Leave it to the record companies, they're almost as bad as the Republicans. At least the Republicans don't sue 12-year-old girls and dead people. Now it turns out they've been ripping off killer musicians like Cheap Trick and the Allman Brothers.

Apparently these assholes at Sony music have been treating consumers who download music online as "licensees", while shortchanging musicians by giving musicians the royalty rate for sales, which are lower. So this way, everyone is screwed.

Corey Doctorow has the breakdown on why this should be offensive to consumers as well.

This is where it gets interesting. As Brad Templeton and others have pointed out, Sony and others have long maintained that what you get when you buy an iTune is a license, not ownership of a product. That license prohibits you from doing all kinds of otherwise lawful things, like selling your music to a used-record store, loaning it to a friend, or playing it on someone else's program.

But if Sony says that it's selling products (and therefore only liable for 4.5 cents in royalties to its artists) and not licenses, then how can it bind us, its customers, to licensing terms?

Go Cheap Trick!

The Republicans just can't seem to do anything without creating a scandal or being indicted.

This post article on polling has some interesting things to say about how the ethics problems of Republicans are seriously putting a damper on their popularity.

On April 10, a Washington Post-ABC News poll found, for example, that 52 percent of respondents said they trusted the Democratic Party "to do a better job handling corruption in Washington," while 27 percent said they trusted the Republican Party more. On April 20, a Pew Research Center survey found that by 44 to 28 percent, voters said the Democrats "could do a better job in reforming government."

And should we be surprised? Just last week the former head of the FDA (for like 2-days) is under grand jury investigation. It's not clear exactly what he may have been indicted for lying to congress about, but it may have been some lie he told about delays in implementing over-the-counter Plan B.

And why do we put up with this corruption? At least with Clin-ton, his nooky on the side didn't interfere with his job performance, these guys can't do anything right. For instance terrorism is increasing dramatically, not decreasing under this administrations "Global War on Terror." The cost of our involvement in the Iraq civil war is ballooning to up to $811 billion making it more expensive than Vietnam. And yes, it is officially a civil war. When you have 100,000 refugees who have fled due to violence you have a civil war.

I think Americans aren't going to put up with it in the next election. Once again, the Republicans are proving to be their own worst enemy. They just can't do anything right, and meanwhile, jackasses like Duke Cunningham get implicated in bribery and prostitution charges. They say services might have been provided to as many as half a dozen congressmen, this is just going to get funnier and funnier. And the best part is, we don't really need to do anything to ruin these guys, they are just hopeless. Oh yeah, and The investigation of Bob Ney's bribery and corruption is expanding, can we dare hope for more prostitution?

Besides, when we do protest, like in NYC this weekend, we just look like idiots. Once again these guys showed up.



Holding signs that just make us look bad like this one


When will they learn? Show up in a suit, make your signs simple and reasonable. Do not call people terrorists and murderers, hyperbole is not helpful, nor is swearing. Just call Bush what he is, an incompetent liar. It's still not very nice, but if you stick to the facts, rather than name-calling hyperbole, you'll do much better. And for the love of god no more street theater! No more puppets! No more flower-girl costumes, white boys with dreadlocks and tie-dye. We must stop acting like the boomers who have caused all these messes, and develop our own methods, based on effective ones like the civil-rights era marches, or hell, the ones used this week to call attention to Darfur. Or study the Democratic congressmen (and women) who protested last week against atrocities in Sudan and got arrested in a pretty brilliant move. Nothing makes you look like more of a jackass as when you have to arrest the US Congress's one survivor of the holocaust for civil disobedience.

Everyone needs to see the video. **Update** the You Tube mirror might be better

He is hysterical, and pointed, and for some reason the secret service didn't tackle him half-way through the act. My favorite part? When he starts exchanging "Sicilian" gestures with Scalia.

Watch it! (Transcript at kos)

Isn't it obvious what the next wedge issue will be? In 2004, we had the prospect of gay marriage to scare the yokels into voting Republican. In 2006, it's going to be Nuestro Himno, (MP3) the National Anthem performed in Spanish!

Just think of it--not only are these illegals protesting on American soil, they have the audacity to translate our National Anthem into Spanish! I foresee our nation's schools having classes on the Star-Spangled Banner, because after all, we don't even know the lyrics anymore. Public events will, in addition to the pledge of allegiance, also have the obligatory performance of the National Anthem (English version). The question is, which should be performed first? We'll then have a move for an amendment to the Constitution to establish English as the nation's official language.

Vote Republican, or English will die, and your children will report you to the government if you're caught speaking it in your home, you rubes!

Interesting drug news this morning.

For one, Rush Limbaugh has been charged with doctor shopping, but don't celebrate yet, prosecutors will drop the charge after 18 months if he stays in treatment.

Also, Mexico is decriminalizing pot, cocaine and heroin, which will surely upset drug warriors in this country. Young potheads will no longer need to travel all the way to Amsterdam to get high.

Keith Richards, who just fell out of tree will probably be glad to hear this news. What was he doing climing a palm tree anyway? You just know that news story has something to do with drugs.

The left wing blogs are alive with word of the spread of the Duke Cunningham scandal to other members of congress.

It started yesterday in the WSJ with a little story about the expansion of the Cunningham probe. But now the pullitzer-prize winning reporter who covered the Dukesters misbehavior and fall from power, is suggesting that up to 6 more congressman and one "former politican who now holds a powerful intelligence post" (Porter Goss?) may be implicated in a prostitution ring that serviced Republican congressmen at the behest of MZM, the crooked contractor that bought the Dukester.

I really hope Goss gets implicated in this. After all, he's the one who famously said, "Somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I'll have an investigation."

I've gotta give it to the times for their coverage of homicide rates in NYC. Many papers would just report the numbers, talk about how it went up since last year or whatever. The NYT analyzes the data case by case and discovers something city dwellers have known for a long time. If your not involved in crime, you are extremely unlikely to be victimized by it.

The police said they were more interested in disrupting crime patterns. "We're looking for things with operational implications — time of day, day of the week — to see that we deploy officers at the right times and in sufficient numbers," said Michael J. Farrell, deputy commissioner for strategic initiatives.

The offender and victim were of the same race in more than three-quarters of the killings. And according to Mr. Farrell, they often had something else in common: More than 90 percent of the killers had criminal records; and of those who wound up killed, more than half had them.

"If the average New Yorker is concerned about being murdered in a random crime, the odds of that happening are really remote," Mr. Farrell said. "If you are living apart from a life of crime, your risk is negligible."

Criminologists confirm that assessment. "People will be shocked to see how safe it is to live in New York City," said Andrew Karmen, a sociology professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and an expert on victimology. "Victims and offenders are pretty much pulled from the same background. Very often, young victims have young killers. Very often, the victim and killer knew each other."

While the rates of annonymous crime are rising, and are about twice as high as they were in 1950 (it sounds like rage-related attacks are increasing), it's still good to see crime reporting that's balanced with regard to how people are actually victimized in this country. This accomplishes two things, for one, people are less likely to be irrationally afraid of being in a city, or seeing people of another race walk down the street. You are much more likely to be victimized by a member of your own race. The second thing this accomplishes is it makes it clear that involvement in crime, even relatively minor ones, is more dangerous than people think. There is good sense in warning people that they can regret the company they keep, and even living in a good neighborhood won't protect you if you're up to no good.

Huzzah for the Times, now if we could get WaPo to do the same for DC.

The New Republic has an startling piece on George Allen and how he seems to have been, at least as a young man, a sadistic, racist prick. I don't know how much crap you can give people for what they do as teenagers. It's the period of your life you are most likely to regret, because it's usually the time you are the worst person you will ever be in your life. I know I was intolerable. But still, this was such a creep his little sister wrote a book about it.

According to his sister Jennifer, he was particularly strict about bedtimes. One night, his brother Bruce stayed up past his bedtime. George threw him through a sliding glass door. For the same offense, on a different occasion, George tackled his brother Gregory and broke his collarbone. When Jennifer broke her bedtime curfew, George dragged her upstairs by her hair.

George tormented Jennifer enough that, when she grew up, she wrote a memoir of what it was like living in the Allen family. In one sense, the book, Fifth Quarter, from which these details are culled, is unprecedented. No modern presidential candidate has ever had such a harsh and personal account of his life delivered to the public by a close family member. The book paints Allen as a cartoonishly sadistic older brother who holds Jennifer by her feet over Niagara Falls on a family trip (instilling in her a lifelong fear of heights) and slams a pool cue into her new boyfriend's head. "George hoped someday to become a dentist," she writes. "George said he saw dentistry as a perfect profession--getting paid to make people suffer."

His pathetic "all hat no cattle" wannabe southerner behavior in high school in California I'm sure is something he regrets, but the stories about his sadism are pretty disturbing. Do people really outgrow sociopathy? I've heard some docs say that you burn out on it in middle age, but who would want to risk it?

Anyway, pretty damning indictment of the behavior of the conservative wing's favorite candidate and alternative to McCain.

But he also found himself repeatedly voting in the minority on a series of racial issues that he seems embarrassed by today. In 1984, he was one of 27 House members to vote against a state holiday commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported, "Allen said the state shouldn't honor a non-Virginian with his own holiday." He was also bothered by the fact that the proposed holiday would fall on the day set aside in Virginia to honor Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. That same year, he did feel the urge to honor one of Virginia's own. He co-sponsored a resolution expressing "regret and sorrow upon the loss" of William Munford Tuck, a politician who opposed every piece of civil rights legislation while in Congress during the 1950s and 1960s and promised "massive resistance" to the Supreme Court's 1954 decision banning segregation.
...
It was the night before a major basketball game with Morningside High. The mostly black inner-city school adjacent to Watts was coming to the almost entirely white Palos Verdes High to play. When students arrived at school on game day, they found graffiti spray-painted on the school library and other places. All five people who described the incident say the graffiti was racially tinged and meant to look like the handiwork of the black Morningside students. But it was actually put there by Allen and some of his friends. "It was something like die whitey," says Campbell. The school administrator, who says he is a Republican and would "seriously consider" voting for Allen for president, says the graffiti said, "burn, baby, burn," a reference to the race riots.

Soon after, Allen finally got the chance to become a Southerner. In 1971, his dad was hired to coach the Redskins, and the Allens relocated to Virginia. Allen transferred from ucla, where he spent his first year of college, to UVA. The old "Hee Haw" fan was like a pig in slop. Even at Virginia's own state school, Allen stood out for his showy brand of good ol' boyness. Under the headline "allen and country living," a 1973 profile in the school paper noted his penchant for country music had earned him the campus nickname of "Neck." He drove a pickup truck (paid for by the Redskins). He wore cowboy boots. He supported Richard Nixon and the war in Vietnam. He once shot a squirrel on campus, skinned it, ate it, and hung its pelt on his wall. "He was trying to be more Virginian than the average Virginian," says Sabato.

After graduating, Allen stuck around UVA for three years of law school. Professors remember him as the guy in the back row of class spitting tobacco into a cup. "He was Mr. Cool," says a UVA law professor who taught him. "But, if you would have said he would go on to be governor, senator, and then run for president, people would have said that was the least probable thing that would ever happen."

I've known guys like this all my life, and they shouldn't be made president, trust me. His responses to these criticism are weak and unapologetic.

Allen knows the trouble spots in his record and has ready answers. We talk about his sister's book ("It's the perspective of the youngest child, who is a girl"), about the noose ("It had nothing to do with anything other than the Western motif in my office"), and about the Confederate flag once hanging in his living room ("I have a flag collection"). As for his mischievous attempt to scare his classmates into believing that his school was going to be burned to the ground, Allen, who, as a member of the Virginia House of Delegates, co-sponsored a resolution calling for a crackdown on school vandalism, denies the incident had anything to do with race. "It was something like eat crap or something like that," says Allen, who was suspended for the incident. "Your school sucks, and so forth. It wasn't racial. Bad enough what I did--didn't have that to it. The purpose was to get your team riled up against a rival."

Besides being a failure as governor who set up the total catastrophe of Gilmore's abortive reign, for some reason they think this guy is fit to run a country. At least Bush's people fudged the statistics to make it look like he had done something positive for Texas, what can Allen claim? He rode a good economy into the ground and about 3 years after his term expired his incompetent Republican replacement put Virginia so deep in the place actually voted for two Democratic governors in a row. So, not only is he incompetent, but he's a (reformed?) wannabe bigot.

Here is the proof.

The H2 is the ultimate poseur-mobile. FUH2 knows what I'm talking about.

A somewhat stunning admission comes from Arlen Specter today with regards to the president's illegal wiretapping program.

Specter also agreed with Democrats who say that any of the bills to tighten guidelines for the National Security Agency program and increase congressional oversight could be flatly ignored by an administration with a long history of acting alone in security matters.

"It is true that we have no assurance that the president would follow any statute that we enact," Specter said. He said he's considering adding an amendment to stop funding of the program to an Iraq war-hurricane relief bill being debated by the Senate this week and next.

So now they're even admitting publicly that they are a do-nothing, irrelevant body. That's great. They don't even think about passing legislation to restrict the president's activities, because they know they have no power to affect anything he does. Unitary executive is no longer a hypothetical, it is now practice.

The defeatists have pointed us to a very interesting article on Stephen Kinzer, the author of the new book "Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq." It is worth reading.

Basically, this guy found a common pattern between most American interventions over the last two centuries.

There's really a three-stage motivation that I can see when I watch so many of the developments of these coups. The first thing that happens is that the regime in question starts bothering some American company. They start demanding that the company pay taxes or that it observe labor laws or environmental laws. Sometimes that company is nationalized or is somehow required to sell some of its land or its assets. So the first thing that happens is that an American or a foreign corporation is active in another country, and the government of that country starts to restrict it in some way or give it some trouble, restrict its ability to operate freely.

Then, the leaders of that company come to the political leadership of the United States to complain about the regime in that country. In the political process, in the White House, the motivation morphs a little bit. The U.S. government does not intervene directly to defend the rights of a company, but they transform the motivation from an economic one into a political or geo-strategic one. They make the assumption that any regime that would bother an American company or harass an American company must be anti-American, repressive, dictatorial, and probably the tool of some foreign power or interest that wants to undermine the United States. So the motivation transforms from an economic to a political one, although the actual basis for it never changes.

Then, it morphs one more time when the U.S. leaders have to explain the motivation for this operation to the American people. Then they do not use either the economic or the political motivation usually, but they portray these interventions as liberation operations, just a chance to free a poor oppressed nation from the brutality of a regime that we assume is a dictatorship, because what other kind of a regime would be bothering an American company?

Then he goes into our history with Iran, and the feeling you get is that Americans really should stop intervening in the world. We're just not good at it.

It's hard to believe today that we could even use the word "Iran" and "democracy" in the same sentence, but the fact is Iran was a functioning, thriving democracy in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Because Iran nationalized its oil industry, rather than allow it to continue being exploited by foreigners, Iran became a target for foreign intervention, and the U.S. did overthrow the democracy of Iran in the summer of 1953.

We placed on the throne the Shah. He ruled for 25 years with increasing repression. His repression produced the explosion of the late 1970s, the Islamic revolution. That revolution brought to power a fanatically anti-American clique of mullahs who began their regime by taking American diplomats as hostage, has then spent 25 years oppressing its own people and doing whatever it could, sometimes very violently, to undermine American interests in the world, and that is the regime with which we are now approaching a very serious world crisis regarding the nuclear issue.

Now, had we not intervened in 1953 and crushed Iranian democracy, we might have had a thriving democracy in the heart of the Muslim Middle East all these 50 years. I can hardly wrap my mind around how different the Middle East might be now. This regime that's now in power in Iran would never have come to power, and the current nuclear crisis would never have emerged. This is a great example of how our intervention ultimately leads us to regimes much worse than the ones we originally set out to overthrow.

Now, how do you think that people in Iran react when Americans point a finger at them and say, "You're a tyranny over there. You're a brutal dictatorship. You should have a democracy. You should have a free regime"? Well, they say, "We had a democracy here, until you came in and overthrew it." Now, the United States today has some very legitimate complaints against the Iranian government, but we have to understand that Iranians also have some very legitimate complaints against us, and that should be a recognition that would lead us into negotiations with them at this point.

I think I've got to get this book.

Here's the Republican solution to the gas price problem, bribe every American with 100 bucks so they won't be so pissed at them.

Really, this passes for legislation in this country? Gas prices are high, hey, I've got an idea, lets just give everybody a hundred bucks!

I think there was a Futurama about this. If I get a hundred bucks I'm going to use it to drink 100 cups of coffee and then exceed the speed of light.

What are we going to do about Trey Parker and Matt Stone?

Tonight they continued their bizarre denial of climate science with an episode mocking Al Gore with the metaphor for global warning being the ex-VP fear-mongering about "man-bear-pig." Apparently Al Gore is now warning about global warning, as he did for years before his entrance onto the national political scene, because he craves attention. This is despite multiple commentators lamenting that he didn't bring up the issue during the damn election of 2000 instead focusing on the damn "lock box."

I've loved South Park for years with occasional blips when they've decided to be unnecessarily contrarian about things like global warming. These days I get the feeling that they are more interested in being contrarian than in using their show to satirize real problems. Granted, I loved their satire of the whole Mohammed cartoon issue, after all, over a year ago they represented Mohammed in a cartoon in their "Super Best Friends episode." No one set fire to a KFC over that, but they got censored on Comedy Central after that whole Danish row despite a history of mocking Mohammed in cartoon form. That's pretty kick-ass. So why are they so anti-global warming? They've had two episodes against it this season alone.

It's a little frustrating when I read Science every single week and see the mounting evidence and these guys just continue to thumb their nose at science just like the creationists do.

So, can climate scientists get together and just try contacting these guys to try to convince them they're being a little bit immature on the whole global warming issue? These guys have a big loudspeaker and they use it to spit out anti-environmental propaganda, not out of any malice, but out of their natural tendancy to be contrarian to the prevailing view of the world. If evolution ever becomes a majority opinion I swear they'll make an episode about how scientists are stupid for studying fossils.

For the life of me I can't find my favorite proxy measurements of temperature over the last few thousand years via pubmed searches. The best I can find is this graph of multiple temperature proxies over that last few thousand years.



If anyone remembers the article, it was either Nature or Science in the last six months, please tell me. It was a measurement, by proxy, of global mean temperature correlated with CO2 emissions over several thousand years. It was really a beautiful piece of data, but I can't seem to track it down. In the meantime, let's ask ourselves, even if this is just a bunch of overreaction to climate fluctuation, do we really want to risk the one place in the universe hospitable to human life? Isn't the safest course of action to behave as if the Earth is relatively fragile, rather than assuming it can take endless amounts of greenhouse gasses being spewed into the atmosphere?

found it


I shamelessly stole this from Stable Carbon Cycle-Climate Relationship During the Late Pleistocene, Urs Siegenthaler et al. in Science last year.

The top curve is proxy data from ice cores of CO2 content of the atmosphere in the antarctic for the last 700 millenia or so. The deltaD is a measurement of Deuterium, a proxy for temperature at each time. Basically it shows a perfect correlation between CO2 content and temperature for 700k years.

Examining {delta}D as a function of CO2, we observe that the slope during the two new glacial cycles compared to the last four cycles is essentially the same. Therefore, the coupling of Antarctic temperature and CO2 did not change significantly during the last 650 kyear, indicating rather stable coupling between climate and the carbon cycle during the late Pleistocene.

Other data in the paper shows the nature of this linear relationship. They've been criticized by the carbon lovers (*cough* coal-company stooges *cough*) over the fact that the increases in carbon are followed by a lag between something like 200-1800 years between the concommitant temperature increase. The flaw in the argument though is that it's assuming that Siegenthaler et al. had the ability to resolve temperature differences from century to century, and I don't think their measurements had that high of a resolution. The other flaw is that it's correlative, but even so it's a perfect correlation over ~700k years, that's gotta make you wonder about the lucidity of the global warming deniers these days. Correlation is not causation, but 700k years of correlation really makes you think, do we want to find out if there truly is causation? Wouldn't that mean putting earth in the test tube and shaking it up with all of us on it? I personally don't want to find the absolute proof that this is causative, it means we all die.

From CNN:

"Scientists find secret to gas-free beans"

The secret: add a couple of otherwise harmless bacteria to the beans before cooking them. But this quote is priceless:

They identified two bacteria, Lactobacillus casei and Lactobacillus plantarum, which can be added to beans so they cause minimal distress to those who eat them, and to those around the bean-lovers, Marisela Granito of Simon Bolivar University in Caracas, Venezuela and colleagues reported. (Emphasis mine)

I nominate this guy to replace Pat Robertson as televangelist to the world. Watch at least until he takes a call from a local Satanist.

Some of my favorite quotes.

I come in the name of Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit, God Almighty, you know, ruler of heaven, and earth, and every goddamn thing in between.

I come in the name of Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit the devil is a motherfucking liar so you no I'm not worried biaatch!

Look at the fucking book I've got in my hand!

Cut that bitch off!

I would go to church if this guy was the preacher.

The NYT brings us news that our lawnmowers are the biggest polluters ever. Many of us already knew that burning 2-cycle gas or whatever, with that oil you pour in there couldn't be good for the environment, but did we know how bad it really is?

Gallon for gallon — or, given the size of lawnmower tanks, quart for quart — the 2006 lawn mower engines contribute 93 times more smog-forming emissions than 2006 cars, according to the California Air Resources Board. In California, lawn mowers provided more than 2 percent of the smog-forming pollution from all engines.

Of course the simple measure of adding a catalytic converter is fiercely opposed by the industry. But here comes the Give Up effect, California doesn't give a shit what the industry wants.

On one side, the federal Environmental Protection Agency and state regulators in California. On the other, the largest lawn and garden equipment maker in the country and a powerful Republican senator. And in the middle, the six million or so lawn mowers shipped to retailers every year.

For older regulators, it is a replay of Detroit's initial resistance to those who wanted clean up car exhaust by installing catalytic converters, which pull smog-forming chemicals and carbon monoxide out of the exhaust.

"I think it's very analogous to what happened in the 70's," said Robert Cross, chief of the California air agency's Mobile Source Control Division. "The arguments are all the same."

A pending regulation in California that is scheduled to take effect next year, if the E.P.A. approves, would tighten emission requirements for small engines, cutting 22 tons of smog-forming chemicals from the California air daily, or the equivalent of more than 800,000 cars a day. It would almost certainly require the use of a catalytic converter — a requirement that Briggs & Stratton, the dominant engine maker in the struggling lawn care equipment field, vigorously opposes.

Sadly, this asshole Bonds is single handedly preventing the effect from being made a nation-wide improvement on emissions by allowing other states to piggy-back on California's regulations.

Senator Bond's main adversaries are regulators in California, who have largely independent authority to set air emission standards independent of the Environmental Protection Agency. In the 1990's the California Air Resources Board first put controls on emissions from these engines and subsequently tightened them. The new, tougher standards they drafted in 2003 would be the first that are likely to require the addition of a catalytic converter.
...
In 2003 and 2005, Mr. Bond inserted provisions into appropriations legislation to delay the California regulations and limit their possible scope. The 2003 amendments, reached as part of a deal with Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, took away the right of other states to adopt California's tougher regulations and required the E.P.A. to hold off its approval until it satisfied itself that the California rules would not entail safety risks.

And in typical industry fashion, the PR spiel is that the industry has improved itself so much already, why should it do more? Also, they make it sound like improvements gleaned over the years were their idea (coal energy commercials are a great example of this particular lie)

Patricia Hanz, an assistant general counsel for Briggs & Stratton, said, "We acknowledge that there's an air quality problem in California." But she added that Briggs engines were 70 percent cleaner than they were than 15 years ago, before regulation.

Funny, that last round of regulation didn't wipe them out and it improved emissions 70%. Now they have the opportunity to lower emissions to essentially nothing, and the environmental equivalent would be the removal of 800,000 cars a day from California's roads. To bad this crook Bond is more interested in groveling at the feet of the industry giving him money than caring for the environment of his constituents. So, overall, a mixed Give Up message. If the Californians were able to do this without Bonds' interference, this could have had a nationwide benefit. As it stands, only Californians will have the enjoy the difference in pollution from removing 800k cars from the roads.

I continue to be stunned by these interesting articles in this month's PLoS Medicine.

I got a chance to sit down today and read through the article entitled"Cholinesterase Inhibitors: Drugs Looking for a Disease?"

Now, we learned about these drugs in medical school as a "temporarily effective" measure against Alzheimer's disease. They are prescribed because nothing else can really be done for Alzheimer's patients, and the experience with them was that they seemed to slightly delay the progression of dementia. Well, it turns out, the benefit was probably entirely due to placebo effect and these drugs have never been adequately proven to improve syptoms or delay dementia in these patients.

An amazing paper considering how broadly these drugs are prescribed, that and with long-term treatment (not studied extensively in clinical trials to date) the drugs may increase mortality. It's better just to give the patients obecalp that these crap drugs.

To those interested in siRNA therapeutics they also have this article on curing West Nile and Japanese Encephalitis virus (in mice) using a single lipid-tagged siRNA targeting the envelope protein. Great stuff.

It looks like Dems are picking up on the incompetence strategy. Now if only they'd pick up on climate change as some smart British pols are doing and they'll have a real strategy for success. There is also talk of using stem cells to divide the GOP but this is a bad idea. Not only is it likely to be unnecessary given stunning advances in developing ES-like lines. Even though I'm still only convinced of the efficacy of embryonic stem cells and unimpressed with most adult stem cell research, this is just another debate over life, and as such will lead to irrationality and anger against dems. Stick to the things we all hate, like incompetence, waste, pollution, gas prices, and lying.

Bush is at a new low. The ES-cell debate is handing him an issue he can rile up his base over, don't give him the chance.

In lighter news, Civil War re-enactments suck, Pirate battle re-enactments rule! Trade in your muskets, beer and wool uniforms for eye patches, cutlasses and rum!

The NYT and Slate have criticized the FDA's report on the Marijuana saying it is scientifically bankrupt and politically biased.

No shit Sherlock. Apparently the only studies the FDA approves of are manufacturer-sponsored ones that only find the results the drug companies want. If science is only going to be accepted based on foregone conclusions, what's the damn point?

Well, so screwed up that even KBR, the evil wing of Halliburton, is having trouble making money off of war. When the war profiteers are suffering, you know things are bad. Things are bad for women too, apparently the sex-slave trade is flourishing now that Saddam is gone. It used to be they just had to worry about Uday and Hussay. Now they've got a major underground white slave trade.

No one knows how many young women have been kidnapped and sold since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. The Organization for Women's Freedom in Iraq, based in Baghdad, estimates from anecdotal evidence that more than 2,000 Iraqi women have gone missing in that period. A Western official in Baghdad who monitors the status of women in Iraq thinks that figure may be inflated but admits that sex trafficking, virtually nonexistent under Saddam, has become a serious issue. The collapse of law and order and the absence of a stable government have allowed criminal gangs, alongside terrorists, to run amuck. Meanwhile, some aid workers say, bureaucrats in the ministries have either paralyzed with red tape or frozen the assets of charities that might have provided refuge for these girls. As a result, sex trafficking has been allowed to fester unchecked.

Ahh the incompetence. Now Bin Laden is saying we are on a crusade against the muslim world. Given that we're saber-rattling with regards to Iran, the guy may have a point. And does anyone else think that Bush and Bin Laden are BFF? They're a match made in heaven. Bin Laden wants to start a war between the West and the Muslim world that will bankrupt the great Satan and cost us lives, money, respect and credibility. Bush just played right into this guy's hands, and doesn't seem to show any signs of halting our progress towards fulfilling Osama's prophecy. Truly, a match made in heaven.

In good RIAA news (no they did not all die in a fire) their suit against a 13-year-old girl has been thrown out by the judge. This fits in with their strategy of suing the dead and people with no computers. Since just about everyone is therefore at risk to being sued, maybe we should all consult EFF's "how not to get sued" faq.

Also, several major record companies may have obstructed justice in their attempts to go after Napster.

Sorry for the long absence, sceince has been a bit of a bitch.

Did anyone see this story at the WaPo about how Condoleeza Rice may have leaked national security information to lobbyists for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee?

These guys might be blowing smoke up our asses, but why would they? It sounds like this case might get squashed for a number of reasons, not the least of which is a deposition of Rice over leaked information would be incredibly embarrassing to the administraiton.

The allegations against Rice came as a federal judge granted a defense request to issue subpoenas sought by the defense for Rice and three other government officials in the trial of Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman. The two are former lobbyists with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee who are charged with receiving and disclosing national defense information.

Defense lawyers are asking a judge to dismiss the charges because, among other things, they believe it seeks to criminalize the type of backchannel exchanges between government officials, lobbyists and the press that are part and parcel of how Washington works.

During Friday's hearing, U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III said he is considering dismissing the government's entire case because the law used to prosecute Rosen and Weissman may be unconstitutionally vague and broad and infringe on freedom of speech.

Rosen's lawyer, Abbe Lowell, said the testimony of Rice and others is needed to show that some of the top officials in U.S. government approved of disclosing sensitive information to the defendants and that the leaks may have been authorized.

Prosecutors opposed the effort to depose Rice and the other officials. Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin DiGregory also disputed Lowell's claim, saying, "She never gave national defense information to Mr. Rosen."

It's amazing, the administration leaks like a sieve when it serves their interest. Then they fire this CIA agent when the information embarrasses them (but is an incredible public service). I guess we shouldn't be surprised.

The good people of Finland just selected their 'American Idol' type band. And instead of some cheesy powder puff crap that usually gets picked by the 15-year olds and their 40-year old moms, the people of that cold, cold land went for something a bit more... offbeat. I wish I could post the picture.
**here it is**


As for their act:

They have eight-foot retractable latex Satan wings, sing hits like "Chainsaw Buffet" and blow up slabs of smoking meat on stage.

And the band members:
As he stuck out his tongue menacingly, his red demon eyes glaring, Lordi was surrounded by Kita, an alien-man-beast predator who plays flame-spitting drums inside a cage; Awa, a blood-splattered ghost who howls backup vocals; Ox, a zombie bull who plays bass; and Amen, a mummy in a rubber loincloth who plays guitar.

And, of course, what do they sing about?

"Wings on my back/I got horns on my head/my fangs are sharp/and my eyes are red."

But some people aren't happy -

...critics called for President Tarja Halonen to use her constitutional powers to veto the band and nominate a traditional Finnish folk singer instead.

Constitutional powers? From the woman who looks like the missing stepsister of Conan O'brien?

This guy should have made a list of everything bad he's ever done and crossed them off one by one.



The similarities are striking.

Somehow I think this story and this one are linked. Note also, the evil wing of Halliburton, KBR (which is going to have an IPO sometime soon), is behind this as well.

More signs the civil war is in full swing in Iraq. We've got religious groups stockpiling arms, open warfare in the streets and a mounting refugee crisis. If those aren't three good criteria for declaring civil war, I don't what else you could possibly need. Maybe Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee need to rise from the grave and take sides with the Shiites or the Sunnis before Americans will believe this is an actual war. Hey, I've got an idea. The insurgents can start wearing either blue or gray.

Also, the Iraqis have expressed a wish for a unifier. I've got a "uniter not a divider" in mind we could send them.

The FDA has declared Marijuana has no legitimate medical uses. Just a day after 4/20 too. However, don't get too upset and stop smoking the weed. The report was released over the objections of the FDA scientists who claim marijuana does have medical uses, and in contradiction to the NAS's previous findings and the researchers who actually study the pot.

That is all.

Despite nobody in the Democratic leadership doing anything about this jackass Bush, except arguably Harry Reid who has started openly calling the Republicans dirty stinking liars, Democrats are pulling way ahead in political contributions. Both in the total amount they have received and in increase in campaign contributions. Bush's approval ratings, even according to Fox News are at their lowest of 33%.

If you look at this month's polling in SurveyUSA you see that in terms of senatorial approval ratings, Democrats are kicking ass. they are 13 of the top 20, and 7 of the top 10 senators. Of the Republican senators ranked highly, they are mostly moderates like Olympia Snowe, the indepedent James Jeffords, and Susan Collins. At the very bottom? Our very own mixture of anal lube and shit, Rick Santorum, and the yet-to-be-indicted Conrad Burns. Not exactly looking good for Republicans these days.

Now, we just need Democrats to grow a pair and seize a victory for once. Republicans, through their three branch majority have failed, and failed, and failed again. The reason is that Republican ideas are empirically defective. They do not work. Not to mention, they waste all their damn time picking on gays. They need to get a life and not be in charge because they are not competent leaders.

This is the essence of Give Up philosophy, there is no better cure for conservatism than people having to live under it for four years. These guys have been in control of everything, and they have failed miserably. Conservatism has failed miserably. Republicans have failed miserably. The argument over neocon philosophy and irresponsible tax cuts and trickle down economics are officially resolved. They do not work, we've tried it, they failed. The end.

It's amazing how porn constinues to innovate faster than Hollywood, the music industry, Microsoft, Apple, and other internet content providers. Think about it, the internet might as well be named the global pornography network, they were at the forefront of delivering multimedia content to consumers long before the movie industry, including huge catalogues of downloadable mainstream porn (like Vivid) online. Hell, porn jumped to video cassette while that asshole Jack Valenti was testifying in front of congress saying the VCR would bankrupt Hollywood. Those assholes at the RIAA opposed cassette tapes saying they would bankrupt music labels and even forced sellers of cassette tapes to include a fee to pay for the damage done by people dubbing music. The RIAA even says that ripping CDs to play on your iPod is theft! Ironically, someone evaluated the president's iPod for "stolen" music and found he had Beatles songs on it, meaning he (or a staffer) had to have ripped or "stolen" the music in order to even have it on his iPod. This is insanity!

The LA Times has an article discussing how porn is cutting edge in delivering burnable-to-DVD content while Hollywood and other providers obsessed with DRM are lagging behind. Every single step of the way in developing new technology to provide consumers with more options to listen to music and watch movies, the major industries have fought again and again to limit consumer choice.

Why is this the case? Is it because porn providers are more interested in making money than obsessing over copyright? Is it because they simply lack the resources to sue college students? Why are so-called legitimate providers of content so obsessed with erecting walls around their product while the porn industry seems to be indifferent (and more profitable)? I'm really curious.

Maybe I've said too much.

So, does anyone want to know who the creator of Katamari is?
Well, it's this guy.



He's looks like the kind of guy that might make a game like Katamari Damacy, that is, Japanese and cheerful.

Anyway, he apparently doesn't like Nintendo game consoles designed for Katamari. Is it some kind of ball you roll?

Our favorite Charlottesville ruffian has been sentenced to 15 years behind bars for his second bicycle-induced antisocial behavior. The local paper has the story here.

And why do we call him antisocial? Let's see what the article says:

"Zimmerman stabbed [the victim] in the market, fled in his friend’s vehicle, disposed of the knife on Rio Road and went bowling."

Hey, I just killed a man! Let's go bowling!

Oh, and this wasn't his first act of bicycle-induced mayhem:

"Zimmerman was convicted of assault and battery in 2004."

Farewell, Stabby!

At BASF, we don't make the apples, pears, oranges, grapes, raisins, cattle meat, and milk you buy. We make the apples, pears, oranges, grapes, raisins, cattle meat, and milk you buy contain more chemicals.

Katamari fans will be interested to know that some crazy SFers are going to be rolling a giant cardboard Katamari ball in the annual Bay to Breakers race.

People may also be interested that the Dresden Dolls are releasing their second album"yes, Virginia..." and have an article about them in the Guardian. Also, my desire to hate Neil Young for inflicting an endless and surreal xylophone musical interprative crap piece on me years ago is conflicting with my new desire to like him for this his new ITMFA stance.

In other pop culture news Keith Olberman continues to piss off Bill O'Reilly. I think he might get Tivoed. Apparently, he spends a portion of every show just talking about falafel and loofahs.

And there is good news in the war against heterosexuality. A US District Court ruled the Kansas AG's persecution of doctors, underaged kids, and other humans beings was unconstitutional. Among other dastardly activities by this guy, he was trying to make it mandatory for doctors to report underage sexual activity in their young patients because all sexual activity, even consensual acts between to minors, represented child abuse.

I'm a little torn on this one. It was a great Give Up opportunity. Imagine, you're in Kansas (not for long, don't worry) and this stupid ass decides this is the law. The solution is simple. Just refer everything to him. If you see two kids kissing on a park bench, report it to the AG. Two kids holding hands, report it to the AG. Two kids sharing a meaningful look, report it to the AG. If all underage sex is a crime then it's your duty to make sure such crimes never occur. Billy and Susy are going to the dance and he said he wants to get to first base! The AG must be warned!

You could render his office inoperative by just obeying what he thinks the law should be. Why should it only be medical personnel anyway? Why not teachers, lawyers, and raconteurs? If all underage sex is abuse just report absolutely everything. Make his life hell.

We should talk about taxes. The LA Times, like many news organizations, has interesting article entitled Taxes Flatten but Deep Pockets Still Bulge.

The thesis is that taxes have been flattened so extensively under Bush, that we have a de facto flat-tax.

Their infobox is pretty stunning (table adapted from the article).

The average percentage of their income that people paid in combined federal income and payroll taxes in 2005: What people actually paid (In thousands of 2005 dollars)

Income	Net tax rate
Less than $10	2.3%
$10-20	3.7%
$20-30	9.1%
$30-40	13.6%
$40-50	15.8%
$50-75	17.4%
$75-100	18.9%
$100-200	20.6%
$200-500	21.5%
$500-1000	22.0%
over $1000	22.0%

That must be why a majority of Americans, when polled, feel there is inequality in the tax code. Either that or because Cheney got a 1.8 million dollar refund or the regressive nature of social security and medicare payroll taxes.

Think Progress has the coverage of new rules for federal funding of abstinence only programs. Dan Savage is right, there's as much for heterosexuals to lose from these right wingers definitions of what is moral sexual conduct as for homosexuals.

Abstinence curricula must have a clear definition of sexual abstinence which must be consistent with the following: "Abstinence means voluntarily choosing not to engage in sexual activity until marriage. Sexual activity refers to any type of genital contact or sexual stimulation between two persons including, but not limited to, sexual intercourse."

Later, the guidelines explicitly define marriage:

Throughout the entire curriculum, the term "marriage" must be defined as "only a legal union between one man and one woman as a husband and wife, and the word 'spouse' refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife." (Consistent with Federal law)

So, no sex for gay people, no sex for straight unmarried people, no sex for anyone but those fitting the narrow definition of what the federal government says is ok. The alternative to marriages project has stats indicating about 9.7 million straight people are living with a different-sex partner and about 1.2 million same sex couples. These numbers have increased 10-fold since the 1960s and continue to incrase. Also, a majority of adult men and women in this country are unmarried, about 55-58%, and according to the DHHS, they should't have sex. Interesting. Such curricula don't seem to actually be helpful for preparing kids for the majority of adult relationships they are likely to get into.

The Devon Zoo has a new baby Tapir. Known to Mormons as a pre-Columbian horse. No, I'm not joking.

Anyway, it's cute.



Apparently they lose the camouflage as they age.

I continue my reign of insensitivity by suggesting imprisonment in Japan might be fun. I'm still reeling from when I was chastised for not fully sympathizing with the Nigerian hostages, who'd have thunk it.

ONOMICHI, Japan -- In a spotless prison ward here, inmates while away their free time reading large-print samurai novels and singing golden oldies on karaoke. Support rails and metal walkers help them ease into soothing steam baths and do light daily chores. After dining on low-sodium suppers in their rooms, most of the fragile felons curl up for the night with freshly filled hot-water bottles.

Their prisons sound like retirement homes, because they are. Apparently, tons of crime in Japan is coming from the blue-hairs. You remember that Seinfeld episode where Uncle Leo was shoplifting in the bookstore because all the old people were doing it? Well, apparently this is a now problem in Japan too.

Japanese over 60 now represent the country's fastest growing group of lawbreakers, with the soaring rate of senior delinquents far exceeding their growth in the general population. The number of those age 70 and older who have been charged has increased the most -- doubling in just four years to a record 21,324 in 2004, the most recent year for which statistics are available. By comparison, juvenile arrests edged up only 2.2 percent during the same period, according to the National Police Agency.

Given it leads to imprisonment in such fine free digs, who'd pass that up. It also sounds like old Japanese people might just be totally crazy for some unknown reason.

Japan has the world's longest life expectancy-- 82 years -- and the highest percentage of seniors, with almost one in five Japanese now 65 or older. But officials are also citing an outbreak of geriatric crime, including a spike in first-time offenders committing anything from petty theft to murder.
...
"Like junior high school students, some older people have the money to pay for things, but they are stealing anyway because they want attention from their families," said Hiroshi Shojima, professor of criminal psychology at Fukushima University. "But it is also true that Japanese prisons are comparatively comfortable. They are spotlessly clean and generally free of violence. If you are a lonely and struggling old person, that atmosphere can be tempting."

I can get the petty theft. After all, if you get caught, you can just act senile. But murder? Then again, Junior Soprano might get away with attempted murder due to senility. And what's with this regression to "junior high school" in old age? I'm now looking forward to turning 60. I'll start smoking pot by the 7-11 and pissing on cop cars. Only I'll have to move to Japan first.

It gets weirder.

The vast majority of crimes being committed by seniors are nonviolent -- usually shoplifting or other types of petty theft. In some instances, "grandpa bandits" are acting together -- last February, police in southwestern Japan arrested three men, ages 71, 69 and 67, for allegedly organizing a purse-snatching ring.

Ok, if I'm 70 and I join a gang of elderly toughs, I'll officially be able to die completely satisfied with my life. But still, this is crazy. Can you imagine your grandparents acting this way? What is it about Japanese society that would generate this trend? I'm really curious, they talk about "veneration of elders" but why would such a privileged viewpoint of old people lead to rampant elderly crime?

Maybe I'm being insensitive again to people being victimized in horrible crimes, but when I read about acid-attacks all I can think of is Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Illustrious Client.

Throwing acid seems very Victorian for some reason, and a surprising kind of assault for upstate New York.

This article is just chock full of the obvious. Including:

"Acid thrown in someone's face is pretty unique," said firefighter Darren Marino. "You gotta be pretty twisted. It was pretty nasty."

and

Rihab Hagelkhider, 39, allegedly targeted Hayfa Hussein, 29, who suffered burns on her face and body, police said.

"It appears there was some type of problem between them," said police Lt. Pete Frisoni.

You think? Sorry, but for some reason I'm obsessed with acid-throwing as a means of revenge. Possibly due to my obsession with old racist imperialistic British literature.

The gender gap that is. MyDD is talking about new polling from LA Times/Bloomberg showing a stunning increase in the size of the gender gap that had been declining for decades.

Take a look at the poll results and you see some interesting trends.

1. 18% of women vs 35% of men feel the country is going in the right direction with 73% of women and 56% of men saying is going in the wrong direction.
   
2. 23% of women want to see a continuation of Bush's policies vs 36% of men, 71% of women and 56% of men want a "new direction."
   
3. A similar (~15%) gap exists in opinion on health of the economy.
   
4. A 10% gap exists between men and women in the evaluation of Bush's job performance.
   
5. A 13-14% gap exists between men and women on Iraq.
   
6. A nearly 20% gap exists between men and women on the GWOT.
   
7. If the congressional elections were held today 57% of women and 41% of men would prefer to vote for a Democrat, 31% of women and 41% of men would prefer a Republican. (registered voters)
   
8. 56% of women would prefer to see the house led by Democrats vs 43% of men. 33% of women would prefer Republicans vs 42% of men.
   
9. Women also see Republicans in congress more unfavorably vs Democrats favorably,
   
10. 50% of women feel the Democrats represent their values vs 37% of men. 32% of women feel Republicans represent their values vs 45% of men.
    
11. There is a ~10% gap on integrity, handling social security, the deficit, increasing prosperity, national security, immigration, and taxes.
    
12. Finally, the ladies are starting to regret not having a gap in the last election. If the 2004 election were held over today 52% of women would have voted for Kerry vs 30% for Bush.
    

Here is the Give Up hypothesis at work. If you piss off women, you lose elections. I don't know what these Republicans were thinking. Abortion is only a winning issue for Republicans as long as it is under no real threat of being banned. Need proof? The poll also asked if people approved of the SD abortion ban. 36% of men and 32% of women approved. 57% of men and 59% of women disapproved. No one wants abortion bans, their attempts to get them passed will be the destruction of the Republican party (and it has already begun).

My optimism for November just increased tremendously. Men are so evenly divided on issues they might as well just not even show up to vote. It's the women that have historically shown a big gap in preference for one party over another (and minorities). Guess how they're going to vote in November? Hooray for the ladies!

Apparently, it's a big mistake in Iran to send a text message to president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad saying he needs a shower. It can get you fired or arrested.

I have a new goal in life, to figure out how to send a text message to Bush telling him to get his head out of his ass.

Bush Co. did it again. It's not being widely reported in the MSM but Pandagon and PageoneQ have coverage of the dirty trick played on the LGBT community by the Bush administration.

Apparently, all the gay families were in line for hours, many camped out over night to make sure they got a place for early events which had always been available first-come first-serve. Well, for the first time ever, the White House only let in invited groups to the opening public ceremonies covered by the press between 8 and 10am, and gave those who waited in line tickets for after 11am, when the press had all left.

Ah, can you feel the Christian love on this Easter holiday? Nope? Well, neither can PZ Myers.

Ok--here's the plan. We (or all that are gifted with the ability to grow facial hair) shall grow our best beards/moustaches/etc and take back the World Beard and Moustache Championship from the Germans, who appear to have swept every single category for the last 20-odd years. Otherwise, just check out this year's events in NYC.

Ever since Dan Savage re-defined Santorum, his name generates all sorts of unintentionally funny material. The latest example is in the Washington Post.

Since 1990, Santorum, 47, has proven to be a canny, come-from-behind campaigner...

Ahhh, dirty.

CNN reports that the Republican strategy for the coming year is to focus on limiting government spending, fostering free enterprise, limiting government power and diminishing the role of government in people's everyday lives.

Oh wait, nevermind. I read the article now. The Republican agenda this year will once again be death to fags and banning abortion and free speech.

The House has approved an amendment to the Constitution to outlaw flag burning and passed a bill to crack down on the practice of minors' crossing state lines for abortions to evade legal limits in their own states

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tennessee, and a possible presidential candidate in 2008, announced early this year that the Senate would consider those and the anti-gay marriage amendment that has failed in both chambers despite Bush's endorsement.

While I understand the Republicans have reliably mobilized their wing with these issues for a decade now, I don't really believe it's going to work this time. After passing the bankruptcy bill, pissing off the largest minority group with this immigration bill, and generally proving incapable of running a government, I somehow doubt that dragging out these same tired issues is going to work again. I mean flag burning? Are you kidding me? Has anyone even burned an American flag on our soil in the last decade? This broad distraction campaign is dated, and started to fray at the edges.

"It seems like for only six months, every two years -- right around election time -- that we're even noticed," said Tom McClusky of the Family Research Council.

"Some of these better pass," he added. "You notice when it's just lip service being paid."

Guess what, they're not going to pass, just like they never passed any other year. The smart Republicans are going to try to distance themselves from the incompetence of this administration and the hate-mongering of the leadership. You think I'm crazy? Even George Will is irreparably pissed although it is his usual crap about money being equivalent to speech. Jackass.

The juggernaut of a coalition that these guys built in 1994 is falling to pieces. The libertarians like Will are pissed, the fundies are pissed, the small government types are pissed. Exactly which of their constituent groups is satisfied with the performance of this do-nothing congress? Frist and the leadership are making a hail Mary pass to try to bring the fundies back into the fold, but it's just going to piss everyone off and motivate the left wing base even more. I, however, personally welcome this strategic error, and look forward to their futile attempts to regulate free speech and people's bodies.

I'll never stop loving Rummy, with his bizarre speech patterns and hand-waving, who will ever forget this guy?


We will be telling Rumsfeld stories to our children, including the time he levitated the seal of the Pentagon.


However, not everyone loves Rumsfeld, and general after general comes out and says he's a disaster. Which leads to the question, just what does it mean when six generals come out against a secretary of defense? Slate answers if a bit disingenuously. After all, it's not that six is a huge number considering about 4,700 officers of similar rank exist. It's just that it's rare for officers to criticize their superiors in public at all. Things have to be pretty bad for even six guys to come forward for a group WTF.

Anyway, it probably doesn't help that Rummy's now been tied to prisoner abuse.

In other news, Nebraska is re-segregating it's schools and Scalia is still freaking crazy.

To raise awareness about the illegal immigrant issue, some College Republicans at Penn State intended to have a "catch an illegal immigrant" game.

Sadly, this effort to prove to everyone Republicans are racist asshats failed as people with brains apparently go to Penn State as well, and shut these guys down.

Unperturbed, they plan on raising awareness of the injustice of affirmative action with a "lynch a negro" game, and on the dangers of feminism with a "burn a witch" game.

Ah, Republicans. You really don't have to do anything, they'll just incriminate themselves given enough time.

It seems that the obvious fact that antiwar protests hurt liberals more than they help is starting to catch on in liberal circles. This diary at kos is interesting because it hits the major points, and the comments nearly all are supportive of the idea that ANSWER jackasses ruin just about every thing they touch like a magic shit wand.

I hope everyone learns to give up on protesting, at least until people are pissed off enough to do it in an organized, intelligent fashion. Anyway, protesting right now is stupid and counterproductive for these reasons:

1. The people who show up are more interested in acting like jackasses than changing peoples minds. It's like a giant outlet for kids to just piss-off their parents, not change foreign policy.
   
2. Protests become magnets for every jackass left-wing cause like "free Mumia" and those obnoxious anarchists (who have probably never even read Emma Goldman) that show up wearing all black and act like idiots.
   
3. No one dresses correctly, they wear hippy clothes and emulate the failed protests of their parents' generation, rather than the effective ones by MLK which succeeded precisely because the protesters looked respectful while the racist asshats looked like, well, racist asshats.
   
4. No one gets upset when cops beat up hippies and anarchists, in fact, the people whose minds you are trying to change love it. I admit it, when a cop beats a hippy or a kid wearing all black in combat boots I feel nothing but joy too. I want to see hippies getting beaten up, it should replace baseball as our national pastime. Ask anyone even slightly conservative and they'll agree, and these are the people who you are asking to change their minds.
   

The rules for all future pro-environment, anti-war etc. protests should be based upon the idea that you are protesting to convince people that your idea is good, right, and reasonable. They should include the following provisions if they wish to have any success and not just be immediately ignored by the majority of Americans.

1. No one may wear costumes, build puppets, or carry signs with dirty language. If these people show up, they are the ones who get the attention, and your message is immediately and totally destroyed. Tell them to leave and never come back.
   
2. People should wear their best clothing. No one is too upset when a anarchists gets the snot beaten out of them. They get very upset when cops beat up men and women that look like them. So, dress like the people whose minds you are trying to change. Wear suits, dresses, and put on your best face. This is like a job interview for your idea of changing the world.
   
3. Protesters should know why they are there, be respectful to the media, and if interviewed, be prepared to say something succinct and informed about why they are there. Do not give the finger to the cameras (and I'm someone who loves giving people the finger).
   

Three simple rules for effective protests. Will left-wingers listen? Probably not, the pot smoker contingent always seems to screw it up. That's why we give up, because it's wasted energy. Once people are willing to have a serious protest, then we might decide to show up again.

Beware! Take care! Beware!

Your university apparently has a ninja problem. Or it has a hot-ass cop problem. Yep, definitely a problem with hot-ass cops.

Why in the world would they think that a guy dressed as a ninja on a college campus is an actual ninja assassin? Are they completely separated from the ironic culture of our generation? Have they never heard of the eternal war between pirates and ninjas?

Ransom was wearing black sweatpants and an athletic T-shirt with one red bandanna covering the bottom half of his face and another covering the top of his head, Williamson said.

"Seeing someone with something across the face, from a federal standpoint - that's not right," McLemore said, explaining why agents believed something to be amiss.

Welcome to America. Don't cover your head. If you wear a burka be prepared to be shot on sight.

**Update** Here's the full size pic.

The New York times has a great article about the clerk who has sent out notices for jury duty for the last billion years in the city, Norman Goodman, and the many bizarre responses from celebrities to being selected.

This is largely irrelevant to giving up, except that it's just so freaking funny. You have to read about what Woody Allen did.

Woody Allen sent a note, in cramped printing, protesting that he had been so traumatized by his experience in court during a child-custody dispute with Mia Farrow that returning to sit on a jury was out of the question.
...
Mr. Goodman, a strong believer in equal treatment, insisted that Mr. Allen show up, bad memories and all. Mr. Allen arrived wearing what Mr. Goodman describes as "army fatigues and a Fidel Castro cap," surrounded by his lawyer, his agent and a bodyguard. Mr. Goodman escorted him to the jury room, where Mr. Allen insisted on standing, rather than sitting like everybody else. The rest of the jurors gawked at him.

"We eventually offered him the opportunity to get out of there," Mr. Goodman said. "Frankly, we were glad to get rid of him."

That has got to be the absolute best way ever of getting out of jury duty. My god, I still can't stand him because he's a creepy pedophile and all, but damn, that's some good humor.

A teacher in Kansas has gotten in trouble with state school board members for posting a picture of the flying spaghetti monster on her door.

Since the new goal of IDers is to "teach the debate" I think this is great. FSM is definitely part of the debate, and he will smite you with a noodly appendage if you remove his graven image from this school.

Not much in Give Up news today.

As usual, we are spending more than we have. Fully 33% of our budget is deficit spending if I read this article correctly.

And Scalia, surprise surprise, seems to be mad with power. He's the kind of guy that really makes you question lifetime appointments.

A bunch of retired generals have said that Rumsfeld should resign. No surprise there, these are people who actually know how to run a military.

Finally, another entry for the obvious files. When a drug company pays for a study, 9 out of 10 times the study favors the drug from the company paying for the study. Even more striking, the analysis showed that conflicts between studies, where one study payed for by one drug company would conflict with a similar study from another company, the only real difference being who payed for it.

I never cease to be amazed at how certain bigots in the Christian fundamentalist movement just never seem to get this whole religious-freedom thing.

It seems that to them, religious freedom means that everyone has to play by your moral rules, and that no one can then criticize them or try to ameliorate your bigotry.

This LA Times article The "Christians Sue for Right Not to Tolerate Policies" is a must-read on the topic. Now they are suing to end non-discrimination policies, because it is against their religion to tolerate other people.

Malhotra says her Christian faith compels her to speak out against homosexuality. But the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she's a senior, bans speech that puts down others because of their sexual orientation.

Malhotra sees that as an unacceptable infringement on her right to religious expression. So she's demanding that Georgia Tech revoke its tolerance policy.
...
The Rev. Rick Scarborough, a leading evangelical, frames the movement as the civil rights struggle of the 21st century. "Christians," he said, "are going to have to take a stand for the right to be Christian."

Why is it so hard for these people to understand that you can display whatever bigotry you want in your church, with your kids, in your home-school, whatever, but not at work or in government. Your bigotry is safe in the private realm. However, your bigotry is not safe in the public realm where we all have to get along. Employers, universities, schools, whatever, forcing you to maintain the bare-minimum of civility to your fellow man are not violating your civil rights, they're just protecting the civil rights of those minorities. Why is that so hard to understand?

Of course, the second you mention that white separatists could just claim non-discrimination policies against blacks are just a violation of their rights according this argument, they throw a fucking hissy-fit.

"What if a person felt their religious view was that African Americans shouldn't mingle with Caucasians, or that women shouldn't work?" asked Jon Davidson, legal director of the gay rights group Lambda Legal.

Christian activist Gregory S. Baylor responds to such criticism angrily. He says he supports policies that protect people from discrimination based on race and gender. But he draws a distinction that infuriates gay rights activists when he argues that sexual orientation is different — a lifestyle choice, not an inborn trait.

By equating homosexuality with race, Baylor said, tolerance policies put conservative evangelicals in the same category as racists. He predicts the government will one day revoke the tax-exempt status of churches that preach homosexuality is sinful or that refuse to hire gays and lesbians.

"Think how marginalized racists are," said Baylor, who directs the Christian Legal Society's Center for Law and Religious Freedom. "If we don't address this now, it will only get worse."

Sorry, homosexuality is not a choice, never has been, never will be. Also, yes, one day you will be marginalized for being the bigots you are, it's called progress. Sorry, deal with it. It will get worse, you deserve it, and one day, hopefully, you'll be ashamed for the way you've behaved towards homosexuals.

Everyone should consider adding JJ Sutherland's blog to your RSS feed. He's an NPR producer/correspondent in Baghdad, and his blogging on the city is fascinating and frightening. We keep on hearing about how the bad news is being exaggerated, and I get the fealing the opposite is true. Baghdad sounds like total hell.

His most recent entry is about US snipers and how they don't appreciate his clumsiness.

The snipers laugh and joke, but are deadly, deadly serious. One soldier tells me a story about a sniper who was interviewed on CNN a little while ago. When asked what he feels when he shoots somebody, he replied, "Recoil." There is a young man's bravado in their talk, but they do seem to have a deep self-assurance that, when called upon, they can make the shot.

Near their position, the men have this tarp blocking the view and the sun from one direction. I was looking for someone, didn't know my way around, and tried to gently pull the tarp aside to peer behind it. And it came down. The snipers were not happy.

"There's a reason we have that there," one said coldly. I panicked and tried to push the thumbtack that held it back in, but I bent the thumbtack. "I'll handle it," said the sniper who quickly took the tarp from me. I meekly walked away, incredibly embarrassed and feeling guilty.

Great, I'm in Iraq and have managed to piss off a bunch of snipers. One of them told me earlier he could make a shot at 1200 meters. Wonderful.

I was sold on his blog with his first entry from Baghdad.

The tension here is the worst I've ever seen it. Just talking to people they seem more on edge. The ongoing sectarian violence is unnerving. Dozens of bodies turn up every day, bound and blindfolded, shot in the head. The discussions I have about security are also different... a lot of, "What do we do if...?" That "if" seems to be more plausible, and on a more frightening scale.

And his entry on the executions in Baghdad is shocking.

I get a call the other night. They've found four more bodies in western Baghdad. They're bound, hands and feet. They're blindfolded. They've been shot in the head. Their bodies bear wounds from beatings and electrical burns, and someone has used a drill on their flesh. That's just one phone call. I get a few more. Every night it seems, dozens of bodies turn up, both Shiite and Sunni, often killed in the same fashion.
...
It is becoming very clear to me that war can shatter a society and what it becomes as it puts itself back together can become a warped malefic grotesquerie -- a social organism that eagerly eats itself alive.

At a press conference the other day, an American general said he thinks that Iraqis feel more secure. I think most of the Iraqis I've spoken with since I've been here might have a slightly different perspective.

Check it.

With all the talk of gas between $3-5 this summer, guess which cities are going to take it in the rear? Not surprisingly it will be those Red state cities where the citizens are going to be up shit creek, but hey, that's what you get when you elect semi-retarded oil men to run your country into the ground.

The top cities for sustainability in an energy crisis are as follows:

1. New York, NY
2. Boston, MA
3. San Francisco, CA
4. Chicago, IL
5. Philadelphia, PA
6. Portland, OR
7. Honolulu, HI
8. Seattle, WA
9. Baltimore, MD
10.Oakland, CA

Notice anything? The worst ten cities are as follows:

41. Tulsa, OK
42. Nashville, TN
43. Arlington, TX
44. Memphis, TN
45. Columbus, OH
46. Virginia Beach, VA
47. Indianapolis, IN
48. Fort Worth, TX
49. Louisville, KY
50. Oklahoma City, OK

Los Angeles ranks a surprising 19 out of 50.

I for one have no sympathy for anyone in this country, Democrat or Republican who complains about high gas prices. How many decades do you have to be warned about a problem before you took steps to protect yourself? And more so for the Red states. If you elected retarded Republican oil men and allow pro-sprawl developers to take over your cities, you deserve to experience the full brunt of retarded energy policy and poor city planning.

It also reminds me of all the talk we hear of "exurbs" or whatever and how they're quasi-Republican strongholds. If we experience gas > $5 gallon for extended periods those exurbs are going to be ghost towns, and the former residents aren't going to be forgiving towards the idiots who failed to plan for the obvious.

Via SustainLane.com.

PLoS Medicine continues to show that public journals not only are a superior method of publishing scientific papers but also serve the public better by presenting unbiased, and often unpopular views, in a forum accessible to all.

This month, it is a series of 11 articles exposing efforts by drug companies to exaggerate and redefine diseases to increase their revenue. The London Times has a lay article on these papers.

And why are drug companies able to do this? Well, direct to consumer advertising (DTCA) of course, (see this article as well). This is a problem mostly confined to the United States of course, mainly because we're the only country on earth stupid enough to allow DTCA (New Zealand is in the process of abandoning the process again). Here's PLoS' take on the problem of letting markets justify patient care:

Because illness is one of the most tangible forms of suffering, the pharmaceutical industry, more than other industries, can link its marketing activities to ethical objectives. The result is a marriage of the profit-seeking scheme in which disease is regarded as "an opportunity" to the ethical view that mankind's health hangs in the balance. Marketers and consumers in the West to some extent share a common vision of needs and the terms of their satisfaction. This apparent complicity helps even the most aggressive marketers trust that they are performing a public service. Pharmaceutical company managers that I speak to signal this when they characterize their engagement with the public as "doing good while doing well."

These managers also see nothing wrong with integrating doctors, patients, and other players into the drug distribution channel. On the contrary, they say, this is state-of-the-art management, making it professionally principled and tactically astute. Marketers also regard the incorporation of consumers into the channel as ethical because then people's needs can best be determined and satisfied, conferring upon them the power of self-determination through choice.

But this choice is an illusion. For in our pursuit of a near-utopian promise of perfect health, we have, without realizing it, given corporate marketers free reign to take control of the true instruments of our freedom: objectivity in science, ethics and fairness in health care, and the privilege to endow medicine with the autonomy to fulfill its oath to work for the benefit of the sick.

Their recommendation? Ban DTCA!

The prohibition of DTCA is consistent with regulatory aims to protect health and encourage appropriate medicine use. Unbranded disease-awareness campaigns for the condition a manufacturer's drug aims to treat are a form of DTCA. If these adverts are allowed under laws guaranteeing commercial freedom of expression, a regulatory rationale remains to (1) de-link them from suggestions to "ask your doctor" for a treatment and (2) to insist on prescreening of adverts by a government agency to ensure conformity with the law before they are broadcast or printed. Similarly, drug company funding of media promotions aiming to stimulate sales should be subject to the same regulatory control as direct advertising.
...
A key question is whether there is sufficient political will among government regulatory agencies to better enforce existing regulations governing drug promotion or to introduce new solutions. Most regulatory agencies fail to treat regulation of drug promotion as a public health concern. Unless this changes, the public can expect more unfettered disease mongering warning them that without the latest treatment, life will be grim indeed.

Finally, does anyone believe this is a new problem? Should we have seen this coming when Clin-ton legalized DTCA? Probably, and I love the quote they find to show how people used to feel about the pushing of drugs 112 years ago.

Henry James's psychologist brother, William James, was so exasperated by "the medical advertisement abomination" that in 1894 he declared that "the authors of these advertisements should be treated as public enemies and have no mercy shown"

Great stuff from PLoS as always. How much do you want to bet that the US media is too thoroughly owned by these companies and their ad revenue to even cover that a major scientific journal has extensively exposed the harm of DTCA? This will have to remain a Give Up Blog exclusive, at least in this fricking country.

Give Up readers, this is the future that the Republicans plan to inflict on their constituents. It is called El Salvador, and they have banned abortion. All abortion. You have an ectopic pregnancy? Too bad, they wait until it bursts, then they operate. They have vagina inspectors that investigate miscarriages. Do you think if the people knew this is the ultimate agenda of right-wingers that they would keep voting for them?

In this new movement toward criminalization, El Salvador is in the vanguard. The array of exceptions that tend to exist even in countries where abortion is circumscribed - rape, incest, fetal malformation, life of the mother - don't apply in El Salvador. They were rejected in the late 1990's, in a period after the country's long civil war ended. The country's penal system was revamped and its constitution was amended. Abortion is now absolutely forbidden in every possible circumstance. No exceptions.

El Salvador, however, has not only a total ban on abortion but also an active law-enforcement apparatus - the police, investigators, medical spies, forensic vagina inspectors and a special division of the prosecutor's office responsible for Crimes Against Minors and Women, a unit charged with capturing, trying and incarcerating an unusual kind of criminal.
...
In El Salvador, the law is clear: the woman is a felon and must be prosecuted. According to Topez, after a report comes in from a doctor or a hospital that a woman has arrived who is suspected of having had an abortion, and after the police are dispatched, investigators start procuring evidence of the crime. In that first stage, Topez has 72 hours to make the case to a justice of the peace that there should be a further investigation. If enough evidence is collected, she presents the case before a magistrate to get authorization for a full criminal trial before a judge.

During the first round of investigations, police officers interview the woman's family and friends. "The collecting of evidence usually takes place where the events transpired — by visiting the home or by speaking with the doctor at the hospital," Topez said. In some cases, the police also interrogate people who work with the woman. Topez added that that didn't happen very often because, she said, "these are women who don't work outside the home." (Indeed, the evidence suggests that the ban in El Salvador disproportionately affects poor women. The researchers who conducted the Journal of Public Health study found that common occupations listed for women charged with abortion-related crimes were homemaker, student, housekeeper and market vendor. The earlier study by the Center for Reproductive Rights found that the majority were domestic servants, followed by factory workers, ticket takers on buses, housewives, saleswomen and messengers.)

As they do in any investigation, the police collect evidence by interviewing everyone who knows the accused and by seizing her medical records. But they must also visit the scene of the crime, which, following the logic of the law, often means the woman's vagina.

Well, you say, surely pro-lifers in this country don't want this extreme? Think again.

The legislative battle and its outcome did not escape the attention of leaders of anti-abortion groups in the United States. Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer, the head of Human Life International, based in Virginia, is intimately familiar with the campaign in El Salvador and says that there are lessons for Americans to learn from it. For one thing, as Euteneuer sees it, the Salvadoran experience shows that all moves to expand abortion rights are pushed through by "elite" institutions of government (the U.S. Supreme Court, for example); by contrast, Euteneuer contends, when the laws are tightened, a grass-roots campaign is inevitably responsible. "El Salvador is an inspiration," he told me recently, an important victory in what he called "the counterrevolution of conscience."

And yes, the Da Vinci code is right. Opus Dei is totally fucking evil.

The pope's appointment of Lacalle 11 years ago brought to the Archdiocese of San Salvador a different kind of religious leader. Lacalle, an outspoken member of the conservative Catholic group Opus Dei, redirected the country's church politics. Lacalle's predecessors were just as firmly opposed to abortion as he was. What he brought to the country's anti-abortion movement was a new determination to turn that opposition into state legislation and a belief that the church should play a public role in the process. In 1997, conservative legislators in the Assembly introduced a bill that would ban abortion in all circumstances. The archbishop campaigned actively for its passage.

This article also shows that the future solution to abortion bans is clearly black market misoprostol.

"I show people how to put the misoprostol in and tell them that when they go to the hospital just to say, 'I started bleeding,"' this doctor explained. "There is no way that can be detected." The only problem, she went on to say, was that "some women go right to the hospital when there's initial staining." Then, if a doctor or nurse finds a half-dissolved pill during a pelvic exam, they are obliged to call the police.

Beware the cult of the fetus!

At one demonstration, members of the group sprinkled the National Assembly with holy water. To punctuate her campaign, de Cardenal arranged to have two pregnant women come to the Assembly and have ultrasounds publicly performed on their fetuses.

Bow down before your god! The FETUS!



Abortion rights is a majority issue, because only the insane think that a serious ban on abortion is a good thing. Inflicting this crap on Americans will create the ultimate backlash, and I think, even suggesting that this be inflicted on Americans will lead to the destruction of Republicans nation-wide.

Just so everyone knows, yes, the administration continues to lie shamelessly about the Plame affair.

Now they are saying that the information released was to help the public understand the importance of the Iraq war, however, the information released to impugn Wilson's claims had been debunked months before.

Further, claims by those such as Fred Hiatt, that hack editor of the post, that the president's leaks weren't designed to target Wilson are being rejected by Pat Fitzgerald who says that the leak campaign was a:

"concerted action" by "multiple people in the White House" -- using classified information -- to "discredit, punish or seek revenge against" a critic of President Bush's war in Iraq.

And, just in case you thought maybe Libby is just lying to save his ass, White House officials have confirmed that Bush approved the leaks. So, just to make everything clear, yes they are still lying, nothing has changed.

They are also continuing to lie about the state of Iraq. The government's own reports suggest that the picture in Iraq is not one of progress as the president has said. Not surprising considering the bombings killing dozens of people and Prime minister Mubarak of Egypt has suggested shiites in Iraq are more loyal to Iran than their own countrymen.

Like AAP has been saying, this should be the new first law of presidential politics. Whenever the administration makes any statement of fact, especially if it is done with conviction or emphasis, it is a lie. My corollary to this law is that it is easier for everyone if you just automatically assume everything they say is a lie, and spend your time looking for the few instances in which they are truthful. It just saves time.

Well, Hersh was wrong last year when he said we would be attacking Iran emminently, but he continues to bring attention to the excess of sabre-rattling over Iran.

Current and former American military and intelligence officials said that Air Force planning groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-government ethnic-minority groups. The officials say that President Bush is determined to deny the Iranian regime the opportunity to begin a pilot program, planned for this spring, to enrich uranium.
...
A government consultant with close ties to the civilian leadership in the Pentagon said that Bush was "absolutely convinced that Iran is going to get the bomb" if it is not stopped. He said that the President believes that he must do "what no Democrat or Republican, if elected in the future, would have the courage to do," and "that saving Iran is going to be his legacy."

Uh oh.

One former defense official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the Bush Administration, told me that the military planning was premised on a belief that "a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government." He added, "I was shocked when I heard it, and asked myself, 'What are they smoking?'"

Exactly! What are these people smoking? This is like when we attacked Iraq they said they would greet us with flowers. Well, I guess since it was Iraq, they didn't have a lot of flowers. Instead they threw what they had, mainly IED's. Anyway, think about the reverse, what if the Iranians bombed the shit out of our country? Would we rise up and overthrow Bush just because the majority of us are dissatisfied with him (and a fair number of us hate him with fiery laser-beam eyes of death)? Not bloody likely.

In recent weeks, the President has quietly initiated a series of talks on plans for Iran with a few key senators and members of Congress, including at least one Democrat. A senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, who did not take part in the meetings but has discussed their content with his colleagues, told me that there had been "no formal briefings," because "they're reluctant to brief the minority. They're doing the Senate, somewhat selectively."

How much do you want to bet that the "one democrat" is Joe Lieberman? He's not much of a Democrat anyway, and he's probably the only one you could rely on not to leak that they're planning to attack Iran.

In a way though, this makes a lot of sense. There's a lot of loose ends that are tied up nicely with this explanation, that the administration is planning to attack Iran. For instance, why did they want to pull out of the nuclear non-proliferation treaties to develop bunker-busters? Maybe because Iran is building facilities deep underground? Why do they continue to insist they have the right to strike countries preemptively?

It gets worse.

"The people they're briefing are the same ones who led the charge on Iraq. At most, questions are raised: How are you going to hit all the sites at once? How are you going to get deep enough?" (Iran is building facilities underground.) "There's no pressure from Congress" not to take military action, the House member added. "The only political pressure is from the guys who want to do it." Speaking of President Bush, the House member said, "The most worrisome thing is that this guy has a messianic vision."

If Bush attacks Iran, it will be the end of him, the end of the Republicans, and quite possibly, the end of our military. We're already over-extended, and what makes you think they'd plan this one any better? Such a plan reeks of a future draft. Unless their plan is just to bomb the country to hell, and leave forever, this could an unparalleled disaster.

There's a gem of a quote in an article appearing in today's Washington Post concerning Zbigniew Brzezinski's opposition to installing a sidewalk in his suburban Virginia neighborhood. Sounds like Brzezinski is being a creep about the sidewalk, but check out this quote critiquing Northern Virginia's McMansion culture:

In the middle of it all are longtime residents such as Brzezinski...He bought his five-acre estate, with its relatively modest, older house, nearly 30 years ago. He doesn't much care for the mansions going up all around him, saying in an interview that they are "reflective of cultural pretension and pomposity" and "make the whole area look like a joke, a Disneyland imitation of the European aristocracy, without the land."

Looks like Republicans continue to dig their own graves. Indian tribes are returning a federal grant that Conrad Burns gave them, I'm sure in response to a bribe.

A wealthy Indian tribe once represented by former lobbyist Jack Abramoff said yesterday that it has decided to return a $3 million federal school-construction grant it received as a result of pressure exerted on Interior Department officials by Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.).
...
A federal task force investigating congressional corruption is looking into actions by Burns and members of his staff in obtaining the grant, according to people involved in the probe.

Burns, who oversees the budget of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, pressed for the funding over the objections of Interior officials, who said that the money was intended to improve dilapidated tribal schools, not build new ones for wealthy tribes.

The Washington Post reported last year that Burns pushed Interior to reverse its decision that the tribe did not qualify for the funds, and when that failed, he earmarked the money in a 2004 appropriations bill.

That certainly doesn't pass the smell test.

Also, Harry Taylor is a hero.

How much do you want to bet that this article means that they've been spying on domestic calls for years?

Delay will not leave the news quietly. Check out this article on how he sent out a bunch of toughs to rough up some old ladies.

Supporters of U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay protested at an event Thursday held by the Democratic candidate for the congressman's seat, and the event quickly dissolved into a shouting and shoving match. Police were called, but made no arrests.

"I got pushed. I got hit. I got a sign wadded up in my face and my hat pulled down over my eyes," said Marsha Rovai, 69, a supporter of Nick Lampson. "They just did it to be nasty."

DeLay campaign manager Chris Homan said he organized the protest but DeLay, a Republican, didn't know about it.

Don't believe that shit about Delay not knowing about it either. Kos had quotes up yesterday from Delay proving he told them to go and disrupt the event himself.

Finally, in science this week, we get the best title ever award. Generating Optical Schrodinger Kittens for Quantum Information Processing. I'm sad to say, I actually kind of understand the article, damn physics geeks.

Check out this coverage of an anti-HIV clinical trial in SFGate.

This article is really neat. The researchers purify out hematopoietic stem cells from patients, transduce them with a mouse (lenti?)virus containing a ribozyme designed to destroy one of the HIV transcripts, and reinfuse them into patients.

Apparently they have a few patients now living off medications with undetectable levels of virus.

Very impressive, especially considering that this is using a single-ribozyme. Ribozymes, by the way, are kind of out. They're hard to design, don't always work, etc. Imagine what you could do these days with siRNA and miRNA. At the same time you knock out viral transcripts you could target the receptors that HIV uses to gain access to cells. And since hematopoietic stem cells will eventually replace all of your blood cells, from white cells to RBCs, you'll eventually have an HIV-resistant blood supply coursing through the old veins.

If they got this level of success from a single ribozyme, this looks like great potential for a future cure. Let's just hope that damn lentivirus doesn't cause leukemia like in that SIDS trial.

I'm trying to make it sound like, "I did not have sexual-relations with that woman, Monica Lewinsky."

Bush just got nailed in his biggest lie yet. Scooter says that Cheney told him that Bush specifically authorized the Plameintelligence leaks. See the Smoking Gun documentation here. Now, does this mean he specifically said to out Plame? Or just leak classified information? Was Plame a bonus? Also, do we really believe that Cheney takes orders from Bush?

Now that's a whopper! Remember when he told us that he'd fire anyone involved in the leak? Well, since he's such a liar I guess we can't expect him to keep his word and resign.

The lay press is full of stories about a new missing-link fossil that shows how animals made the transition from the sea to land. The Nature news link here and the papers here and here



So, anyone think this will change anyone's mind? I'm torn between being excited for the new find and depressed upon the realization that it's only convincing evidence to those of us in the reality-based community.

Similarly, people in the reality-based community are probably excited to see the cervical cancer vaccine is highly efficacious according to clinical trials ongoing for 4 1/2 years, but I remain depressed because I know right-wingers will vilify this vaccine as "the sex vaccine" and prevent its widespread use in our country. Even if it can prevent the spread of HPV, possibly be used to eliminate it from the human population, and prevent about 5000 deaths from cervical cancer a year.

*sigh*

Well, the Blue states are kicking some ass again. Aside from the wonderful actions of NYAG Eliot Spitzer, Massachusetts is showing the country it's a real Blue state by offering universal health care. While all the Red states are failing their citizens miserably (probably because Bush tax cuts are actively enriching multimillionaires), Massachusetts is actually extending services to its citizens.

Go Massachusetts, the bluest of the Blue states. Even if they have a stinking Republican governor like New York, California or Maryland (notice in all four of these states the Republican governors are widely seen as ineffective failures obstructing effective legislation by Democrats).

Second, consider these two important news stories. One, I can walk on water when it freezes too, and bug extermination should not be attempted in the nude.

Wait, let's make that three news stories of importance. Another Bush administration employee is going to jail. This time, it's the DHS press secretary getting nailed for child molestation. That might not be as high profile as Claude Allen, but still, a pedophile? The worst guy in the Clinton administration accepted Superbowl tickets. These Republicans definitely have us beat. They've got crime covered from shoplifting, to pedophilia, to conspiracy, to fraud, to bribery, to money laundering, to *ahem* war crimes. Man, I miss Clin-ton.

**Update** Read this WaPo article on Massachusetts new health insurance scheme. It's amazing. They're actually requiring their citizens to purchase health care (with a progressive system to protect those below the poverty line). They've changed health insurance into a system like car insurance. I think it's kind of genius!

"We insist that everybody who drives a car has insurance," Romney said in an interview. "And cars are a lot less expensive than people."
...
What resulted is a proposal that health-care experts say is unlike any other in the country. What to do about the 45 million Americans without health insurance has flummoxed both the Bush administration, whose proposal for "health savings accounts" fizzled, and that of Bill Clinton, whose broad plan for health-care changes fell flat.

On the state level, Hawaii and Maine have programs that seek to offer near-universal access to health insurance, and Illinois last year approved a subsidy plan that will widely increase coverage for needy children.

But no state, experts say, has taken the step of making health insurance coverage a legal requirement. The idea was applauded by Uwe E. Reinhardt, a professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, who said that he has long believed that the American system of allowing uninsured patients to receive care at the government's expense was nothing more than "freedom to mooch."

"Massachusetts is the first state in America to reach full adulthood," said Reinhardt, noting that the new measure is a move toward personal responsibility. "The rest of America is still in adolescence."

Holy crap! I agree, this is a move towards personal responsibility, just like the right-wingers always claim they're for, but wait until they hear about this shit! They're going to go crazy.

Amid reports of even more misery coming out of Detroit, here's a little levity. Chevy decided to let anyone and everyone make ads for their Tahoe behemoth - they give a website with stock footage, vroomy soundtrack, and the ability to put any words over top of it. They wanted people to say how great this stupid SUV is.

This is what they got. The Times has an article here.

Now he's suing spyware vendors. Check it:

New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer accused an Internet advertising company of secretly installing "spyware" on millions of personal computers to deliver pop-up ads.

Mr. Spitzer is seeking a court order in state Supreme Court blocking New York-based Direct Revenue LLC from allegedly installing millions of pop-up ad programs that he said also monitor the Internet activity of users.

"These applications are deceptive and unfair to consumers, bad for businesses that rely on efficient networks to do their jobs, and bad for online retailers that need consumers to trust and enjoy their online experience," Mr. Spitzer said in a press release. "We will continue to side with consumers in their fight for control of their desktops."

Go Spitzer! He always takes on real creeps, and is a great example of a Give Up AG. Because he's so good at consumer protection and his state is so powerful and populous, effectively every corporation in the country has to abide by New York's rules, by which I mean Spitzer's rules. He provides consumer protection for the whole nation through his actions. Another example of why Blue states rock, when was the last time you heard about a Red state AG doing something good? Instead you hear about them attempting to pry through abortion clinics' records to try to shame the heathens. The last Red state AG I can remember doing anything good at all was the Texas AG suing Sony over the rootkit DRM (which I think Spitzer did too). This is what good AG's should be doing, and Spitzer is by far the best AG in the country.

Hey Buck,what do you think of this new house bill, the Data Accountability and Trust Act?

Is this actually going to stick it to the direct marketers and credit-reporting agencies? Or is it yet another federal bill designed to render good state legislation toothless (like the new fuel efficiency bill that targets California's emissions program)?

By the way, should we even believe this NYT editorial on the new fuel efficiency bill that says that, "only the federal government has the authority to set fuel efficiency standards and that any state program that has the effect of changing these standards is illegal." Wouldn't such a measure be blatantly unenforceable and unconstitutional? Hasn't California essentially been increasing fuel efficiency through their extremely high inspection standards already? I don't know, it seems like a foolish thing to try to force because the right wingers on the courts might just back the states' rights against the Bushies and for our Californian friends.

Readers aren't clamoring for it. It's advertisers who want it.

Clickz news reports:

NYTimes.com Builds Original Video Inventory to Satisfy Advertiser Demand
By Kate Kaye | April 3, 2006

The Times they are a-changin' again. New and planned NYTimes.com enhancements bring additional video ad inventory and sponsorship opportunities as well as promises of a more personalized experience for the news site's readers.

As part of a host of new site features to be launched in the coming weeks, NYTimes.com will now present more original video content directly on its homepage, most main site section pages and link to it via a navigation tab at the top of each page.

"There's just going to be more inventory for video [ads]," said Alyson Racer, VP sales at NYTimes.com, adding, "You hear it across the Web; there's a thirst for this kind of inventory." She noted that Lexus and AT&T will be running pre-roll ads within the site's embedded video content starting today.

Andrew Marks, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, has released a scathing editorial criticizing Elias Zerhouni and the Bush administration's attack on the NIH. For a scientific journal, this type of language is both rare, and very funny.

In the Coen brothers' The Big Lebowski the hero, who calls himself "The Dude," has just had his apartment broken into by some dumb thugs. One of the thugs lifts the Dude's prized bowling ball and says, "What . . . is this?" The Dude replies, "Obviously you are not a golfer." The current state of the NIH prompts me to say to its director, Dr. Elias Zerhouni, "Obviously you are not a scientist."

This is true, Zerhouni is famous for being a big donor to the Bush campaign, not for being a leader in science. He made his dough in the field of angioplasty catheters, but in terms of science, he's got the publications but nothing really groundbreaking, mostly publications in his trade journals (not that I would knock such research, but you typically don't get to be head of NIH with that record). It's also sad to note how far down the ladder the Bush administration had to go to find a scientist that would be loyal to them. Marks continues:

Dr. Zerhouni's apparent lack of understanding of how science is done is compounded by the utter lack of support for biomedical science from the White House and Congress. Neither Democrats nor Republicans appear to understand the key role of science in the nation's health, welfare, and economy. The White House under George W. Bush is targeting the NIH for destruction.

...the use of the term road map to describe Dr. Zerhouni's new directions for the NIH is misleading: a road map is a document that helps its readers locate their present locations, plot a course to a new location, and relocate once they arrive. The NIH Roadmap is not a road map at all, but a yellow brick road: it looks like it will lead us back to Kansas, but the way is really fraught with danger, the end of the road is not really where we want to go, and it is all just a fantasy. It was irresponsible of Dr. Zerhouni to use scarce funds to support his new initiative before protecting the most tried and true mechanism for funding science: the investigator-initiated RO1 grant. Instead, precious resources that the nation's scientists depend on for survival have been diverted to support a new enterprise whose success, directions, and goals are vague and unproven.

These are extremely strong words coming from a scientific journal. But Marks also offers a solution to the current problems facing the NIH.

There are achievable solutions that can reverse the demise of the NIH and rescue one of our nation's most precious resources. First, members of Congress need to step forward and champion the cause of supporting biomedical research. The NIH budget should be restored, with appropriate annual increases. This is an easy sell to the electorate, as every citizen has a vested interest in the development of cures for diseases and technologies that can improve the efficiency and reduce the cost of delivering health care. Second, the Roadmap needs to be shelved and the funds restored to the pool of resources that support investigator-initiated individual RO1 grants. Third, large clinical studies that suck up hundreds of millions of dollars need to be supported by pharmaceutical companies that are eager to fund them. Fourth, the process for funding established investigators needs to be streamlined and focused on productivity rather than on false promises. Some scientists are receiving millions of dollars of precious NIH funding and have little to show for it. Established investigators applying for competitive renewals should be required to provide a brief progress report and outline of proposed new directions along with their top 3-5 papers published in the previous funding period. The study sections could then make renewal contingent on the productivity and impact of the previously funded period, by far the best indicator of future success.

With these four simple steps we can ensure the health of our national scientific research enterprise and rescue the NIH before it is too late. The NIH is an essential component of the scientific community, one that we have grown comfortable with and somewhat taken for granted. Continued misdirection and neglect of the NIH will have long-lasting disastrous consequences for biomedical research and our ability to achieve scientific breakthroughs that can reduce human suffering and save lives.

I would add an additional three suggestions to fix the problems at NIH.

1. Get rid of that stupid fence and excess security that just makes it more difficult for patients, scientists, and visitors to access what should be an open federal facility.
   
2. If you are truly worried about security of the new BL4 bioterror facility, why did you build it right next to Rockville Pike? Why not just locate it in the middle of the campus, and just put a fence around it rather than the entire campus?
   
3. Get rid of the stupid ethics rules that Zerhouni is terrorizing senior scientists with in reaction to the relatively minor conflict of interest scandal concerning senior scientist consulting fees. The solution to the problem was simple, punish the one scientist who was seriously out of line and give a wrist-slap to the other 8 who were borderline. Instead, forcing everyone from scientists to janitors to secretaries (and their spouses) submit to outrageously excessive investment disclosures is yet another barrier to attracting talent to the institution.
   

Finally, if you think that this editorial is an exception to the rule, you should check out what David Baltimore says about this administration and science.

From the Nature article "Science Under Attack":

For Baltimore - Nobel laureate, outgoing president of the California Institute of Technology, president-elect of the AAAS, and arguably the most eminent voice in all of American science - events have reached a tipping point. He suggested that the Bush administration's approach to science stems from its adherence to a particular philosophy of government, that of a 'unitary executive'. Instead of resignedly shrugging their shoulders whenever such a case of scientific manipulation arises, Baltimore argued, scientists need to recognize the potency of the threat that this governmental philosophy represents to the long-cherished independence of US science.
...
Baltimore warned that the doctrine opens the way for "an exertion of executive hegemony over science". He called on researchers to "fight for a very different doctrine" under which "the executive's role is to defend intellectual freedom". In the light of the Bush administration's adherence to this philosophy, he added: "It is no accident that we are seeing such an extensive suppression of science." From someone of Baltimore's experience and reputation, these are strong words.

CNN reports that Tom Delay has dropped out of his race for re-election.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Rep. Tom DeLay will drop out of his re-election race, two Republican congressional sources told CNN on Monday.

DeLay was forced to step down as House majority leader last year after being indicted in his home state of Texas.

DeLay told Time magazine Monday that he and his wife, Christine, had been prepared for an election battle, but that he decided Wednesday to spare his suburban Houston district the mudfest to come.

"This had become a referendum on me," he told the magazine. "So it's better for me to step aside and let it be a referendum on ideas, Republican values and what's important for this district."

That's it! Delay is out for good. And you know what this means? He knows he's going to jail!

Do you think it might have anything to do with his former staffer Tony Rudy pleading guilty to conspiracy charges and cooperating with prosecutors in the Abramoff investigation? Abramoffukah continues!

I don't know about you guys but I think I smell blood in the water.

I too, am extremely excited by the breakthrough reported in yesterday's post and wrote a diary at Kos on the subject.

I think it is important that liberals and Dems jump on this result before some right-winger like Santorum or Lieberman does. Not only because it has the potential to deflate ES cells as a wedge issue to get the right-wingers angry, but because if Santorum endorses the technology, the knee-jerk rejection of it by the entire left-wing is likely to set off an earthquake.

This is a chance to eliminate a stupid partisan fight that consistently brings those crazy blastocyst-loving right wingers to the election booths every couple of years to stick it to those baby-hating Democrats.

One could say that ES cell science is a winner for Democrats, but I don't think so. That would require one to believe that Americans know enough about science and medicine to overcome their emotional reactions to the poor little blastocysts being killed by those evil baby-eating scientists to actually realize that this is the future of biology. I think this new techology is a winner for whichever side picks it up first, hopefully it will be the Dems, and they can still be on the side of science. Now they can just say, hey, we found a compromise that's actually even better than the original. After all, these cells would genetically match their donors. This is great stuff, better than ES cells if they truly are as powerful as these researchers have shown.

Sticking to the, "I am a scientist feed me babies!" message is a mistake as long as a technology as promising as this is out there.

In other news, there can no longer be any doubt, Iraq is in a civil war especially considering a rising refugee problem. I think we've now checked off everything on the list. Death squads killing civilians, people shooting eachother over religion, destruction of holy sites, bombings in markets (not just the occupation is being targeted), open gunfights in the city streets, and now people dividing by religion and fleeing their homes.

"What's true for [mice] is true for [humans], only moreso."

The Post today reports that a US firm has been able to replicate the mouse germ cell to stem cell finding, but using human samples. See the story here. And they suggest that they can use ovarian tissue to do the same work. Imagine - patient-matched stem cells. Huzzah!