Just in time to tell that special someone just how much deficit busting means to you (unless you are Dick Cheney, of course..) the ever entertaining Michael Steele sends me the link to the awesome and hilarious (just not in the way they want it to be) GOP Valentines. Here’s my personal favorite:

Personally, I would make a Nixon one with <expletive deleted>. I would send some of these to my friends, but I don’t think they would enjoy being on Michael Steele’s email list as much as I do.

It would jeopardize my law license.  I swore an oath many years ago to support the Constitution of the United States.  South Carolina is one of those states.

You may not so encumbered.  You may wish to fill out the form, and send five dollars to the South Carolina Secretary of State.  As an attorney, I must advise you that doing so may have adverse repercussions should you wish to enter certain professions or to form certain associations, but at the same time, the First Amendment protects you from criminal prosecution should you merely fill out the form and send your five dollars.

In its ironic way, it may be the best five dollars you ever spent.  If ever an American government needed to be overthrown, it was the government of South Carolina.

H/t: TJIC.

The case of Sean Hopwood, perhaps the most successful jailhouse lawyer in history, begs to differ with Fitzgerald.  Hopwood’s “legal career” has been more significant than mine, and most likely yours.

While for all that I wouldn’t hire Hopwood as a paralegal in a position that involved other peoples’ money, it’s a beautiful story.

Via Orin Kerr.

I used to live in New Orleans. It was the most insane place I have ever been, and that was before their beloved Saints won the Super Bowl. A few random observations of my time in New Orleans (all pre-Katrina, so perhaps no longer as relevant, but still..):

- It is a cliche to say a city bleeds their football team’s colors, but it is true for New Orleans. I was there when the Saints were awful (and Mike Ditka gave away the entire draft for Ricky Williams) and still it was all the sports anyone talked about. I used Saint’s box scores to teach my students math. It was a lot easier to understand averages if you were figuring out yards per rush.

- Celebrations are just different there. Before the winter break, the school district had us send home a letter to parents reminding them that the bullets they shot in the air would come down somewhere, and might be dangerous. Note: the letter was not silly enough to suggest they not do so, merely that they be careful.

- Somehow, things that are bad ideas still get done in New Orleans. Example, for St. Patricks Day they have a Mardi Gras style parade. Along with the usual cups, beads, the various floats throw heads of cabbage! While watching this parade I witnessed two windows broken by flying cabbage, to the general amusement of all.

- In short, New Orleans is not like the rest of the world. Congratulations to all the Saints fans out there, party safe, but still party.

Former Equestrian Show Horse fan and FEMA Director Michael Brown is picking the Colts to win the Superbowl. That’s strange, it’s not like him to ignore New Orleans…

Japanese Astronaut Soichi Noguchi posted a twitter picture of the Golden Gate Bridge as seen from space. As you’d expect it’s really quite lovely.

I did enjoy the comments suggesting how he might make the photo better with photoshop. I’m sure the ISS has photoshop installed and ready to go.

Man invents $7,000 sex robot.

The picture really makes the article.  Tell me you aren’t surprised a dude like that would’ve either A) killed his parents because they wouldn’t let him raid in WoW anymore or B) use his advanced AI program to design a robot that you can hump.

I think we found the man to pull us through these tough economic times.

Why do I love this quote so much? Is it the total lack of self awareness? The pitiful nature of it? The fact that her mother’s response is the most true thing she has probably ever been around? I’m not sure.

Reality TV star Heidi Montag had massive amounts of plastic surgery to remake herself. She waited a long time to show her family her new look. Here (in Ms. Montag’s own words) is what happened:

“She was looking at me almost like a zoo animal. It wasn’t like I was her daughter anymore. She was looking at me like I was a circus freak. I tried to leave it as best as I could, but my heart was breaking.”

Hmm. I wonder why she would look at you like that? Maybe the problem is with you, not her.

Reports from North Korea indicate that the nation has fallen below Mordor as a desirable place to live.

[O]rganized protest was impossible. But many expressed their anger by discarding the worthless currency.

Some threw it into the wind from motorbikes, others made bonfires or tossed the money into the ocean, according to North Korea Today, a newsletter produced by a Seoul-based Buddhist charity with sources in the country. Arrests followed, the newsletter reported, and at least one man was executed — not only because the law requires the old notes to be turned in, but because desecration of the image of the nation’s late founder, Kim Il Sung, whose portrait was on the currency, is considered treason.

But that’s not all.

Even in the days of communism, there were reports from Eastern Bloc and Cuban diplomats about the paranoid character of the system (which had no concept of deterrence and told its own people that it had signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty in bad faith) and also about its intense hatred of foreigners. A black Cuban diplomat was almost lynched when he tried to show his family the sights of Pyongyang. North Korean women who return pregnant from China—the regime’s main ally and protector—are forced to submit to abortions.

There is a story that could only have come from Stalinist Russia, in which a rural Communist Party holds a gathering to celebrate Stalin’s birthday.  After the first toast, to Stalin, the assembled burst out in rapturous applause.  And applause.  And applause.

No one wants to be the first to stop clapping.  Finally, after ten minutes, a high-ranking official ends the ovation by sitting down, to the relief of everyone in the room.  Several days later, that official is arrested.

That story couldn’t have come from North Korea because the Kim regime, unlike Stalin, has succeeded in killing off humor.

The next time someone tells me that communism is “good in theory,” but wasn’t applied properly, or that the noble experiment was corrupted by Stalin or some defect in the character of the Russian people (because the Germans would have carried it out so well), or just some idiot wearing a Che t-shirt, I’m going to point out the example of North Korea, where communism hasn’t just been properly applied.

It’s been perfected.

You have to love going to the Chronicle’s website and seeing this fabulous headline: “Study says parents shouldn’t drink with their teens.” Really? Dang it, there’s go most of Ken’s golden years…

An “activist” is a vigorous advocate for a cause.  Famous activists have included Martin Luther King, Mohandas Gandhi, Lech Walesa, and Leo Tolstoy.

Scott Roeder is not an activist. He is a “murderer,” or most accurately, an “assassin”.  Please amend your headlines accordingly.

I recognize that the appearance of objectivity (as opposed to actual objectivity) is important to journalists, but please, show a little perspective.

Next week, we’ll discuss the word “militant”.

Proponents of open carry laws in California are calling for boycotts of Peet’s Coffee and California Pizza Kitchen chains today, as both chains announced they will prohibit the possession of firearms in their stores. This comes after an open carry group met at a Peet’s and met with mixed reactions. The next meeting was going to be at a California Pizza Kitchen, but the new policy rules that out.

Peet’s policy is: “While Peet’s Coffee & Tea respects and values all individuals’ rights under local, state and federal laws, our policy is not to allow customers carrying firearms in our stores or on our outdoor seating premises unless they are uniformed or identified law enforcement officers. Like most other private businesses, particularly retail establishments, we believe this policy is in the best interests of all of our customers, regardless of their personal beliefs. In no way does this policy conflict with or discriminate under the law, and it does not take a position on the law.” And CPK’s: “CPK does not allow guests other than uniformed officers to display firearms in our restaurants. CPK is a family oriented restaurant and the comfort and well being of our guests is a top priority. We are concerned that the open display of firearms would be particularly disturbing to children and their parents.”

Both of these policys are 100% legal and make perfect sense. And yet, the open carry folks are angry (as is their natural state, it seems..) They are perfectly within their rights to call for a boycott, and (as customers of both those chains) I hope they do. I enjoyed this sign they are running.

P.S. – Guess where else asserts it’s rights to say you can’t bring a gun onto the premises? NRA headquarters. I think I’ll see about organizing a boycott.

I got a lovely email from RNC Chairman Michael Steele telling me all about how he feels about the State of the Union. He includes this tough but fair analysis of one year of Obama:

“We have seen a year of ethically challenged appointees, haphazard attempts at keeping America safe from terror, failed “stimulus” plans, budget busting deficits, back room deals with special interests, and Obama’s blatant attempt to continue binge spending with unprecedented debt.”

So, sort of like the 8 years before it then. The more things change…

By the way, the fact that Obama & Shrub are easily grouped together should not make anyone feel good.

Did you think that the good folks of the Menifee Union School District in California were the only censorious twits annoying us this week? Oh, ye of little faith.

Today it’s Culpeper, Virginia. School authorities there pulled the full version of the Diary of Anne Frank, apparently with the intent to replace it with the bowdlerized version that Otto Frank originally published in 1947. The school had been using the definitive, complete version released upon the fiftieth anniversary of Frank’s death in a concentration camp.

So — why did they pull it? Were there grim stories of Nazi atrocities? Vivid descriptions of heaps of dead spied out of the garret window? Horrific but apt speculations about the millions of Jews who were not hidden?

Nope. Anne mentioned her Bad Bad Place in a context other than identifying it as a font of pure evil, and a parent was offended.

Citing a parent’s concern over the sexual nature of the vagina passage in the definitive edition, Allen said school officials immediately chose to pull this version and use an alternative copy.

“What we have asked is that this particular edition will not be taught,” Allen said from his office Wednesday morning. “I don’t want to make a big deal out of this. So we listened to the parent and we pulled it.”

Apparently, Anne’s father, Otto Frank, the sole survivor of the “Secret Annex,” felt the need to censor his daughter’s most intimate thoughts as well, eliminating about 30 percent of the original diary published in 1947.

He omitted parts where Anne criticized her mother and other Jews living in the confined quarters as well as some sexually suggestive references.

May I say entirely inappropriately JESUS CHRIST.

The school district is not backing down. Quoth the ironically named Bobbi Johnson:

“The essence of the story, the struggle of a young girl faced with horrible atrocities, is not lost by editing the few pages that speak to adolescent discovery of intimate feelings,” Johnson wrote in an e-mail to the Star-Exponent Thursday. “While these pages could be the basis of a relevant discussion, they do not reflect the purpose of studying the book at the middle-school level and could foster a discussion in a classroom that many would find inappropriate.”

Of course, most people who read the Diary of Anne Frank recognize that it is precisely the juxtaposition of the raw feelings of an adolescent girl and the horror of the Holocaust that makes it remarkable. If people wanted to learn more about how much Hitler sucked, they could just Tivo the History Channel at random. There are tens of thousands of written accounts of the fate of Jews in World War II. Anne’s is gripping precisely because of who she is and how she expresses herself.

Now, bear in mind that it is eighth-graders in Culpeper who are reading this. What kind of language is the school district classifying as “explicit”, justifying a retreat to a different version that cuts out 30% of the content? This blogger quotes the Washington Post:

There are little folds of skin all over the place, you can hardly find it. The little hole underneath is so terribly small that I simply can’t imagine how a man can get in there, let alone how a whole baby can get out!

Oh my God. If eighth graders read that, society will be DOOMED.

If there’s anyone I can’t stand, it’s people who wander up to a conversational group talking about a TV show and intone “Oh, I don’t even own a television,” then recline upon their own insufferable smugness. Look, just go read Recherche du Temps Perdu as translated into Navajo or something, will you? We get it. You’re our intellectual superiors. Let us go back to talking about the B-plot on Friday Night Lights.

I agree with the recent cliche that we’re in another golden age of television — particularly with the addition of cable as a dominant player, the last decade has seen a flood of high-quality, sophisticated, literate, well-written, and gripping and/or hilarious shows.

But there’s no denying that television, to swipe and modify E.B. White’s famous comparison, is like humor or frogs — it does not benefit from being picked apart. In fact, nearly everything on television suffers badly from close analysis. A good show is a windswept romance, not a stable long-term relationship. I’m not saying that you can only enjoy TV if you are dumb — though it certainly helps in many cases. I’m simply saying that examining its premises too closely will spoil your enjoyment. That doesn’t mean its a uniquely crass or stupidity-inducing form of entertainment. Have you closely analyzed the lyrics to your favorite song recently? No, it simply means that if you’re going to watch TV with a skeptic’s eye, you’re going to wind up disappointed or, possibly, freaked out by the hidden premises.

One of the best places to observe this phenomenon is the blog Overthinking It. Today, they take on Cartoon Network’s Star Wars: The Clone Wars, illuminating a level of dramatic irony that borders on the grotesque. My eight-year-old LOVES this show, but I don’t think I can watch it again without shuddering now. Enjoy!