This Blogging Not From Concentrate

With the end of the semester hanging over me Damocles style I just have time to bang out one post of bullet points. Sorry for the lack of commentary, but if someone puts something down in the comments I'll probably be unable to resist the urge.

• Bill O'Reilly is going on a cruise. Watch out ladies.
• Japan spends less money on healthcare than we do by a mile and still has a better system.
• The retiring Henry Hyde is finally honest about the Clinton impeachment and what we knew all along is therein confirmed. Evidently the original version of the story was a little too spicy for ABC, but I found ya the real deal.
• Even though E3 is still a little ways off we have some hot pics of the successor to the Xbox, the Xbox 360. We'll know soon enough how final these designs are. Also in Xbox 360 news, we have the patent for the X360's graphics chip.
• And last but not least we have the first photo of the new Superman in costume.
• Bravo's going to have a series of specials on Superherodom starting in late May. Sounds interesting to me, but I think we can establish from this list that I'm a bit weird.
  

No Help To The People That Need It Most

Despite the fact that bankruptcy is extrodinarily easy for corporations to do, Bush today signed a rewrite of the bankruptcy law for normal citizens making it harder for individuals to have their debts erased.

Berzerker Rage!

Seriously, DeLay's gone so crazy we're lucky he doesn't have adamantium claws.

"Absolutely. We've got Justice Kennedy writing decisions based upon international law, not the Constitution of the United States? That's just outrageous," DeLay told Fox News Radio. "And not only that, but he said in session that he does his own research on the Internet? That is just incredibly outrageous."

Now let's just ignore all the things he's saying about international law that are just factually wrong. Kennedy using the internet is incredibly outrageous? I mean, does DeLay know something we don't about Kennedy's surfing habits? Really, I'm just baffled, he's gotten to the point where he's not even making sense.

Thanks Atrios

It's fundy time!

Echidne waxes poetic on the occasion of the election of a new pope, some fundy Catholic asshole from German.

He says nothing about the scenarios people hold about values in general. I can think of at least three: Some (including old Ratz) believe that there is one single framework of values, given to everyone by some superhuman being (not Echidne, though). Others believe that every society has its own value frameworks and that those outside that society cannot evaluate them meaningfully. This would be the relativist viewpoint. Yet another theory argues that there are certain almost universally held values but their actual manifestations differ in different societies because of historical reasons and reasons of weighing the basic values differently. This one Ratzinger ignores in his homily, perhaps, because it requires thought to understand and apply. Obviously, it is the one I follow!

None of these three lines up exactly with what I think, but I am rather inclined towards something like #3 these days.

Ratz is a fundamentalist. The problem with religious fundamentalism for me is twofold: First, I don't believe that divinities wrote the holy books in the first place. I believe that they were written by religious people of their time and place and that they largely reflect the values of those societies. So what Ratz tells me is to live my life according to the values that nomadic shepherds had two thousand years ago.

Second, fundamentalists have a lot of trouble ranking the messages in their holy books, and ranked they must be if they are to make sense in actual decision-making. Is the condemnation of usury more important than, say, the ban on wearing wool and linen at the same time? What about all the pro-poor statements in the Bible? Should they take precedence over the few statements which advocate killing the witches or subjugating the women or murdering the gays? Questions, questions...

In reality, all fundamentalists take the bits they like and magnify them while ignoring the other bits. This is value relativism, of course.

These are the two points I have with fundamentalism, too. Some of you may know I have a particular lady friend who I'm rather partial to, yet is also an evangelical Christian with some conservative leanings. We've had some very angry and upsetting conversations about religion in this vein. Usually I was angry, and she got upset; sometimes I'm not so nice.

Ben 1-6

Joseph Ratzinger of Germany has been choosen as the 265th Pope. He's 78, and though he was considered somewhat liberal in his youth has become something of a traditionalist in his old age. He has chosen Bendict XVI as his Pope name.

Plan B when your pharmacist is an asshole

From Trish Wilson, I learn that Plan B emergency contraception is not actually a new drug; it's just two high doses of ordinary birth control pills spaced 12 hours apart. She provides some info on using ordinary pills to make your own Plan B. Even if you will never need to know how to make emergency contraception for yourself, this is good information just in case, say, your college-age sister had a night of bad judgement and is freaking out the next morning. Remember that emergency contraception is most effective during the first 24 hours after unprotected intercourse, and still somewhat effective for a few days after that.

Katha Pollitt on Andrea Dworkin

The following is from Katha Pollitt's column, reflecting on Andrea Dworkin after her recent death. Reading it reminded me of some recent conversations with MosBen. Pollitt also mentions the Naomi Wolf article that, indirectly, started the hullaballoo we've had here over the past couple days.

At least Dworkin put some important hidden bits of reality out there on the table. There is a lot of coercion embedded in normal, legal, everyday sexuality: Sometimes the seducer is a rapist with a bottle of wine. A whole world of sexist assumptions lay behind my parents' attitude back in 1968: This is what happens to women who take chances, male brutality is a fact of life, talking about sexual violence is shameful, 'Bennington girls' should count their blessings. Polite, liberal, reasonable feminists could never have exploded that belief system.

Andrea Dworkin was a living visual stereotype--the feminist as fat, hairy, makeup-scorning, unkempt lesbian. Perhaps that was one reason she was such a media icon--she 'proved' that feminism was for women who couldn't get a man. Women have wrestled with that charge for decades, at considerable psychic cost. These days, feminism is all sexy uplift, a cross between a workout and a makeover. Go for it, girls--breast implants, botox, face-lifts, corsets, knitting, boxing, prostitution. Whatever floats your self-esteem! Meanwhile, the public face of organizational feminism is perched atop a power suit and frozen in a deferential smile. Perhaps some childcare? Insurance coverage for contraception? Legal abortion, tragic though it surely is? Or maybe not so much legal abortion--when I ran into Naomi Wolf the other day, she had just finished an article calling for the banning of abortion after the first trimester. Cream and sugar with that abortion ban, sir?

I never thought I would miss unfair, infuriating, over-the-top Andrea Dworkin. But I do. And even more I miss the movement that had room for her."

And For His Birthday Present You Can All Post Comments

Dan recently had a birthday, and I forgot to mention it here, so happy trip 'round the sun man. Keep 'em coming! You're a champion of blogging and small furry animals! If any of you would like this very personalized and warm message posted on or near your own birthdays, you should all join Friendster because that's the only way I'll conceivably remember.

Interesting Things You Find Links To On Video Game Websites

Found this link in a comment to a post about the next Madden football video game on Evil Avatar.

Bitch Ph.D: Do You Trust Women Revisited

I was going to put this in the comments to Dan's post, but it got long enough that I thought I'd put it on the front page. I don't mean to steal the discussion from Dan's post, I just thought this way we could encourage discussion from some of the lurkers that never comment. After slogging through a good deal of the comments after the article I just had some thoughts I wanted to put down. If you haven't read the original Dr. Bitch article, here it is.

I don't know that it's that people don't trust women in this case, it's that they don't trust *anyone* to make certain decisions relating to abortion and it's merely the fact of biology that limits the distrust to women. Were men capable of pregnancy, I think there might be some difference in thinking, but I think the people whose beliefs on the issue are grounded in religious dogmas are going to distrust men as much as women.

I also have a problem with the way Dr. Bitch characterizes the issue as moot merely because the fetus is inside the uterus. I don't exactly know when we should call a life a human, with all the attendant rights that requires, but it really bothers me that she simply disregards it as unworthy of any real consideration.

On of the posters really hit on an important, and equally ignored in the subsequent discussion, point; fetus' are quasi-human. No one thinks of them as a lump of coal in the uterus which suddenly because a legal person upon passing through the mother's genitals. As Dr. Bitch herself admits, the decision to have an abortion is a serious one which demands serious thought and reflection. On the other side, no one argues that babies deserve formal due process proceedings or some other such thing that a legal person would be entitled to. Fetus' are unique entities and I think it's consistent with this that the morality surrounding them is more complex than with simple matter or human beings. At the beginning of the pregnancy I think it's easy to characterize the "thing" in the womb as akin to a parasite and I think it's fair to characterize a birthed newborn as a person, but between those points I think it's unfair to dismiss the moral ambiguity so easily.

It's precisely this unique moral quandary that makes this not exclusively a woman's issue, as many of the posters tried to characterize it, to the point that some questioned men's right to even participate in the debate. This isn't a women's issue in the way that breast cancer is or that prostate cancer is for men. I'm not argueing, however, that men should have a say in the ifs and whens of a particular abortion, just questioning the statement that men have no place in the discussion.

I had more thoughts banging around in my head, but they're gone now so maybe I'll do another post if I feel the need. Hopefully, however, the lurkers that end up here (I know there are at least a few of you) will put down thoughts of your own and I'll just be able to post in the comments. Unlike Dr. Bitch, we're open to other opinions here and won't get all caustic if you dare to think differently.

Edit: After all that I think it's important to say that I'm sort of thinking outloud here, so don't take anything I'm saying as a settled belief, merely an argument that I want to think about and debate.

State Of The Video Games Industry

Oddworld Inhabitants is out of the biz. Lorne Lanning's got some really interesting things to say about the industry here, which dovetails pretty nicely with a post from a while ago on Penny Arcade here.

Bitch. Ph.D.: Do you trust women?

There's a long and involved discussion on abortion over at Bitch. Ph.D. I recommend it if you have some free time this afternoon -- note that that's a big if, there are 95 comments as I'm writing this.
I'll try to summarize the issue with some cut-and-paste.

The bottom line about abortion is this. Do you trust women to make their own moral judgments? If you are anti-abortion, then no. You do not. You have an absolute moral position that you don't trust anyone to question, and therefore you think that abortion should be illegal. But the second you start making exceptions for rape or incest, you are indicating that your moral position is not absolute. That moral judgment is involved. And that right there is where I start to get angry and frustrated, because unless you have an absolute position that all human life ... [is] equally valuable ... , then there is no ground whatsoever for saying that there should be laws or limitations on abortion other than that you do not trust women. ...

If you're pro-choice, you have to give up the right to have a "say" in someone else's choice. If you're pro-feminist, you have to give up the right to expect your personal feelings to be more important than women's public rights--including the right to be unpleasant, if, in her judgement, unpleasantness is called for.

Translated into more practical terms: there can be no qualifications on a pro-choice position along the lines of 'I'm pro-choice, but restrictions on third trimester abortions are okay' or 'I'm pro-choice, but parental consent laws for minor women are okay' or 'I'm pro-choice, but outlawing dilation and extraction ("partial-birth abortion") is okay'. If you make these kinds of qualifications, this argument goes, you are not, in fact, pro-choice; and in particular, you do not respect the rights of women to make their own decisions about their bodies. It's a line of thought I recently came to on my own, reflecting on Kantian pro-choice arguments; and I defend this point of view in the comments.

Geek News

April has been an expensive month for me, and here's why:

Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
On the Xbox, it's a beautiful game, the boys(girls) at UbiSoft certainly know how to push the Xbox to the max in the graphics department. While I have only played a little, single player is the same, high-quality stealth action it has always been with a little more reliance on the player to figure out exactly how they want to approach a certain situation, because there are multiple, perfectly capable ways of dealing with any situation in the game.

Multiplayer is enjoyable, the versus is an updated version from Splinter Cell: Pandora tomorrow. It's the best cat & mouse game available, and a refreshing break from Halo 2 Team Deathmatch. The co-op has to be played to be believed. Watching your teammate slink out of the shadows to grab a terrorist from behind is an experience like no other.

Now all I need is LameAim to actually respond to me when he's online, and for MosBen to actually buy the game.

Woo-hoo Jade Empire!

Oh yeah, Amanda (my significant other) picked this up for me this week at Fry's for the oh-so-cool price of $37 for the shiny limited edition. Too bad I won't have any time this week to actually play it seeing as how I must pack up my house in order to actually move next week to Portland, Oregon, home of several recently-annulled gay marriages. It's too bad, you know, when a vocal majority practicing a religion which claims to be inundated with love and compassion and tolerance and all the other kind philosophies of Jesus of Nazareth has such severe problems with that love and compassion and tolerance when it exists outside of their one-man-one-woman paradigm. Now I know why the phrase "Practice What You Preach" came into being.

Triumph of the free market!

As everyone knows, government regulation always and inevitably leads to inefficiency and waste, higher costs to the consumer for lower quality goods and servers.

Oh wait.

Before deregulation, airlines competed mostly on the freshness of their cocktail nuts because the Civil Aeronautics Board dictated their routes and ticket prices. This seemed a little strange, so economists and policy wonks proposed 'marketizing' air travel -- that is, allowing airlines to compete head-on. They thought this would give consumers lower prices, more direct flights, more airlines to choose from, and simpler ticketing and flying requirements. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

But contrary to predictions, deregulation has actually led to fewer direct flights, fewer airlines, less predictable prices, costly restrictions -- and, not incidentally, the financial ruin of nearly every major carrier. Analysts estimate that the airlines have collectively lost more than $50 billion since deregulation began. True, consumers have gotten lower prices on some flights, but only at the cost of astronomical prices on others and a rash of new restrictions and conditions.

The Right Man For The Job

Would we expect anything less from a man whose job requires only that he watch a wheel spin around and be able to read? Seriously, read some of his posts, they're ridiculous. Also, that picture of him sitting on that stool is great.

Edit: Forgot to thank Atrios for the tip off.

I'm gonna go with innovative rape protection

Brilliant. As some of you know, I'm strongly in favour of castration of convicted rapists. Actually, 'castration' is probably too mild a term, because that could be done surgically or chemically, with minimal pain for the rapist. My preference would be for the violent mutilation of the convicted rapist's genitals. Say, with a golf club or baseball bat.

Oh, and this isn't about trying to discourage rape by providing a disincentive, like death penalty advocates say. Nor, obviously, is this about rehabilitation. This, plain and simple, is the state taking revenge on a rapist in exact parallel with the violation of the victim.

Oregon Supreme Court Nullifies Gay Marriage Licenses

Damn. Though really there was nothing that could be done; an amendment to the state constitution, allowing only hetero marriages, was passed last fall. As I understand it, though, amendments like this can't be enforced, due to the 16th amendment to the federal constitution; but a *federal* judge has to make that ruling, because state judges have to operate within the bounds of the state constitution. It's very much like a state whose constition only gave full civil rights to men, or white people.
The way things are going, I expect we'll see a circuit court (federal) ruling within the next two years, and a supreme court ruling within ten.

Here's an amusing quote from the wingnut lawyer for the 'Defense of Marriage Coalition':

'Two West Coast liberal states now, both California and Oregon, have both said that local governments don't have authority to take the law into their own hands,'' said Kelly Clark, the attorney for the Defense of Marriage Coalition. ''It certainly sends a signal to the rest of the country.'

Because everyone knows governments don't have the authority to enforce the law!

Question for the pre-lawyers who hang out here: Multnohma County issued marriage licenses to gay couples before the amendment was passed, and the ban was only a law. It sounds like the county executive government determined that the ban was unconstitional and therefore unenforceable, and this ruling says only that they did not have the authority to make that determination. It really has nothing to do with the amendment at all; if, for example, there had been no law on the books at all, the court could not revoke those licenses issued prior to the amendment, right? But then if the ban was unconstitutional before the amendment, wouldn't Multnomah County have the authority to issue those licenses, and they could be reinstated?

If You Ever Doubted That Rush Was Batshit Insane

Ezra's got the best quote imaginable about Al Gore's new liberal TV station from Rush Limbaugh:

When does he start up this stupid little network? August? Yip yip yip yahoo. You know what Gore said about this? It's going to be liberal. It's going to reflect the point of view of young people.

What the hell is that, Al? What the hell is the point of view of young people? Blow jobs, that's what they're doing out there. They're out there getting oral sex all day long, that's what they're talking about.

Firstly, I'll be using the phrase "yip yip yip yahoo" as often as I can until I forget/realize it's actually stupid, but for now it's hilarious. The sad part about this quote is that it made me feel terribly old, because I'm getting nowhere near the level of action that I'm evidently supposed to be.

Culture Wars

There's a lot of Democratic handwringing going on around the net recently about how we should approach the culture wars, particularly as they relate to the traditional connection between the Dems and Hollywood. As a rabid player of video games I'm going to come at this from that perspective.

I know that I'm not going to be a very good Lefty by saying this, but as gamer that's growing up (ever so slowly) I have become concerned about the content of a lot of games. I do *not* think we should concede the many and various points on censorship of products or give any ground on how available such products should be. I do, however, think we need to recognize that games have gotten to the level of realism and interactivity that we need to restrict their availability to minors if not now, then soon. We no longer live in a world where the worst a kid could come in contact with is Double Dragon. The recently released God of War features grotesque (and awesome) acts of violence and a ménage à trois minigame. Grand Theft Auto, as many know, allows the player to have sex with a prostitute to recharge health, and then follow this with murdering the prostitute to take back the player's money. Mortal Kombat made the shredding of one's foes, for no purpose other than to see the gore, famous. I love all of these games. They're great adult escapist fun. And that is really my point; these games are made by adults for adults and the ratings they receive mark them as such.

Because of this I think the Democrats should support some kind of legislation making it a fine-able offense to sell M-rated games to children below the age of 17 (I believe that's the age the rating states). Several state legislatures have attempted to pass similar laws but all have been struck down for being too vague. Simply tying the law into the already established and well articulated ESRB ratings should get around this I think. I'm not suggesting that we take M-rated games off the shelves and put them in a back room or behind the counter like we do with porn, all I'm saying is that we should require store clerks to check IDs when selling M-rated games. This isn't a very onerous thing to expect clerks to do because it won't be needed for every customer and it will only take a few seconds when needed. Personally, as an adult gamer I think this is a reasonable compromise for us to make which would let us then take a hard line stance against censorship attempts.

If we can't agree that we need something like this now, what about the future? What happens if someone releases a rap simulator game? What about virtual reality games that give the player the sensations of whatever they're doing? At what point to we simply say that we don't want kids to be able to buy these games unless there is a parent directly involved in the purchase? Sure, this isn't going to completely solve the problem and kids will get ahold of some of this stuff the same way they get ahold of booze or porn, but that doesn't mean it's not something we should do.

I think it's perfectly fair to say, as many parents do that there are some things kids shouldn't have free and easy access to. As with many things in this life the objectionability of a particular piece rests on a spectrum and that different parts of the spectrum should have different levels of control applied even if the demarcations between levels is arbitrary. We absolutely protect the ability of adults who want the material and parents that want their kids to have to be able to get ahold of such material, but we should also recognize that in some cases, like with video game sales, it's extremely easy to give parents who want to control what their kids play a little bit of help without hurting the rights of adult consumers.

Sin City

I saw Sin City this last weekend and it's great. Drew just reviewed it, but most of the bad things he says about it are wrong, so don't be too worried about that. For some contrast, here's a positive review by by Roger Ebert. Actually, I'd love for a discussion to erupt in this thread about the movie because I think there is lot of work to be done there with gender roles but I can't quite coalesce my thoughts.

Indiana bound

I have just been offered, and accepted, admission to the University of Notre Dame's Ph.D program in philosophy.

A Good Deal On An Ancient Empire

Jade Empire comes out this week, and I've got it coming in the mail. Hopefully by either tomorrow or Wednesday I'll be smacking guys around like you wouldn't believe. It also seems like this is going to be a critical, as well as commercial, success.

Here's where I got a good deal on it with free shipping too. $45 for the Limited Edition and $39 for the regular. It actually was cheaper than that a couple of hours ago when I ordered mine, but I guess they got a lot more orders than they thought they would.

Andrea Dworkin has passed

Dr. B

Dworkin's work has been grossly misrepresented in the public imagination (what feminist hasn't?), as many folks have pointed out; even so, agree or disagree, her work was very important, and it's important to note her passing.

I haven't studied Dworkin enough to really have a strong opinion on her one way or the other, but what work of hers I've read has made me think long and hard about my own sexuality.

And just when is this parade of death going to let up a little? Chiza.

Popapalooza 2005

Here's a bit of a contrasting POV on that major world figure who died not so recently:

The Vatican's deeper power is in its personal authority over 1.3 billion worshippers, which is strongest over the poorest, most helpless devotees. With its ban on condoms the church has caused the death of millions of Catholics and others in areas dominated by Catholic missionaries, in Africa and right across the world. In countries where 50% are infected, millions of very young Aids orphans are today's immediate victims of the curia. Refusing support to all who offer condoms, spreading the lie that the Aids virus passes easily through microscopic holes in condoms - this irresponsibility is beyond all comprehension.

And Amanda goes further:

On top of that, his complete refusal to expand the church's view of women as anything more than helpmates and breeders certainly damaged the status of women in this world and may have damaged the overall well-being, as it's a well-known fact that in order to best improve a society, you improve the lot of the women in it. And, as Steve Gilliard has been pointing out, the pope and the entire Catholic church infrastructure bears responsibility for the molestation of children by priests--not because it happened so much, but because they tried to hide it and avoided dealing with it. And now, because people involved in the cover-up are getting rewarded instead of getting thrown in jail where they belong.

But it describes me perfectly!

I have to agree, personality tests are nothing more than a mildly entertaining way to waste time. Though I don't think we're so apt to accept the descriptions the tests give of us because we're vain or optimistic; rather, they're simply so generic and loaded with subjective standards that they're accurate for pretty much everyone.

You have a need for other people to like and admire you, and yet you tend to be critical of yourself. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them. You have considerable unused capacity that you have not turned to your advantage. Disciplined and self-controlled on the outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure on the inside. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. You also pride yourself as an independent thinker; and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory proof. But you have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others. At times you are extroverted, affable, and sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary, and reserved. Some of your aspirations tend to be rather unrealistic.

The shorter version: You are human, with all the idealism, self-criticism, and desire to be both authentic and socially involved that implies.

Duty to whom?

I recently engaged some Christians in discussion, arguing that the value of human life is to be found in more than serving others and, instead, that every person's worth is in our free will and the ability to set great tasks for ourselves, whether personal or social or spiritual. Unfortunately, they did not seem to understand this as anything more than selfishness, taking refuge in uninterpreted biblical quotation rather than engage the ideas I tried to present.

Via Echidne, here's a short speech Bill Moyers gave, accepting Harvard Medical's Global Environment Citizen award last December. Moyers, himself an ordained minister (Methodist, I believe, but don't quote me), challenges the anti-environmentalism of Rapture-fixated Christianity, and the silent complicity of the media in this anti-environmentalism:

The news can be the truth that sets us free—not only to feel but to fight for the future we want. And the will to fight is the antidote to despair, the cure for cynicism, and the answer to those faces looking back at me from those photographs on my desk [of his grandchildren]. What we need to match the science of human health is what the ancient Israelites called 'hocma' —the science of the heart.....the capacity to see....to feel....and then to act...as if the future depended on you. Believe me, it does. [his elipses]

Moyers is faithful to his God, but he is also faithful to himself, his family, his community, and his world. He finds value in all of it, not because he believes God has created it and it can glorify God, but because all of it is valuable in itself.

Similarly, Immanuel Kant understands what it means to glorify God and do His will not as slavishly following orders from above, but as holding all rational beings in equal respect (ourselves *and* others; what else could 'love your neighbor as yourself' mean?), and pursuing the moral duties we discover through reason (which Kant finds to be stated most eloquently in the Gospels). Soren Kierkegaard, the other Christian philosophy I brought up, argues that Christian devotion to God involves transcending morality, but this level of devotion to the transcendent involves, paradoxically, a deliberate, continuous choice in which the individual becomes completely isolated: Kierkegaard's Christian, striving to follow God's will, can still only find her worth only in herself.

Why would God give us free will, only to have us abandon that will in blind deference to Him? That's not love; that's empty, mindless devotion. I cannot accept the idea of a loving God who values me *only* because I stroke his ego with Hallelujiahs.

Thank You, Josh Marshall

One of the things I love most about blogging is when you run across someone that seems to feel exactly how you feel and has either already put it into better words than you ever could or has found a source that does it for us both.

Perhaps it is time for the Democrats simply to embrace their destiny as the party of grown-ups. No members of congress threatening judges. No gonzo federal legislation cooked up in the middle of the night to game a family struggle in Florida. Borrowing money and saving money are not the same thing. A reasonable respect for the rules under which the country has long been governed. Congressional staffers will neither steal work material from members of the opposition party nor stand on principle when caught. Bribes tendered on the floor of Congress will be frowned upon ...

I Never Thought I'd See The Day

I mean, I love politics and all the tactical manuvering that goes into it, but I had always hoped that underneath it all there were some basic rules of fair play. Turns out I'm wrong. Tom Delay (on the fast track to political oblivion and acting like it) and some of his fellow wingnuts are actually openly dismissing the separation of powers.

The organizers of the conference and Congressional staff members who spoke there called for several specific steps: impeaching judges deemed to have ignored the will of Congress or to have followed foreign laws; passing bills to remove court jurisdiction from certain social issues or the place of God in public life; changing Senate rules that allow the Democratic minority to filibuster Mr. Bush's appeals court nominees; and using Congress's authority over court budgets to punish judges whom it considers to have overstepped their authority.

Wow. Just wow. First, as even William Rehnquist says in a quote ealier in the article, "a judge's judicial acts may not serve as a basis for impeachment." It's simply not something Congress can do. The Founders made the judiciary independent specifically because they might be improperly influenced by the political branches of government. This same argument applies to budgetary issues. Article III of the Constitution specifically fixes the pay of federal judges so that their salary isn't a Sword of Damocles hanging above their head whenever they make a decision. Congress can play politics with the budgets of all kinds of areas of government, the military for instance, but separation of powers demands that the judiciary be left alone. And again, I can't stress this enough, the decision a judge makes in a case is *not* sufficient for impeachment. The Constitution states that judges "shall hold their Offices during good Behaviour" which basically means that unless the judge does something pretty seriously illegal they can't be removed. "Good Behavior" does not mean, "Decides cases in step with the ideology of the majority" and there are a million reasons why the judiciary is independent and apolitical.

Secondly, looking to modern standards throughout the world is never the only basis for a decision, but when it is used it is entirely proper to look to prevailing ideas throughout the world for help in fleshing out an argument. Again, it's not the only basis for an opinion, but when you're saying that it's cruel and unusual punishment to execute kids, it can be useful to notice that before we recently stopped we were among Somolia, and Iran as one of the extremely few countries to continue to do so.

As pertains to the filibuster, it's been a political tactic for 200 years in this country and it's only now, when the Republicans have both houses of Congress and the White House and aren't able to get literally *everything* they want that people are seriously calling for an end to it. It is important to remind ourselves that we live in a republic, not a democracy. We are not ruled by the majority, but rather we try to honor the wishes of the majority while protecting the minority. People complain about how slow things happen in Congress, but there's a perfectly good reason for it; we don't want one party or group to take over the government and then radically change the system overnight. We're a huge country and we need to make sure that when big changes are made it's something that is not only wanted by a majority but is something that also jibes with some basic concepts inherited from our history as well as is something that will hopefully last beyond one election cycle. And this isn't even to mention that Republicans had absolutely no compunction about using the filibuster and other tactics to stop appointments when they were out of power.

In an interview, Jeff Lungren, a spokesman for Representative F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., Republican of Wisconsin and chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said the panel was likely in some way to take up the issue of how the federal judges handled Ms. Schiavo's case.

But Mr. Lungren said Mr. DeLay had not requested a hearing and the committee had not decided on a course of action. "There does seem to be this misunderstanding out there that our system was created with a completely independent judiciary," he said.

It's nice of Jeff to cover for Tom DeLay on this, though it's pretty apparant from the full article that DeLay is right in step with this type of action. This quote just proves exactly what I'm talking about. Congress overstepped it's powers by getting involved in the Schiavo case and the Judiciary let them know about it. Instead of meekly crawling back to their own sphere of power, Republicans in Congress are trying to siphon off judges' ability to make decisions independent of the will of the political majority. Why they would choose this issue, which poll after poll shows something like 70% of Americans want Congress uninvolved in, is beyond me. Then again, DeLay is a dying lion and they always go down fighting a hopeless fight.

Thanks to Kos for the link.

Fruit & Vegetable Monster?

So Scott Kurtz seems pissed about Sesame Street introducing a healthy aspect to the show, specifically through our beloved Cookie Monster. To me the bottom line is that things change. Sometimes things we grew up with don't work for the modern era and you've got to make appropriate changes.

The gist is that Sesame Street looked at the alarming rates of childhood obesity and decided that having a character that mindlessly shoves his face with cookies couldn’t be helping. This isn’t to say that they’re getting rid of Cookie Monster or turning him into some whole-grain-only vegan. What they are introducing is the concepts of “anytime food” and “sometimes food.” Though I cringe to quote Bill Frist, he put it pretty well, “Even Cookie Monster is learning to control his cookie cravings. His sage advice opened our eyes to the simple joys of a tasty cookie and now reminds us that moderation is the key to healthy living."

To sum it up :

“The furry one also plans to try different kinds of cookies (read: healthier cookies) rather than his just staple, chocolate chip.

But will he still scarf his food? Yes, plus the occasional object, Truglio said.

But isn't that unhealthy? Her reply: He's still Cookie Monster.”

He's the Cookie Monster for the 21st Century Scott, what's wrong with that?


Update: Kurtz has a new strip up dealing with this "problem". As is common on the internet, Kurtz seems to think that the only issue of importance is parenting. What he fails to realize is that parents can do the best job in the world and kids will still be influenced by outside factors including their teachers, friends, and yes entertainment. Parents should absolutely be involved in teaching their kids good habbits, but that doesn't mean that educational programs shouldn't think twice about telling kids to scarf down plateful after plateful of sweets. Responsibility isn't just for parents.

And really does Kurtz honestly want us to believe there should be no difference between characters on an educational program on PBS and the corporate cartoon mascots of sugar cereals?

Roll Out

It's been talked about for years and it looks like it's finally happening. I can only hope they take us back to the 80s era and not this Pokemon inspired crap that they've been making lately.

More On The Real Party Of Death

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) thinks that it's understandable, given those crazy liberal judges and all the crazy liberal things they do, that there has been a spate of violent outbreaks in some courtrooms. Giving excuses and justifications for this kind of domestic terror is bad enough when it's from a lunatic like Michael Savage, but coming out of the mouth of a U.S. Senator on the Senate floor it is just disgusting.

Thanks Kos and Drew.

Bush Sucks, And We All Know It

If the mandate ever existed, it is most certainly over. This shouldn't be surprising given the way the Bush Administration is distancing themselves from some of the issues they had been sinking their teeth into (see Terri Schiavo and private accounts). Though we're still a little early in 2005, it's not too early for us to be thinking about mid-term elections and numbers like this are always promising.

We Only Write About David Brooks On This Blog

Really though, can you blame us when he writes such purile crap all the time? Big Dave's newest column boldly takes on the belief that it wasn't because the Republicans spent decades putting together a coordinated message machine that they are now enjoying success, it is because they have intra-party arguments all the time that has led to political domination.

The theory is that liberals must create their own version of the conservative pyramid.

Brooks admits that conservatives have created an efficient machine for creating and disseminating the party message, and that liberals are leagues behind in this regard, but dismisses the importance of this without so much as a single argument. I may not be a fancy pants conservative philosopher, but when faced with a really compelling argument about why liberals have been getting kicked around, especially in the media, I would think I'd at least get a sentence about why that's not true. But then again, Brooks has spent a lot of time thinking about philosophy, so deigning to address such sophomoric concerns might be beneath him.

Conservatives have thrived because they are split into feuding factions that squabble incessantly. As these factions have multiplied, more people have come to call themselves conservatives because they've found one faction to agree with.

This reasoning seems a bit circular to me. Conservativism has grown because it represents a wide variety of wildly differing political beliefs and people with wildly different political beliefs end up starting to call themselves conservative because the party is so diverse. Look, taking political power will always involve coalition making. The truth is that personal politics will always be a continuum and not a series of discrete political ideological sets. Parties draw in special interest groups to the fold which themselves have segregated the personal political continuum into discrete groups and this is largely accomplished through framing the Party's message.

The major conservative magazines - The Weekly Standard, National Review, Reason, The American Conservative, The National Interest, Commentary - agree on almost nothing.

The same could be said of many liberal publications from various points on the left side of the continuum. I'm sure that these conservative publications do have a lot of differing ideas about how things should be, but they also probably have a lot more in common with each other than they do with a lot of liberal publications. Rush may not agree with someone at the Cato Institute on a lot of stuff, but they're far more to agree with each other than they would with Al Franken.

This feuding has meant that the meaning of conservatism is always shifting. Once, Republicans were isolationists. Now most Republicans, according to a New York Times poll, believe the U.S. should try to change dictatorships into democracies when it can. Meanwhile, 78 percent of Democrats believe the U.S. should not try to democratize authoritarian regimes.

Well, that's a fine statistic Mr. Brooks! And what a startling revelation that, gasp, the party line changes over time! I wonder why he didn't choose to talk about how the party used to be pro-segregation, but that now they just support policies which effectively, if not officially, segregate the population. And can anybody seriously look at the reletively recent dominance of the DNC Democrats within the party and still insinuate that the party is without change and introspection. Not that I think this change has been a good one for the party, but to insinuate that the right is this big tent party that has led to dynamism while the left is completely homogenous and therefore ideologically stagnant is either purposfully blind or dishonest.

Conservatives fell into the habit of being acutely conscious of their intellectual forebears and had big debates about public philosophy. That turned out to be important: nobody joins a movement because of admiration for its entitlement reform plan. People join up because they think that movement's views about human nature and society are true.

Liberals have not had a comparable public philosophy debate. A year ago I called the head of a prominent liberal think tank to ask him who his favorite philosopher was. If I'd asked about health care, he could have given me four hours of brilliant conversation, but on this subject he stumbled and said he'd call me back. He never did.

Brooks once again makes assertions that he either doesn't support at all or simply uses crappy anecdotal evidence. A) If philosophy and knowledge of intellectual forebears is so important, where is that in the Republican platform. When I see Republicans on the Sunday shows, they're not talking about Thomas Aquinas, they're talking about their reform plan. If all this philosophizing is done behind the scenes, then, isn't this an issue of message? That is, isn't what he's saying the Republicans did that the Democrats haven't done is to craft a cohesive message platform; a single marketable ideology that they can apply to nearly any political scenario. While I think philosophy is great (and I'd happily say that my favorite philosophers are Hume, Kant, Marx, and Mill), I'm not sure there's quite the functional difference that Brooks would like us to believe. Let's say we took two groups, one from the right and the other from the left and put them in separate rooms. The Republicans, ever the scholars, talk about their favorite philosophers for a few hours and hammer out a cohesive message platform based on the writings of those philosophers. The Democrats, on the other hand, spend their time building their message based on principles of social fairness and equity but with no reference to specific intellectual forebears. When we put them on Hardball is there really going to be a difference? Are the Republicans going to support their arguments with quotes from "A Philosophical Inquiry Into The Origin Of Our Ideas Of The Sublime And Beautiful" or are going to be talking policy? In terms of gaining political successes, which we should keep in mind is the basis for this article, is the philosophy that Brooks thinks is so important really getting to the people that the right is courting or is it the cohesive policy platform?

And I'm sure you all thought it too, but what kind of garbage argument is, "I called up this one liberal that I know and he never called me back with his favorite philosopher!"?

In addition, liberal theorists are more influenced by post-modernism, multiculturalism, relativism, value pluralism and all the other influences that dissuade one from relying heavily on dead white guys.

This is my favorite part of the article. Want to know why? Brooks here *admits* that in the conservative view the only philosophers worth studying are dead, white, and male. Yeah, that's a big tent party you got there Dave-o.

If I were a liberal, which I used to be, I wouldn't want message discipline. I'd take this opportunity to have a big debate about the things Thomas Paine, Herbert Croly, Isaiah Berlin, R. H. Tawney and John Dewey were writing about. I'd argue about human nature and the American character.

Firstly, let's all agree that just because Brooks may have changed his mind about some areas of politics it doesn't mean his current ideas are any more valuable. In fact, as we can see, I think his horrible inability to see an issue *explains* why he might have changed his mind, especially to the party that values good tag lines over good arguments. Secondly, sure, I'd love to debate philosophy with my liberal friends. In fact, we do, all the time. Politics, however, must always be grounded in the policies that you are advocating. Government is about people and making their lives better with your policies, not ethereal ideas concocted by some "dead white guys". What Brooks seems to be saying is that Democrats should just give the reigns over to the Republicans for a while so we can go back to our cave and talk a bunch, but you don't win by retreating. Republicans didn't start beating Clinton around by talking a good philosophical game; they got their hands dirty making policy. I may not agree with their policies, but they were talking about concrete concepts, not the music of the spheres.

And all we have to do is look to the beginning of this article to prove Brooks wrong. Republicans have message disipline, Democrats don't. While this philosophical debate may also be beneficial, writing off something the opposition has that we don't is just plain stupid. Even if we decide we need both I don't see any arguments why we can't *do* both.

In disunity there is strength.

It's interesting that Brooks managed to avoid saying the word "diversity" here, choosing "disunity" instead. Firstly, it means he doesn't have to implicate evolution, which is good because, you know, having disunity on an issue is good, but not THAT much disunity. I just know that if he didn't actually type it out, diversity was the word that popped in his head first, which just goes to prove my point; by changing what has to be the most obvious word in order to better conform to the party line Brooks is feeding the unity of the party message. This type message workis exactly what Republicans have gotten so good at and why they are so good at politics.

And next time a part of the party that is cutting funding for kids to get through college tries to tell me I need to get more philosophical I think I might throw up.

The Real Death Party

The Pope is very near death it seems, but Fox would have *loved* it if his death could have coincided with when they started reading their eulogy and casting him as a great conservative leader. When you think about it this was a really fortuitous event for Democrats because we got to see the Republican machine jump the gun and give away their biggest memes for the post-Pope coverage including this crap about the "culture of life" crap. Hopefully the Dems are organizing right now to counter exactly that message rather than trying to be above the politics like they usually do and which usually gets them spanked on the TV shows and in the polls.

As a member of the "Culture of Death" however, I should say that the Pope represents 15 points on my Death Pool. Mmmmmm, savory death....

Thanks to Pandagon for that linkeroo.

Update: The Pope has now *actually* passed away.

Phunny Stuph

I've been pretty inconsistent with posting the Photoshop Phriday's lately, but this one warrants a post. It's not laugh out loud funny, most of the time, but I got a lot of enjoyment out of 'em.

Abortion prevention and Democrats

I found this post, about tolerance for abortion among Catholics, quite heartening. Until this, at least

The Prevention First Initiative coupled with a position on prohibiting late term abortions except when required by the health of the mother neutralizes GOP attack lines .... [my emphasis]

Bullshit. Better sex ed and easier access to contraception for teenagers? Great. Working harder to prevent rape? Fantastic. Acting as though anyone knows better than a pregnant woman whether to continue her pregnancy or not? Completely unacceptable.

The Democratic party needs to stay the hell away from any restrictions on abortion rights if they don't want to marginalize feminists.

Halo New

This is mostly a test post to prove to Dan that Blogger actually works, but as long as I'm typing I might as well tell y'all that Bungie is releasing a Halo 2 map pack for $20 in stores and $16 if you download it through Live. The bonus to buying the actual retail disc is that you get a physical copy of the maps as well as getting some bonus movies and stuff to make it a little more interesting.

Petition!

Go sign

We have very disturbing news to report - some Democratic leaders are actively recruiting anti-abortion candidates and forcing out pro-choice Democrats!

Feminists and progressives must speak out to stop the Democratic Party from becoming "Republican-lite" on women's issues and undermining its own women candidates.

Barbara Hafer is a strong advocate for reproductive rights and was the frontrunner to take on extremist Republican incumbent Rick Santorum in the 2006 Pennsylvania Senate. She has just been forced out of the race by Democratic leaders and consultants in favor of an anti-abortion candidate they recruited.

Who did top Democrats pick to run against Santorum, one of the leading anti-abortion, anti-women's rights and anti-gay senators?

Top Democrats recruited Robert P. Casey Jr., a staunch abortion opponent in the mold of his father, the late Pennsylvania Governor Bob Casey Sr. You may recognize his name from the 1992 Supreme Court case of Casey v. Planned Parenthood, in which the senior Casey defended Pennsylvania's Abortion Control Act, which was so extreme that the Supreme Court struck it down.

Unless, of course, you don't care *glares*

Terri Schiavo Commentary

Long time, no post, I'm back.

Seeing as how we are now entering the tenth day without the feeding tube, it's probably safe to say that Terri Schiavo will probably pass in the next day or so, and according to MSNBC the parent's have finally resigned themselves to the situation.

I, like most of America it seems, have been following this case. At least it's made us all more aware of the importance of having a living will. What bothers me most is the sensationalism that the right has used to portray this as a "Democrats support Death" rally. Of course, none of us really thought they wouldn't at least try, but when Rush Limbaugh keeps asking his listeners why the liberals want to kill Terri Schiavo, it just makes me shake me head at the idiocy.

Some pearls from the MSNBC article above, apparently the Schindlers claim that Terri tried to speak to them yesterday, to vocalize that she knew she was dying and that she didn't want to die. Call me crazy, but that sounds a little over the top when she hasn't uttered a single coherent word since her brain died 15 years ago.

Awwww!

Cute little snake!

Depression

An interesting essay, via BitchPhD, on depression -- the post-partum sort in particular, but there are still some good points on depression and mental illness in general.

All of our feelings are biological. To attempt to invalidate some of them as 'less real' or somehow less important because they're hormonal or biochemical or whatever--that would invalidate all of them. The deepest, most profound feeling you have is biological. Hormonal. Biochemical. To say, 'When my boyfriend gives me flowers that makes me feel happy, that's good. But when I don't have the money to pay the utilities and they get shut off again and I feel sad and hopeless and like my life will never change, that's bad, and not only that, but it's actually a biochemical imbalance in my brain that needs to be corrected by drugs,' just doesn't make any sense.

Individual people have to find ways to cope with their individual situations, and often a medication is the best answer. But it is **not** the **societally** best answer **when there are clear social and economic reasons for this mental illness.** Yes, absolutely, if you're a woman and you're depressed and you can't cope, meds can be very helpful. But when that's society's only answer, I have a big problem with it. We don't need drugs as a long-term solution. We need social change.

What do you do

to help a friend get over a bout of depression, when you agree all the things she's depressed over are horrifying tragedies, worth being depressed over?

Brooks is a tool, part seven billion and five

In direct contrast to the political opportunism they have demonstrated on this exact issue in the past, David Brooks claims social conservatives think

The value of a life doesn't depend upon what a person can physically do, experience or achieve. The life of a comatose person or a fetus has the same dignity and worth as the life of a fully functioning adult.

Social conservatives go on to say that if we make distinctions about the value of different lives, if we downgrade those who are physically alive but mentally incapacitated, if we say that some people can be more easily moved toward death than others, then the strong will prey upon the helpless, and the dignity of all our lives will be diminished.

Meanwhile,

The core belief that social liberals bring to cases like Ms. Schiavo's is that the quality of life is a fundamental human value. They don't emphasize the bright line between life and death; they describe a continuum between a fully lived life and a life that, by the sort of incapacity Terri Schiavo has suffered, is mere existence....

The central weakness of the liberal case is that it is morally thin. Once you say that it is up to individuals or families to draw their own lines separating life from existence, and reasonable people will differ, then you are taking a fundamental issue out of the realm of morality and into the realm of relativism and mere taste.

You see, if we think it's right that individuals should decide for themselves whether to remain on life support, we simply no longer understand the meaning of the words 'right' and 'wrong'. Because, I guess, David Brooks has decided such things are clearly wrong.

Of course, all of this crap only indirectly applies to the Schiavo case because the bill passed by social conservatives in Congress simply said that the Federal court system should decide whether Ms. Schiavo had expressed a desire to be taken off life support in situations such as this. It didn't try to outlaw removing life support from patients in this particular or more general cases; it simply claimed a new area of Federal jurisdiction, and hence debate over the bill should have boiled down to precisely the procedural issues Bobo mocks non-social conservatives for bringing up. The fact that social conservatives didn't debate this on procedural grounds shows how much this bill was intended to stir up the anti-abortion vote (and if you don't see the connection you haven't been reading enough Pandagon lately).

I Got The Whole Word/ On My Computer

I'm not sure if I already blogged about this when it first came out but I don't even care because it's the coolest thing ever. Nasa has developed a program that puts together satilite images from several different satilites orbiting the globe into a cohesive map of the globe. You can start completely zoomed out and then take yourself further in to anywhere you want. So far I've looked at downtown Tokyo and Mt. Fuji, Disney Land and World, downtown Philly, and found my house in New Jersey and my parent's house (I could even see the pool and some trees) in Washington. Yeah, it's a little creepy, but really damn cool.

What makes it less creepy is that given the size of the globe the pictures are mostly not new. The ones of Philly are at least several years old because certain things (like stadiums) are missing.

Nice To Know

Ezra's pointing us to this article in the Washington Post which shows that Osama Bin Laden was in fact in Tora Bora for a while. Remember when General Tommy Franks made that big deal about how Kerry didn't know what he was talking about and that we didn't really know where Osama was? We Kerry was right and either Tommy Franks was lying/told to lie, or our generals are horribly out of the loop.

Oscar Romero

Not that long ago, there were prominent religious figures who were known for other than trying to deny women reproductive autonomy:

While it is clear that our Church has been the victim of persecution during the last three years, it is even more important to observe the reason for the persecution . . . The persecution comes about because of the Church's defense of the poor, for assuming the destiny of the poor.

Abortion: Net Zero Effect?

Jesse makes an argument I gave a while ago (go find the link yourself, I'm on break and lazy)

If pregnancy is truly this life-altering process, why do anti-choice advocates simply treat it as if it's a factory line? (Because they don't give a damn about the woman or the fact that children exist after the umbilical cord is cut, but bear with me.) If children are little more than plugins to industrial womb variables - this woman shall bear us nine, with optimal utilization - and the argument against abortion is that it doesn't provide enough foot soldiers, a simple X and Y argument, it cheapens the lives of everyone, it cheapens the decision to abort a fetus. It's a slap in the face to anyone who believes that an individual can accomplish or achieve, to anyone who truly thinks that each life has value. If you're a mass, a lump in a clump of lumps waiting to be shaped by forces beyond anyone's control - what's the difference between abortion and pregnancy? It's a tick in an attendance book, and if you don't show up, you just get someone else to make another tick somewhere else.

By reducing a pregnant woman to an incubator, a broad range of anti-choice arguments undermine the significance of pregnancy, childbirth, and parenthood.

Oscar Romero

Not that long ago, there were prominent religious figures who were known for other than trying to deny women reproductive autonomy:

While it is clear that our Church has been the victim of persecution during the last three years, it is even more important to observe the reason for the persecution . . . The persecution comes about because of the Church's defense of the poor, for assuming the destiny of the poor.

Xbox In Short Supply, But Not For Next Gen

VE's got word that given the rush on Xboxes lately stores are starting to run out. Supposedly MS is on top of this enviable problem and will rectify it soon.

In similar news a source at a major publisher is saying that the next iteration of the Xbox will launch with a million units in Europe. At first this may not sound enormous, but I believe at last count there were something in the neighborhood of 15 million Xboxes sold thus far so if they sold 2 million units worldwide in the first month or so after launch they'd be in a pretty good position to do a lot better than this generation; and be in a really good position for Sony's launch of the PS3.

Office (Air) Space

I know a few people interested in all thing Bri-ish, so here's a review of the American remake of the BBC's cult favorite, The Office. Seems like they think it's about par for the course for American remakes of BBC hits, funnier than most shows conceived here but not as good as the original.

Culture of Death, Culture of Life

Echidne and Amanda are pissed.

Unlearning From The Past

Thomas Freedman seems to think there's something wrong with the fact that 26 prisoners of war taken by US troops since 2002 in Iraq and Afghanistan have been killed while in custody in what appears to have been acts of torture. Crazy liberals!

PS3 Revealed? Or Someone Photoshopped Their Digital Camera?

Given that this isn't official, take the following picture of the PS3 with a grain of salt. Every generation fans Photoshop what they would like the next machine to look like, but then again, every generation an image or two of the machine gets leaked. So here they are.

What? No Celts?!

I could *NEVER* do anything productive in the Age of Empires games. I'd try a million different strategies, but my guys just got slaughtered every time. Be that as it may, I have always loved the series, and check the fuck out of these hot pics for Age of Empires 3.

We are the champions of the world!

It turns we're the first hit when you do a Google search for Staff of Ra.

New Social Security Trustees Report

Ezra does all the hard work, so go read his stuff. The short story is that the report lowered the trouble time for Social Security by a year which gives the bad guys something to crow about, but it's not much. So really, not that big a deal since it's really Medicare that we should be worried about.

Supremes?

The 11th Circuit agrees, Terri Schiavo's parents have no case. The Supreme Court is the last option, and I'm really curious if they'll even want to touch this one. On the other hand, I'd really like to see what they have to say about the constitutionality of Congress' actions in this case.

You can find the actual opinon through Kos above, or here too.

THWIPP! Round 3

Thomas Hayden Church, of Wings and more recently Sideways fame, has been announced as the new villain for Spiderman 3, though his character is still shrouded in secrecy. The movie is set to release in May of 2007 (closer than you might think at first).

Now that all the press release stuff is out of the way it's time to get my geek on. Who's he going to play you ask? Here are some options, ranked by likelihood:

10. Hydroman. Ok, do we really need to talk about this one much? He's kinda like Sandman, but less cool and made of water. Add in that he'd be a fortune in special effects, even for a movie like Spiderman 3, all for a pay off of one shitty ass character.

9. Manwolf. This one is a little more than what you might think. He's John Jameson, the son of J. Jonah Jameson, Peter's Spiderman-hating boss at the Daily Planet. Basically he picks up a magic rock on a moon landing and gets turned into werewolf. Sure, sounds pretty lame, and in fact that's the death knell for this one. In actuallity they introduced the character in Spidey 2, there's some connection to Mary Jane, and the interplay between J. Jonah, Peter, and John could be interesting. Still, Spidey v. Wolfman isn't exactly going to play well with a non-comicbook audience and as a character he's not that easy to control, which I'll explain later.

8. Hammerhead/Tombstone. These guys are exactly the bonehead thugs you think they are. The problems are many and varied with these guys. First, Thomas Hayden Church doesn't have the body for thugs like these guys. Second, they're just not interesting characters. I mean, Hammerhead bashes things with his head, and they both typically work for the mob. Not what we're looking for exactly, move along people!

7. Jackel. He's actually a really cool character. Sort of a super scientist with a penchant for manipulation and long term plans. But therein is the problem; he's a little too big of a character for the third movie in a trilogy. There's no way they could really do any kind of justice to the character and the character isn't really the type we're looking for here. Plus, he looks too much like The Green Goblin.

6. The Lizard. The first and biggest problem; they already have a Dr. Conners (who turns into the Lizard) in the last movie. Granted, it wasn't a big part, and they could probably just recast the part and nobody would notice/care, but it's an obstacle. Plus, Lizard is a ton of special effects and almost no acting for Church. This wouldn't be the first minor cameo by a star, but there's just not much for Church to do, he doesn't seem like a scientist to me, and Lizard, again, isn't what we need for the third movie.

5. Kraven the Hunter. Church could probably pull this guy off, but he's not without problems. I think Kraven's a bit too aristocratic for what I'm imagining is going on and isn't likely to "work well with others". And actually, unlike so many of the others on this list, Kraven doesn't really lend himself to *enough* special effects. He doesn't fly, he doesn't shoot lazers. All he's got is slightly higher than normal human abilities and a knife.

4. Venom. The old alien symbiote meets rival news man. There have been a few hints dropped in the last two films about a possible Eddie Brock/Venom apparance, and the fanboys crap their pants every time the topic comes up. He'd also be perfect for both the movie and Church. I think they could pretty easily simplify his background enough to fit him into feature film. Unfortunately, I don't think they've set enough up for a Venom appearance in this one. A few more hints dropped and it might have happened, but I think you'd need major introductions in the other two films that just isn't there.

3. Mysterio. Also a good one for Church, though he might not play as well with audiences. Mysterio's a special effects/hallucinogenics expert that succeeds through confusion and obfuscation. He works well and plays well with others, which is what I need for what I'm thinking. The special effects stuff could make for some good scenes. The only real problem is that he's not too cool, as compared to, say, something like Venom. In fact, some people might say he's a little, um, gay, but I think with a really good costume redesign it could be possible.

2. Sandman. We started with Hydroman and threw him out because he's both a rip off of Sandman and because he's lame. Well, Sandman's not. He's a thug type of character so he can work with other characters, but interesting instead of just plain stupid. Plus, it'd be fucking cool special effects wise.

1. Electro/Shocker. Why're they number 1? More importantly, why are they sharing the top spot? Well, they're sharing because they might as well be the same character, powers wise which is important for a special effects movie. These guys can take just enough of the plot to make them interesting without making the audience feel like there's something the movie's not telling them/pissing off the fans. They're both powerful enough to give Spidey a run for his money on their own and can work in teams to really make life hell for our neighborhood wall crawler. Both wear costumes, so it's something Church can do without getting lost in constant special effects, and both of them are of roughly normal build. Also, in teams these guys are dumb enough that they can be bullied by a strong, intelligent leader. Also, my bet is on Electro because Shocker sounds lamer from a marketing perspective.

The reason I've been harping on this "working with other characters" bit is that I think it's pretty obvious at the end of Spidey 2 that Harry Osborne is going to take up the mantle his father left behind. Sure, Sam Raimi has said in interviews that he doesn't feel tied to making Harry become his father, but from a story arc perspective of the trilogy, it just makes more sense for Harry to see his father's failure as the Green Goblin and take up the glider with a much better plan; use a recently arrived somewhat minor villain to either team up with or manipulate into fighting Spiderman. Either in a one-two attack or a full on simultaneous assault the two of them will try to pound on Spiderman until one of them can kill him. Who knows, maybe Harry will realize his mistake just in time and go good at the end. It'd certainly be true to the comic character.

Who knows, maybe I'm totally off base, but I think given the options this seems most likely.

Judicial Activism

After the Republicans moved the Terri Schiavo case to federal court, where had no place to begin with, the federal judge denied Schiavo's parents' request to reinsert the feeding tube. As Drew points out in his updates, the judge didn't even address the Constitutionality of the issue because on its face the parents' case was without foundation.

Here's the case made simple. Ideally, if a person has a living will and it says that they don't want to be kept alive like this you just consult the will and pull the damn plug. Schaivo didn't have a living will. In that case the spouse can say that it was the express wish of the patient to die. Now, as we see here other parties, like parents, can try to intervene and show that it was not the wish of the patient to die by showing evidence to the contrary. In this case *several* courts have found that Terri Schaivo's parent's have no proof. I can understand why they wouldn't want their daughter to die, but they simply have no case for showing that this isn't what she wanted.

Brooks Gone Wild

Everyone's posting about David Brook's new piece, so I might as well too. It's not quite as broadly condemning of Republicans as some of the sites made me believe, but it *is* rather impressive that he made it an entire column without some attempt at faux balance by bringing up some slight the Dems have done.

Bush Goes Into Matrix To Save Terri Shiavo

Bush has, for the very first time ever in his presidency, come back early from a vacation in Crawford, to address the Terri Shiavo case. I'd hate to think that this was a baldly political reach around to the fundies, but then I remember all the rest of the shit that has happened in the last four years that didn't warrant coming back to work early. And yet, people think Bush is all about values. The only answer is that he can remake the Matrix as he sees fit and will some day soon lead us to the real world.

In the mean time, life in the Congo still sucks more than anything should suck and we're spending national attention and over $80,000 a year to keep a woman alive that stopped living life when "Particle Man" by They Might Be Giants was brand new and Apartheid was still in effect. Here are some other things that happened in 1990 other than Terri Shiavo dying.

Thanks to Ezra for the tip.

Edit: Drew from Terminus found some hot pics of Terri's brain. I don't think any of us need an MD to seek how fucked up that is.

Re-Edit: Look at the pics linked above, then read this quote from Tom DeLay: ""She talks and she laughs and she expresses likes and discomforts," he said Sunday evening. "It won't take a miracle to help Terri Schiavo. It will only take the medical care and therapy that patients require." Tom DeLay is a fucking liar, yet it doesn't seem like anyone has seriously called him on it, at least, not yet.

Omega Edit: Ok, here's a conservative voice for our debate, though it focus' on Terri's husband. Of course, James Taranto is completely wrong and is either being purposefully deceptive or is so simply foolish that it'd be amusing if the issue weren't so infuriating. Several courts have found that Terri Schiavo expressed a wish to die if she were in this type of situation. To me, that's all I need to know.

X-Man United

Matt Vaughn, who produced "Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Gun Barells" and "Snatch", has been locked in to direct the third X-Men movie. Also, Hugh Jackman, getting his Hollywood money people are still hiring him, is the first principle cast member to sign on with the rest of the cast in negotiations. For those that don't remember, Halle Barry, cresting on her career, announced after the last movie that she would not return as Storm for the third movie. Given the state of her career lately though I wouldn't be too surprised if they hooked her in for another go.

Womens: They is so confusing!

To the surprise of no-one who paid attention in high school genetics, scientists have determined that the miniscule Y chromosome found only in males is much less active than the X chromosome -- which occurs twice in females and once in males. What is the inane, Feminine Mystique-esque, conclusion Maureen Dowd comes to?

As the Times science reporter Nicholas Wade, who is writing a book about human evolution and genetics, explained it to me: "Women are mosaics, one could even say chimeras, in the sense that they are made up of two different kinds of cell. Whereas men are pure and uncomplicated, being made of just a single kind of cell throughout."

This means men's generalizations about women are correct, too. Women are inscrutable, changeable, crafty, idiosyncratic, a different species.

Does Maureen Dowd have no experience interacting with actual women and men, people who exist outside of romantic comedies and sitcoms? Christ.

Badger, badger, badger, badger

Mushroom, mushroom!

Think of a headline

A discussion of abortion over at the panda which has left. Amanda's point is extremely well-taken:

I've said it before, but it bears repeating--that the pro-lifers define "conception" as what makes a baby is a rhetorical device to reinstate the belief that a baby is made by a man and merely borne by a woman. There are many steps in the process of turning raw material into a baby, but only one is bandied around by pro-lifers as the point that something turns from raw material into a baby, and amazingly enough that step is the only one that involves a man. Anything pre-conception (or, with the morning after pill, pre-implantation) that prevents bearing a child isn't baby-killing, but anything after a man has planted his seed, if you will, is the moral equivalent of murder. Ejaculation has become the end-all and be-all to pro-lifers of what makes something a baby.

Prior to Roe v. Wade and the formation of the radical anti-choice movement, most women and midwives regarded quickening -- the time when the woman starts to feel the foetus moving inside her -- as the start of new life and when this thing forming inside her really becomes a baby. But religious figures, doctors, and other assholes who had a problem with women having a say in their reproduction pushed the view common among anti-choicers today that life begins at the instant sperm and egg combine.

Sortastic Pics

Here are some pics from Will Wright's Spore.

Edit: If you read the article on Spore you might have been wondering what this "Demo Scene" he talked about is. It's a group of programmers that make computer demos with music and stuff happening but with a very strict size requirement, usually 64k which is about the size of a biggish Word document. The way they do this is with all kinds of math stuff I don't understand, but it's pretty cool. Here's a site that has some demos you can check out.

An Emergent Spore

Will Wright has, as ever, come up with another of his wacky ass ideas and it looks....fucking.....cool.

Tuesday afternoon blogging digest extravaganza!

Pandagon
Bitch. Ph.D
and Pandagon again.

He Was Just Helping The Sheep Over The Fence

Billy "Wicked" Wilson, creater of Voodoo Extreme and Gaming Groove game news web sites, has passed at 33.

Voodoo Extreme was the web site that made the internet useful to me. It was the first site that made me log on every day because there was actually new stuff happening every day. Magazines suddenly seemed horribly late with everything they reported and VE was able to open up the video game world in a way that no place I had ever seen before.

Man, it's weird how someone that you don't even really know dying can still unsettle you.

R.I.P. Billy, hope wherever you are you don't have to ice up the tp.

Freedom Force: The Review!

So I just finished Freedom Force vs. the Third Reich (FF2), the sequel to Freedom Force (FF), released in 2002 (possibly 2001, but I picked it up the Summer of 2002). I enjoyed Freedom Force immensely, and I've gone back and played through the single-player game several times. Both games have a similar format: In each mission, you control a squad of up to four superheroes from a third-person overhead view. As the story progresses, characters earn experience and 'character points', which allow them to purchase more spectacular powers. The game includes a 'hero builder', which allows you to create your own heroes, who can then be 'recruited' into the single-player game; with some 3D modelling experience and practice with the hero builder, a user can create just about any hero they might come up with.

The differences between the two games is largely cosmetic: FF2 uses a new graphics engine which allows for more spectacular special effects than in FF, though these aren't anything that will blow your mind. Controls are almost identical, so if you've played FF recently you'll just notice a few small streamlining touches here and there. FF2 includes several new characters, my favourite being Tombstone (whose Possession power makes the game ridiculously easy sometimes), and all of the characters from the old game show up at one point or another.

The weaknesses of FF2 are largely the same as the weaknesses of FF, and the primary one is the fact that I got this game on Friday night and finished it Sunday night -- with Saturday and Sunday largely taken up by homework. All together, I'd say less than 20 hours to play the entire single-player game, even shorter than I remember FF being. The writing can also get more than a little cheesy at times, and there are some out-and-out plot holes.

If you, like me, are addicted to superhero games, then I recommend FF2, though not everyone will want to spend $40 on a game they can finish this quickly.

Propagantastic!

By now, I assume you've heard about the pundits paid to shill Bush administration policies. You might also remember hearing about a pro-Medicare Drug Bill 'video release' which ran on local news stations across the country but was produced by the administration. As it turns out, like it so often has lately, things are much, much more appalling: the administration has spent hundreds of billions of dollars over the past four years (twice as much so far as was spent under the Clinton administration) to produce hundreds of similar segments, most of which have been shown on local news stations throughout the country, and often modified so that the token indications that these are government productions are removed or replaced.

Eastern and Western Washington

Some state senators in that state we all know and love have floated a proposal to split Washington in two along the Cascades. We get these sorts of proposals every ten or fifteen years in California, too: people from rural parts of Northern California (everything north of Bakersfield/San Luis Obispo, including San Francisco, Sacramento, and Lake Tahoe) object to all the water that gets sent down to LA and propose cutting them off. Nothing ever happens, of course, because something like 40% of the state lives in the Santa Barbara-LA-San Diego corridor, and another 40% in the Bay Area (who, on the whole, don't care what happens to the lakes up in the mountains other than Tahoe).

Gender politics in the US of A

Have I mentioned how much I'm enjoying the guest bloggers over at the panda which has left?

The problem with comments like this [that the greatest gift a husband can give his wife is the freedom to choose whether or not to work] is that men in this country are already oppressed by the American Dream, the male version, at least. As far as I know, there's no female-centered version of the American Dream. In the American Dream, our hero Ward Cleaver is a Real Man because he has a job that pays for him to have a big house, a family and a most importantly, a wife who is financially dependent on him and under his direct control. This is how masculinity is defined for so many, many men in our country. The problem is that fulfilling that dream of having a woman sequestered away at home tending to you and your children is that it's out of the financial reach of the majority of men.

Of course, what this means is that we have a population of men in this country that both believe that in order to be Real Men they have to have a wife that is both at home and subservient, but out of financial necessity, they have wives who work. And it's hard to get subservience out of someone when you can't tell them, 'Well, who makes the money around here?' There's a lot of resentment there.

In step the Republicans, who can't give these guys what they really want--jobs that pay enough to have a family with one income--but they can give them an endless list of people to scapegoat: welfare moms, illegal immigrants, disobedient women getting abortions, gays who want marriage when you can't even have the Leave It to Beaver one you wanted for yourself, and so on and so forth. Plus, the President is all too willing to be a walking phallic symbol for all sorts of masculine fantasies of power to be projected on. Maybe you can't be Ward Cleaver, conservative men of America, but at least you can pretend you're Dirty Harry.

I wonder if Jesse consciously turned his blog over to a handful of women during women's history month?

Some good advice

from some wingnut writing for Focus on the Family's magazine for teenage girls. The topic, as the topic of most such magazines, is boys, and the three 'essential' differences between boys and girls.
1. Guys are visual -- because girls just don't ogle.
2. Guys are physical -- which is a euphemism for fucking-oriented; and again, unlike girls, who are much less fucking-oriented.
3. Guys are the sexual aggressor in the male/female relationship.

That’s not really a news flash for you, is it? The fact is, guys are not only visually stimulated and physical, but they really are the sexual aggressor in any relationship. And you know why? God made them that way. That’s right. God wired guys to be sexually aggressive, just as He made you to be the caring, nurturing one in the relationship.

You know what pisses me off about abstinence-only sex ed? It's not really the fact that it doesn't work; that just makes it bad policy. What bugs me so much is how much patriarchal crap like this the wingnut abstinence cheerleaders just throw into the stuff they write. Come on, people: couldn't you just admit that most everyone (not just men) wants to fool around with the person they're dating and ogle attractive people, and most everyone (not just women) wants a deep emotional connection and worries about getting 'too involved too fast' (whatever that might mean in each particular case)? Then your textbooks wouldn't be offensive and wrong, just ineffective.

Bonus: Even more patriarchal crap from the same magazine. This piece reveals the 'eight secrets' about guys:

2. Keep a Little Mystery ...
Guys by nature are "conquerors" (just look at their interest in football, video games, rock climbing, etc.). What can guys conquer or pursue if girls reveal everything about themselves? I'm referring to how you relate to guys, but it can also apply to how you dress....
It is possible to be too open and too buddy-buddy with guys. There seems to be a fine line between treating them as brothers in the Lord and crossing over into too familiar territory. When a guy knows everything about you, it leaves nothing for him to conquer....
In our discussion, the girls drilled me about how to actually maintain some mystery. I responded by giving them questions to ask themselves.
• Who initiates most of the conversations I have with a guy?
• Who (other than adults) initiates our activities, the girls or the guys?
• Who's making the phone calls?
• Does he ask questions, or do I volunteer information?
Remember, if you're too available, you've removed the challenge.

Remember, if you're not letting the boys decide what you're going to do, they'll dump your feminist butts.

3. Don't Mock
Guys of any age don't like being playfully mocked by a group of girls, even if the mocking comes in the form of a compliment: "nice eyes/hair/muscles/etc."...
5. Free or Flee
Guys don't like feeling manipulated, controlled or emotionally cornered by girls. Being conquerors, they naturally withdraw from those situations. My sons know they're not yet ready for relationship commitments, and the more they feel pressured by girls to make them, the more they pull away....
6. Guys vs. Girls
Guys don't like competitive "guy vs. girl" contests. It puts them in a lose-lose situation. On one hand, when guys win a contest, they're put in a male chauvinist category. If they lose, it's humiliating and creates an invisible barrier between them and the girls.
Competition locks girls into a no-win situation as well. If the girls win the contest, it forfeits the openness the guys may have felt with them. If they lose, girls usually feel some degree of humiliation, resentment or bitterness.

Got to stroke those oh-so-fragile male egos. Remember: you're here to make the boys feel good about themselves, and if you show them up they'll dump your feminist butt. Boys only like girls who stroke!

7. Guys Are "Allergic" To Silliness
Guys enjoy seeing girls have fun, but they don't like being around girls' silliness.... Rest assured, guys definitely have their own form of silliness. Do they ever! But it needs to stay among the males. Keep your silliness among yourselves as well. Guys admire girls who conduct themselves with poise in public.
8. Guys Do Notice Homemaking Skills
Believe it or not, in these days of liberation, guys still notice a girl's homemaking skills. In fact, the older my sons and their friends become, the more alert they are to the presence or lack of those skills in their female friends. Can she cook? Administrate? Is she kind to children? How does she handle her money? Does she care about learning?

So, to put it all together: if you and your boyfriend are hanging out with your friends (who, naturally, are all girls) and their boyfriends (who, naturally, are his friends), let them decide what movie to watch or game to play. Then, while they're having their fun, you girls can go in the kitchen and bake them some pies!

Christ.