Expressio Unius

Don't Look Away

2009-06-21T23:46:00.001-07:00

This woman was murdered by illegitimate cowards who deserve nothing but suffering and derision.

Freedom is contagious

2009-06-19T21:56:00.000-07:00

China censors its own news outlets for fear of inspiring democratic movements within China.

You can't stop freedom folks. As time progresses, the tendency toward greater and greater freedom approaches 1.

This other guy is pretty cool too

2009-06-19T14:13:00.000-07:00

The focus is on Mir Hossein Mossavi, mostly because people expected him to win, and because he was the primary opposition candidate. But this other guy, Mehdi Karoubi, is looking pretty good too.

Defeated presidential candidate Mehdi Karoubi called on Friday for Iran's election result to be cancelled, hours after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei endorsed the victory of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

In an open letter which will be delivered to the country's highest legislative body, the Guardian Council, on Saturday, Karoubi said: "Accept the Iranian nation's will by cancelling the vote and guarantee the establishment's survival."

The letter was published on Karoubi's website.

Suck it Ayatollah Khamenei.

I may die tomorrow.

2009-06-19T13:59:00.000-07:00

And this is courage.

"I will participate in the demonstrations tomorrow. Maybe they will turn violent. Maybe I will be one of the people who is going to get killed. I'm listening to all my favorite music. I even want to dance to a few songs. I always wanted to have very narrow eyebrows. Yes, maybe I will go to the salon before I go tomorrow! There are a few great movie scenes that I also have to see. I should drop by the library, too. It's worth to read the poems of Forough and Shamloo again. All family pictures have to be reviewed, too. I have to call my friends as well to say goodbye. All I have are two bookshelves which I told my family who should receive them. I'm two units away from getting my bachelors degree but who cares about that. My mind is very chaotic. I wrote these random sentences for the next generation so they know we were not just emotional and under peer pressure. So they know that we did everything we could to create a better future for them. So they know that our ancestors surrendered to Arabs and Mongols but did not surrender to despotism. This note is dedicated to tomorrow's children..."

And the police shoot blindly into the crowd

2009-06-15T15:02:00.000-07:00

Canadian Journalist Beaten, Given Tea

2009-06-15T01:52:00.000-07:00

This is an incredible story of a Canadian journalist mistaken for an anti-coup protestor.

By being detained, he was able to see the brutal conditions of other detainees.

“There has been a terrible misunderstanding,” I was told. “There is a bad situation in Tehran, and sometimes the officers get confused,” he said with a smile, while a plainclothes officer offered me water and tea.

In an almost surreal gesture, they introduced me to the riot police officer standing nearby, who shook my hand and said, “You are my friend,” and, “Canada is good.”

The officer told me I was free to go, and I was allowed to walk out of the Interior Ministry building with nothing more than bleeding welts on my neck and a swollen arm.

My journalist credentials and Canadian passport got me out of the Interior Ministry building, but dozens of others remained in that basement.

Please God protect the people left behind in that room.

Where Can I get up to date Iran News?

2009-06-15T01:46:00.001-07:00

The undercoverage of the coup in Iran is pretty surprising, but here are the links I'm finding most helpful to understand what's going on, and what the likelihood of another revolution is:

NYT's The Lede

Huffington Post's Live Blog

TehranBureau is Twittering from the inside.

Daily Dish, by Andrew Sullivan

We Will All Go Down Together

2009-06-15T01:43:00.000-07:00

Embedding is disabled, but this is worth clickin the link for.

Great Song

2009-06-07T19:37:00.001-07:00

Awesome Name for a Political Party

2009-06-07T19:33:00.000-07:00

Congrats to the Swedish Pirate Party for picking up a seat in the EU Parliament.

Truly inspiring for all pirates. Wait, is that good or bad?

iTunes at $1.29 per Song Now

2009-05-28T00:39:00.001-07:00

Whoa. I just noticed this over the weekend. Which only makes me about 3 months behind the times.

Guess what? Major record labels are *losing* money on the new system.

Is Sotomayor a "Racist"?

2009-05-28T00:26:00.000-07:00

You be the judge:

Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, a possibility I abhor less or discount less than my colleague Judge Cedarbaum, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging. Justice O'Connor has often been cited as saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am not so sure Justice O'Connor is the author of that line since Professor Resnik attributes that line to Supreme Court Justice Coyle. I am also not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, as Professor Martha Minnow has noted, there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.

Michael Vick's Rehabilitation

2009-05-25T12:30:00.000-07:00

Michael Vick is out of prison, and on house arrest for two more months, before he is done serving his time.

But how can Michael Vick make up for this?

I suggest that he do something can help him both rehabilitate his image and possibly get him back in the NFL -- offer to donate his next 5 years' salaray to the SPCA.

Sad Parrot

2009-05-24T14:24:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure how they got the Pittsburgh Parrot to look so sad in his costume.

I remember the Bream slide that started the Pirates' 16 year losing streak. I was a Braves fan. I was 12.

Never Lose Faith In Your Team On The Air

2009-05-24T10:43:00.000-07:00

Especially not when there's still hope. This video is awesome.

Good Picture

2009-05-23T17:24:00.000-07:00

Obama hugs John ("Jack") McCain IV at the 2009 Naval Academy graduation.

Suck it Long Beach

2009-05-03T01:31:00.000-07:00

Fresno is now number 5 largest city in California

Next up, San Francisco. Only 350,000 more people left to go. Fres we can.

Souter Retiring

2009-05-01T13:56:00.000-07:00

Republican appointee David Souter is retiring from the Supreme Court.

To focus more on dating and frat games.

McCain's First 100 Days

2009-04-30T18:26:00.000-07:00

It's easy to criticize Obama, but hard to imagine McCain doing much better:

John McCain, the oldest first-term president in history, is proving as rambunctious and pugnacious as the youngest one, Teddy Roosevelt. Of course, Teddy probably would have sent the Marines to Venezuela, while McCain had to make do with mugging for the cameras with an exaggerated grimace when he was forced by protocol to shake Hugo Chavez's hand at the recent hemispheric summit.

Regardless of their respective policies, I think the national mood would be a lot worse now had McCain won. I guess that's an obvious tautology, since a large majority of people voted for Obama (and would thus be understandably moody if McCain won).

But more broadly, I mean that Obama's message of hope, though often devoid of content, is actually doing a good job making people think that America's future remains bright, in a way that McCain probably couldn't have done.

So Mr. President, enjoy the compliment.

Rest in Peace, Frau Koopman

2009-04-26T19:43:00.000-07:00

My high school German teacher passed away last week.

Knowing this was coming, a group of us got together to make a photo album for her, which she got a week or so before she passed. The article, to my surprise, mentions it:

In the weeks following, students, parents, and the generations she taught at Bullard flooded Ms. Koopman's home with more than 500 letters, notes and e-mails. Hammaker said among her most treasured gifts was an 82-page photo album that current and former students put together and delivered about a week before Ms. Koopman's death.

Sweet. Not only was the exercise of putting the album together really valuable and memorable, but Koop loved it and got to cherish it before she passed. Somewhere, in heaven, she is putting on a German play right now.

One Bad Argument Against Waterboarding

2009-04-23T21:19:00.000-07:00

I remain undecided as to whether waterboarding is ever justified in any circumstance, including the "ticking time bomb" scenario where waterboarding may be the only means of obtaining critical information to potentially save lives.

What I know, however, is that there is one very terrible argument against waterboarding -- that we should not do it because it would justify other countries waterboarding our citizens or soldiers, and that we would lose credibility were we to complain about other countries waterboarding if our people were captured during war time.

The argument has a couple of obvious flaws. There are plenty of things we do -- and feel justified doing -- that we don't want other countries doing. Projecting power in the western hemisphere, influencing monetary and economic policies throughout the globe, exercising undue influence in organizations like the WTO, World Bank, IMF, etc. When critics say these are bad things, they generally don't say it's because they want us to be able to complain when other countries do it.

But for some reason this is an argument gaining traction with anti-waterboarders.

But even in the context of interrogation, we know instinctually that this argument is a bad one. There are lots of things we don't want other countries doing to our citizens that aren't as extreme as waterboarding.

We don't want other countries yelling at or verbally threatening our prisoners of war with prosecution, other countries imprisoning our soldiers in solitary confinement, or other countries, even temporarily, detaining our citizens without a fair hearing. And yet, obviously the U.S. isn't about to give up these abilities on the basis that it won't be able to credibly complain when other countries do it.

As another matter, it's far from clear that the opposite isn't true, at least in some cases. That is, we *might* be ok with other countries waterboarding our citizens in very specific situations. Say, a U.S. national like John Walker Lindh plants a ticking suitcase bomb in England, and has been captured by MI5. Is that an easy case? What about less than waterboarding, but still more than what we'd be comfortable subjecting our soldiers to? Is that ok? If so, are the critics then saying it's ok for the U.S. to waterboard in analagous instances? I doubt it.

Ultimately, then, if waterboarding is immoral or bad policy, it shouldn't be because we're worried about other people doing it to us. We're worried about other people doing lots of things to us, many of which we do in some form or another, and that we certainly aren't willing to give up.

This does little to resolve the overall debate as to whether waterboarding works, or whether it's just so immoral that no one should ever do it. But I think it at least removes one terrible argument from the debate.

Boalt Stays Strong at 6th

2009-04-22T22:59:00.001-07:00

The USNews rankings have been leaked a little early, and Boalt has stayed strong at sixth -- and the top public law school -- in the country.

Good work Dean Edley. When you took over we were 13th, and quickly rose from there back into the top 10, and now as high as we've ever been ranked two years running.

The only downside is that UChicago, which used to be 7th behind us, is now tied with us for sixth. Oh well.

Where in the World is Daniel San Diego?

2009-04-21T13:19:00.000-07:00

Kudos to ABC News for running with the joke in an otherwise serious story about a top ten most wanted eco-terrorist.

Passover Done, Another Year Through

2009-04-16T22:08:00.000-07:00

You know your bias is obvious when...

2009-04-15T16:23:00.001-07:00

...even the Onion is capping on you.

America's leading news/parody magazine has suggested that the media might be a little too forgiving of our Commander-In-Chief. Especially amusing is how the piece singles out Newsweek, CBS, The New York Times, and the Washington Post as being particularly indulgent, if not downright sycophantic, towards the president.

Sometimes life imitates art...and sometimes art imitates life.