(For what it's worth, a Target security guard politely complained that "you can't take pictures in the store."
Rather than pointing out his semantic error, I just said I wouldn't take any more.)
As Tabitha is indisposed to be photographed in her current condition, here's a rare appearance by Catherine's
"other" cat, Mitchell:
Unlike Lotus, but like Catherine's other cats over the years, almost all of whom were shelter cats or adopted
strays, Mitchell is his own unique self, not a product of human-directed breeding. He is very serious by nature
and tends to avoid strangers, but otherwise is confident that he doesn't need any fancy pedigree or ribbons. In
this picture he emerges from seclusion for a few minutes of bird-watching at eye level through a second-story
window.
That seemed to be that. Real ID was supposed to sleep-walk into the next president’s administration, who would
have to decide whether to put the multi-billion dollar unfunded mandate on life support, or drive the final
steak through its vampiric heart.
...
I remember, in my meat-eating days, steaks that were bony enough to be driven through the heart...
About 15 years after my undergraduate days at Rice University, soon enough that I was still keeping up with
research being done at my alma mater, the field of nanostructured carbon was brand new. The earliest
examples of the class of carbon molecules called
fullerenes
(named after Buckminster Fuller and casually called "buckyballs" and "buckytubes") were discovered by a team
including some researchers at Rice. All these years later, I still find the field intriguing. By now, the
applications of materials made with such structures are well known: medicine, armor, and even toys available at
your local sporting goods stores. But there may be a problem ahead.
From Kristen M. Kulinowski, PhD at the International Council on Nanotechnology,
via Jennifer Sass at NRDC,
and indirectly via
ellroon
writing on another subject, we learn that multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) are as carcinogenic as
asbestos when injected directly into mice bred for susceptibility to cancer. Two studies suggest this result,
but do not prove that the MWCNT, rather than other materials used in the experiments, cause the mesotheliomas.
The information is new enough that no human studies have been done yet, and as far as I can tell there is no
suggestion that the presence of these carbon nanotubes in sporting equipment actually exposes people to the
nanotubes. The authors are not drawing conclusions, so the rest of us probably shouldn't jump to them.
It is difficult to generalize from this, but one thing did occur to me. Some other hazardous phenomena, such as
ionizing radiation, caused immediately pernicious effects in many of the earliest researchers and workers using
technology that generated them. By contrast, the earliest effects of exposure to high levels of asbestos and
similar fibers must have taken years or even decades to manifest themselves as disease. Absent current evidence
that multi-walled carbon nanotubes are harmful to human health, they are a bit like cell phones: rumors of harm
from their use are everywhere, but there is really no smoking-gun evidence. I suppose the first step is to
exercise caution in the manufacture of products using MWCNT, avoiding significant worker exposure. I hope those
workers have good unions.
Off-topic household health report for Tabitha's fans: Tabitha's treatments have improved her status enough that
she was able to resist my efforts to feed her this morning... she actually jumped down from my lap and walked
off... and also to get into an argument with Samantha about Tabitha's walking straight through her water bowl
while Samantha was drinking from it. Tabitha has another treatment this afternoon. Meanwhile, I feel physically
ill today. Stella and Samantha seem well, thank goodness.
The Lone Star Project
reminds us that the lawsuit against Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott's blatant voter suppression activities,
Willie Ray v State of Texas, Case # 2:06-CV-385, comes to trial today.
See here
for an introduction and editorials from the Austin American-Statesman and the Dallas Morning News. As the
Trailblazers Blog
of the Dallas Morning news explains it,
...
The suit contends that get-out-the-vote activists who help voters with mail ballots have been harassed an
intimidated by Abbott's investigators. Abbott says it's his job to prevent voter fraud.
The New York Times today cites this month's Dallas Morning News investigation of all cases prosecuted by Abbott
since he declared vote fraud an "epidemic" in Texas. He has prosecuted 26 cases, all against Democrats, mostly
minorities, and most against people helping elderly neighbors with their mail-in ballots.
...
Abbott is one of those GOPers who believe every Democrat is guilty of something, and no Republican is ever to
be investigated. Think
Dan Burton in 1997;
Abbott is a lot like that. The numbers alone... Abbott has spent $1.4 million, prosecuted 26 Democrats and no
Republicans for alleged voter fraud, and nailed a bunch of voter registration activists who conveyed elderly
voters' registrations from their homes to the registrar, without signing the activists' names on the outside of
the envelopes. If I understand correctly, the registrations were themselves legitimate.
I don't need to tell you what I think of this: what Abbott has done is, in a word, un-American. I hope his
prosecutions are reversed and that he himself rots in jail for this.
UPDATE Wed. afternoon: WE WON. As far as I can tell
(I am not a lawyer), Abbott, i.e., the state of Texas, settled on every significant issue. See the Lone Star
Project site linked above. We can now assist seniors registering to vote, without fear of being prosecuted
ourselves over tiny technicalities. Abbott is still a bastard, though; the settlement didn't fix that.
Aung San Suu Kyi,
leader of the opposition to the military junta in Myanmar, is to be under
house arrest
for another six months (some say one year). This is no surprise, as she has been held captive for 13 of the
last 18 years. It is important that the world remember her ongoing captivity.
My family's members of the "greatest generation" were my father Bill Bates (Lt SG, US Navy), my father's brother
Wes Bates (sorry, I don't remember his rank, paratrooper, US Army, 101ST Airborne) and my mother's
brothers (I don't have pics) including my Uncle Bill Hurley. Wes saw combat in Europe; Dad was gunnery officer on a
troop transport ship, delivering troops at Normandy on D-Day and several other places, and in addition was on
his way to the Pacific theater when the war ended. Bill and Wes both came home alive. Uncle Bill was not so
lucky; he died in an accident while in service in Washington, DC. I honor all of them.
As I age, more and more I perceive war as an inevitable human activity. That's a tough realization for a
one-time antiwar activist like me who still disapproves of almost all wars. The notion that war and politics are
intertwined is not surprising to me, but the idea that America would initiate and fight an endless war like the
current one in Iraq, and perpetuate one as ineffective in guarding national security as the one in Afghanistan,
primarily for the political purposes of a crew of corrupt, greedy assholes unwilling to risk their own necks but
all too willing to send other Americans to die for the assholes' personal and corporate profit, offends me so
deeply I can scarcely contain myself.
All I can do is take a deep breath, offer my profound thanks to service members both living and dead who
preserved our democracy through two terrible world wars, a cold war and assorted other conflicts, and condemn
the bastards in charge now who are abusing today's troops for no good national purpose. America's finest
deserve much better.
Off-topic: Stella's cat Tabitha is very weak. She can still walk, but frequently seems so exhausted that she is
almost unresponsive. Occasionally, Tabitha gets herself "stuck" facing a wall or in a tight space between
furniture, and has to be located (not always easy) and extricated; one could easily interpret this as a gesture
of resignation on her part. Everything that can be done for her chronic renal failure is being done, but I fear
it's just a matter of time. Stella is holding up at the moment, but I know that when her dear loved one of
almost 20 years finally departs, she will be beside herself. Please keep Tabitha and Stella both in your
thoughts (and prayers, if you're the praying sort).
Here's
how they pursue the War on Some Drugs in Japan:
Page last updated at 10:34 GMT, Monday, 26 May 2008 11:34 UK Cannabis blunder at Tokyo airport
An unwitting passenger arriving at Japan's Narita airport has received 142g of cannabis after a customs test
went awry, officials say.
A customs officer hid a package of the banned narcotic in a side pocket of a randomly chosen suitcase in order
to test airport security.
Sniffer dogs failed to detect the cannabis and the officer could not remember which bag he had put it in.
Anyone finding the package has been asked to contact customs officials.
...
While American airlines (including, if I recall, American Airlines) are charging extra for even one bag,
Japanese airlines are setting a high standard for service...
Phoenix
performed flawlessly in a complex and difficult landing on Mars today at about 8pm Eastern time. Stella
and I sweated out the last half-hour before the landing, watching the video feed from NASA JPL, figuratively
biting our nails along with the crew at JPL. This is one of the largest objects we've ever successfully landed
on Mars (the name is a reference to a rebirth from the metaphorical ashes of a failure a few years ago), the
first near an ice-water boundary. The mission has the potential to uncover
new fundamental facts
about "the geologic history and biological potential of the Martian arctic." It is likely to answer some
questions many of us have had about Mars for decades, in my case for over fifty years. Today is a very good day
indeed in the scientific use of space technology.
And if you'll forgive my indulging that inner nine-year-old who thought a lot about Mars when he was nine...
WOO-HOO!
I ran across
this article
quite a while ago, but only now remembered to post about it. You expect a fish net to have holes in it, but
did you know that the Internet has "black holes" into which packets simply disappear? Here's the
synopsis preceding tgdaily's article:
Seattle (WA) - The reason why you cannot reach a specific web site at any given time can be very simple. Server
and hosting issues, maintenance or the plain fact that a site has been discontinued are the most likely
explanations why a site just won’t load. But there is another, more mysterious possibility: Black holes. A team
at the University of Washington (UW) has begun mapping scenarios where information packets on the Internet
simply disappear.
If you have any interest in the workings of the 'net, and particularly what is called "Internet astronomy"
(amusingly, the tool used to measure network responses is called Hubble), this article is worth reading.
Via ellroon,
from Think Progress,
some part of our government (No Such Agency?) now has a database of about 8 million people to be
surveilled, interrogated and even incarcerated in the event of some unspecified sort of unrest:
...
CAP’s Peter Swire wrote on ThinkProgress at the time that Comey’s testimony implied that
“other programs exist
for domestic spying” outside of the
NSA program.
Radar’s Christopher Ketcham suggests that another spy program
does exist:
“Main Core,”
a program that authorizes “computer searches through massive [unspecified] electronic
databases” in order to discover “potential threats” in the event of a “national emergency”:
According to a senior government official... ”There exists a database of Americans, who, often for the
slightest and most trivial reason, are considered unfriendly, and who, in a time of panic, might be
incarcerated. The database can identify and locate perceived ‘enemies of the state’ almost instantaneously.”
... One knowledgeable source claims that 8 million Americans are now listed in Main Core as potentially
suspect. In the event of a national emergency, these people could be subject to everything from heightened
surveillance and tracking to direct questioning and possibly even detention.
These so-called “Continuity of Governance” plans, Radar notes, “are shrouded in
extreme secrecy,
effectively unregulated by Congress or the courts.” “Main Core is the table of contents for all the illegal
information that the U.S. government has [compiled] on specific targets,” said a former military operative.
Furthermore, the NSA domestic surveillance program reportedly “suppl[ies] data to Main Core.”
According to Radar, a “number of former government employees and intelligence sources with independent knowledge
of domestic surveillance operations” say Main Core is
strikingly similar
to what Comey
refused to authorize
at Ashcroft’s bedside:
[T]he program that caused the flap between Comey and the White House was related to a database of Americans who
might be considered potential threats in the event of a national emergency. Sources familiar with the program
say that the government’s data gathering has been overzealous and probably conducted in violation of federal law
and the protection from unreasonable search and seizure guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment.
“We are at the edge of a cliff and we’re about to fall off,” said constitutional lawyer and former Reagan
administration official Bruce Fein. “To a national emergency planner, everybody looks like a danger to
stability.”
(All emphases in block quotes are original with Think Progress.)
Oh, shit...
Afterthought: yes, several of the links in the Think Progress article point to the same Radar Online article. I
mistakenly assumed they would at least point to anchors within it. Sigh.
For the past few hours, Tabitha has behaved strangely. She is not sick in the usual sense of the
word, but something is clearly wrong. She wanders the floor incessantly, from room to room, back and forth,
stopping only rarely to rest. She does not want to be stroked. She will permit us to pick her up, but responds
little if at all to our affectionate attentions while we hold her. (Tabitha is typically a vociferous purrer or
complainer.) Stella has arranged to take her to the vet late this afternoon. I'll keep everyone informed.
Please keep Tabitha in your thoughts.
UPDATE: Tabitha's confusion was a new side-effect of a chronic condition she
suffers, and was partly due to dehydration, despite her having (as always) plenty of water available. The
immediate effects have mostly subsided, and Tabitha shows some signs of being her old self again, though she
is not quite back to normal. The condition is ongoing. We hope for the best.
Count me among his admirers. For about 46 years, noisily before the Senate or quietly behind the scenes,
Kennedy has been one of the most effective champions of the causes of the poor and middle-class working man and
woman. When such advocacy has been fashionable, when it has not, and when (as in the past eight years) it has
been been at best ignored or at worst actively suppressed, Kennedy has been there, getting the job done. Lost
causes are sometimes worth fighting; Kennedy, on the other hand, intends not to lose. And between his seniority
and the great respect accorded him by many of his colleagues on both sides of the aisle, he often joins with
members of both major parties to accomplish things few others could manage. See the
wiki
for more on his record.
And now we are about to lose him, to a malignant brain cancer, within a year or three.
Like Talking Points Memo,
I think the best way to honor Kennedy is to view a sample of his work. He is not a polished orator, but his
floor speeches are often very moving, and that is the case in the one Marshall has selected for us from a year
and a half ago, about the minimum wage:
Our thoughts and prayers are with Senator Kennedy and his family. We owe him a lot.
(A little note: I have seen trolls about, maligning Senator Kennedy. Any trolls on this post will be
eviscerated with a dull knife.)
Please check out the
ACLU Blog of Rights,
a new blog authored by well-known experts on human rights, civil rights and civil liberties (you will recognize
some of them). The entries are for the most part extended, well-constructed essays on the liberty-related topics
of the day. I have added the Blog of Rights to my blogroll, and anticipate reading it daily.
If you are not a member of the ACLU, now would be a good time to join. The services they render to
the cause of liberty are hard to overstate; America would be a much more restrictive place today without them.
I have been a member for about half my life; in good years and in lean years, I make room in my budget for my
annual membership. I know there are many worthy org's out there competing for your dollar, but in my opinion the
ACLU has impact far beyond the contributions you send them. Think about it.
Via everybody, but I saw it first at
Crooks and Liars:
the GOP has a new slogan for this election...
THE CHANGE YOU DESERVE
The only problem is, that line is already the registered slogan of the antidepressant Effexor XR.
We know the GOPers are beholden to Big Pharma, but really...
Venlafaxine (Effexor) is an antidepressant of the serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor (SNRI) class first
introduced by Wyeth in 1993. It is prescribed for the treatment of clinical depression and anxiety disorders,
among other uses. Due to the pronounced side effects and suspicions that venlafaxine may significantly increase
the risk of suicide, it is not recommended as a first line treatment of depression.
Word. When the GOP is in office, you're gonna have thoughts of suicide (or murder), and you're gonna need an
antidepresident. Antidepressant, that's what I meant...
Via ellroon,
from Jason Linkins at Huffington Post,
in turn from jfxgillis at Newsvine,
we learn that within the recent Pentagon document dump regarding its TV "analysts" was an audio recording from
Dec. 12, 2006 of Donald Rumsfeld addressing a valedictory lunch of these military "analysts," saying some very
interesting and even alarming things, which you should read about at Newsvine. One stands out above all others,
though, and I'll quote Linkins, who in turn quotes from a transcript of the audio recording:
But by far the most extraordinary part of this luncheon is the antipathy the gathered members exhibit toward the
American people for having the temerity to vote the Democrats back into power. When Lt. Gen. Michael DeLong
bemoans the lack of "sympathetic ears" on Capitol Hill, Rumsfeld offers that the American people lack "the
maturity to recognize the seriousness of the threats." What's to be done? According to Rumsfeld, "The correction
for that, I suppose, is [another] attack."
DELONG: Politically, what are the challenges because you're not going to have a lot of sympathetic ears up
there.
RUMSFELD: That's what I was just going to say. This President's pretty much a victim of success. We haven't
had an attack in five years. The perception of the threat is so low in this society that it's not surprising
that the behavior pattern reflects a low threat assessment. The same thing's in Europe, there's a low threat
perception. The correction for that, I suppose, is an attack. And when that happens,
then everyone gets energized for another [inaudible] and it's a shame we don't have the maturity to recognize
the seriousness of the threats...the lethality, the carnage, that can be imposed on our society is so real and
so present and so serious that you'd think we'd be able to understand it, but as a society, the longer you get
away from 9/11, the less...the less...
...
If I read this correctly, Donald Rumsfeld advocated another 9/11-style attack on America. Excuse me, but isn't
his plotting with military leaders, advocating an attack on the American homeland, whatever his motives...
treason?
Well, of course they are wildflowers, and of course they are growing...
... unless those few blossoms obscure the fact that the text is really "wildflowers growLing," and the
wildflowers are therefore (ahem) dandy lions. <gdrvvf /> *
These wildflowers are growl... um, growing at the Bellaire Nature Center, a half mile from my home.
* gdrvvf = grin, duck and run very, very fast. Oldtimers already know that.
Samantha contemplates the chemical wonders available today to a cat or a human, but decides that her appearance,
her vision and her grooming habits are already perfect...
Click any permalink below to go to the original article on a previous page.
Click a comment link below to add a comment to the original article.
Your comment will be noticed, by the YDD at least:
HaloScan has a page allowing me to view recent comments, no matter which post they refer to.
Some very recent posts may be included in their entirety.
'Peel and Stick' Tasers Electrify Riot Control
Company's New Converter Kit Turns Shields into Shockers
BLOG by NOAH SHACHTMAN
May 14, 2008
Pretty soon, cops won't just be packing stun guns. They'll be carrying electrically-charged riot shields,
zapping their unruly without unholstering their weapons. That is, if the folks at Taser International have their
way.
The company just introduced the "Taser Shield Conversion Kit featuring the Taser Repel Laminate Film
Technology."
The kit "features a peel and stick perforated [f]ilm, power supply and necessary conversion equipment. This
laminate becomes electrified providing a powerful deterrent to protect officers and keep suspects or rioters at
bay." What could possibly go wrong?
Let me get this straight: police will be able to tase (will have no choice but to tase?) arbitrary people they
happen to be directly physically approaching in a crowd control situation, whoever happens to be in front of
their shields no matter what those people are or are not doing, without taking overt action to unholster a
weapon and initiate the shock?
I can think of some names for such an action. "Police work" is not among those names.
Let us be clear about one thing: lethal or nonlethal, a Taser is an offensive weapon. It is not body armor or
protective gear. A Taser is intended to bring down the person it is aimed at. This new add-on lowers the bar to
shocking someone... and not necessarily an aggressor... one notch below an already far too low standard. In
short: our government should not be making it easier to zap someone, nor making said zapping a significantly
more frequent occurrence.
Oh, and wouldn't this be an ideal weapon for, say, disrupting elections once and for all?
Better the occasional faults of a government that lives
in a spirit of charity than the constant omissions of a
government frozen in the ice of its own indifference.
- FDR
I belong to the Democratic Party wing of the Democratic Party.
- Paul Wellstone
I am a Democrat without prefix, without suffix, and without apology.
- Sam Rayburn
My family's members of the "greatest generation" were my father Bill Bates (Lt SG, US Navy), my father's brother
Wes Bates (sorry, I don't remember his rank, paratrooper, US Army, 101ST Airborne) and my mother's
brothers (I don't have pics) including my Uncle Bill Hurley. Wes saw combat in Europe; Dad was gunnery officer on a
troop transport ship, delivering troops at Normandy on D-Day and several other places, and in addition was on
his way to the Pacific theater when the war ended. Bill and Wes both came home alive. Uncle Bill was not so
lucky; he died in an accident while in service in Washington, DC. I honor all of them.
