dang

Good-bye to Andrew Wyeth, John Mortimer (creator of Rumpole of the Bailey), Ricardo Montalban, and Patrick McGoohan (#6).

QOTD

"Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men's blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans..." D. Burnham

(gacked from @nowthis, on Twitter)

Montreal is the site of the 2009 Worldcon

Hm.

a: I've never been to a Worldcon.
b: I'm really more of a fan emeritus than a fan these days.
c: Have always wanted to see Montreal.
d: Economy is bad - will I have a job in August 2009?

Hmmmm.

Maybe I Should Retire the Skeleton Motif on this Blog

Now that the Bush Administration is Over.

8 years of being angry at and about my country - which for the record, if you do not find that to be an expression of deep love, affection and true patriotism, kindly fuck off - is a long time.

Now, Obama lifted the global gag rule already....c'mon, lift Don't Ask, Don't Tell. You can do it, man. Let people serve with dignity instead of fear.

Prehistoric monument under Lake Michigan?

Stonehenge Beneath the Waters of Lake Michigan

Cool.

Really, you need to read this

The WaPo article I linked in the previous post. here.

In May 2008, Crawford ordered the war-crimes charges against Qahtani dropped but did not state publicly that the harsh interrogations were the reason. "[The torture] did shock me," Crawford said. "I was upset by it. I was embarrassed by it. If we tolerate this and allow it, then how can we object when our servicemen and women, or others in foreign service, are captured and subjected to the same techniques? How can we complain? Where is our moral authority to complain? Well, we may have lost it."

The harsh techniques used against Qahtani, she said, were approved by then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. "A lot of this happened on his watch," she said. Last month, a Senate Armed Services Committee report concluded that "Rumsfeld's authorization of aggressive interrogation techniques for use at Guantanamo Bay was a direct cause of detainee abuse there." The committee found the interrogation techniques harsh and abusive but stopped short of calling them torture.

[...]

"A prosecutor has an ethical obligation to review all the evidence before making a charging decision. And they didn't have access to all the evidence, including medical records, interrogation logs, and they were making charging decisions without looking at everything."

Ouch.

Oh, look! Lies! Misrepresentations! Government! And , Torture.

Pentagon Pushes Debunked "Returning To Terror" Hype. Gee.

Meanwhile, WaPo reports Detainee Tortured, Says U.S. Official: Trial Overseer Cites 'Abusive' Methods Against 9/11 Suspect

"We tortured [Mohammed al-]Qahtani," said Susan J. Crawford, in her first interview since being named convening authority of military commissions by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates in February 2007. "His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case" for prosecution.

Crawford's an alum of my law school, btw. She gave a very insightful talk as the main speaker for the last Law Day banquet I was at, last year or so.

Alaska Statehood - 50th Year

The Alaska Statehood Act was passed in July, 1958, and Alaska officially became a state in January, 1959. *waves flag* Yaaaaaay.

Interesting factoid: The National Municipal League called the Alaska Constitution one of the best ever written. (according to this brief history)

When I was little, I predicted Alaska would secede. (I was very little.) Hey, it could happen, but now that I'm a lawyer (and, allegedly, a grown-up), I understand better how such bonds can be difficult to dissolve.

Still, sometimes I wonder what it really gets out of being part of the U.S. Except for, you know, keeping me from having grown up in the Soviet Union. (But...I wonder if the Soviet Union would have extended across the Bering Strait in the first place. Hmmmmm. I smell a story idea in there somewhere.)

Hatewatch's 2nd Annual Smackdown Awards

The Last Word: Hatewatch’s 2nd Annual Smackdown Awards

Ringing in the New Year with "The Thin Man" movies

They're not really screwball comedy. They're more...screwball comedic mysteries. Anyways, everyone in the family knows I love screwball comedy and strive someday to write like Connie Willis (Willis fans should understand the connection), so, the Thin Man Collection (all 5 or 6 films) was a very logical gift.

Happy New Year to them as observes it

Let this new year be a better one than the last.

Ooooo, dinosaurs!

China finds major dinosaur site.

Zhucheng in Shandong province is known locally as "dinosaur city" and has been the scene of several important finds since the 1960s.

Cool!

Snow! Snow! Snow!

I always love the first snow of the season, and here it is! Yaaaaaay!

The flakes are huge now, and falling softly. I am reminded of many moments in various Japanese anime where cherry blossoms, etc., are obeying gravity, and then don't, falling upwards instead.[*] These flakes look so light I could see them do the same if I just looked away at the right moment and then sneaked a glance back out of the corner of my eye.

[*] As an art form, I love many of the liberties anime takes with, oh, everything.

From the puff pastry department

The slogan of this blog goes back and from between "from politics to programming, paramecia to puff pastries" and "things that keep you, things that kill you," when I've got the skeletons up in the fall.

Time for an alert from the puff pastries department: There is a new mexican restaurant in Boston, near the corner of Tremont and Stuart, just a block downhill from Boylston station. Don't cross Stuart as if you're walking to the Wang Theatre, that's too far.

Maria's Taqueira: It's a hole in the wall, with walls painted orange and blue, a small coat of armor (yep! you read that right), over by the tables, and half the people in there when I stopped by to check it out were speaking spanish. Always a good sign.

The menu is straightforward - tacos, burritos, tortas. The carnitas (that's pork) tacos were excellent. I wanted to go right back after work and try something else off the menu.

Huzzah!

Thought for the Day

Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better. -- Samuel Beckett.