Noted author and William F. Buckley foe Gore Vidal. (NYT. LAT. WP. No A/V Club yet: when they post it, I’ll add it here.)
Archive for the ‘Clippings’ Category
Obit watch: August 1, 2012.
Wednesday, August 1st, 2012Banana republicans watch: July 31, 2012.
Tuesday, July 31st, 2012I apologize: things were so hectic while I was away that I kind of let the banana republicans slip. I don’t think there was much that went on while I was in Las Vegas, anyway. But now that I’m back…
…this LAT story is kind of confusingly written, but it looks like Angel Perales of Cudahy, the “former head of code enforcement”, has pled guilty. Osvaldo “Bimbo and the Badge” Conde and former mayor David Silva are pleading Thursday.
Perales could receive a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison and a $500,000 fine.
And Louis Byrd and Fernando Pedroza, former council members in the city of Lynwood…
According to the LAT, this was the first test of this argument, but the LA County DAs office is expected to use this same approach against the city officials in Bell. Also:
Strippers. Always with the strippers.
Hold me closer, tiny dancer. Count the headlights on the highway…
Tuesday, July 31st, 2012Obit watch: July 31, 2012.
Tuesday, July 31st, 2012Chris Marker, filmmaker perhaps best known for his short “La Jetée”.
What. The. Frack?
Friday, July 27th, 2012The Consumer Product Safety Commission is trying to ban Buckyballs? Because a bunch of stupid kids swallowed Buckyballs, a product that isn’t even marketed for children?
Screw those losers at the CPSC. I’m ordering a set for myself now, while I still can.
And what will Woot do, without Buckyballs to sell?
I have no joke here, I just like saying…
Tuesday, July 24th, 2012Random notes: July 24, 2012.
Tuesday, July 24th, 2012Obit watch: Sally Ride.
Previously noted, but bears repeating: The Lustgarten Foundation for pancreatic cancer research.
Noted without comment. (See also.) (See also.) (See also.)
More:
I’m fascinated by the events in Anaheim, but I don’t know what to make of them right now. (More here.)
Art, damn it, art! watch (#31 in a series)
Tuesday, July 24th, 2012This story has gotten a fair amount of attention elsewhere, but I want to highlight one aspect of it.
Ileana Sonnabend was a noted NYC art dealer who passed away in 2007. Her children inherited her art collection, which was valued at $1 billion. So far, her heirs have paid $471 million in estate taxes on the collection, selling off a large part of it to do so.
One of the pieces in the collection is a Robert Rauschenberg piece called “Canyon”.
The IRS values “Canyon” at $65 million, and wants the family to pay $29.2 million in tax.
But doesn’t the fact that the work can’t be sold make it of zero value anyway? Sort of by definition? And is Ms. Barron confusing aesthetic value with market value?
We can’t make doughnut jokes any more.
Thursday, July 19th, 2012But we can make burrito jokes. TJIC, call your office, please.
The popularity of this Chipolte among the NYPD might – just might – have something to do with the 50% discount they give to uniformed officers. Of course, accepting this discount violates NYPD policy, or so the department says. However, offering the discount does not violate Chipolte’s policy, according to a spokesman for the chain.
I want my two dollars!
Thursday, July 19th, 2012Back in 2008, Austin Energy (the city’s electric utility) made a deal with Nacogdoches Power LLC to purchase the entire output of a proposed new power plant. The key here was that the new power plant would produce electricity from burning “wood waste”, a renewable resource, and thus would avoid potential federal taxes on carbon-based fuels.
This was not a popular decision at the time. Even the local environmental activists were opposed to the plant. Many people felt the city wasn’t releasing all the relevant information and was rushing into the deal.
The plant went live yesterday.
More:
Austin Energy is currently paying “a little more than” 4 cents a kilowatt hour for “coastal wind” power. If I’m reading the article correctly, natural gas is running at about 2 cents per kilowatt hour.
Sometimes, the questions are hard.
Thursday, July 19th, 2012And sometimes there’s not an easy answer.
What is justice?
What is redemption? How do we decide when a person is redeemed? Are there crimes that are beyond redemption?
What is the purpose of prison? What should our goals be when we lock people up? Protection of society? Punishment? Reform?
How should we treat young people who commit horrible crimes? Do we lock them away for life? Do we give them a chance to reform? What if we’re wrong, and reform doesn’t take?
Greg Ousley is serving a 60 year sentence in the Indiana prison system. He’s been there since 1994. In that time, he’s earned a degree in liberal arts from Indiana State (summa cum laude, no less). The corrections staff at his prison apparently thinks the world of Mr. Ousley.
His former work supervisor, Cindy Estes, was more explicit. “This kid has jumped through every hoop the state has put in front of him,” she told me. “He deserves to come out. There’s absolutely nothing to be gained by keeping him in there for another 10 years.”
He’ll be eligible for parole in March of 2019, unless a judge agrees to modify his sentence.
What did Mr. Ousley do? At the age of 14, he shotgunned his parents to death.
I don’t know what to do with Mr. Ousley. I don’t claim to know whether he’s reformed enough that he deserves to be let out. I don’t have answers to those questions. The only thing I have is the knowledge that I’m glad I don’t work in the justice system, because I don’t have those answers.
What the frack is wrong with you people?
Wednesday, July 18th, 2012Not “you people” as in my regular readers. I’m sure you’re all tall, strong, above average in IQ, and every one of your bodily functions smells like a vanilla Glade plug-in.
No, I’m talking about the rest of the Internet who doesn’t read my blog and seems to be overrun with a massive sense of entitlement.
Item 1: The existence of the GR Bullies site. “GR Bullies” is apparently a website devoted to combating “bullying” on the GoodReads website (for values of “bullying” that seem to include posting negative reviews) by…acting like misogynistic bullies themselves. Good plan, guys; I’m sure Big Fred Nietzsche would approve. Or maybe not. I commend to your attention the take of John Scalzi, an actual professional writer who gets bad reviews from time to time, on this subject. (I also recommend reading the other three writers Scalzi links.)
Item 2: The existence of ChickLitGirls, a site that takes money for reviews, only posts positive reviews, and, when it is politely suggested that their pay-for-review policy may not be 100% clear, issues bumptious lawsuit threats.
(“bumptious”. Such a great word. I need to work that into my vocabulary, along with “gargantuan“.)
Item 3: “How dare you think Dark Knight Rises isn’t the greatest thing since the invention of fire?”
Item 4: “…those like my son who have disabilities have the right to live life with access to everything people who aren’t handicapped do.” So, therefore, Netflix is obligated to closed-caption streaming video. And, no, providing closed-captioned DVDs isn’t good enough. I am so sick and tired of hearing people like Ellen Seidman talk about “rights” without making a distinction between liberty rights and claim rights.
There are some things that should require accommodation; for example, access to governmental services. And it may be good business for Netflix to make this kind of accommodation. Right now, Netflix feels that it isn’t. (As other people have pointed out, Netflix gets the material it uses for streaming from studios, that material probably does not have closed captions, and the studios would be rightfully upset if Netflix started altering their property.) If you want to prove to Netflix that they’re wrong, don’t use the service, or start your own competing service with closed captions. If Netflix looses enough business, they’ll change their mind. But you don’t have a right to closed captioned streaming video, or, for that matter, to “access to everything people who aren’t handicapped do”. Down this path lies madness: should we build a wheelchair ramp to the top of Half Dome?
[Edited to add: Hattip on item 4 to Walter Olson at Overlawyered.]
Banana republicans watch: July 18, 2012.
Wednesday, July 18th, 2012Joe Wolfe has either resigned or been fired from the Fullerton, CA police department. Former Officer Wolfe was involved in the (warning!) Kelly Thomas beating death (as always, graphic image warning at that link), but has not yet been charged with a crime.
Add Compton to the bankruptcy watch. With a $42 million deficit, I doubt even a tax on rap groups with platinum records will help.
…the city has consistently fallen behind on payments to vendors, including its sheriff’s contract.
Remember when Compton was talking about reopening the Compton PD and spent $1 million on “equipment” before giving up? Good times, good times.
I’ve avoided blogging this next story because I felt like there was a limit to what my readers (many thanks to both of you) would put up with. Surprisingly to me, though, these banana republican updates have been among the most popular recent posts on my blog. You put up something thoughtful and original, and it gets ignored, but people seem to love California political corruption.
Anyway, there’s an ongoing case involving the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and accusations of bribes and kickbacks. The Coliseum is nearly broke, and USC is in talks to take it over.
A bunch of people have been indicted in the case. Former “general manager” Patrick Lynch has already pled to conflict of interest charges and agreed to repay $385,000 he got from a man named Tony Estrada.
Estrada is a former contractor with the Coliseum, and has been charged with “embezzlement and conspiracy”. Estrada is also a fugitive from justice.
Today’s LAT has an interview with the fugitive Mr. Estrada.
Tony Estrada, rocking the ski mask.
No joke. Mr. Estrada claims to be “somewhere in South America”; the interviews that make up the story were conducted by telephone and over Skype. (It is unclear to me how the LAT verified that the man in the mask was actually Estrada.)
And:
This just in: our old friend Cudahy City Councilman Osvaldo Conde (of the bimbo and the badge) has agreed to plead guilty to extortion and bribery. Actually, make that former city councilman: Conde resigned yesterday.
Conde is the last of the three indicted city officials (the others being former Mayor David Silva and former code enforcement head Angel Perales) to take a plea in the case.
Guns, guns, guns!
Wednesday, July 18th, 2012(This is also partially an Olympic watch.)
We’re the only ones professional enough…to shoot ourselves while cleaning our weapons.
The HouChron has a nice profile of Sergeant Glenn Eller, of the Army Marksmanship Unit. Sgt. Eller is competing in the shotgun double trap competition in the London Olympics. This is his fourth time at the rodeo; he won a gold medal in double trap in 2008. And he’s had an interesting time of it:
- In 2000, he got food poisoning from “an Australian ham salad sandwich” and finished 12th.
- In 2004, he finished 17th “after being informed before the competition of what proved to be a false positive drug test”.
- He won the gold medal in 2008, but the shotgun he used was stolen in 2011 while he was on his way to another competition. It took him a while to get used to the replacement gun, and he “…lost the automatic U.S. slot in double trap to his Army teammate, Staff Sgt. Josh Richmond, but won a place on the team when a second berth for the London Games opened up this spring.”
Worth noting:
You know, I like these AMU guys. It’d be fun to meet some of them and hang out. I wonder if the AMU will have a presence at next year’s NRA meeting?
(Joy! Also speaking of the AMU, Amazon says my copy of US Military Match and Marksmanship Automatic Pistols
Banana republicans watch: July 17, 2012.
Tuesday, July 17th, 2012Today’s tale is brought to you by the town of San Fernando, where voters are trying to recall three of the city council members.
Fiscal irresponsibility? Criminal acts? Election fraud? No. The oldest motivation in the world.
Councilman Mario Hernandez, who has already resigned (but is still up for recall), was carrying on an affair with Councilwoman Maribel de la Torre. For some reason, he decided back in November to announce this. At a council meeting. In public. With his wife sitting in the front row.
Since then, the relationship has deteriorated, to the point where police were called on June 28th; both parties have restraining orders against each other. Hernandez has asked the DA to drop the domestic violence charges against de la Torre: as you might know from watching “COPS”, or living in California, this decision isn’t up to the alleged victim, and the DAs office states they will pursue charges if the evidence warrants.
More:
Former councilman Hernandez may want to be very careful about that. I believe California still has laws against perjury.
Anyway, that’s two down. Number three on the recall parade is the Mayor, Brenda Esqueda, who is accused of having an affair with a sergeant on the police force.
I’ll have to try the “still are human beings” excuse sometime and see how it works out.