BoingBoing’s Xeni Jardin gets around, finally, to making this observation: “We are being lied to.” Yep, we sure are. Finally, several days after I first heard part but not all of it, here is the link to This American Life’s Guantanamo report, “Habeas Schmabeas.” This is the one where part of it, in explanation of the origin of the legal concept of habeas corpus, entails a visit to Westminster Abbey. I was wrong about the guide, his name is Tony, and thus is not the same one we had when we visited the Abbey year before last. And remember, the…
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I just sneezed, extra-juicily, all over it. Gah. So, yes. Still sick, but not as a dog. Maybe I’m just sick as a cat – cute sneezes, lying around all day, demanding to be fed, etc. At least there have been no hairballs, yet. I’m going to try to add in the “Recent Comments” thing again later. It stopped working, and I couldn’t figure out if it was related to an upgrade somewhere, a plugin conflict, or what. I’ll probably be stopping by Learning Moveable Type’s tutorial to figure it out. Spoke to Mom on the phone – she sounds…
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It’s been raining and thundering and lightning off and on for a couple of hours. Just now, things started to get very noisy outside – heavy rain… WHOA! We lost power for a couple of minutes after a lightning strike very close by. Suddenly, I was completely in the dark, which is not all that uncommon for me, frankly. After a few seconds my eyes adjusted enough to find the proper keys on my laptop to hibernate, so I pulled the plug and shut down. Grabbed a flashlight, because I had heard David holler and figured he was down in…
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This is some of what I’ve been tweaking and playing around with on Flickr. I keep tinkering around, though, and I really need to get the Maui blog entry finished and published. Maybe today or tomorrow? I’ve got more surfing photos, but so far I like this one the best. Via: Flickr Title: Satori 2-28-2006 4-42-45 PM 874×701 By: GinnyRED57 Originally uploaded: 11 Mar ’06, 6.04am PST This guy was so relaxed, he could have been meditating. He was one with the wave.
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Prisoners without Trials – Blumner: Treatment of Guantanamo prisoners unprecedented in U.S. In the 1660s, England’s Lord Clarendon was in the habit of sending prisoners to remote islands and military garrisons in order to put them out of reach of the due process protections afforded by English courts. For these misdeeds, Clarendon was impeached, and in 1679 Parliament passed the Habeas Corpus Act, which made it illegal to ship prisoners away to deprive them of their rights. It appears the Bush administration never got that memo. Just an “oh ho!” moment after following up on a detail from This American…
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BBC NEWS | Americas | Shoe alert shuts New York airport New York’s LaGuardia airport was evacuated and flights were halted for about two hours after a man’s shoe set off a false alarm during screening. A search was launched for the man after he was allowed to pass through security despite setting off the alarm for explosives residue. Oh, so that’s what it was. The really troubling thing is that after he was selected for secondary screening, he put his shoes on and walked away. Somebody screwed up, royally, by not keeping an eye on him the whole time,…
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I’m part of this group on Flick. One or two of my photos from Maui may be good enough to be matched to a known whale, like this one. This photo ended up on the site blog, demonstrating “the power of Flickr.“ Crossposted to Razzberry Vinaigrette. Via: Flickr Title: Humpback Whale, Newfoundland By: George K Originally uploaded: 18 Jan ’06, 9.34pm PST Taken 6/29/03, off Trinity, Newfoundland
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Salt Lake Tribune copy editor and headline writer Robert Ellefson died Tuesday of pneumonia. From the sound of it, he started out at City News Bureau, since his bio includes a stint at the Chicago Sun-Times. City News was owned by the Sun-Times’ arch-rival the Chicago Tribune, but nearly every young reporter spent some time “checking it out” at the News. He sounds like a rare character for Utah, and I wish I’d known him. -30-
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Chicago Tribune | Ethnic groups rally for immigrant rights and against HR4337, which places much stricter guidelines for immigration. It is opposed by a broad spectrum of church, labor, and minority-rights groups. It is supported by… “people” like the Minutemen and a group called the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which sounds much more tasteful and level-headed than the “Keep the dam’ furrin wetbacks out” Club. Immigrants: 100,000. Minutemen: Oh, about t’ree or four. The large turnout was partly in response to urgings from the Chicago Catholic Archdiocese, evangelical and socially-progressive churches, and a Hispanic radio announcer called “El Pistolero,”…
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The TSA is really working hard to keep us safe and secure when traveling… I checked around just now because of rumors of a security breech at Laguardia Airport in the Delta terminal, and found my way to the Transportation Security Administration’s “security checkpoint wait times” site. They’re so tightly wired, they’re warning about delays for the Fourth of July weekend. Now that’s thinking ahead. TSA | Transportation Security Administration | Wait Times Due to the increased passenger traffic expected at airports over the Fourth of July holiday weekend, you may encounter wait times at the security checkpoints that are…