kicked Pomeranian at the thought of her potential replacements. I'm sure Bush will be happy to replace "Swing Vote" O'Connor with a justice who will never waver in his determination to follow Antonin Scalia around like a devoted puppy (sidenote: offhand, I can't think of a Scalia opinion that I've agreed with outside of Kelo v. New London, and I think he's the worst kind of conservative supremacist, but I'm also very glad to have him on the Supreme Court, which is another post for another day).

Anyway, I'm a skimmer, but Matt over at Basket Full of Puppies reads the footnotes, and I'm glad he did:

By making her retirement, and hence the vacancy that an appointment would fill in the first place, contingent upon confirmation of a successor, O'Connor has single-handedly stolen Article II, Section 2, Clause 3 of the Constitution (recess appointments) from the Executive Branch and--it needn't be said--from Bush personally. A recess appointment isn't confirmed by anyone, and O'Connor's conditional clause means that absent confirmation, there isn't even a vacancy, meaning she never retired in the first place.

Unwilling to get caught in the Newsweek single-source thing, I checked, and yah, you betcha: "This is to inform you of my decision to retire from my position as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, effective upon the nomination and confirmation of my successor," she wrote to President Bush (emphasis mine).

I'm sure there are many of you out there who are far better versed than I in constitutional law and who will be more than happy to put a rifle round through my little balloon of happiness, but until that happens, I'm going to start sleeping nights again. And I'll do so with a smile on my face, because I always thought Justice O'Connor kind of rocks, but now I'm convinced that she, in fact, rawks. Hard core. You have no idea.

On living like it's your last day

Okay, so a friend forwarded me the text of Steve Job's graduation address at, I dunno, some school. The e-mail didn't say. For all I know, the entire thing never took place and somebody has been sending around inspirational quotes attributed to Steve Jobs. But a lot of it was pretty solid good advice, so I read it, and one quote jumped out at me:

For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Sounds like pretty good advice, right? We don't know how much time we have left here, and it's better to live a fulfilling life than to put off fulfillment for a day we aren't sure will actually come.

Alas.

I haven't discussed it with my landlord, but I'm pretty sure they won't be willing to accept fulfillment in lieu of a rent check at the first of the month. Similarly, I think that my editor would, at best, suggest therapy for me if I told her, "Yeah, the awards ceremony I was supposed to cover? Not really what I'd want to do on the last day of my life. I wrote this lovely short story instead." I can tell you for sure and for certain what I'd like to be doing on the next-to-the-last day of my life, but I can tell you with just as much certainty that doing that every day is likely to get me in more trouble than anything else.

So here 'tis: has anyone actually ever answered the above question affirmatively? Does anyone know anyone who has? And if you could say, "Yeah, I could die happy," do you actually have some profession/occupation/vocation that makes you so blissful every day, or are your standards so low that whatever you're doing is good enough for the last day of your life?

On human rights - the end, at long last

Okay, so Human Rights Month was a roaring success in the sense that no one sent me any computer viruses for wasting so much blog space on something that no one really disagrees with anyway. Thirty days hath June, and what have we learned?

- That it's best to analyze declarations with way fewer than thirty articles. Think, like, ten, maybe.

Besides that.

- That a person is a person, and it's the fact that you're a human being that grants you all of these rights and protections.
- That torture and slavery are right out, along with any other kind of degrading treatment.
- That rights can't be taken away, and if they're to be limited, those limits are subject to fair, public, and equitable due process.
- That at the very least, everyone deserves a roof over their head, food on the table, a place to call home, and the wherewithall to support their family.
- That everyone is free to speak their mind and practice their beliefs, and everyone is similarly free to shut up and not to practice beliefs that they don't support.
- That no matter who you are and what you do, some human rights are basic and necessary and can't be taken away, period.
- That human rights are guaranteed only by the benevolence of the world as a whole; that starts at home, by teaching our children tolerance and respect for others and demanding same out of the government that serves at our will.

Here's the upshot: no one disagrees with these rights. No one says, "Hey, y'know, as a rundown of basic human rights, I think the UDHR gives a lot of people way too much freedom" (or, at least, no one has yet). If that's the case, why do we have so much trouble actually honoring those rights? Why should we enjoy all of those freedoms, but object when they're extended to others? Anyone who can answer that question to my satisfaction gets guest blogging priveleges, my eternal gratitude, and a nice crisp five-dollar bill.

Thus endeth the lesson.

Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI Part VII Part VIII Part IX Part X Part XI Part XII Part XIII

On bringing justice to the justice system

Okay, so apropos of the recent Kelo v. City of New London ruling and courtesy of Josh at Martians Attacking Indianapolis, we have the possibility that someone might just pave Justice Souter's house and put up a parking lot:

Justice Souter's vote in the "Kelo vs. City of New London" decision allows city governments to take land from one private owner and give it to another if the government will generate greater tax revenue or other economic benefits when the land is developed by the new owner.

On Monday June 27, Logan Darrow Clements, faxed a request to Chip Meany the code enforcement officer of the Towne of Weare, New Hampshire seeking to start the application process to build a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road. This is the present location of Mr. Souter's home.

...

The proposed development, called "The Lost Liberty Hotel" will feature the "Just Desserts Cafe" and include a museum, open to the public, featuring a permanent exhibit on the loss of freedom in America. Instead of a Gideon's Bible each guest will receive a free copy of Ayn Rand's novel "Atlas Shrugged."

...

"This is not a prank" said Clements, "The Towne of Weare has five people on the Board of Selectmen. If three of them vote to use the power of eminent domain to take this land from Mr. Souter we can begin our hotel development."

Today's award for great big round brass cojones goes to Logan Darrow Clements, developer, former California gubernatorial candidate (but then, who isn't?), and my brand new hero.

On human rights, Part XIII: end run

Okay, so the end is totally nigh.

Article 28.

Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.

Article 29.

(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.

(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.

(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Article 30.

Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.

But what does this mean for me?

This seems kind of tautological - everyone has the right to their rights. But it makes sense. Not only does everyone have certain rights, but among those rights is the right not to get sweated by the authorities when you try to exercise your rights. And Article 29 makes an especially important distinction - rights can be limited, but only in the interest of securing others' rights. My right to swing my fist ends at the tip of your nose, my right to practice my religion ends at the beginning of yours, and now it's all on paper.

Just answer the question already.

It means that everyone has the right to a just world. Life isn't fair, like my mama always said, but justice is something we can all get behind.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8; Part VI: Articles 9 and 10; Part VII: Articles 11 and 12; Part VIII: Articles 13, 14 and 15; Part IX: Articles 16, 17 and 18; Part X: Articles 19, 20 and 21; Part XI: Articles 22, 23 and 24; Part XII: Articles 25, 26 and 27

On human rights, Part XII

Okay, so like our president, I've started something that turned out to be far more unpleasant than I'd expected. Unlike our president, however, I have an exit strategy and the determination to see it through to its proper end.

Article 25.

(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.

(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.

Article 26.

(1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.

(2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.

(3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.

Article 27.

(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.

(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.

But what does this mean for me?

Despite what the 'wingers might say, we really do all have the right to some basic standard of living. It might not be the Hummer-and-Armani standard, but it's a standard. No one should have to starve, and no one should have to die of an easily curable illness, whether they're employed or unemployed or happily unemployed, whether they're solid good citizens or make poor lifestyle choices. After all, a person who gets him/herself in trouble can hardly get out of it if he/she doesn't live that long.

Also despite some 'winger arguments, everyone has the right to an education - and it's gotta be free. So the whole voucher thing? Forget it. Anything that would require a parent to pay money out-of-pocket for their child to receive any acceptable standard of education is right out. Parents do have the right to choose the kind of education, be it secular or religious or specialized, but they may end up having to do it themselves; the government can't be expected to cater to every single tiny whim with a billion slightly different educational systems.

One caveat? Education is meant to teach respect for human rights - "understanding, tolerance, and friendship." So parents have the right to choose their children's education to the point that they start teaching hatred, intolerance, and ideals contrary to the peaceable goals of the UN. So if you don't want to teach your kid that gay is okay, that's your right, but don't turn him into a bully, either. Tolerance and intolerance each breed more of same, and raising a child full of hatred and violence isn't going to result in a peaceful world.

Just answer the question already.

It means that everyone has a right to the basic necessities of life, including healthcare, food, and education. And it means that an appreciation of human rights is, in itself, a human right.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8; Part VI: Articles 9 and 10; Part VII: Articles 11 and 12; Part VIII: Articles 13, 14 and 15; Part IX: Articles 16, 17 and 18; Part X: Articles 19, 20 and 21; Part XI: Articles 22, 23 and 24

On looking like a duck

Okay, so my first reaction to the Supreme Court's ruling on the New London case was that it smelled seriously funky, but I didn't want to comment on it until I had looked into it a little more. I discovered, to my horror, that the ruling was, in fact, constitutionally sound. And, uh, so was the dissenting opinion. Huh?

(Untwist your panties, Steve; I do have a solid position to take on this one.)

So, yeah, I sided with Scalia on this one. I. Sided. With Scalia. It actually sounds better to say that he sided with me. See, J.P. Stevens said that the taking of private property by the state for public use falls within the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment, to which I say "Meh." Only kind of. It all depends on whether or not private commercial ventures would benefit the community enough that handing an 87-year-old woman a check and knocking down her house is something we think is okay. Said clause doesn't really draw a line between the benefits from a highway overpass or a public building and the benefits from a shopping mall. Plus, not every house subject to eminent domain has an 87-year-old woman in it; it could be argued that a shopping mall would definitely benefit the community more than a crack den.

That's where I started to actually agree with the ruling a little bit, because Stevens also made the point that eminent domain covers a wide variety of cases. It wouldn't make sense to rule on the basis of an 87-year-old woman if it would hinder the progress of a town looking to get rid of a crack den. He said that state legislatures and courts were in a better position to "discern local public needs" and that it was their place to make such rulings. And that makes sense.

Except it totally doesn't, because seemingly without realizing it, Stevens did make this ruling on the basis of an 87-year-old woman. The Supreme Court didn't refuse to hear the case because it was better decided in state courts; they heard it and he ruled on it, and now there's precedent. Now, a town is free to tear down a crack den to make room for profitable economic development, which is great, but there's also judicial precedent saying that a community's power of eminent domain is basically unlimited as long as they can make it sound pretty. And that just isn't right.

I had a conversation a few months ago with a law student named Harry who admired Scalia greatly and also thought that he was kind of a dick, an opinion which I greatly respected even if I didn't happen to agree. The conversation wasn't so much about Scalia, though, as it was about O'Connor, who has a tendency to ride the fence between ruling rightly on one case and ruling rightly to set precedent. Harry made the point that sometimes, a Supreme Court justice really does have to screw over one certain party, because that ruling is going to become the law of the land. It could be that that particular party in that particular situation is completely in the right, but that to say so would be to open the door to lots of other parties whose similar situations might leave them entirely in the wrong. I'd never really thought about it that way before, and it really stuck with me.

Justice Stevens, I can give you this guy's e-mail address if you want. See, you've just laid down what amounts to a law saying that a state's rights under the Takings Clause are basically unlimited. Sure, you said that state legislatures can do what they want with it, but how long will it be before a city is knocking down a well-kept low-income neighborhood to build a mini mall and saying, "Hey, Kelo et al. v. City of New London et al. Suck it." O'Connor made the point that "[t]he specter of condemnation hangs over all property. Nothing is to prevent the state from replacing any Motel 6 with a Ritz-Carlton, any home with a shopping mall, or any farm with a factory." You have given the state the power to steal from the poor to give to the rich, and that's not okay. Maybe in this particular case, your ruling made sense, but you can't rule on one case without considering the impact on the rest of the country years into the future. That's your burden as a Supreme Court justice.

And dude, you made me agree with Scalia.

On human rights, part XI

Okay, so is everyone else as bored with this as I am? Good gravy.

Only nine more to go. Onward!

Article 22.

Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.

Article 23.

(1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.

(2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.

(3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.

(4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

Article 24.

Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.

But what does this mean for me?

I think that these articles are kind of cool because they outline rights that aren't specifically retained for American citizens by our own foundational documents. People (usually conservatives who have an issue with any kind of social program proposed by the Democrats, but it could be anyone) often say things like, "No one is guaranteed the right to work" and "It's not the government's responsibility to take care of you if you were dumb enough to trust your retirement to a company like Enron or United" and "If women want equal pay for equal work, they need to just get rid of their ovaries like the rest of the guys." Well, folks, sit down, 'cause those are all rights that you actually do have. And they're rights that are enumerated for all nations adhering to the UDHR, not just the United States. So the next time you hear someone pulling out that right-to-work crap, you can say, "Dude, French people have the right to work. German people have the right to work. Hell, Iraqi people have the right, and so do I." And then start in about vacations, 'cause you know you need one.

Just answer the question already.

It means that you have the right to work, the right to not work sometimes, and the right to not die of starvation and/or exposure during those periods that you're unable to work.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8; Part VI: Articles 9 and 10; Part VII: Articles 11 and 12; Part VIII: Articles 13, 14 and 15; Part IX: Articles 16, 17 and 18; Part X: Articles 19, 20 and 21

On human rights, Part - good Lord, part X

Okay, so we're getting close to the end. Bear with me here.

Besides, think of what a handy reference you'll have when this is all over.

Article 19.

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Article 20.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.

(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.

Article 21.

(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.

(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.

(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.

But what does this mean for me?

God bless Lindsay Lohan when she sings, "Don't think that you can tell me what to think / I'm the one who knows what's good for me." It's not a new idea, but she's the most recent person to put it to music. And then she dieted until her boobs went away, and the rest of us women who have boobs were, like, "What, boobs aren't cool any more?"

But that's neither here nor there. The point is, you are welcome to your own opinion, and the government can't step on that. Let it be known that other entities aren't the government - if you're an idiot and I tell you to shut the hell up, I am in no way infringing on your right to free speech, because I'm not the government, I'm just one pissed off citizen. And in terms of profanity and "fightin' words" and lies, if you can manage to get through a sentence without cussing like a sailor, Doug, or lying about people or insulting their mama, you're good to go. Similarly, you "decide / where [you] go / what [you] need / who [you] know" because of your freedom to (peacefully) assemble with whom and where you want to, within reason. Or not assemble or associate, as you see fit.

Ohhh, Article 21, how I love your rippling abs. This is the one that says you have the right to participate in government and take advantage of all the services it provides. It also says that government serves at the will of the people. The government, at the will of the people. Does this say the majority of the people? It does not. Everyone gets the right to vote, but the majority of the people are not given the right to just step on the minority. Just because most people think a certain way doesn't make it right. A majority of Germans going along with the Holocaust didn't make it okay, a majority of Americans going along with segregation didn't make it okay, and a majority of people going along with discrimination against gay people or the wholesale Conservative Christianization of the country or the invasion of Iraq while things weren't finished in Afghanistan doesn't make any of it okay (as we're seeing now, as a majority of Americans are now saying, "Hold on, we invaded Iraq? Why? I didn't vote for that").

It also means that you don't have to agree with what your leader says just because he says it. It's okay to disagree with your government, in fact, it's expected. That's why we have a legislature, and debates, and elections - because not everyone agrees. And if you happen to think that someone, say, your current president, has made some great big, huge screwups, it's okay to say so. It doesn't make you any less patriotic or any more divisive. Your government serves at your will, so if you think they've screwed up, it's not just your right but your responsibility to tell them so.

Just answer the question already.

It means that you not only have the right to your own opinion, but also the right to express it and to seek others' opinions. And it means that you tell the government what's good for you, not the other way around.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8; Part VI: Articles 9 and 10; Part VII: Articles 11 and 12; Part VIII: Articles 13, 14 and 15; Part IX: Articles 16, 17 and 18

On human rights, Part IX

Okay, so interestingly enough, among your basic human rights? Not the right to party. That one you've got to fight for.

Article 16.

(1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.

(2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.

(3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.

Article 17.

(1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.

(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

Article 18.

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

But what does this mean for me?

Basic lifestyle stuff. Marriage. Family. Property. Freedom of thought, conscience, religion. Everyone has the right to make decisions that affect their own lives, as long as all involved parties consent and no one is harmed in the process. Re: Article 16, note that it doesn't say that any man has the right to marry any woman and vice versa; it just says that men and woman of full age have the right to marry. And that family that we're trying to protect? We're not specifying a family of Mommy, Daddy, and 2.5 kiddles. Just a family. A family is a family, and it's special and worthy of protection - even if Heather really does have two mommies.

Re: the freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, I say right on. Everyone gets to pick his or her own religion, and everyone gets to practice it. If you happen to live in a nation that's populated 85 percent by shrimp worshippers, they can't demand that you worship shrimp or get out of their country; they can't hold your behavior to the standards of the Church of Shrimp; they can't insist that you say a prayer to shrimp every time you enter a government building. Conversely, you can't keep them from praying to shrimp in private or gathering to worship at the Church of Shrimp. Everyone has the freedom to their own religion and no one else's.

Just answer the question already.

It means that I can't keep you from getting married, no matter how much it creeps me out, and it means that I can't keep you from worshiping whom and how you want, no matter how much it creeps me out.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8; Part VI: Articles 9 and 10; Part VII: Articles 11 and 12; Part VIII: Articles 13, 14 and 15

On being only as mature as is absolutely necessary

Okay, so you know it would have to be one of my Navy boys to send me this one. A FOXNews story tells us of the Glory Hole, a homeless shelter in Alaska that has stopped serving bear meat:

Some of the people served by the Glory Hole said they miss meat of any kind.

Um... Okay, then. Fly Navy.

On human rights, Part VIII

Okay, so if you think that some people are subject to being shackled in the fetal position in a puddle of their own feces and some people aren't, you just don't know your Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

Article 13.

(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.

(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

Article 14.

(1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.

(2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Article 15.

(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.

(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

But what does this mean for me?

Now, of course these rights are subject to criminal prosecution; if you've been convicted of a felony, then your right to move around within the country is going to be somewhat hampered by the 7x10 cell that you call home; if that felony happens to be child molestation, your freedom of residence is going to be somewhat hampered by any elementary schools nearby. But as long as you're a decent, law-abiding person, you get to go pretty much where you need/want to go. It's kind of like a really understanding mother; if you behave yourself, she's likely to trust you and let you hang out with your friends and give you a late curfew.

But let's say your mother isn't so understanding, and despite your good behavior, she's going to ground you for a multitude of offenses. In that case, you also have the right to go next door to seek asylum from Mr. and Mrs. Canada, the really nice old couple that lives there. However, if it turns out you're grounded for an offense punishable by reasonable grounding, those kind old folks are likely to march you right back to your mom. Sometimes it happens that way.

And when you get there, your mom'll probably be plenty pissed off, but one thing she won't do (as an understanding mom) is disown you. You're her kid, and even when you misbehave, she loves you. Just like the US government loves you and won't call you unamerican just because you do something that pisses them off.

Wait, no, hold on...

Just answer the question already.

It means that home is home, and you're not going to get kicked out of home. And if home isn't treating you right, you've always got a place to go.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8; Part VI: Articles 9 and 10; Part VII: Articles 11 and 12

On all of you damned uppity blue staters

Okay, so I'm with Amanda over at Pandagon here. I am so freaking tired of people ragging on the red states just because they happen to be red. I will grant you that the red staters in the red states can be a pain in the ass, but there happens to be a growing number of moderates, liberals, and progressives in those states fighting to drag their states kicking and screaming to the light side of the Force. And honestly, who's doing more good here - the Georgia Dems working from the inside to reform their state, or the Massachusetts Dems standing on the outside, pointing and saying, "Ooh, you like barbecue, you've got cooties" and then going to their committee meetings to pat each other on the back?

And Tennessee Guerilla Women really need to kiss my ass:

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country's fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation's fresh fruit, 95 percent of America's quality wines (you can serve French wines at state dinners) 90 percent of all cheese, 90percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools, plus Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT.

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson...

Oh, don't even...

... and the University of Georgia.

Oh. You. Bitch.

Fine, TGW. Have your blue states. You can get together and have your happy little blue state party, with all of your little self-satisfied blue state friends who can do a little blue state dance over not having to worry about mosquitos or bad weather. Just don't count on listening to any jazz music, or rock music, or, um, country music, because that's all red state. So you can hand over REM, Widespread Panic, the B-52s and Elvis whenever you're ready. Don't count on eating any barbecue, either, 'cause we came up with that.

And while you're at it, you can give back Hank Aaron and Ty Cobb and, yeah, even Peyton Manning. Oh, and Thomas Jefferson and Jimmy Carter and Martin Luther fucking King fucking Junior.

See, this is why liberals get the reputation for being so damned uppity and superior - because they act that way. They look down on anything not appropriately northern and intellectual and dismiss entire sections of the country as boondockified rubes. How exactly do you expect to gain southern votes that way, blue staters? It starts this way: by pulling your heads out of your asses and realizing that, just like with religion, just like with race, just like with sexual orientation, the fact that it's different than you doesn't make it inherently inferior. My suggestion is that you sit down on a nice front porch swing, pour yourself a glass of iced tea, listen to some Patsy Cline and get the hell over yourselves.

And while you're at it, see if you can figure out how many NCAA football national champs have come from blue states in the past fifty years (I'll give you a hint: it's between four and six).

On being this many

Okay, so it was one year ago today that I sat down and thought, "Hey, y'know, there might be someone out there interested in the inconsequential ramblings rattling around in my head." This post was the unfortunate result. Since then, we've moved on from pointless navel-gazing to even more pointless musings on life, love, politics, religion, and anything having to do with the hind end of a dog. And more than 4,000 of you have sat through the entire damn thing. Suckers.

In honor of this most hallowed of days, I give you a look back on the past twelve months: Practically Harmless, Year One: By the Numbers

6: times the f-bomb has been dropped in the past twelve months
20: times it was dropped on Hey Jenny Slater in the past three months
1: raises received
-5.76: increase in annual take-home pay (in dollars)
32: times I've seen my byline in print
32: times it's given me a little bit of a thrill
2: penpal requests from incarcerated felons
0: requests answered
15: links from other blogs
0: links from "Top 100" blogs (heeeeey…)
4: moths spent "giving it another try" with ex-fiance
2: other girls he was dating without my knowledge during that period
861: US troops lost in Iraq
0: WMD found in Iraq
200: terrorists convicted courtesy of the USA PATRIOT Act, according to the Bush administration
39: terrorists actually convicted
0: terrorist attacks on US soil
0: alien invasions on US soil
8 million: Iraqi citizens voting in January's elections
0: US Senators voting in January's elections
10: signs of impending apocalypse (out of 20)
4: New Year's Resolutions kept (out of 5)
2: Old pope, John Paul
16: New pope, Benedict
78: time spent listening to Honey's evening constitutional (in hours)
1.3: total time for Honey to actually do her business (in hours)
4,235: visitors in the past 12 months
17: visitors not looking for dog porn or dating tips

"No point in mentioning those bats, I thought. Poor bastard will see them soon enough." Hunter S. Thompson, 1937-2005

On the origin of X-Men species

Okay, so Jesse at Pandagon shares with us an e-mail proving that God is, in fact, Magneto.

On human rights, Part VII

Okay, so we've got more rights fo' that ass:

Article 11.

(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.

(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.

Article 12.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

But what does this mean for me?

Last time, we discovered that no one can detain you without cause. Today we learn that, even with cause, they can't just assume that you're guilty. We'll go back to our previous example of the convenience store holdup. The officers who arrested you can't just take you into a back room and start beating you until you crack, with the excuse that, "Hey, this kid held up a convenience store," 'cause the fact is, they just don't know. The fact that you've got your nice, shiny alibi is actually secondary to the fact that you just aren't guilty until they have reason to think otherwise. Video of you committing the crime? Catching you with loot afterwards? They might start drawing conclusions. But as long as all they've got is you sitting at Denny's with a bunch of folks, you're guilty of nothing more than picking the wrong friends. Oh, and just for the sake of argument, if robbery wasn't against the law at the time your friends did it, they'd get off, too. But, uh, for the record, robbery? Against the law.

The police (or government or whomever) can't mess with your family, either. Say they really want to get some information on your friends for the trial, so they, say, put you in a position that makes it look like you're fellating a guy and threaten to show it to your family or put it on the Internet. Nothin' doin'; they can't do that. They can't make up stories and pass them around, can't pick up your wife and threaten to rape her in front of you, nothing; your family, your privacy and your reputation are all off-limits.

Just answer the question already.

It means that they can't immediately start beating the crap out of you just because they think you're a terrorist, nor can they mess with your family or smear you publicly.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8; Part VI: Articles 9 and 10

On nomenclature

Okay, so quick question: when a gay guy hangs around a girl for the purpose of looking straight, she's called his beard, right? So what would it be called when a straight woman carts around a gay guy for the purpose of looking not single (note: "pathetic," while accurate, doesn't fit for current purposes)? Post suggestions below.

On Friday ten, randomly

Okay, so tops on my iPod today:

1. Kay Star, "I Love Paris"
2. Oasis, "Some Might Say"
3. Abbey Lincoln, "The Nearness of You"
4. Orff, "Carmina Burana"
5. Jet, "Look What You've Done"
6. OutKast, "Bombs Over Baghdad"
7. Kay Starr, "Night Train"
8. Abbey Lincoln, "Time After Time"
9. Frank Sinatra, "Nancy (With a Laughing Face)"
10. BDF, "Diner Dans Le Dessert"

Okay, random my preternaturally toned pink behind. Seven days' worth of music on my iPod, and I get jazz, jazz, SATAN, jazz, jazz, jazz, cabaret jazz?

An experiment to try at your own office: put the Carmina Burana on your speakers at your desk and count the number of strange looks you get. I got five before mercifully hitting "skip."

On a pharmacist's right to choose

Okay, so the controversy over the pharmacist's conscience clause has been going for a while now, and I haven't really commented because other folks have said it better and besides, I'm not really sure which position I take. I mean, on the one hand, I completely support a doctor's right not to perform an abortion; I know doctors who (rightly) feel passionately about First Doing No Harm and as such are unwilling to perform abortions and/or prescribe the Morning After pill. However, respecting the rights of their patients, they're willing to refer said patients to a doctor who will. Why shouldn't a pharmacist who feels passionately about such things be able to do the same?

At the same time, though, I'm personally the consumer of birth control pills for reasons other than birth control. Whether or not my pills are ever going to go head-on against a sperm, they're also controlling a whole lot of other things happening in that particular system, and I'll be goll-durned if some pharmacist is going to sentence me to a life of cramps and bloating - and sentence the people around me to my irritability and weepiness - because he's afraid I might use it to murder a blastocyst. And for that matter, if I do choose to murder myself a blastocyst (or prevent its creation), I'll be goll-durned if some pharmacist is going to shake his head and cluck his tongue at me.

That's why I was so amused by a comment on a thread over at Pandagon. My Ponygirl is my new friend for the following brilliant suggestions:

I work for a major hospital, where the policy is such that a male nurse, should his religion prohibit him from touching females not in his family, can be protected from doing just that without endangering his job. But the hospital has to know about it. So, I don't think that these pharmacies would be in any way out-of-line in these conscience clause states to give each and every pharmacist they employ a sheet of all the different Rxs they distribute, and ask the pharmacists to check off any medications that they wouldn't fill. Then, the pharmacy needs to post those drugs that might not be filled clearly, before the woman even enters the store.

...

The other way to combat, this, of course, is to beat those little assholes at their own game. ... I say we need to get some hardcore feminists into the pharmacies in these conscience clause states, and have them deny Viagra and Cialis (could be used in the rape of a woman), Propecia (a baldness drug that might cause birth defects if a woman so much as handles a pill), and any other drug consumed by men that could even be tenuously linked to birth defects. I bet if all those bald, flacid old shits suddenly found themselves driving all over town to get their drugs, they'd want that law repealed damn quick.

We have our solution. I invite all you female pharmacists out there to refuse any prescriptions for any erectile dysfunction drug that might contribute to the rape of a woman, and any other drug that could cause birth defects. And then come back to tell us all about it. I still don't have my mind entirely made up about the whole thing, but I do know that conservative Christian male pharmacists don't get to dictate everyone else's conscience.

On human rights, Part VI

Okay, so now we're starting to get to the meat of the Declaration, and the part of it that seems to stymie so many otherwise bright Americans. While all of the rights listed are crucial and inalienable, these are particularly germane to ongoing debates.

Article 9.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 10.

Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

But what does this mean for me?

Not all arrest and detention is arbitrary. Say you're hanging out with a bunch of your friends at Denny's, innocently scarfing down your Moons Over My Hammy and talking about how great Hayden Christensen looks with his shirt off (or, if you prefer, Angelina Jolie in a vinyl bustier) when the police bust in and arrest the lot of you for robbing a convenience store, and you have no freaking idea what's going on. When they take you back for questioning, they discover that while your friends were, in fact, robbing that convenience store, you were delivering the keynote address at a symposium on theoretical partical physics and three hundred people can attest to your whereabouts. At this point, the police have two choices: they can let you go, or they can suspect that you might have had a hand in planning the robbery and hold onto you, interrogating you throughout the night, not letting you sleep, playing loud music constantly, and handcuffing you naked in the fetal position in a freezing room in a puddle of your own feces until you crack and tell them something, anything, whether it's true or not.

Wait, no, the police can't do that last part.

Of course, international terrorism is waaaaaay more serious than knocking over a 7-11, and of course more intense interrogation methods are warranted in that case, and I'm sure that none of the detainees had an airtight alibi for whatever they're being accused of. But as for you, stuck in the interrogation room for five hours without so much as a potty break, since the police don't seem to believe that you had no involvement in the robbery, you'll probably be pleased to know that you're entitled to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal - no imprisonment without cause, no pretend trial with your arresting officer as judge, and no secret tribunal - if your rights aren't upheld during the trial or if you're sporting size 11 waffle-tread bruises, the entire country gets to know about it.

Just answer the question already.

It means that if they arrest you, they have to have a good reason for it, and that reason has to hold up in a fair and public hearing.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6; Part V: Articles 7 and 8

On human rights, Part - Where are we now? Part V?

Okay, so I'm back! And I'm... eh, if I'm not any better, I'm fairly sure I'm no worse than ever. As the best way to shake the dust of the past week from my sandals is to jump right back in where I left off, we're going to be looking at articles 7 and 8 of the UDHR. And what a couple of articles they are:

Article 7.

All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.

Article 8.

Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.

But what does this mean for me?

These two are pretty self-explanatory. Everyone, without discrimination - that's everyone, people, as in every one, each person - has the right to protection of his rights. It seems kind of tautological, sure, but it's still important, because Article 7 is the one that keeps the state from saying, "So your human rights are being violated, huh? Meh." And Article 8 says that if your rights are violated, a competent, non-kangaroo-courty tribunal must be available to hear your complaints and appropriately punsh any guilty parties.

Just answer the question already.

It means that everyone, no matter the circumstances, has the right to equal protection of the law, and that if these rights happen to be violated, some wigs are gonna get split.

Part I: The Preamble; Part II: Articles 1 and 2; Part III: Articles 3 and 4; Part IV: Articles 5 and 6

Stay tuned for Part VI, where we look at Articles 9 and 10, wherein a couple of my favorite commenters start to get noisy (honestly, guys, I love you. I really do. Yes, you, too).

On a mini-hiatus

Okay, so my regularly scheduled craziness at work has picked up, which will keep me out of blogging comission at least through Monday, if not Wednesday. I'll do what I can to jump on the computer every once in a while, but if I don't, it's 'cause I'm downtown trying to wring interviews out of the reluctant and inarticulate. Fun!

Oh, and I wanted to clarify something, in case anyone was confused - yes, I am, according to my college diploma and the Atlanta Press Club, a journalist, but this blog is no more a source of accurate and hard-hitting news than Cosmo is a source of fashion tips (just trust me on this one). You'll find here my opinions, written at length, and for my own amusement (although I'm always stoked by the prospect of amusing others). I try to stick pretty close to the f'real truth but have no problem easing away from that slightly if giggles can ensue. Reader bewarre.

On Us vs. The World

Okay, so everyone who has ever wondered where the Religious Right is coming from needs to read this post over at Johnson City Forum. Brook looks at a post from DailyKos that gives a lot of insight as to why the more radical conservative Christians seem so completely out of touch with the rest of the world:

It starts with the fact that we as conservative Christians are taught to see America as our land. I mean, you guys in Europe and the loonies on the East and West Coasts think the Founding Fathers died to bring us religious freedom.

They so did not. They died to give new Christianity a place where it could flourish. And if you think that Catholicism was flourishing perfectly fine before that, thank you, then you don't understand conservative Christianity. See, I grew up being taught that Catholicism was almost-sort-of-not-quite-but-we-won't-talk-about-it cult. Really.

...

Conservative Christians are taught all our lives that we are constantly engaged in spiritual warfare. [...]

And I can't really explain to anybody who isn't familiar with conservative Christianity, but we are taught that this is real. Demons? Real. Angelic warfare? Real. That passage in Ephesians about putting on the full armor of God? We take that seriously. We take everything Paul said seriously, actually. Way, way, way too seriously, but the reason we take it so seriously is because Paul has this way of delineating Christianity as a practice so that you can live it out very easily. He basically teaches Christians that they are to live every day as though they are battling persecution. Paul is the classic propagator of the Us/Them mentality. Them is the World. The World is evil and sinful and wants to persecute Us. It is Our job as Conservative Christians to don our armor and wage war against the World.

...

How this plays out is that you begin to filter your environment as a conservative christian based on what you can easily categorize. Once you have identified, say, George Bush, as one of Us, it's much easier to disregard negative news about him because the Media is one of Them, and the two things can be easily canceled out in your mind.

Honestly, read the whole thing. It really is enlightening, and if Aja's experiences really are consistent with the rest of the Southern Conservative Christian experience, we've got a whole new way of looking at and addressing this increasingly powerful segment of society.

On human rights, Part IV

Okay, so today we look at articles 5 and 6 of the UDHR, and it's not bad timing, considering an ongoing debate in the comments thread of my last post over at Hey Jenny Slater. I proposed that the soldiers responsible for the abuse at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo might have been the result of poor leadership reinforcing that kind of behavior, rather than depravity and inhumanity on the part of the troops themselves. A commenter insisted that I hate America and our troops and want to poke them all in the eye with a stick, and it went back and forth like that until I got tired and went to bed.

Anyway.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Article 6.

Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.

But what does this mean for me?

These articles seem fairly basic, but they've got a lot of meat to them, especially the first one. Article 5 doesn't just prohibit torture; it also prohibits cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment. So if you're in captivity in any country in the world, their responsibility doesn't stop with just not beating you. They also have to take care not to strip you naked and wet you down with a fire hose, not to force you to simulate oral sex with other prisoners, not to sodomize you with anything they happen to have lying around, not to sic their dogs on you, and not to attach electrodes to your genitalia. Obviously, taking pictures with a big ol' grin on their faces is right out, if they're smart.

Article 6 is significant because it says that everyone has the right to recognition as a person before the law. It doesn't say "everyone who doesn't look like a terrorist," it doesn't say "everyone who's probably not guilty of a crime," it doesn't specify. Everyone gets to enjoy the rights included in this Declaration, and if you go to Saudi Arabia and get arrested for proseletyzing, whether you're guilty or innocent, whether they like you or not, they have to respect you as a human being, not some little chew toy that they can bat around for their own amusement. If you get picked up in Basra for hanging out with terrorists and/or cab drivers, ditto.

Just answer the question already.

It means that no matter what you've done or who you are or where you are in the world, you can't be tortured - to any reasonable definition of the word.

Part I: The Preamble
Part II: Articles 1 and 2
Part III: Articles 3 and 4

On human rights, Part III

Okay, so we return to Human Rights Month with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, articles 3 and 4:

Article 3.

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.

Article 4.

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.

But what does this mean for me?

These are really short and pretty self-explanatory. Life. Liberty. Security of person. No slavery, no slave trade.

Just answer the question already.

It means that you're entitled to life, liberty, and security, and that you can't be forced into any form of slavery, dumbass.

Part I: The Preamble
Part II: Articles 1 and 2

On the devil beating his wife

Okay, so it's only now that I'm told that Your Washington Redskins picked up Jason Campbell in the 2005 draft?! People, this is a reason to pick up a phone. You see this and think, "Oh, I should pick up a phone."

I don't even know how I feel about this. I mean, sure, it's not Deion Sanders bad, but still - Jason Campbell? Am I supposed to feel happy that we've picked up a QB who has at least shown a little consistency, and then feel guilty about feeling happy? I just - I - Drink. I'll drink. Drink helps everything, right?

Right?

On Friday randomness

Okay, so what did Charles Graner say to Lyndie England? "Hey, it's Friday. Let's forget about human rights for a while." And then they did it. But we're not going to have icky redneck sex; we're just going to have our Friday Random Ten.

1. Howie Day, "Ghost (live)"
2. Toad the Wet Sprocket, "All I Want"
3. Hugh Masekela, "Mama"
4. Kay Starr, "Me-Too (Ho-Ho! Ha-Ha!)"
5. Bjork, "Hyperballad"
6. Elvis Presley, "A Little Less Conversation"
7. Mono, "If You Only Knew"
8. Luigi Boccherini, "Concerto in D Major (II), Larghetto"
9. Ben Folds Five, "Evaporated"
10. Frank Sinatra, "Too Marvelous for Words"

Gotta say that Boccherini kind of spoiled the mood for a minute there. Huh. Feel free to throw your own Random Ten in comments.

On human rights, Part II

Okay, so we continue our look at the Universal Declaration of Human Rights with the first two articles.

Article 1.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 2.

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

But what does this mean for me?

These articles establish that all human beings are equal from birth, that regardless of our differences we all share the same basic rights. It means that people who worship God and people who worship many gods and people who worship shrimp are equally valuable as human beings. It means that Democrats and Republicans and Libertarians are equally valuable as human beings. it means that native Americans and Native Americans and Mexican immigrants are equally valuable as human beings. And it also means that no matter where you are, whether you're living or visiting or squatting, the government of that state has to respect your basic rights as a valuable human being.

Just answer the question already.

It means that we can't disregard the rights of the brown folk just 'cause they're brown, and similarly they can't disregard our rights just 'cause we aren't.

Part I: The Preamble

On blogroll maintenance

Okay, so now that I'm back to solo blogging, I've had the chance to make some much-deserved additions to my blogroll. Be kind and welcome our newest additions No More Mister Nice Blog, whom I've been wanting to add ever since he revealed himself as not retired after all, fellow Atlantan LazyCat, old friend AngryKevin's Where've All The Good People Gone, and finally, another Atlantan with the all-time best blog name ever, ever, Josh Massey and Martians Attacking Indianapolis. Let's make them feel welcome.