Archive for January, 2011

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Dinner with Dick.

Wednesday, January 26th, 2011

Or “Nixon In China: The Dinner”:

Nearly 40 years later, Mr. Tong will serve the menu again to about 60 invited guests on Jan. 31, after the Metropolitan Opera’s dress rehearsal for its staging of John Adams’s “Nixon in China.” The Zhou dinner figures prominently in the 1987 opera, by John Adams, which makes its Met debut next week.

I’d always thought that Nixon had rather crappy taste in food; his cottage cheese with catsup is notorious. However, at least according to this web site (which provides sources) the catsup thing is a base canard, and the Nixon family was quite fond of seafood. That puts the shrimp dishes in a new light.

Anyone seeking the full Nixon experience will naturally want to down a shot of maotai, which the restaurant will be pouring for $25 for a tiny cup.

I tried searching for maotai online, but couldn’t find any sources. However, I did turn up this Washingtonian article that goes into more detail about the banquet.

At their table, Chou En-lai said proudly to Nixon that mao-tai, with its alcohol level of more than 50 percent, had been famous since the San Francisco World’s Fair of 1915. Chou took a match to his cup, saying, “Mr. Nixon, please take a look. It can indeed catch fire.”

Posted in Clippings, Food, Mixology, Music, Nixon | 1 Comment »

TMQ watch: January 25, 2011.

Tuesday, January 25th, 2011

It’s a travesty! It’s a sham! It’s a mockery! It’s a travishamockery! All in this week’s Tuesday Morning Quarterback, after the jump…

(more…)

Posted in Guns, NFL, Sports, TMQ watch | 1 Comment »

We are amused.

Monday, January 24th, 2011

By this story in the LAT about the arrest of rapper “40 Glocc” (sp?).

Specifically, we are amused by:

  • the name “40 Glocc” (which, Lawrence points out, is both distinctive and not subject to trademark infringement suits).
  • Mr. “Glocc”‘s arrest (his real name appears to be Lawrence White) on weapons charges.
  • the fact that he was arrested carrying a 9mm handgun and not a .40 S&W. The LAT does not specify if it was, at least, a Glock.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Guns, Law, Stupid | Comments Closed

Random notes: January 24, 2011.

Monday, January 24th, 2011

Things are still kind of up in the air, but improving slowly. In the meantime, have a handful of random crap:

Your Jack LaLanne obit from the NYT. And from the LAT.

Just for Lawrence, a review of the New World Center, designed by Frank Gehry.

Happy belated birthday, John Moses Browning.

The Pack is back, baby! (Mostly, I’m linking this for the font: may not be valid after 1/24. Did they drag the “Japs Attack Pearl Harbor!” font out of the Linotype case?)

Should General Vang Pao be buried in Arlington?

Posted in Art, Clippings, Gehry, Guns, History, NFL, Obits, Sports | 1 Comment »

A sad end to a sad story.

Thursday, January 20th, 2011

Remember the case of the clerk who shot the beer thief? The one who got eight years probation for his murder and evidence tampering conviction?

Yeah. Well, there’s a follow-up to that story. You see, it turns out that the jury couldn’t do that.

The Texas Legislature took away from juries the ability to sentence murder defendants to probation in 2007. Juan Romero , 24, fatally shot 22-year-old Jorge Vielma at a South Austin Shell station in 2009.

So the judge tossed the verdict, and everybody involved made a deal. Romero pled out to manslaughter instead of murder, and got the same eight year probated sentence.

I would have preferred to see a retrial, and a fight at the appellate level if Romero was convicted again. But I can’t blame Romero and his lawyers for taking the deal.

Posted in Clippings, Guns, Law | Comments Closed

Here I stand; I can do no other.

Wednesday, January 19th, 2011

Someone who can claim credit in the comments (or send me an email if they want) suggested a T-shirt:

Front: “One down, 534 to go.”

Back: “Wearing this t-shirt is cause for revoking your civil rights. At least in Massachusetts.”

I don’t have time to work on the design (the personal situation I alluded to in an earlier post is not improving as rapidly as I would like) but if someone does want to take the ball and run with it…I would suggest that any proceeds go into TJIC’s legal fund.

Posted in Guns, Law, Politics | 4 Comments »

Lasers, eight o’clock, day 1!

Wednesday, January 19th, 2011

Last year, Los Angeles International Airport recorded the highest number of incidents in the country involving laser beams that were pointed at aircraft, a potentially dangerous activity that can distract or temporarily blind pilots, the Federal Aviation Administration announced Wednesday.

(Sorry.)

Posted in Clippings, Lasers, Planes | Comments Closed

Some thoughts on civil rights.

Wednesday, January 19th, 2011

We generally do not read the Huffington Post, although we do not react to it in the same way we react to that wretched hive of scum and stupidity known as Salon. However, we wanted to make note of this article, even though it has been thoroughly linked and blogged elsewhere:

…in 1956, after King’s house was bombed, King applied for a concealed carry permit in Alabama. The local police had discretion to determine who was a suitable person to carry firearms. King, a clergyman whose life was threatened daily, surely met the requirements of the law, but he was rejected nevertheless. At the time, the police used any wiggle room in the law to discriminate against African Americans.

We especially wanted to make note of this article in light of another recent event. Supporter and sometime commenter on this blog TJIC had his Massachusetts firearms license suspended over postings on his blog. Yes, you read that correctly: Jay G. has a more detailed account, which also preempts much of the commentary I would otherwise offer on this subject.

TJIC’s commentary may be disagreeable, even reprehensible to some. But if being disagreeable and running contrary to popular opinion was a reason to revoke someone’s civil rights, where would we be today? Jay says it better that we can:

To those of you on the left applauding the actions taken against TJIC: how would you feel if that were a left-wing blogger in Texas getting audited over something unflattering they wrote about GWB three years ago?

Or how does it make you feel to know that Martin Luther King was denied the ability to defend himself and his family, because he was black and unpopular?

The Bill of Rights is a sum-total package; we take all the freedoms enumerated therein or we take none of them. For far too long both the left and the right have views the BoR as a buffet, where some rights are added to the dinner plate with gusto while others are left to languish – or worse, removed entirely from the menu.

Can we get an “Amen!” for Brother Jay?

Posted in Guns, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

Obit watch: January 19, 2011.

Wednesday, January 19th, 2011

Don Kirshner, music mogul. Lawrence suggested I insert Paul Simon’s parody of Kirshner from SNL here, but sadly I can’t find that online.

R. Sargent Shriver, who was never a sergeant, and was perhaps most famous as a Kennedy in-law.

Posted in Clippings, Obits | Comments Closed

TMQ watch: January 18, 2011.

Tuesday, January 18th, 2011

Is it possible to be a football atheist? Plus Easterbrookian ignorance about guns and stealing jokes from FARK. All in this week’s TMQ after the jump…

(more…)

Posted in Guns, Media, Music, NFL, Sports, TMQ watch | 5 Comments »

Gun crankery.

Tuesday, January 18th, 2011

It is well known that I am an unabashed Smith and Wesson fanboy.

I will not be purchasing one of these, thank you very much.

I already have a S&W that shoots .45 LC, and while I’d like to add a .45 ACP revolver to the collection, it won’t be one that looks like it has been knighted with the ugly stick. I also don’t have a burning desire for a handgun that shoots .410 shells. (The Circuit Judge actually does have a small amount of appeal to me, but there are a lot of long guns higher on the list, like the Ruger Scout Rifle or something in .45-70. I think the reason the Circuit Judge appeals is that it doesn’t look as ugly as I originally expected it to be. Then again, the Uberti revolving rifles are also attractive.)

(Hattip: Tam.)

Posted in Guns | Comments Closed

How appealing.

Monday, January 17th, 2011

Since we have, in the past, noted cases where Austin Police Department (and Austin Fire Department) officers have won arbitrator’s rulings over disciplinary actions, simple fairness requires us to note this article in yesterday’s Statesman:

When Austin police officers and firefighters have disputed their punishment and taken their cases to outside arbitration, employees have lost that battle more frequently than not, an American-Statesman review of city records shows.

Certainly not the impression I had. However, if you read down a little more in the article…

Arbitrators have upheld 10 of the 23 police disciplinary cases that officers have appealed since Acevedo came to Austin in July 2007.

So if the arbitrators have upheld 10 of 23, that implies they haven’t upheld the remaining 13, right? So is it fair to say “employees have lost that battle more frequently than not”?

In fairness to the author of the article, he goes on to state:

• Arbitrators have overturned only a single police disciplinary case.

• Arbitrators have agreed that officers erred in five cases but reduced their punishment.

My impression is that he’s grouping those as “wins” for the employees. That accounts for six out of 13. What of the other seven?

• Department officials and officers independently have settled five cases, one is pending, and one officer withdrew his appeal.

I think the author is counting the five settlements as “wins” for the city, where I would count a settlement as a “win” for the employee. Reasonable people can differ on this, and I’m not sure there’s enough evidence in the article to resolve that difference. Let’s be fair and count a settlement as a “tie”. By that count, I make it 11-6-5 (counting the withdrawn appeal as a “win” for the city).

Also interesting:

• However, [Art] Acevedo [chief of police] and [Rhoda Mae] Kerr [fire chief] have lost each time they’ve tried to withhold promotions from those who had otherwise met criteria to move up a rank. Arbitrators found they lacked enough reason.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

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