Neck Deep in Code-The pains of updating
Mood:  chillin'
Now Playing: NPR- Talk of the Nation
Topic: Mysteries of Life


I find myself sitting here with my happy DHTML menu software and having to relearn how to write and deal with DHTML. Arrgh. Most frustrating. My email address on the site is wrong and I'm trying to load up a friends biking page, I mean the page is up but I don't have the menu leading anyone there yet. Sort of a good idea. I've put a few pictures of some friends up, recent parties and such. House cleaning stuff, very exciting. Butterflies, a sweet and thoughtful token. I find presents like that to be most meaningful. Time to dive back into the menu problems.

Great News for Constitutionality
Now Playing: Tough Crowd-Comedy Central Show
Topic: Law
Great News for Constitutionality

All kinds of good news from the Supreme Court which comes on the heels of the recent (bad) Hiibel decision (which allows the states to stop you and require you give your name-beyond the Terry Stop rules). There is the MISSOURI v. SEIBERT decision which said that the Miranda warning decision is still quite valid. Police must inform you of your rights to remain silent and that anything you say can and will be held against you. The 'work around' employed by police increasingly has been to question a person, then mirandize them, then question them again and then using the first interrogation to work the confession, information they are looking for. No no no said Justice Souter, joined by Justice Stevens, Justice Ginsburg, and Justice Breyer-with Justice Kennedy in concurrence. By saying no to this strategy, the police can no longer use it as a interrogation technique.

HAMDI et al. v. RUMSFELD,- Yaser Esam Hamdi, an American citizen was in Afghanistan when Northern Alliance people caught him. When the US figured out that he was American, he was taken to the US and has been in the Brig for the duration. He had been labeled as a 'enemy combatant' which would give him, according to the government, no rights at all and in fact this designation would make him eligable to be kept in jail, without lawyers and without contact -Indefinitely. Justice O'Connor, joined by The Chief Justice, Justice Kennedy, and Justice Breyer, concluded that although Congress authorized the detention of combatants in the narrow circumstances alleged in this case, due process demands that a citizen held in the United States as an enemy combatant be given a meaningful opportunity to contest the factual basis for that detention before a neutral decisionmaker. The court said that you can't just throw someone in a hole and forget about them, theoretically, he gets his day in court. We know that it takes an interminal amount of time to get your day in court even if there is no question about your right to be there. This guy, perhaps a bad guy, has spent that time in a cell and he is still in a cell. Logically, constitutionally, by every idea of what is supposed to be good about America, you cannot be tossed into a cell indefinitely, this brings to mind the horror stories about the Man in the Iron Mask, -the sorts of things that happen in historically distant times or in third world dictatorships. We could feel superior in the knowledge that we are protected by a constitution and those idiots in other countries weren't. Instead, we are forced to sit here for years and hope that the Supreme Court does the right thing for the constitution and the country.
Having said that, if the government has a case then they should bring it, and if they don't then let him go.


RASUL et al. v. BUSH- Do the Guantanamo Bay people have any rights at all? Again, they've been there for years now with the US government saying of course these folks have no rights and we could keep them detained indefinitely. No review of their detention, of their incarceration, of their situation. Well of course, it's not like they are americans after all with rights, like say, umm, Hamdi? Padilla? Oops, never mind bad argument. Again, late but the Supreme Court does the right thing, Held: United States courts have jurisdiction to consider challenges to the legality of the detention of foreign nationals captured abroad in connection with hostilities and incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay.

RUMSFELD V. PADILLA- Let's see, oops guys, wrong district, please refile again.

Judge Diddles, loses control-removed from Bench
Now Playing: Wallflowers-One Headlight
Topic: Law
I can't let this one pass on by. Courtesy of The Drudge Report, courtesy of The Smoking Gun comes the story of a Judge who found that his own pecker was more interesting and more important than his distinguished life as a Judge. Incredible but true, at least if court filings were to be believed and come to think of it, that does not make them true. Ahem, the allegations though, the ones calling for the removal of District Judge Donald D. Thompson for a violation of Canons 1,2 and 3 of the Code of Judicial Conduct, 5 O.S. 2001, Ch. 1, App. 4 and for Conduct Constituting an Offense Involving Moral Turpitude in Violation of Oklahoma Constitution Article VII -A sec 1(B) basically said that the good Judge was caught on many occasions whacking off in his seat, during trials and using a number of noisy devices to accomplish this feat. Completely amazing and here is the link Smoking Gun Whack Off Judge

Most folks will find this story funny and shocking. The real thing to think about in all of this is that while hopefully Judges whacking noisily during trials in their courtrooms is rare indeed it is important to note that it went of for a very long time with a lot of people knowing about it. The thing to think about here is the fact that Judges generally have too much power with little oversight to hold their behavior in check. If a man can whack off, dig a whole in his desk, use noisy devices, and fire people around him who are 'cooperating' with the investigation against him what do you think a judge with as few scruples can do when his misconduct is more mundane and his power is so complete? Power in any form is corrupting and we are flawed creatures. Judges, like everyone else need to be under a effective oversight to keep them under the law and under control.

Completely out of the blue comes the long awaited and never expected sequel to Ministry's amazing Psalm 69. Psalm 69 came out in 1992 and I got a cassette copy of it back in the day through my trusty Columbia House music subscription. It was on that list of 3 dollar cassettes you could buy after you had purchased your required one at regular price. I had no earthly idea what it was or what it would be like, I just liked the interesting cover art and heck it was three dollars. I got it out of the mailbox one day and was straight into the car with me and my little pile of new tapes. Strange, I remember where I was, in Colorado Springs, and going to pick someone up when I put that cassette into the stereo. If you've never heard Ministry then I doubt I can describe it with any justice at all. It's a throbbing, screaming, end of the world cacphony which comes at you like a thousand freight trains, thunderstorms and tornados all at once. Relentless, unflinching and still strangely rythmic through it all even as your mind attempts to make sense of the riot in your head. Driving in Colorado Springs, the face of Pikes Peak in front of me and the sun starting to set, I pulled the car over the first time I heard Ministry's Psalm 69. To just listen and absorb the remarkable music the likes of which I had never heard I sat there numb yet with my mind on fire. Very cool stuff.

Now I find out yesterday that a new Ministry CD is out. This has happened before of course, I remember bitterly when Filth Pig came out. The cover art was gross, I said, hum, well let's get it any ways. I remember the Best Buy guy saying that it was different and if I liked Psalm 69 I might not like this one. He was right, it was ordinary. Like a bunch of other stuff out and I was horribly disappointed. I left it at that. The new Ministry CD comes out, ho hum says I. Then I read a few reviews that tell me there is finally a worthy sequel to Psalm 69. Whoa, that got my attention. "House of the Mole" is the name of the new CD. Okay, I get myself a listenable copy, put on those headphones and there, in all it's magnificence is the Ministry I remember. Wow. Ministry is back with some hard music. About time and rock-head bang on.

Let's See Your Papers Old Man- Hiibel
Now Playing: Dulce Pontes-Portuguese Music
Topic: Law
Let's see your Papers Old Man-Hiibel

I read the Supreme Court decision HIIBEL v. SIXTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT OF
NEVADA, HUMBOLDT COUNTY, et al. today. Actually I read some of the news reports, then I read the
decision then I read some more of the reports in light of actually having read the decision.
Naturally, some of the reports were hysterical and others were less so. To me, the Supreme Court
has given up it's fictional mantle of dispassionate decision making ability a long time ago if
it ever really existed except in grade school classes. I know the force and strength of the
court lies somewhat in the illusion that it is the "Supreme Court" and as such it makes the
proper decisions. If this was in any way true then the whole battle over Supreme Court nominees
wouldn't be such a war. But the Congress, the President and everyone else knows that the
decisions of the Supreme Court are less a matter of right and wrong and Constitutionality and
more a matter of right and left. If only Al Gore would have been confirmed as the President
based on his winning of the popular vote and of winning the electorial college vote then perhaps
another Justice would have retired and a different fellow would have been on the Court. This
would have made a different decision today and every other day. Of course, that didn't happen,
the old Justices hold on with a death grip to their places hoping and waiting to be replaced by
someone of their own political and philosophical bent because its really only a matter of
philosophy and political viewpoint. It isn't about what is Constitutional at all. The argument
about what is constitutional starts off with ideology and goes from there in it's many
intellectual trappings. Original intent, living constitution, all just the intellectual
trappings used to excuse the viewpoints. Well, in the Hiibel case welcome to another step closer
to the day when all your rights and all your freedoms are gone. Like an old 30's black and white
movie the nazi police come in and demand everyones 'papers' we are another step closer to that
reality. The use of the image of a nazi policeman demanding everyones papers brought justifiable
horror and distaste when used in the movies. It was another illustration of why the Nazi's must
be defeated by the forces of good and the forces of freedom. Well sorry, what a difference some
70 years makes. It turns out the police can ask you for your papers without any reason. I mean
really, you know and I know that they can make up the justification later on. "That person was
acting suspiciously", "he matched the description of a known bankrobber.

The slippery slope has never been slippier. The slope has never been more inclined. The excuse
of terrorism, the excuse of enemies everywhere that was trotted out in the 50's is now here for
good. We know the truth of it because some terrorists, some jihadists destroyed the World Trade
Center towers. So we know the bad guys are everywhere, taking liberties away for security is
therefore justified. And a big government needs to know what each and every citizen is doing
anyways. It's all so logical and all so insidious. The time of freedom is over, the time of the
illusion of freedom is over as well. Perhaps it never really existed but it did in the ethos and
the mythology of America. It existed in the mind of a man, perhaps not a just and virtuous man.
but a man in Nevada who thought that he didn't have to tell the police his name. A man who
thought that part of being an American meant that he didn't have to give his name to police when
he wasn't driving and wasn't engaged in any crime. Welcome to America where it's a crime to not
tell the police your name. But of course, they already do know your name. They know where you
live, they know what you do, your credit history and the books you buy. Welcome to the future,

Welcome to the present.

The Volokh Conspiracy-Men and Sexy
Now Playing: Dulce Pontes-Lagrimas
Reading the Volokh Conspiracy, as I often do and read the bit that Eugene wrote about how men generally refuse to do anything to make themselves more appealing to the opposite sex. I've been trying to think whether that is true or not. Undoubtedly we want women, we desire women and perhaps we expect them to just fall over on us without any effort on our parts. Humm, I know men are happy and surprised when a woman decides that they are attractive. Then they might start combing their hair but that's usually about the extent of the effort that is made. But then a lot of men would do anything, move heaven and earth to attract women and to keep them. I agree that a lot of men are no good, shiftless bums who won't so much as get a job which is a pretty low standard for a woman to have just to find a fella. A good head scratcher.



Now the music I'm listening to at the moment, the CD Lagrimas by the portuguese female artist Dulce Pontes, is really beautiful. Mellow and with a voice that is clear, she reminds me of Basia. I can't understand a single word but that doesn't matter. It's worth a listen.

A Rainy Dreary Day
Now Playing: Dashboard Confessionals-Standard Lines


A day of great sheets of depressing rain. Hot and humid.
Let's see, the Dashboard Confessionals song, Standard Lines.
"Which of the bold faced lies will we use?
I hope that you're happy,
you really deserve it,
this will be the best for us both in the end.

But your taste still lingers on my lips like I just placed them upon yours and I starve,
I starve for you.

Once in a while you find a new author, a new artist, that speaks to you. Like the Counting Crows when they appeared. Something that is there, immediate and real.

Sweet and Wonderful


Still can't walk but I've put that bike together and am zooming about, this beach, a mile from my home is a sweet little thing.

Some days life is like sex on the beach
Now Playing: Blink 182-I Miss You
Some days life is like sex on the beach

A day to digest the wonderfulness and painfulness of life. A day and a night too hot and humid which if I was used to it would be like a warm blanket of heat. I remember a few years back running for miles in a dark heat like that and I would feel the rhythm of my breathing and the sound of my feet touching the ground for a moment. A nice zen feeling and a chance to meditate in the moment. Now I have a bonespur and can hardly even walk right now. The heat drains the energy clean out of my body and as one person once said to me, I probably wouldn't be happy in the humidity. Well no kidding, right now I certainly find it annoying. And draining, and embarassing. Ah goodness. A moment, a day, lost in time, but a moment forever treasured. Resplendent in a light purple wrapper. Smooth and lovely. Like heaven, like a warm evening wrapped around you. Everything is right, everything is wonderful and everything is beautiful.

Time to put the front wheel back on my bicycle and try to get the strength back up on the chance that my bone spur someday gets better and I'll be able to run in the heat and humidity again. I love that rhythm, like the sound of the water on the beach, strong and constant. I close my eyes and see the beach on a moonless night and it's beautiful, like a dream. I see that track in the darkness as I run through that tunnel of darkness, knowing the feel of everything and loving every moment of it, letting that warm tunnel encompass me and listening to the the rhythmic breath in the dark.

I"m listening to Dashboard Confessionals, This Ruined Puzzle.

"But the hours they creep
The patterns repeat
Don't be concerned....
You know I'll be fine on my own.
I never said "Don't Go" (don't go)"

It's hard to say why sometimes lyrics speak. A line here, a verse there. A little something to identify ourselves in. And all that intellectualizing and thinking for who knows what and why.

Then of course there is another of the songs that are in my head now. A Blink 182 song, I Miss You.

"Don't Waste your time on me, you're already the voice inside my head.
I miss you."

Then there is one song that has infected me by Daniel Bedingfield- Gotta Get Thru This

"When your love is pouring like the rain
I close my eyes and it's gone again
When will I get the chance to say I love you
I pretend that you're already mine
Then my heart ain't breakin' every time
I look into your eyes"

While I'm at it, I've got Gary Jules, Mad World in my head, Los Lonely Boys, Heaven and Daniel Bedingfield, Gotta Get Thru This all churning around in there as well. Humm.

"I've never lied to you. I've always told you some version of the truth."
Now Playing: Something's Gotta Give
I'm sitting here watching the dvd of Something's Gotta Give starring one of my favorite actors, Jack Nicholson. Diane Keaton isn't one of my favorite actors as she generally seems too whiny for my tastes and this character she plays doesn't stray far from her normal whiny self. Her best work was in Annie Hall from bygone days of yesteryear. Well I think I'm still mad at her for the movie, Looking for Mr. Goodbar. I mean, who didn't see that ending coming for her. I'm mad that her character didn't figure it out and save herself before she found herself strangled with her own bra. I hate that in a movie, a sad ass ending. If I want sad ass I watch the news. Well, in this movie it seems a bit forced, the frivolity seems painful and Jack Nicholson is playing the same character he played in Terms of Endearment. His best line in the movie to Diane Keaton's character- "I've never lied to you. I've always told you some version of the truth." There are a few good funny bits like when Keanu Reeves as his doctor asks after his heart attack while trying to bed the fine looking Amanda Peet if he is using Viagra. As Jack Nicolson watches the three ladies watching him he denies that he has used Viagra. Keanu Reeves informs him that the medication he has put into his IV combined with say Viagra would literally make his heart explode and he would die. Ah well, Jack flings out and yanks that IV right out of his arm because of course he is jacked up on Viagra. A great laugh. The other two funny bits involve older people and their naked bits, there is Jack's naked ass in a hospital gown and then there is the forever classic bit of Jack wandering around the house to find Diane Keaton walking naked in her room. Very funny. But other than that, it's been a bit painful. I'm still waiting for Shirley MacLaine to show up since it seems like it should be her movie or that she should be getting residuals for it. There is also an anger inducing thing about the movie in that the thing forces you to watch previews of other movies. Again, if I'm paying for a movie I don't think I have to watch damned trailers when I don't want to. I'll have to rip the movie and burn it without the crap. And I'll have to watch As Good As It Gets again to get a good Jack Nicholson fix.

My last Lord of the Rings dvd is sitting there waiting for me to feel I have enough time to watch the damned thing. It's a bit long, I'm tired of Andy Serkis and Golum right now. Bah. I don't know, if seems like it will be a chore to watch again after that long long time in the theater. I mean, heck, to see the movie in the theater I basically had to go into training to keep from having to go to the restroom for the three plus hours it would take to see the whole thing. I am happy to say that under the right diet, the right fluid intake and a bit of exercise I watched the entire movie without pain. Good for me. Perhaps there is a bit of residual psychic pain from the whole experience.

Well, let's see. In website news, my website news that is, I did notice an uptick in the number of hits. Someone put a link over at a site called www.goregasm to the death penalty pictures and boom. I don't know that I like the idea that people interested in actually grim and depressing pictures are flocking to my site for that purpose. But, I mean, you take the good with the bad in these cases. The pictures are there for people who are researching the topic of the death penalty and who are genuinely interested in seeing the results of whatever intellectual position they take on the issue. I've had people say that have been shocked, that the pictures changed their minds and others who say that they hate me. All in a days work.

The Death of Uncle Ronnie
Now Playing: Daniel Bedingfield-Gotta Get Thru This
It's with a great deal of sadness I feel as I follow the preparations for the ceremonies that will accompany this Sunday's death of President Ronald Reagan. It has been one of those things that you knew was coming but still to hear the news of his passing has been very saddening. I turn to the news and flip over to CNN for a moment and Joey Chen is speaking with George Will and with a great deal of classlessness, mentions two of the things that President Reagan said which were staples of the 'President Reagan is an idiot' crowd. George Will pauses a few seconds, stunned as I was that in the first hours of his death that someone would so crassly think to try to make political points. George said something to the effect that we all have at least a few things that we might have not wished to speak and for someone like Ronald Reagan who had spent a lifetime in the public eye those few phrases were not indicative of the man or his worth. It was stunning and a reason I don't often visit the news at CNN.

I notice that a couple of the Reagan haters mentioned in the Drudge Report have been crashed as they so richly deserve. It amazes me that people whose political philosophies supposedly expouses compassion and care for people would be completely devoid of the characteristics they preach. In fact they show themselves to be vicious and evil in their treatment of human beings who happen to disagree with them.

It was heart breaking to see Nancy Reagan lean her head on the flag draped casket of the President. I only hope that the naysayers and professional political rabblerousers take the hint as dropped by both campaigns and refrain from politiking for a short period of time and let the man be buried with dignity and the gratitude of the nation. The majority of the citizens of the United States feel affection and respect for the man. I don't believe that the wishes of the majority of the people actually factors into the thinking of those who profess to know better than the rest of us and so I expect Hitchens, Rall and the others to continue to use whatever opportunity they have in the next couple of days to scream loudly as do those with nothing constructive to say or do. It's a annoyance, it's not polite, it's disrespectful and simply evil.

Not dead yet.
Now Playing: Los Lonely Boys
Nothing like a couple of Whoppers-the malted milk chocolate balls of yummy goodness to make a person think about the various foods that we eat and keep in our minds through the years. As a child I ate Whoppers as they were sold in their milk cartoon shaped containers. They have never been all that expensive but it's not always been easy to find. These days they sell them at the checkout counter in a small bag, a tiny handful of them. Tasty as ever but I haven't found the occasional nonmalted one that used to slip through quality control. Those chewy whoppers were a reminder that not everything was what it should be or what it was advertised as. Good stuff, I think the handful of whoppers sold at the counter now cost as much as that quart container of whoppers used to cost. Sigh.

Lord of the Rings Clean Sweep
Now Playing: Oscars
I just watched the last of the Oscar telecast and I was happy to see that the Lord of the Rings sweep every category that it was nominated in. I didn't have much faith in it winning ever since I saw Braveheart lose out to the Turkey 'Shakespeare in Love' - You sort of see it as a invalid measure of what should be the award for the 'best' film when the best film doesn't win. Happily that wasn't the case for a change. Not that any of it matters in the grand course of civilization of course. A mild diversion, after all, I know what movies I like the best and who I thought was the best actor or the best movie. Sometimes though, it's a human desire to have your opinions validated. To me, the Lord of the Rings was and is a most incredible accomplishment. Take into account the magnitude and length of the story and the amount of time that has gone into creating it and you really have an incredible feat of endurance, love and effort which was not even closely followed by any of the other movies. I love the LOTR.

Of course, I'm a bit put out that Johnny Depp didn't win. His effort in Pirates was unique and made the movie great and very rewatchable. His body of work is most impressive and shows him to be a fearless risk taker. From his beginnings at 21 Jump Street to What's Eating Gilbert Grape to Ed Wood to Don Juan DeMarco, this guy can act.

One of the frequent hits I get to my site is to the Aileen Wuornos page. My page noting her as the first female serial killer has been up for ages and after the buzz for the movie I do see many folks trying to find out a little bit more about her. I have not seen the movie and it's not the kind of movie I could even watch. I hope it's accurate to what happened as I think true information is important for people to have access to.

U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown
Ah, the sweet smell of double standards are wafting through the air like the odor from an outdoor toilet. U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown racially abused a hispanic man, Assistant Secretary of State Roger Noriega, who she had mistaken for a republican 'white man' who happened to be giving a briefing about the Bush administration policy toward Haiti. The briefing was attended by about thirty and Rep Brown called the Bush policy racist and the President's representatives 'those bunch of white men'. When she was informed that the man who gave the briefing was hispanic, she stated that classic racist statment and one which would have certainly ended the political career of any white man, "You all look alike to me." I love it. Nothing adverse will happen to this Florida representative. There aren't any consequences for a black politician which I think is really some sort of ultimate racism. She will get a special pass since there are lower standards for female black politicians. Sad but true. Special as in lower standards and a reserved place at the table for the kids instead of the adults. The double standards are there, we all know they are there. Sad. But we all know, Representative Brown is racist and she has a free pass to say whatever racist claptrap she feels compelled to say. It's just one of those facts of life in the US of A.

French Vanilla Hot Chocolate
Now Playing: Deep Forest-Pacifica
There are many important mysteries of life, a few come to mind such as the origin of pink lemonade when there are no pink lemons. Or how'd they get the brown out of chocolate for that white chocolate stuff. These things greatly trouble me you know. Beverages come to mind at this time because of my cup of French Vanilla hot chocolate which is sitting next to the computer monitor. As always I glance at the directions and as always I am made most cranky by the instructions to put hot water in the powder. It cranks me out because you know, hot chocolate requires hot milk, not hot water. I ignor the instructions on how to heat up the water and instead carefully put my mug of milk in the microwave and watch for the first moments of bubbly action that tells me I have a scant few seconds to turn the microwave off and retrieve the mug before half of the milk foams over. That's part of the ritual of making hot chocolate. Granted, it's not as ritualistic or as historically meaningful as a Japanese Tea Ceremony but it's something that recalls times gone by when making hot chocolate wasn't as easy as it is now and it recalls when it was something a bit more magical. So I will always use milk in my hot chocolate, even when hot water is called for. I'll pour my milk into a cup and place it in the microwave while I recall putting milk into a small pan and trying to not scald it, usually failing and remembering the ritual of scrubbing out the scalded milk from the pot. The scalded milk a reminder that nothing good comes without effort and a bit of hard work, even if it's after the hot chocolate is sitting nicely in my belly.