Wisdom of The Daily Show

I have been becoming increasingly worried that The Daily Show's Black Correspondent Larry Wilmore is going to be proven correct.

Americans are only voting for the chance to vote for a black president. Once they get to the general election I think they'll find that a 72 year old white republican is just about the kind of change they're ready for.

Fast forward to around 2:30

I drink tap water

preferably filtered, yes, but tap water none the less.

Stop debating buying a Prius and just stop drinking bottled water instead! (Or do both.)

From Slate's Earth Day special...

According to the Earth Policy Institute, it now takes more than 17 million barrels of oil to make enough PET to meet the America's demand for bottled water—enough to fuel more than 1 million cars a year. ... Royte estimates that each water bottle we buy consumes one-quarter of its volume in oil in production and transportation costs.

And yes, he does go on to say that some tap water has contaminants.... but that they are exacerbated by ... ding ding ding ... bottled water and plastic bottles leeching toxins.

So please just buy a filter and a reusable bottle (look these are pretty! I have one!)
or at least buy those giant water coolers that at least have reduced transportation costs by economies of scale, plus they recycle the bottles constantly.

Either that, or I'm totally going to advocate O'Rourke's suggestion of a 'sin tax' on bottled water that goes towards improving tap water.

Live Update from Class!

I should start live-blogging my public policy class.

Just recently:

Theres a thought out there that Rev. Jeremiah Wright controversy is partly good for Obama b/c people wont think he's a Muslim.

Hey! At least he believes in Jesus!.....

Of course, its just frivolous

Kelli Arena of CNN today reported that the CIA director finally publically admitted that waterboarding was used, but is not being used right now. She then reported that they did not say it will never be used again, "and of course that got everyone in a tizzy."

Because caring about whether or not the United States of America uses torture is just a little frivolous manner that some silly people get all worked up about.

She also talks like she's talking to third graders. Let me remind you that she's on CNN.

Congrats to Guantanamo detainees and POWs

Because I'm guessing that either way -- McCain vs. Obama or McCain vs. Clinton -- a year from now we'll probably stop torturing people! Yay!

"It may include us some day."

In the Republican debate in Simi Valley, Mike Huckabee said that his stance on being pro-life is

exercising that deep conviction held by our founding fathers that all of us are equal and no one is more equal than another, recognizing that once we ever decide that some people are more equal or less equal than others, then we start moving that line, and it may include us some day.

Of course -- he also thinks that homosexual couples are not quite as equal as heterosexual couples.
(He thinks gay marriage would end civilization, that they should respect the definition of marriage, especially now, and that the constitution is a sacred document that shouldn’t be changed, which is cute, cuz, uh, its not.)

Registrable Sex Offenses

"Oral copulation" and sodomy and indecent exposure are "registrable sex offenses" in the state of California, meaning that if convicted the person needs to register as a sex offender, be listed on Megans Law websites and announced to one's neighbors that one is a sex offender.

Indecent exposure, of course, includes women being topless in the same places where men are allowed to be topless (as discussed over at The Colonic).

Sodomy technically / historically means basically putting a penis anywhere other than a vagina, which could cover oral as well.

And former President Clinton would be a registered sex offender had the Oval Office been located in California instead of DC.



I know these are old laws that just happen to still be on the books and generally people aren't persecuted for them... but I don't really understand what's stopping us from saying, "Oh, hey, I found one of those out dated ones... Let's scratch that," with a general nod of unanimous agreement from everyone. I see them as merely being potential weapons to throw at someone for other purposes, like the homophobia demonstrated in Lawrence v Texas.

Does someone really need to get caught and drag a case up to the Supreme Court in order for these laws to be overturned? Because, a) that's kind of ridiculous and b) let's get some volunteers.

Equality Irony

apparently...

Wyoming is the "Equality State" according to their state nickname. They were the first to grant women the right to vote.

Wyoming is also where Matthew Shepard was murdered by a bunch of homophobes.

Interesting.

Congratulations Iowa

Not only for very clearly choosing Obama across so many demographic groups and independent voters and everything else awesome


But for so many people caucusing. And for that many new caucus goers and college kids.

Hurray. Democracy's on the way back up perhaps.

RIAA is going crazy

Apparently, the RIAA's website says

If you make unauthorized copies of copyrighted music recordings, you're stealing. You're breaking the law and you could be held legally liable for thousands of dollars in damages.

Hm. Nope. Not illegal to make copies for personal use. That's pretty much been the backbone of all the related lawsuits so far, that it is fine to make copies for your own use, you just aren't supposed to share them with others or (more importantly) profit off them.

The RIAA honestly thinks that if you want to listen to a song on your CD player, your computer and your mp3 player, that you should pay for it three times.

And they wonder why people are generally pissed off at record companies.

Silence != Prayer

LAT covers a bitching session in Illinois where atheists are angry over a moment of silence in school because they think it breaches the separation of church and state.

To their defense, the moment is for "reflection and student prayer".

While normally I'd be all over making sure we keep prayer out of school, and making sure kids don't feel awkward and isolated for not praying, I really don't feel that this fits at all.

But its for reflection and prayer.

And it is silent.

Kids aren't about to be singled out for not praying along with their friends, or for sitting while everyone else is standing. Everyone just shuts up for a minute.

I'm sure that if they had instead called it a Moment of Reflection and talked up how the kids would have time to reflect on their day, or their studies, or mediate, or just relax and be less stressed, etc, then there would be no problem.

And there's no freakin difference anyway.

An atheist student who's part of the dispute says, "My one friend was really angry because he liked having that moment to think about his life. He's going through a tough time. His parents are getting divorced. His brother's not very nice to him."

... basically hurting her entire argument. So just let everyone sit quietly for a minute and everyone will chill and take a deep breath and it'll be nice.