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Labels: telescopes Labels: global warming Labels: child sexual abuse Labels: child sexual abuse Labels: telescopes Put aside the fact that Danny was a beautiful, intelligent child who became schizophrenic at age 18 through no fault of his own; then ask how you would respond to someone attacking you with his fists. Most normal people would respond by instinctively running or using their hands to defend themselves. Except that the victim didn't have either option. According to news accounts, he was knocked to the ground, unable to run or use his hands effectively in self-defense. However, the shooter was not what we would think of as normal — he was carrying a gun and his immediate instinct was to shoot his attacker. Many "normal" people are capable of killing another person in a brief moment of extreme anger, but this is uncommon because most of us do not carry lethal weapons and our bodies are not killing machines — a .357-caliber Magnum is. The normal response when you are knocked to the ground and are being attacked by a complete stranger is what? Lie back and enjoy it? Hope that you wear out your attacker by absorbing kicks?
Never forget!
I ran for Idaho state senate in 2008--didn't win
I've written a number of history books, as well as scholarly and popular articles, (see my web page).
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You Heard It Here First
I mentioned several weeks ago that I thought that the election was by no means in the bag for the Democrats to take back either house of Congress. Now Dean Barnett is saying just about exactly the same thing, and for the same reasons:Meanwhile, I’m merrily skipping about Soxblog Manor (in a completely manly way, mind you) whistling a happy tune. I expect Tuesday to be an extremely successful day for the Republican Party.
I'm not quite as optimistic as Dean Barnett, but a U.S. Senate seat from Maryland is tied in the most recent survey, with the final weekend before the election with the news media actually talking about the Republican's momentum? In Montana, Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate Tester was such an obvious shoe-in that lots of media types were already talking about Republican incumbent Conrad Burns as a lost cause--and the last survey done October 31 through November 2 shows this one tied.
First of all, let’s concede the obvious – if the polls are accurate, then we’re in medium to deep shinola. There’s no question about that. It reminds me a bit of Election Day 2004 when we had to reach no other conclusion than if the exit polls were accurate, we were looking at the horror of President Kerry.
At the time, it was unthinkable to serious followers of politics that the exit polls would be completely worthless. They had never been wrong before. But something fundamental had changed in the way the public was responding to exit polls or the way the pollsters were gathering information to make their work-product obsolete. By 9:00 pm., it had become obvious to everyone except a hysterical and incredulous Susan Estrich that the exit polls were wrong. Why it happened that way is still something of a mystery.
What is even more of a mystery is why they all erred in the same direction, dramatically favoring the Democrat. I’ve offered theories in the past why this is so, and I’ll briefly summarize them for those with better things to do this fine Saturday than thumb through my archives: Liberals are bigmouths who can’t wait to share their opinions with strangers. Conservatives have lives.
...
None of the foregoing means the polls are worthless. It just means that to get an accurate gauge on things, you have to add a significant layer of Republican support to the reported numbers.
So what’s it all mean? In the tied races, the Republican will win. In the close races, the Republican will win. It adds up to Republicans running the table in the Senate. That’s right – running the table. Montana, Virginia, Missouri, Tennessee, New Jersey, Rhode Island (whoopee), and Maryland will all send or re-send Republicans to the Senate. But wait, there’s more! Michigan will send Sheriff Michael Bouchard to the Senate. And in Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum is in striking distance.
In the House, the same holds true. Republican Joe Negron will take Foley’s seat. New Mexico’s Heather Wilson will return to Congress. So, too, will Connecticut’s Chris Shays. We’ll lose a handful of seats for the individual failures of certain Congressmen (hello, Curt Weldon), but we will retain control of the House.
We're going to lose some seats--especially the ones where there isn't even a Republican on the ballot (almost certainly, Tom DeLay's seat), or where the Republican whose name is still on the ballot is way too well-known (Mark Foley, for example). I am afraid that we are going to lose Kolbe's seat in Arizona as well, as much as I would love to have seen Randy Graf take it. But you know, if we manage to hold the House (which I think we will probably do, although perhaps just barely), it will be the ultimate repudiation of the moonbat wing of the Democratic Party. I'm hoping that they will, like Rumplestiltskin, stamp their little feet until they disappear into the ground.
What concerns me more, however, is what I saw this evening. I was channel surfing, and I ran across Book TV, where they were showing a presentation by John Dean about his new book Conservatives Without Conscience or something similar. This was in Beverly Hills (of course), and one member of the audience was asking a question that started out along the lines, that most of the people in the room believe that the last two presidential elections were actually stolen.
At this point, my eyes roll, and I change channels. Look, I can understand, if people weren't paying attention to the post-2000 election examinations of the Florida vote done by a number of newspapers, they might genuinely think that there was something improper about what happened there. It was a confusing mess, and trying to keep track of the Byzantine struggle over what standard which counties used, and all the related legal issues, might have created some uncertainty. Bush lost the popular vote, but won the electoral vote. But 2004? This wasn't even close. Bush cleaned Kerry's clock, not only on electoral votes, but popular vote as well.
Now, if you are a multimillionaire, the only Republicans you ever meet are probably the guys who get their hands dirty, fixing your plumbing or your Ferrari. It is somewhat excusable that you don't know any Republicans. But to assume that your side keeps losing the elections brings to mind the famous Pauline Kael remark after the 1972 election: "How did Nixon win? No one I knew voted for him!"
What concerns me about the widespread moonbat belief that the elections are being "stolen" is that if there is only a two or three seat Republican margin in either body, that the moonbats might try to "recall" Republican members violently. The level of derangement among the moonbats is at an all time high. I suppose that if you thought that George Bush arranged to blow up the World Trade Center towers, fake airliner hijackings, fake Osama bin Laden's videos claiming responsibility for the 9/11 attacks, murder the passengers aboard those airliners that never actually crashed, steal two elections--well, that's an incredible amount of evil. I can see how the temptation to take criminal actions would be too much for them resist. (What's the difference between mental illness and collective political paranoia? Mental illness can't be corrected by reading multiple news sources.)
I mean, it's not like the left has any morals anyway. They operate on the principle that there is nothing really right or wrong (everything is culturally determined), and throughout history, they have shown a willingness to commit mass murder if it helped them to achieve power (Mao Zedong, Stalin, Pol Pot, and arguably Hitler are part of that leftist tradition).
As If There Weren't Enough Reasons to Vote
There are reports that Justice John Paul Stevens has received sufficiently bad health news that his retirement may come before the end of the year. A Democratic Senate, even supposedly moderate Democrats like Casey in Pennsylvania and Ford in Tennessee, would almost certainly take us back in the direction of the idiots that decided that the people of Colorado didn't have the right to amend their own state constitution, and that virtual child pornography is constitutionally protected.
Idaho Proposition 2 Ads
The environmentalists are spending their last-minute $600,000 quite effectively on radio ads. Among the claims that I have heard are that if passed, it would allow junkyards to be built almost anywhere. Huh? No, because it uses the zoning conditions in effect on the date of the election to determine any possible damages caused by zoning changes. The only way for Proposition 2 to allow junkyards to built somewhere in Idaho is if you can already build a junkyard in that spot.
It is certainly true that if a county or city changed zoning on an existing parcel so that it could not be used in the future as a junkyard, the owner could sue for the loss of the value of his land. But let's examine this claim carefully, with all possible scenarios.
1. The parcel is already being used as a junkyard, and rezoning puts the junkyard out of business. The owner would have a claim--but unless a business is a public nuisance of some sort, I don't believe that a zoning change takes affect until the parcel sells, anyway. (At least, that is the way that it is in many places that I have lived in the past.)
2. The parcel is not yet being used as a junkyard. Rezoning removes junkyard from the list of possible uses. But junkyards aren't exactly a high value use of a piece of land. Short of rezoning the parcel as greenbelt or agricultural, what zoning change would make junkyard zoned land worth less than it is worth now? If anything, rezoning most areas of a city that now have junkyards would make the land worth more, not less.
These are scare tactics.
One of the other claims of the ads does seem to be true; the provision prohibiting use of eminent domain to transfer property from one private owner to another private owner does seem to have been adequately dealt with by the Idaho legislature this session, as House Bill 555.
I am still inclined to vote for Proposition 2, because of the protection of the rights of property owners from rezoning that diminishes the value of the land. This is a sensitive issue with me because when we bought the parcel on which our house now sits, I did worry that something might happen to prevent us from building on it.
In California, out and out bribery is a pretty common part of the process of having a house a built. A friend's first attempt at getting a house built in the Los Angeles area was stymied by the fact that he couldn't find out who he was supposed to bribe. Someone needed to be paid off, but because bribery is, technically, illegal, he couldn't just ask anyone: "Hey, who am I supposed to bribe to get the approvals on this house?"
I don't think that's a problem here in Idaho (although perhaps I'm being naive), but it does worry me a bit to think that you could end up buying a piece of land with the intention of building a house, and the billionaire environmentalists might decide to have your area rezoned so that it requires 10,000 acre legal parcels per house, or prohibit houses below 20,000 square feet.
In California, I've been told that there is a provision of the state constitution that has been interpreted to mean that any legal parcel is guaranteed to be buildable for a house. I don't know if Idaho has anything equivalent.
Porn Addiction: It's A Bad Thing
Or at least this idiot decided it made sense to break into someone's home, and get threatened with a shotgun, to watch Girls Gone Wild. From November 3, 2006 NBC channel 2:Deputies say a teen was caught breaking into a house Wednesday, but he wasn't trying to take anything. Instead, deputies say he was breaking into the home to watch porn on TV.
When the Brito family opened up their most recent DirecTV bill, their jaws dropped. What is usually a $60 invoice ended up being closer to $300 and said they had ordered films such as Girls Gone Wild and other pornography.
So, the family asked their neighbors to watch the home when they were gone in an attempt to figure out what was happening. What they found was hard to believe.
"We realized when we got the DirecTV bill. That's when we started thinking something was up," said Jasmine Brito. "They tell you, 'You know you're being charged and that person agreed to it.'"
The Brito's then resorted to asking their neighbors for help. They asked them to watch the house while they were gone during the day. Peggy Lalor did just that.
"I peeked through the window and I saw this guy ducked down running across the hall," said Lalor.
Seeing a threat, Lalor took drastic action.
"I went in, got my shotgun and I told him if he didn't come out, I was going to blast him through the window," said Lalor.
She fired one shot in the air and 16-year-old Readchy Pellaire surrendered.
Deputies say the high school senior skipped classes, broke into the home, ordered porn in the bedroom of the home, and watched TV while sitting on the bed of one of the Brito children.
Obsession: It's Not Just a Perfume
When I saw the first coverage of this, I thought, "Oh, no." Then I saw that the guy making the accusations against the president of the National Association of Evangelicals failed a lie detector test. Now, Rev. Haggard is admitting that at least part of the accusations are true. But which part? Meeting with a homosexual prostitute for monthly massages? Buying meth from him? Having sex with him?
You know, anyone that is doing something that they are ashamed of should be aware that they are risking at least blackmail. When you are getting together with a homosexual prostitute (even if it only turns out to get naked so he rub his hands all over your body)--and you are a high profile personality that is arguing that homosexuality is a sin--this is not just hypocrisy, it is incredibly stupid!
People ask me why I think homosexuality is a form of damage. How about demonstrating that your obsession is out of control by destroying your reputation and political influence in the pursuit of your sexual orientation? (And yes, that applies not only to Haggard, but also former Congressman Foley, and Rev. Jim Bakker, who was defrocked by the Assemblies of God for homosexuality.) Haggard is admitting that at least some part of the accusations are true. The least destructive part of the accusations are the meth purchases, and that's pretty bad. If Haggard had been getting together for a monthly massage by a woman--even if was simply for a massage--it would call into question Haggard's good sense. But getting together to get massaged by a homosexual prostitute when you are actively involved in a political campaign that seeks to legislate disapproval of homosexuality?
Some people are too stupid--or too obsessed--to stay in the public limelight. There are days I feel like one of the last straight conservatives in America.
UPDATE: The more I think about this, the more upset I get. The Democrats clearly want Republicans to engage in a "pink purge" and shove all the homosexuals out of the party. That would be wrong. But it isn't wrong to tell all the closeted homosexuals leading anti-gay marriage movements to adopt a discrete silence. I suspect that some of them (as Haggard appears to be) know that homosexuality is wrong, but can't help themselves--the temptation to sin is too strong. I can understand that.
Everyone has some area where they are tempted, and are well advised to stay well away from that temptation. (For me, it's food.) There are Christians who struggle with homosexual temptation, and do their best to discourage others from being led into what they regard as a form of slavery. Others may call this hypocrisy, but it is entirely possible for a person struggling with a temptation to genuinely and sincerely work overtime to steer others away from that path. I respect the person who recognizes that he is losing such a struggle, and decides to step out of leadership. The person who can't see that they losing the struggle destroys everything: the cause he fights for, and the respect of others around him.
Retubing Big Bertha
Big Bertha, my 17.5" reflector, has an unnecessarily heavy framework. I've been thinking of ways to put her on a diet, perhaps with the possibility of getting her onto an equatorial mount.
I think the biggest part of why Big Bertha is so heavy is that the people that built her put a far heavier wooden structure around the tube than was really needed. I don't see how the tube, mirror, secondary mirror, holder, focuser, and finder weigh more than 120 pounds--and yet I am pretty sure that with this massive wooden box around the tube, which carries the altitude bearings, it may be closer to 200 pounds.
One possibility is to replace the existing Sonotube (which is delaminating because of many years of less than perfectly dry storage, before I received it). Sonotube that diameter is not hideously expensive, and surprisingly light. The 20" diameter Sonotube (the right size for Big Bertha) is only four pounds/linear foot, and I think that I only need six feet of it. (The current tube is longer than it needs to be, I think.)
But it turns out that you can fiberglass the outside of Sonotube, and get a reasonably waterproof and probably more attractive finish than just painting the Sonotube directly. The instructions sound messy, and probably require warmer weather than we will see here until May. The fiberglass will also make the tube stiffer than Sonotube is alone--which is traditionally one of the problems with Sonotube--it tends to deform when you tighten down screws to it.
A stiffer tube might also allow use of lightening holes as well--knocking a few pounds off the total weight of the tube. There's probably a book that explains how many holes and of what size give you the greatest savings of weight without compromising stiffness.
The temptation is strong to ditch the existing base, and start from scratch on a Dobsonian mount (or perhaps something more exotic, such as a yoke mount). Still, a good starting point would be to reattach the existing altitude bearings to the new tube, perhaps attaching them to something that clamps to the tube, so that I don't have to drill any unsightly holes in the tube.
The New York Times: Too Stupid To Breathe Without Assistance
They just ran a news story intended to attack Bush and the Republicans as threats to national security--because the detailed documents captured in Iraq provided information about nuclear weapons design:Last March, the federal government set up a Web site to make public a vast archive of Iraqi documents captured during the war. The Bush administration did so under pressure from Congressional Republicans who had said they hoped to “leverage the Internet” to find new evidence of the prewar dangers posed by Saddam Hussein.
But wait! "Bush lied" about WMDs. And now the New York Times is admitting that documents we captured in Iraq show that they were actually pretty far along in their program?
But in recent weeks, the site has posted some documents that weapons experts say are a danger themselves: detailed accounts of Iraq’s secret nuclear research before the 1991 Persian Gulf war. The documents, the experts say, constitute a basic guide to building an atom bomb.
...
Among the dozens of documents in English were Iraqi reports written in the 1990s and in 2002 for United Nations inspectors in charge of making sure Iraq had abandoned its unconventional arms programs after the Persian Gulf war. Experts say that at the time, Mr. Hussein’s scientists were on the verge of building an atom bomb, as little as a year away.
Sali's Traffic Accident
There has been a question raised about a traffic accident that Bill Sali was engaged in some years back, and a subsequent lawsuit. I don't know Bill Sali, and I don't even have a strong opinion about him or his integrity. I intend to vote for him primarily because I don't want the party of John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, and Lynne Woolsey in the majority--and Ron Grant, Larry Grant's son, has demonstrated that he is part of the temper tantrum hard left end of the Democratic Party. I am beginning to wonder if the rotten apple didn't fall far from the tree.
As is typical of character assassination election maneuvers, IdaBlue tells us that:I have been sitting on these documents since June, wondering whether I should publish them.
Well, gee, if these documents and what they say about Sali are really that important, you should have used them in June--when there would have been time for Sali to respond. But last minute? Yeah, that's the mark of someone who really wants an honest discussion of the question, rather like sitting on questions about Mark Foley until just before the election. How Democratic of IdaBlue.
However, the materials that IdaBlue presents are really not all that persuasive of wrongdoing, and do show that IdaBlue really does not know much about traffic accident injuries. For example, IdaBlue makes a big deal about:Apparently Sali went to church and then home after the accident rather than straight to the emergency room.
I have news for IdaBlue--this is by no means uncommon. Back in 1979, my fiancee (now wife) turned a full-sized Ford station wagon into a compact, getting onto a freeway in Los Angeles. She was quite shaken up by it, but felt no need to go to the emergency room--she wasn't in pain. The next morning, she woke up, and called me to drive her over to the emergency room--she was now in enough pain to wonder if she had broken a rib. This happens with traffic accidents, especially soft tissue injuries. People sometimes feel okay right after an accident, and it can take many hours before the full extent of their pain becomes apparent.
IdaBlue tries to make the case that because of inconsistencies in how Sali responded to various tests that he was faking or exaggerating injuries as part of hitting the great traffic accident lottery. Do you know why there is a long and sad tradition of people falsely claiming whiplash and other forms of soft tissue injury after traffic accidents? Because it is very, very difficult to prove that someone is lying about it. There are real injuries, and there are faked injuries, and doctors often can't clearly identify which are which. Indeed, part of the document that IdaBlue points to, where the doctor suggests that Sali might be faking, admits that he can't be sure:I freely admit that I could be wrong on this issue, but that is my concern at this time.
Another point IdaBlue makes that is supposed to be a clear-cut demonstration of fraud:He reported to his doctor in June 1999 that he experienced stuttering, poor sleep, difficulty concentrating, and slow thought processes. He said he felt like there was a tight band around his brain, and as if his face was sagging. The doctor considered psychomototor retardation and reactive depression. The doc also wrote that Sali had been making some progress in therapy, but "His therapist notes some inconsistencies in his lower limb weakness..."
Here's a thought for you to consider: someone has been through a bad traffic accident. They are in chronic pain. It produces psychosomatic symptoms. It wouldn't be the first time that this has happened.
Several years back, I started having serious neck and back problems. I originally injured myself with a bad chair at a company I worked for in the 1980s. The problem never completely went away, but it got worse in August of 2001. My employer was also in the process of flaking out, starting to issue promises instead of paychecks. Shortly after I started work at my current employer, here in Idaho, the neck and back pain problems went away.
Was it because I was off work for several months, not sitting in front of a computer for eight hours a day? Was there something wrong with my work environment at the flaky employer? Was an existing mild pain problem (which I have had off and on since the 1980s) aggravated by being out of work? The fact that the problem went away after I started getting a paycheck again suggests to me that the stress of not having a paycheck severely aggravated a mild problem.
Maybe Bill Sali was trying to pull a fast one. I don't know. But IdaBlue hasn't demonstrated this very satisfactorily. All that IdaBlue has demonstrated is that he/she has very little experience with people that have been through serious traffic accidents.
Is Larry Grant A San Francisco Democrat?
Larry Grant is the Democratic nominee for the U.S. House seat 1 here in Idaho. I've had Republicans who were backing Larry Grant against Bill Sali argue that he's not like one of those crazy left-wing Democrats out on the coasts--that if Larry Grant lived in California, he would probably be a Republican. I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt on this until I saw his remarks about the establishment clause. At best, they are ambiguously worded--almost like he was trying to get the ACLU supporters without directly insulting the vast majority of Idahoans who see nothing wrong with having "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance.
Anyway, over at Adam's Blog, one of the commenters claims to be Ron Grant, Larry's son, who feels that Adam Graham has engaged in "creating false statements" by quoting accurately what Larry Grant wrote for a newspaper. However, once the blood was pumping, Ron Grant proceeded to open his mouth and reveal the moonbat within:At a time where 100 US troops are dying in Iraq, an administration full of chicken hawks lies to justify starting a pre-emptive war, the Republican party protect pedophile legislators, a 9 trillion dollar debt, the most mal-distributed tax system since the beginning of the US Tax system, and unfunded Federal mandates such as “no child left behind,” it’s good to know that Candidate Sali’s supporters find “under God” to be the most important issue here on Earth right now.
I proceeded to blow giant holes in each of these claims.
Argue if you want that the Bush Administration was wrong about WMDs in Iraq (a mistake that every other major power's intelligence service also made), but to claim that they intentionally lied is simply false. Even many of Hussein's generals believed that their government had WMDs--although always assigned to a brigade next to theirs.
We now know, from the Final Report of the Iraqi Survey Group, that Hussein's top officials believed that Hussein had worked to create the impression that the WMDs existed to keep Iraq's neighbors afraid.
There is also this little problem that one of Hussein's air force generals, Georges Sada, now says that at least 58 Iraqi Airlines flights to Syria just before the war were flown to move chemical weapons out of Iraq. Oddly enough, the Israeli government at the time noted the unusual level of air traffic from Iraq to Syria. There was also an attempt by al-Qaeda forces in Jordan to launch a chemical weapons attack on the capital of Amman using about 15 tons of chemical weapons--that were brought in by truck from Syria.
Mal-distributed tax system? Huh? Over here you can see a table showing what happened to the share of income and Social Security taxes paid by the Top .1%, Top 5%, Top 20%, and Bottom 20% of income earners in 1979, 1999, and 2003. Yes, the Bush tax cuts made it less progressive than it was in 1999--but still far more progressive than it was in 1979. The Top 20% (my group) paid 58.28% of the tax burden in 1979, 68.17% in 1999, and 67.47% in 2003.
If anyone is going to complain about No Child Left Behind, I'm not sure it is wise to characterize this in partisan terms. One of the principal authors of NCLB was that well-known conservative Republican, Teddy Kennedy.
Now, maybe Larry Grant really is part of the adult supervision wing of the Democratic Party. His son, however, is part of the San Francisco crazy wing--and I find myself increasingly wondering if the apple did not fall far from the tree.
UPDATE: Larry Grant's son proceeds to post about this over at DailyKos. I guess that tells us everything we need to know about Ron Grant's brand of Democrat. He takes my unwillingness to spend responding to his claim that the Republican Party leadership protects pedophiles as an admission. No, the claim is so absurd--and coming from a Democrat, of all people!--that I just ignored it.
At this point, there is NO evidence that I have seen that the leadership knew about Foley's sexually explicit emails. They knew that he been a little too friendly--last year. We know now that the other gay Republican Congresscritter (Kolbe) warned Foley several years ago--but it isn't clear that Kolbe ever said anything to the leadership about it.
In any case, if the leadership had told Foley last year that he needed to resign, Ron Grant would be whining about "homophobia." Democrats are in no position to whine about sexually explicit emails. Have they forgotten Democrat Gerry Studds having sex with a 17 year old page, and Democrats applauding his decision to show contempt when he was censured about it?
Have they forgotten Rep. Mel Reynolds (D-IL) little problem with child porn and a 16 year old girl? The Pardons for Cash President, Bill Clinton, pardoned him.
Unless Larry Grant disavows Ron Grant's steaming hypocrisy and dishonesty, I am going to assume that the rotten apple didn't fall far from the tree.
Publication Date Moved Up!
Armed America will start shipping December 19th, and will be in book stores by January 16th. Remember: if you have trouble talking yourself into spending $26.99 for a book--buy a copy, read it, then contribute it your local library, where it will be sitting on the shelf, available for students writing term papers for the next fifteen years. Because you have contributed it to a public library, you can deduct the cost of the book as a charitable contribution on your income taxes--which makes it really not so terribly expensive.
Or, you could buy two copies--one for you, and one for your local library.
I'm So Surprised: A Gun Buyback Didn't Work
In this case, the huge gun buyback after the Martin Bryant mass murder in Australia in 1996 did effectively nothing but waste money, according to this article in the Sydney Morning Herald:HALF a billion dollars spent buying back hundreds of thousands of guns after the Port Arthur massacre had no effect on the homicide rate, says a study published in an influential British journal.
Of course, a serious examination of the events leading up to Bryant's actions might have into question the competence of the Tasmanian police, who seem to have misread two previous, highly suspicious deaths involving Martin Bryant--both of which caused him to become wealthy. In light of the recent mental illness related mass murders in Canada and the U.S.--and especially Martin Bryant's actions in Australia in 1996, this paragraph alone is the important one:
The report by two Australian academics, published in the British Journal of Criminology, said statistics gathered in the decade since Port Arthur showed gun deaths had been declining well before 1996 and the buyback of more than 600,000 mainly semi-automatic rifles and pump-action shotguns had made no difference in the rate of decline.
The only area where the package of Commonwealth and State laws, known as the National Firearms Agreement (NFA) may have had some impact was on the rate of suicide, but the study said the evidence was not clear and any reductions attributable to the new gun rules were slight.
"Homicide patterns (firearm and non-firearm) were not influenced by the NFA, the conclusion being that the gun buyback and restrictive legislative changes had no influence on firearm homicide in Australia," the study says.
In his first year in office, the Prime Minister, John Howard, forced through some of the world's toughest gun laws, including the national buyback scheme, after Martin Bryant used semi-automatic rifles to shoot dead 35 people at Port Arthur.
Although furious licensed gun-owners said the laws would have no impact because criminals would not hand in their guns, Mr Howard and others predicted the removal of so many guns from the community, and new laws making it harder to buy and keep guns, would lead to a reduction in all types of gun-related deaths.Dr Baker said many more lives would have been saved had the Government spent the $500 million on mental health or other programs rather than on destroying semi-automatic weapons.
Larry Grant on the First Amendment
Larry Grant is the Democratic candidate for U.S. House district 1, and not surprisingly, because he is a Democrat, he apparently believes that "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance and "in God we trust" on our money is in conflict with the First Amendment:One of the most precious rights we have in America is freedom of religion. The First Amendment to the Constitution ensures it by saying:, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof ...”
Except, of course, the First Amendment does not require Congress to pass "no laws promoting religion." Congress did so repeatedly in the early Republic, including mandating that section 29 of each township in the Ohio territory was reserved for support of whatever church a majority wished. Not only did the state constitutions from the Revolutionary period have explicitly Christian provisions, but the First Congress (the same one that adopted the First Amendment) used language that seems to contradict the ACLU's parallel universe version of American history.
A true strict constructionist would read that and say it means exactly what it says, no laws promoting religion. But, of course, Congress has passed laws that do express a religious preference. We do have “In God We Trust” on our money and we do say “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. Given the plain language of the Constitution, how did that happen?
Some people say that these things were within the intent of the framers of the Constitution at the time it was written. However, “In God We Trust” did not appear on any federal coin until 1864 and was not on paper money until 1957. As for the pledge, I was in grade school when they added “under God” in 1954, and I remember how hard it was to learn to put those words in when we recited the pledge every morning.
So, no, these things were not part of our Constitution when it was written in 1787, nor for a long time after that.
The Jefferson and Madison Administrations also clearly didn't get the memo about how the First Amendment prohibited the government from promoting or encouraging religion. As the Library of Congress exhibition on Religion and the Founding Fathers observes:It is no exaggeration to say that on Sundays in Washington during the administrations of Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809) and of James Madison (1809-1817) the state became the church. Within a year of his inauguration, Jefferson began attending church services in the House of Representatives. Madison followed Jefferson's example, although unlike Jefferson, who rode on horseback to church in the Capitol, Madison came in a coach and four. Worship services in the House--a practice that continued until after the Civil War--were acceptable to Jefferson because they were nondiscriminatory and voluntary. Preachers of every Protestant denomination appeared. (Catholic priests began officiating in 1826.) As early as January 1806 a female evangelist, Dorothy Ripley, delivered a camp meeting-style exhortation in the House to Jefferson, Vice President Aaron Burr, and a "crowded audience." Throughout his administration Jefferson permitted church services in executive branch buildings. The Gospel was also preached in the Supreme Court chambers.
Now, Grant may actually believe that what he wrote is correct. There are a lot of people out there who aren't terribly knowledgeable about history. But that doesn't mean we need to elect him.
Jefferson's actions may seem surprising because his attitude toward the relation between religion and government is usually thought to have been embodied in his recommendation that there exist "a wall of separation between church and state." In that statement, Jefferson was apparently declaring his opposition, as Madison had done in introducing the Bill of Rights, to a "national" religion. In attending church services on public property, Jefferson and Madison consciously and deliberately were offering symbolic support to religion as a prop for republican government.
Thanks to Adam's Blog for pointing me to Grant's statement.
The First Rule of Gunfighting Is...Bring a Gun
But in this case, I'm glad that the bad guy wasn't paying attention in school. Or is the better analogy the scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark where Indiana demonstrates why swords are an obsolete technology? From November 1, 2006 Denver channel 7:GRAND JUNCTION, Colo -- A man allegedly found trying to break into a car got a lot more than he expected when his intended victim fought back.
Grand Junction police said 28-year-old Aaron Johnson pulled a knife on the man when confronted Tuesday afternoon, but the victim was armed with a gun and chased Johnson down the street.
...
No one was hurt, and police and sheriff's deputies caught the man within five minutes.
Johnson faces multiple charges including burglary, and possession of more than a gram of methamphetamine.
I'm Glad That Our Troops Can Take a Joke
I guess John Kerry's claim that the ones not smart enough to go to college end up in Iraq was true:
John Kerry, what a guy--just in time for soldiers in Iraq who are filling in absentee ballots to stop dragging their knuckles long enough to ask the one guy in the company who knows how to read for advice for whom they should vote!
It would be amusing to see how many soldiers changed their mind about Republican vs. Democrat based on the Democratic Party's 2004 standard bearer calling them uneducated.
Great Moments in Patent Applications
Professor Volokh points to a recently published patent application, in which the patent lawyers inserted something to see if the inventor actually bothered to read the application--and then forgot to remove it before filing:9. The method of providing user interface displays in an image forming apparatus which is really a bogus claim included amongst real claims, and which should be removed before filing; wherein the claim is included to determine if the inventor actually read the claims and the inventor should instruct the attorneys to remove the claim.
The Need For Family Friendly Sci-Fi On Television
Considerettes has a thoughtful piece about how many of the science fiction programs on television could be, with only the most trivial of changes, family-friendly:Yeah, I’m going to sound like a prude. Whatever. My point is that with just a few quick edits, I wouldn’t have to man the VCR remote and skip past these things, and my kids could enjoy some grownup, intelligent sci-fi stories and not have to get indoctrinated into the cultural “norms” that have brought on so many problems in society. (Quite the multiple personality syndrome, eh? Society is shocked–SHOCKED–at the number of teen pregnancies and the rising number of porn addictions, and then turns a blind, or approving, eye to neutral or approving references to the same things.) Sure there’s kid-oriented sci-fi, but most of it’s pathetic. (Don’t get me started on “Phil of the Future”, which is simply another cookie-cutter high school sitcom with gadgets, where bad attitudes and actions aren’t changed and where sexual innuendo is almost as prevalent. Thanks, Disney.)
I wish that the problem was just that the entertainment industry is so out of touch with America. But I'm pretty sure that this is intentional--an attempt to change the moral climate of America by desensitizing us to vulgarity. Many years ago, there was a very well done TV miniseries, Amber Waves, starring Dennis Weaver as a guy who ran around the Midwest harvesting grain with a big combine, who discovers that he has cancer, and is dying. Near the end of the movie, we see him approach a church, with the implication that he has not been a churchgoing sort of person, but now is looking for answers or at solace. The door of the church is locked, and a passer-by basically says to him that of course it's locked--it's not Sunday. So of course, the film ends with him taking an existential acceptance of death.
But in the real world, most churches aren't locked on Sunday. Most churches that I have ever attended are sufficiently busy or active that there is almost always someone there during the week--someone that might be able to answer some questions, extend a helping hand, or give a man facing imminent mortality a hug and some understanding. So why was this scene in there? To create a perception that there are no answers in a church.
Michael Medved's Hollywood vs. America makes the point that people who work in the entertainment industry really hold America's religious values in contempt. He reports that when he asks people in the entertainment industry what percentage of Americans they think attend religious worship services every week, they usually say, "Oh, about 5%." Their ignorance of America's values is exceeded only by their contempt for them.
How Global Warming Will Affect Me
It was 22 degrees outside this morning when I woke up. It is now 10:25 AM--and the temperature has risen to 28 degrees. Hmmmm. I can see some potential benefits.
Who Is Opposing Proposition 2 in Idaho?
Reports submitted to the Idaho Secretary of State's office by the political group Neighbors Protecting Idaho show that they had received $32,195 as of October 1, almost entirely from local Idaho entities--but between October 1 and October 28, when this last report was filed, they received another $563,522.91--and in spite of the rhetoric from "Neighbors Protecting Idaho" about how Prop. 2 is funded by big out of state developers, this enormous wad of money is largely coming from out of state environmental groups and George Soros' backed leftist groups.
Ballot Initiative Strategy Center (funded in part by George Soros) $10,000
Defenders of Wildlife $25,000
Greater Yellowstone Coalition $100,000
Sierra Club $21,000
Nature Conservancy (a group that I used to be a member of) $150,000
The Partnership Project $30,000
Now, remember that Proposition 2 does nothing that directly threatens environmental concerns. If Proposition 2 passes, governments can still changing planning or zoning in ways that make the environmentalists happy--but if doing so substantially reduces the value of someone's property, then the government will have to compensate the owner for that reduction in value. I think it is only fair that if the government is going to do something to protect the environment, that they should not expect one property owner to get stuck with the full cost of something that theoretically benefits everyone.
Environmentalists, of course, see it rather differently. Remember: a developer is someone that wants to build a cabin in the woods. An environmentalist already has his cabin in the woods.
Won't You Be My Neighbor?
My neighbor Brandon has his house up for sale: 5080 square feet, on 7.8 acres. The picture here really doesn't do it justice. It has a view only slightly inferior to ours, and it is an amazing house. And the asking price is only $1,295,000!
Here's a picture giving you a bit better of an idea of the surroundings.
Click to enlarge
Signs of Interest Rate Cuts Coming
The gap between yields of bonds in emerging markets and U.S. Treasury bonds is narrowing:"U.S. interest rates will probably go lower," said Raphael Kassin, who helps manage about $4 billion as head of emerging- market securities at ABN Asset Management in London.. "The emerging market is very strong, supported by U.S. Treasuries."
Falling interest rates can be driven either by a slowing economy, or by reduced competition from the federal government at the borrowing window (because the deficits are falling). If the interest rates fall because of the economy slowing, it might take a while for real estate prices to run back up. If the interest rates fall because the federal government is borrowing less, but the economy remains healthy, real estate prices might well rebound.
The difference between emerging-market debt and Treasury yields today narrowed 2 basis points, or 0.02 percentage point, to 1.92 percentage points, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s index of emerging-market debt. The spread had increased after an Oct. 27 Commerce Department report showed the U.S. economy slowed last quarter, leading to concern that demand will drop for the exports of developing nations.
Treasuries gained today, driving 10-year notes to their longest rally since August 2004, after an industry report showed manufacturing grew last month at the slowest pace in more than three years. Ten-year note yields dropped 3 basis points to 4.57 percent, the seventh straight daily decline.
The Institute for Supply Management said its manufacturing index declined to 51.2 last month, the lowest since June 2003, from 52.9 in September. The median forecast in a Bloomberg survey was for a reading of 53. The report's price component fell to 47, the lowest since February 2002, from 61.
Slave Revolt in Maryland
The Maryland Democratic Party has always been able to count on blacks staying on the plantation--but it now appears that a major rebellion against white Democratic paternalism is under way:Yesterday, a group of African-American Democrats from Prince George's County, Maryland, endorsed Republican Lieutenant Governor Michael Steele, a fellow black, for the U.S. Senate. It might be the most important political development in the country this week.
Why does this matter?
Control of the Senate appears to hinge on the results in one or two contests. There are no states in which Republicans have appeared likely to pick up a seat, although New Jersey remains a possibility. If Steele could manage an upset in the race for the seat of retiring Democratic Senator Paul Sarbanes, it could be the difference-maker. And Steele is undeniably close. The current RealClearPolitics poll average shows him trailing by 5.3 percentage points, and, in the words of University of Maryland political scientist Ron Walters, yesterday's endorsements are "going to go through the black community like a rocket. It's going to be the talk of the county, the state, maybe even the nation." Prince George's County is a huge, majority-black area east of Washington, D.C. With a total population of just under 850,000, it's the second-largest jurisdiction in the state, with some 225,000 more people than the city of Baltimore. As you would expect given its ethnic makeup, it's a Democratic stronghold. In 2002, the ticket of Governor Bob Ehrlich and Steele won statewide by four percentage points (52-48), but lost in Prince George's by fifty-three percentage points (76-23).
As a number of black academics over the years (Walter Williams, Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, among others) have pointed out, many of the policies that the Democratic Party promotes have been very bad for blacks. Expansion of the welfare state was promoted as a sign of compassion, but the regulatory society had the net effect of making it difficult for the poorest and least educated blacks to get jobs.
So why a high-powered leadership would group from Prince George's break ranks with their party and support Steele? (And they are high-powered. Their leader is a two-term former County Executive, Wayne Curry, arguably the most popular politician in the county. Five others are members of the County Council. Another, Major Riddick, was the top aide to former Governor Parris Glendening. Also on hand were one of the Democrats' top fundraisers, several prominent businessmen and other community leaders.)
Part of it is that Steele is a Prince Georgian. The county leaders know him, like him and respect him. But that alone wouldn't be nearly enough to cause them to break ranks with their party in a critical election.
What it's really all about is that blacks in Maryland have begun to realize that they've been being snookered by the white-dominated Democratic Party all these years. As Riddick put it, "They've been showing us a pie, but we never get a slice."
The Democratic Party's slavish devotion to teachers' unions meant that there were no alternatives to the non-functional big city public school systems. While ineffective public schools have been a problem for whites as well, they have been an especially severe burden on poor blacks, who were often struggling with cultural problems about education as well. (The phrase "acting white" has long been used by some inner-city blacks to castigate fellow students who were trying to make something of themselves by applying themselves to learning.)
Local Elections: Boise County
Boise County has about 6000 people; I suspect that the total votes cast is going to be 1/3 or less of that. (I guessed well; the actual ballots cast at the primary was 1831.) As a result, my vote probably matters more in some of these local races than just about anywhere that I've ever lived. The problem is that there is precious little information or propaganda coming to my door from any of the candidates. The best that I can find is the articles in the weekly Boise County newspaper, The Idaho World, established 1863.
Republican Brent Adamson is challenging incumbent Democrat Linda Blough for the position of Assessor. My general inclination is to vote Republican, but I've emailed both candidates asking them:
1. Perhaps I am a little ignorant of what the Assessor's office does, but I was under the impression that the bulk of what a county assessor does is determine valuation of property for purposes of taxation. Isn't this a pretty mechanical process? Is there likely to be any real difference in how this is done, regardless of who wins?
2. What is your position concerning Proposition 2 on the November ballot?
Proposition 2 is the statewide initiative to limit use of eminent domain and require compensation of property owners if the value of their property is adversely impacted by a zoning or planning change.
Idaho counties are run by a Commission, and Boise County seems to have three commissioners, elected from districts. I believe that I am in District 3, where Linda Zimmer won the Republican primary, defeating the incumbent, Paul Stutzman. Stutzman is running a write-in campaign. (I guess there was no Democratic nominee. This seems to be close to a one party county.) I gather that Stutzman's big upset, and the reason that he is running for re-election, is that he wants the government to have more say about a development. To quote from an ad that he ran in The Idaho World:The current planning process binds the hands of County officials. A development like South Fork Landing need only be "legal" to gain approval by County Boards, including the Board of Commissions. Legal advice encourages a "yes or no" vote based only on the legality a development. I run as a write-in for Commissioner to specifically change this process. Just because a development passes the legal test does not make it right!
I don't know the details about South Fork Landing, but you know, I'm rather partial to the idea that discretion in planning and zoning processes is a bad thing, because it can lead to bribery.
Now, some of Stutzman's other concerns make sense, but he also seems to have a pretty strong hostility to what he characterizes as "out-of-state developer[s]."
I was a little surprised to see that there has been some discussion of moving the county seat from Idaho City to Horseshoe Bend. Stutzman's ad rejects that completely, and claims that Zimmer says "such a move would be too costly for three years." I wouldn't mind having the county seat closer to my home, but I can see why people who live in Idaho City might see it differently.
I suspect that I will be voting for Linda Zimmer, primarily because I am concerned about Stutzman's apparent desire to see planning subject to discretionary decisions by government officials.
Clerk of the Court? Again, like the Assessor's office, I thought that this was a pretty mechanical process. Constance Swearingen is running against Kerri Pattee-Krosch, and I guess the only item that might cause me to pick one against the other is that Pattee-Krosch has an Accounting degree. Swearingen apparently does not. I can see that there might be some advantages to such an education in that job.
This Requires Further Investigation
Okay, I can believe that a San Francisco police officer on vacation in Cambodia might have gone there to hire a child prostitute. I can believe that once arrested, shame or more likely fear of what was going to happen to him in Cambodian prison might have caused him to commit suicide. What I don't find plausible is:
1. That someone who is in a jail cell manages to get hold a gun.
2. Shoots himself in the mouth twice. That's not very easy to do.
Here's the story, which I am pleased to see indicates that investigation of the suspicious circumstances is under way:A San Francisco police officer who had been arrested for alleged sexual abuse and "debauchery'' in Cambodia related to a 14-year-old girl there has apparently committed suicide in his jail cell, authorities said Monday.
Officer Donald Rene Ramirez, 50, a 25-year veteran, "committed suicide by firing two bullets into his mouth," said Keo Thea, chief of antihuman trafficking police in Phnom Penh.
...
Following the reports of Ramirez's death, reporters in Phnom Penh were not allowed into the police station to verify the official account, and it was unclear exactly how Ramirez shot himself, including how he would have fired twice.
The death is under investigation by both Cambodian and U.S. officials.
Keo Thea told reporters in Cambodia that Ramirez killed himself after a police guard left to use the bathroom. Ramirez allegedly used a broom to pull a gun from under a woven mat to his cell.
Is There Something Broken in Islam?
I've mentioned my concerns before--that even though it sounds like nasty, vicious propaganda, there seems to be some evidence that sexual abuse of children in Islamic societies is widespread and generally accepted, leading to "paranoid, highly traumatized, and revenge-seeking adults." Now I see this report by the Egyptian blogger Rantings of a Sandmonkey complaining about mass public rape and the unwillingness of the police to intervene:It was the first day of Eid, and a new film was opening downtown. Mobs of males gatherd trying to get in, but when the show was sold out, they decided they will destroy the box office. After accomplishing that, they went on what can only be described as a sexual frenxy: They ran around grabbing any and every girl in sight, whether a niqabi, a Hijabi or uncoverd. Whether egyptian or foreigner. Even pregnant ones. They grabbed them, molested them, tried to rip their cloths off and rape them, all in front of the police, who didn't do shit. The good people of downtown tried their best to protect the girls. Shop owners would let the girls in and lock the doors, while the mobs tried to break in. Taxi drivers put the girls in the cars while the mobs were trying to break the glass and grab the girls out. It was a disgusting pandamonium of sexual assaults that lasted for 5 houres from 7:30 PM to 12:30 am, and it truns my stomach just to think about it.
Thanks to Power and Control for the link.
...
The ones who approached the police asking them to do something were told : "what do you want us to do? It's Eid. Happy Eid to you too!" The same response was given to women who went to the police stations to report the incidents. The police refused to do their jobs and take a report, because it would probably reflect badly on their downtown peers. Some people were surprised at the Police's reaction, but the majoirty of us weren't. Those are the same police officers who facilitated the assaults on women last year during the referendum. This is business as usual for them.
What was unusual was the silence of the press. Nobody was mentioning it. Nobody was bringing it up. It seemed like there was some consensus of just not reporting it and maybe it will just go away. What at first seemed like a conspiracy got later on confirmed by my sources in the news media. Al Jazeera had taped the incidents but were forbidden to air it at the request of the egyptian authorities. The editor at a leading newspaper refused to touch it with a 6 foot pole. This was going to be one of those incidents that only the blogsphere would talk about, while the mainstream media ignored.
James Lindgren Blows a Hole in a New Myth
I'm sure that for the next ten years, every 15 year old who never grew up is going to be pointing to this article in Slate to prove that access to computer pornography reduces rape rates. But Professor Lindgren points out that the claim is wrong--or at least, not all that well-supported:According to the headlines on the internet, a new study by Todd Kendall of Clemson University (using regression analyses of panel data) finds that having computer access to the internet at home, and thus better access to internet porn, is consistent with the hypothesis that more porn REDUCES the incidence of rape (tip to Instapundit).
My suspicion is that access to pornography for well-adjusted adults is probably not destructive. The problem is that just like with television, the audience includes quite a few kids who do not have sufficient maturity or experience with the real world to know that pornography has much the same relationship to real world sex and relationships that The Terminator has to life in Los Angeles. In addition, there is some reason to worry that adults who are not well-adjusted may find the portrayal of sex in pornography to act as some sort of justification for their actions.* If you find it at all implausible that what you watch may influence your behavior--ask yourself why companies spend billions of dollars a month on advertising, and millions of dollars a year on "product placement" in movies and television. Hint: it's not because of their selfless generosity.
What neither the author of the study nor online commentators seem to have noticed is that the data also are consistent with the hypothesis that owning a computer INCREASES the incidence of rape. Indeed, the observed rape increasing effect of computer access is even more highly significant than the observed rape decreasing effect of internet access (p. 43).
Since by 2003 87% of households with computers had access to the internet, and since the two effects are about even in size, the “rape reducing” effects of internet access (-.730, p. 43) are almost completely offset by the “rape increasing” effects of owning a computer (.641, p. 43). Since it appears that everyone in the study who lived in a household with computer internet access also lived in a household with a computer, the net effect on rape of having household access to a computer and household access to the internet was nearly zero and probably not even close to being significant.
The supposed rape reducing effect of internet access that the study and commentators are talking about is the effect of household internet access, CONTROLLING for the observed rape inducing effect of household computer access. That these two highly intercorrelated variables tend to have implausible offsetting effects when significant is supported by other models in Kendall’s paper; for example, one model shows a huge increase in prostitution arrests associated with computer access and a huge offsetting drop in prostitution arrests associated with internet access (p.51).
* By the way, I was surprised to find that in addition to considerable research on whether early exposure to pornography made men more prone to rape, there is research sugesting that early exposure to pornopgraphy may encourage women to be more accepting of rape:Tested hypothesis that women's attitudes and fantasies about rape arise partially from their socialization to accept sexual aggression as normative. Female participants answered questions on childhood exposure to pornography, sex fantasies, and rape attitudes. Early exposure to pornography correlated to "rape fantasies" and attitudes supportive of sexual violence against women. (RJM)
Also:Abstract This study tested several hypotheses regarding (1) the effects of reading pornography on women's self-esteem and attitudes about rape and interpersonal violence and (2) how these effects were mediated by subject's degree of sex role stereotyping (SRS). Women high and low in SRS read one of three sexually explicit stories portraying different combinations of a woman's consent (or no consent) and arousal (or no arousal) to forceful sexual activity. As predicted, all stories had some effect on attitudes. Differences attributable to the Consent and Arousal manipulations were minimal, but generally in the expected direction. Compared to not reading a story, reading any story generally led to changes in self-esteem and greater acceptance of rape myths and interpersonal violence. Also as predicted, high, compared to low, SRS subjects generally reported lower self-esteem and more tolerance of rape and other violence. Differences were also found in perceptions of sexual situations. Significant SRS by story interactions and other results related to the hypotheses are also discussed.
What's interesting is that a number of studies have failed to find any connection between pornography and rape rates in multiple states and nations, while experimental work would suggest that violent pornography increases aggressiveness (see pp. 9-10).
What's Wrong With This Picture?
There's a town in Pennsylvania that has new ordinances designed to drive out illegal aliens. Not surprisingly, there's a lawsuit challenging the new law--but what surprises me is the name of the group that filed it:Opponents sued on Monday to block the law and a companion measure, saying they trample on the federal government's exclusive power to regulate immigration.
Puerto Rico is part of the United States. No Puerto Rican in the United States is, or can be, an illegal alien. What's wrong with this picture?
"These ordinances are nothing more than an officially sanctioned witch hunt," said Cesar Perales, president of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, a group representing plaintiffs in the case.
John Kerry's Tin Ear
You know, Bush can be inarticulate at times, and he was especially (and perhaps intentionally) so before the 2000 election. (I suspect that the goal was to seem like a bumbling idiot so that the Democrats would "misunderestimate" him.) But John Kerry has a tin ear for anyone outside of the limousine liberal class that just amazes me:Kerry then told the students that if they were able to navigate the education system, they could get comfortable jobs - "If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq," he said to a mixture of laughter and gasps.
As Michelle Malkin points out here, this notion that the military takes all the losers who can't get an education is simply wrong. My recollection is that the military doesn't even take high school dropouts anymore, and only with some reluctance takes those with a GED.
But even if this were true, Kerry should know better than to say this because:
1. It is poor manners to insult people. There are people that I hire to do work for me on this house, and just because they don't have a college degree doesn't make them lesser creatures. Not everyone has the temperament or abilities to go to college (and sometimes, they don't have the temperament right out of high school, but develop it later), but that doesn't mean that they aren't fine people.
2. As the television show Dirty Jobs points out in its opening, there are a lot of people out there doing disgusting jobs that make civilized life possible. The military is an example of what George Orwell was talking about when he said:People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.
As we discovered after the 2004 elections, John Kerry wasn't much of a student at Yale--actually a bit inferior GPA than that "dummy classmate" of his, George Bush. Perhaps Kerry might have been better off suggesting that those who aren't good at navigating the educational system should work on their skills marrying wealthy widows.
"Oh, No, Not Another Learning Experience!"
That's the poster in someone's cubicle at work. I've had days where I have had far more learning experiences than I deserve.
Today's learning experiences involved machining. Telescope eyepieces come in two common sizes: 1.25" and 2" diameter barrels. (There used to be a Japanese standard size of .965", but it seems to be going extinct.) Many newer telescopes have a focuser that accepts a 2" eyepiece--and usually, they include an adapter that slides into the 2" focuser so that you can use 1.25" diameter eyepieces as well.
One of the advantages of the 2" diameter eyepieces is that you have a much larger piece of glass, and a somewhat wider field. It's much more pleasant.
The other advantage of the 2" diameter eyepieces is that longer focal lengths are commonly available with the bigger pieces of glass, which is useful for getting lower magnification and therefore a wider field. (Trust me, there are times you want less power, and a wider field, especially on galaxies.) For example, I don't think I've ever seen a 1.25" eyepiece with a focal length longer than about 55mm. But I have a 2" eyepiece with a focal length of 85mm.
Now, my 8" reflector, wonderful piece of optics that it is, only a 1.25" focuser. I discovered that by holding some of these 2" eyepieces above the focuser, I could actually get a pretty respectable image--and a very wide field (which is useful when hunting for faint objects that don't show up in the finder scope). Yes, I could buy a 2" focuser and install it, but that's quite a bit of work, and might involve moving the mirror mount within the tube, which means drilling fresh holes and patching the old ones--too much work.
Now, I've seen adapters that let you put a 2" eyepiece into a 1.25" focuser, and no, they aren't made by Mobius Strip Enterprises. Obviously, the adapter goes into the 1.25" focuser, and the 2" eyepiece sits above the focuser. The downside is that the adapter might reduce the edges of the cone of light coming from the telescope's mirror, making the image slightly less bright. Of course, the cone of light is often quite small, anyway, to get into a 1.25" eyepiece, so the loss is usually pretty trivial.
But what the heck, I've got a lathe, I'll make the adapter that I need! This should be really quick! And that's where the lessons were learned.
1. Start out with a 2.25" diameter, 3.5" long piece of Delrin.
2. Face the ends so that you have a perfect cylinder, with 90 degree angles on both ends.
3. Drill a 1 7/8" diameter hole 1.25" deep in one end, using the drill press. This isn't perfectly centered, but the drill press is powerful, and it's fast.
4. Use the boring tool on the lathe to make that hole exactly 2.00" inside diameter--and the boring tool also corrects whatever slight discrepancies there were in centering of the hole in the drill press. The boring tool makes the hole very exactly centered--within .001" or .002".
5. Drill a 1 1/8" diameter hole in the other end of the cylinder using the drill press, until it cuts through to the 2.00" hole.
6. Use the boring tool on the lathe to smooth and center that 1 1/8" hole (not actually enlarging it more than .01").
7. Now, what should be easy: turn the outside of the end with the 1 1/8" hole down to 1.2450", so it will fit into the 1.25" eyepiece holder. I'm going to cut away the outer 1" of the cylinder for a length of 1.5". This should be easy, right?
Here are the lessons learned.
1. When you start turning a 3.5" long piece of plastic, it is very, very easy for the pressure of the cutting tool to pop the plastic right out of the chuck. (Remember that because the end in the chuck is only a 1/8" thick wall (2.25"-2.00"/2), you can't really tighten the chuck down too aggressively because the plastic bends slightly.). The plastic pops out of the chuck, again. And again. And again. If you support both ends of the plastic, for example, by using a live center in the tailstock for the end that isn't the chuck, this isn't really a problem. But it turns out that having already bored that 1 1/8" hole in the plastic, my live center was too big to grab it. I improvised, using a 3/8" drill chuck in the tailstock to hold that end, but this really wasn't dramatically better than leaving it unsupported.
2. It is vitally important that the cutting tool in your lathe, when turning down a piece of plastic, be exactly perpendicular to the cylinder (that is to say, horizontal). If the cutting tool is much above or below horizontal, it cuts very poorly. I knew this--but didn't bother to check if I was off horizontal until I had seen the plastic piece flying across the garage a number of times.
Next time, I'll turn down the plastic to 1.25" on end end before boring the holes on each end.
And yes, it works very nicely. I was able to use the 85mm eyepiece, giving 17x, and one degree field of view.
More On The Death of Daniel Culotti
Earlier this month I mentioned the death of Daniel Culotti in Seattle, a person identified by Washington State as a Dangerous Mentally Ill Offender who, of course, was therefore out on the street. His second unprovoked attack of the day was his last; he knocked an older man to the ground who, understandably, perceived himself at risk of great bodily injury or death. Once you are on the ground, it is hard to run, and hard to protect yourself. The victim did what I think any rational person would have done: he drew his handgun and fired, killing Culotti.
Culotti's uncle wrote a piece for the Seattle Times in which (you guess):
1. He blamed the system that put his nephew out on the street to care for himself when they knew that his nephew was mentally ill, with a history of violence.
2. He blamed the man who was knocked to the ground, in fear for his life.
Yup, you guessed it: Witnesses say Danny's attack appeared random, but it was Danny who was shot dead. Initial reports painted Danny as a dangerous person who deserved it and the shooter as the victim.
Schizophrenia, amazingly, affects one of a hundred people. Its major symptom is hearing voices, often telling the person to perform abnormal acts. Its cause is not understood, but it can strike anyone and is one of the worst scourges of modern society.
What amazes me about this statement is that this guy a professor of molecular genetics. He has to be aware of the research suggesting a genetic component to schizophrenia, with this in his family.There is no doubt that Danny acted erratically that day, but he did have a diagnosed mental illness.
I am certain he would admit that what he did was wrong, if he were alive, but he was taken from us by a misguided man with a gun.
A diagnosed mental illness did nothing to prevent Danny from attacking a stranger, and putting him at risk of great bodily injury or death. This is a tragedy that Danny's victim will never forget. But if there is someone "misguided," it wasn't a guy defending himself from potentially deadly, unprovoked, irrational criminal attack, it was a system that thinks it makes sense to label someone a Dangerous Mentally Ill Offender after committing a felony--and then sends him out to the streets, in the hopes that he will take his medicines and not get in any trouble.Danny won't be here to rejoice in a cure for schizophrenia, which we all hope will one day be found. May Danny rest in peace.
But his victim will be--and had he not been armed, Danny might be sitting in jail awaiting trial for murder or manslaughter. I really wish that we didn't have to make hard choices like this--but as long as an insane person who has committed a felony (setting fire to an apparently occupied day care center in 2001) can't be locked up for the safety of himself and others, we're going to continue to ahve these tragedies.
Arthur Chrenkoff's Night Trains
I promise not to give anything away that you can't figure out by reading the front and rear covers of the book.
As I have previously mentioned, there is more than a little similarity to Orson Scott Card's Enchantment--a weird mixture of supernatural and science fiction. When I say, "supernatural," I don't mean in the goblins and witchcraft sense of Enchantment--but time travel without the technological trappings to explain it.
Others have used this device before, such as Jack Finney's Time and Again (1970), and the 1980 film Somewhere in Time, but at least Time and Again and Somewhere in Time made feeble attempts to give a scientific explanation for how. Enchantment and Night Trains both dispense with this. In one sense, this disappoints me, because I live in a rational universe, where things need to have a reason to take place. In another sense, Night Trains is really more focused on what happens, not why it happens. Perhaps we are better off skipping a feeble explanation for how the time travel happens; it would have been just as lame as Time and Again's effort--and might have forced a somewhat more spiritual explanation than Chrenkoff was prepared to offer.
As I observed on receiving it, Night Trains is a bit more literary in its style than Enchantment, quite evocative of places and feelings. I must confess that while Chrenkoff is a better writer than Card (and Card isn't exactly a knuckle-dragger), I wish this novel was as positive and uplifting as Enchantment. It is dark, and depressing. It is not terribly predictable, however. I figured out where and how it was going to end a chapter or two before the end, and throughout, I found myself on the edge of my seat. What's going to happen next?
Henry James's advice to novelists was, "Show, don't tell." By that, James meant that instead of the narrator describing a person, or an event, or the background, you give information that allows the reader to figure it out. Night Trains, like many better novels, does this. Piece by piece, bit by bit, the first few chapters hand the reader clues as to the protagonist's age, job, and interests. Compared to a more traditional "tell the reader" approach, it is a bit longer way to tell a story, but it does create a bit more of a sense of adventure--and it is definitely more interesting. If you want a good example of someone suffering from the "tell, don't show" approach--try almost any novel by John Grisham. (I'm fumbling around with writing a novel at the moment, as a mental break from the less fun of the book on deinstitutionalization, and as I try to follow Henry James's advice, I can see how much harder this is to do well.)
This wasn't quite as riveting as Michael Crichton's novels, but I finished Night Trains in about three sittings, and I never found myself wondering, "Why am I reading this?" There are several mysteries to be resolved, and the twists and turns held my attention. Do you have to make a long plane flight somewhere? You might want to pick this up and put it in your briefcase. It is about the right length to absorb a coast-to-coast flight.
By the way, there are historical parts of this novel that may seem implausible or startling to you, if you haven't read much about the German resistance movements against Hitler. Rest assured, Chrenkoff is on solid ground with his discussions of some of the historical players. I did find a few minor technical errors with respect to the weaponry, but unless you immediately recognize the flaw in the phrase "German Sten gun" you aren't likely to recognize them.
Races Closer Than I Expected In Idaho
This is a worrisome sign: For the first time since the early 1990s, the outcome of a statewide election appears in doubt with just 10 days to go.
Still, there's recognition that the poll numbers in Idaho (like everywhere else) underpredict election results:
An Idaho Statesman/Today's 6 poll says races for governor, 1st Congressional District and school superintendent are essentially tied.
Now, the state with the nation's highest proportion of GOP legislators has a nail-biter election that will turn on last-minute advertising, debates and organization.
Democrats haven't won a governor's race since 1990 or a seat in Congress since 1992, but a call for change nationally is reaching Idaho. Coupled with Republican candidates who inspire negative feelings, Democrats have a shot.
In the governor's race, Republican U.S. Rep. Butch Otter leads Democratic newspaper owner Jerry Brady by a single percentage point. Republican state Rep. Bill Sali has a 2 percentage point lead over Democratic businessman Larry Grant for the congressional seat that runs from West Boise north to Canada. In the race to oversee public schools, Democrat Jana Jones leads Republican Tom Luna by 3 percentage points.
All three are statistical dead heats. The survey of 625 likely voters was conducted for the Idaho Statesman and Today's 6, the local ABC affiliate. The margin of error statewide is plus or minus 4 percentage points; in the 1st District that rises to 6 percentage points. Likely voters were polled last week by Mason-Dixon Polling and Research of Washington, D.C.
A fourth race shows Gov. Jim Risch leading former congressman Larry LaRocco by 9 percentage points for lieutenant governor.
"At this point in a typical campaign, Idaho Democrats are dispirited and looking for moral victories," said Jim Weatherby, a political scientist who has overseen polling at Boise State University. "This time, it looks like they may actually pull off some major victories."Still, Republicans have the advantage in Idaho. Brady agrees with the rule of thumb offered by former GOP Gov. Phil Batt, who said his party gains about 5 percentage points on Election Day over opinion poll findings. "I know Phil's right," said Brady. "We would like to go into the last weekend ahead 4, 5, 6 points, because that's the typical Republican gain. But this isn't a typical year, Democrats are better organized."
I think I've heard that claim before. But let's not get arrogant about this--it does appear that this is going to be close. In the House race, Grant has done an effective job of portraying himself as a moderate Democrat--unlike certain "other" Democrats who hold seats in Congress.
