Edited to add: Additional coverage from the LAT.
Noted without comment.
March 16th, 2012Daisey, Daisey, give me your answer do…
March 16th, 2012I wanted to break this out into a separate piece rather than adding updates.
Marketplace’s story on the Apple/Daisey controversy is now up. Long quote follows:
“I met workers in, um, Hong Kong, going to Apple protests who had not been poisoned by hexane but had known people who had been…”
This week in journalism fraud.
March 16th, 2012One great story that is just now breaking, and one sad story.
The great story: remember that “This American Life” episode about Apple’s factories in China? Aired back in January, I think? “#454: Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory
More:
Excerpts are from the press release attached to the story on Jimbo’s website: the TAL website is currently inaccessible (it looks to me like they’re getting hammered).
Mike Daisey has a statement on his website, which is accessible:
ETA 3/16 1:53 PM: TAL website seems to be accessible now.
ETA 3/16 2:05 PM: Selected shorts:
The sad story, also by way of Jimbo: You may have seen the first part of this story earlier in the week. I didn’t cover it because it was well linked everywhere. Briefly, editorial editor Bob Caldwell of the Portland Oregonian died over the weekend. After some initial confusion, it came out that he hadn’t been found dead of a heart attack in his parked car, but had passed away while engaged in a sex act with a 23-year-old woman.
That’s sad, but not the sad part I want to talk about. The initial information (that he’d been found dead in a parked car) was provided by a friend of the family who also worked for the Oregonian. That friend has been fired.
I understand both sides here. From editor Peter Bhatia’s summary of what went wrong:
But I understand the fired editor’s position, too. In a moment of grief and weakness, she chose to try to shield the family from the pain that would be caused by the circumstances of her friend’s death becoming public. I think she was wrong. I think she shouldn’t have lied. But I also think the paper could have had some compassion and sympathy for the position their editor was placed in: a one or two week unpaid suspension seems more reasonable to me. It may be that I’m a wimp. It may be that I’m not a serious journalist. But I feel a great deal of compassion for the fired editor, even though I think she made a mistake.
By the way…
March 15th, 2012
Marc Randazza, and some thoughts about the First Amendment.
March 15th, 2012Ken over at Popehat has a post up about his friend Marc Randazza. I’m not part of Ken or Marc’s group. I’m not a lawyer, I’ve never met Marc Randazza, and I wouldn’t know him if he walked up to me and punched me in the face while using the word “f–k” repeatedly.
But I wanted to pull together some thoughts on the Hon. Marc Randazaa, and why I’d like to shake his hand and buy him a beer.
I think part of the reason for that is one of the small regrets I have in my life. When I was younger, I was inspired by the work of Nat Hentoff: not as a jazz critic, but as a First Amendment activist. My school libraries had books like The First Freedom
I thought seriously about becoming a lawyer. But I didn’t want to be just any kind of lawyer: I wanted to be a First Amendment lawyer. I wanted to fight the good fight for little kids like me who were fighting high school newspaper censorship, and big newspapers and magazines who were fighting the government.
In the end, though, I gave up that idea because I didn’t think I could make any money at it. Don’t get me wrong: I didn’t want to get rich, but I wanted to be able to pay off my loans for law school and buy a new car every few years. Just being a First Amendment lawyer didn’t seem like it would lead down that path.
Many years later, I became aquatinted with Mike Godwin. Yeah, that Mike Godwin. I would recognize Mike if he walked up to me and punched me in the face, though it has been about…greeez, 15 years? since I last saw him in person. (He didn’t punch me in the face then, for what that may be worth.) The thing that strikes me about him, thinking back on that time, is that he did something interesting that I didn’t have the knowledge or ability to do: Mike Godwin was one of the people – perhaps the person – who pioneered Internet law. Literally, Mike pretty much invented a whole brand new field of law from scratch as the first general counsel of EFF.
And then there’s Marc Randazza. Why do I think he belongs in the company of people who make me wish I went to law school? Why do I praise a man I’ve never met? “Because that’s just the kind of hairball you are,” say some of my friends. They’re probably right about that. But:
- He’s one of the people who stomped Righthaven like a bunch of vatos locos.
- He’s also a backer of righthaven.com, the “spineful hosting service”.
- He’s a loyal friend. Ken quotes him as saying “in three hours he could be on my driveway camping out with a shotgun and a thermos of espresso”. And let’s face it, a guy who is willing to camp out in your driveway with a shotgun and a thermos of espresso is good to know; at least as good as, perhaps better than, a Lithuanian hit man or someone who knows the best way to mail a dead gopher.
- He and Eric Turkewitz are defending a bunch of bloggers being sued by Joseph Rakofsky, a spectacularly bad lawyer who doesn’t like being called a bad lawyer. And they’re doing it pro bono. (“Pro bono” is an old Latin term that means “I ain’t making any money off of this.”)
- People often say that it is easy to defend the popular causes, but harder to defend the unpopular ones. I’m not 100% convinced of that: I think, regardless of how people feel about Illinois Nazis, people tend to give you credit. “Oh, no, he doesn’t like Nazis, he’s just consistent in his beliefs. Isn’t that wonderful?” “He wasn’t a Communist, he just believed in their right to free speech. Wasn’t he a hero?” I don’t want to trivialize those who defend the Commies or the Nazis, but it seems, in some ways, harder to defend the speech of the people that the proverbial “cool kids” don’t like: the people who are unpopular, but not unpopular enough. People like radio talk show hosts.
- I will have to remember to steal murum aries attitigt and use it in an inter-office email when the time is right.
- He has a hugely entertaining blog. And he doesn’t just cover legal issues: The Legal Satyricon is the place to go for people playing “Bohemian Rhapsody” inside a VW Polo in a field somewhere in Finland and photos of attractive young women in addition to perceptive legal coverage and TSA bashing.
- The man’s not above a good dick joke when it is called for.
- And getting back to the TSA, Marc Randazza is defending Amy Alkon, who is being sued by the rapist TSA agent Thedala Magee.
I’ve been thinking about this since last night, and it seems to me that Marc Randazza is a modern day exemplar of the kind of people Melville Davisson Post was talking about:
…
…
“a just man, and honorable and unafraid”. I like that phrase very much. I believe there is a shortage of people in the world about whom that could be said, but I think it fits the honorable Mr. Randazza well.
Things you may have wondered about. (#3 in a series)
March 15th, 2012What do deep-fried Fruity Pebbles look like?
The HouChron has the answer, in yet another go around of the rodeo food (warning! Slideshow!) slideshow (warning! Slideshow!). The Fruity Pebbles photos are at the very start.
You may also have wondered what kind of person comes up with these ideas. The HouChron also has the answer at that same link, in the form of an interview with Ken Hoffman.
Not answered: how do they taste?
I have no joke here, I just like saying…
March 15th, 2012Gonzaga!
This is to note that Lawrence has bet me $5, straight across, against the Gonzaga men’s basketball team winning the championship this year. (I have Gonzaga, he has the field.) This is a little late, since the tournament has already started, but Gonzaga has not played yet.
Since I know he follows basketball more than I do (heck, Helen Keller follows basketball more than I do, at least when she’s not hiding from the Nazis) I’m curious to see who his pick is. Perhaps he’ll weigh in in comments.
A toast to Post.
March 14th, 2012Melville Davisson Post, to be specific.
While looking up a related subject, I found this essay by Joseph Bottum which calls him “America’s Greatest Mystery Writer”. I am not sure I would be willing to go that far, but Bottum makes a good case, and I do admire what of Post’s work I’ve been able to find.
When I was a kid, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine would occasionally reprint one of the Uncle Abner stories. Later in life, I found a copy of the University of California collection he mentions and rediscovered Uncle Abner, who “belonged to the church militant, and his God was a war lord.”
I think the Abner stories appeal to me for the same reason Chesterton’s Father Brown stories do; the mixing of religion and reason, and the idea that one can believe in both God and the application of the human mind to solve the great mysteries. Post and Chesterton and C.S. Lewis, and others, to me fit in the great tradition of rationalist Christianity.
I am also particularly struck, and delighted, by the extended passage Bottum quotes (starting just after “The extraordinary passage…”) I, too, was struck by that passage when I read it; it hangs over my desk today, and I re-read it (along with Bolt’s line from Sir Thomas More: “And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide…?” and a few other select quotes) in times of great moral crisis.
“…whatever I may have to say of him hereafter I want to say this thing of him here, that his bigotry and his vanities were builded on the foundations of a man.” I admire the way he paints that word picture. “He stood up as though he stood alone, with no glance about him to see what other men would do. . . .”
I commend Bottum’s essay to your attention. He did write the “God and the Detectives” essay, which I am still reading and digesting, but which you may also care to read.
And speaking of drinking…
March 14th, 2012…the NYT on one of my favorite drinks, Irish coffee.
With recipe. Just for the record, here’s Law Dog’s recipe. If you know how to search, you can find at least part of Larry Niven’s “Adrienne and Irish Cofffee” in Google Books, but you really should go buy Playgrounds of the Mind
Important safety tip. (#11 in a series)
March 14th, 2012This has been covered on FARK, and my angle on it may be more of a legal tip than a safety one.
However.
While I am opposed to drinking and driving, it helps your court case if you can say you drank something reasonable and innocent sounding. “I had a Grasshopper.” Grasshopper. How threatening does that sound? “I had two Sidecars.” Nice, mellow, classic drink. Gentlemen drink Sidecars. Even “I had two Manhattans” or “I had three Negronis” doesn’t sound too bad.
But when the testimony in court is that you ordered eight of something called a “Mind Eraser”, that doesn’t look so good. Just a suggestion. If you plan to get your s–t f–ked up, you should consider a designated driver and something that doesn’t sound threatening. A nice Long Island Iced Tea or eight, perhaps.
John Carter, John Carter, Malkovich.
March 14th, 2012Actually, no Malkovich.
John Scalzi’s column at filmcritic.com this week is about “studio math”. Specifically, why a movie that cost $250 million to make has to bring in at least $600 million at the box office in order to turn a profit. Much of this was stuff I already knew (the movie studios take most of the first week’s box office gross, declining in subsequent weeks, distribution cuts, gross profit cuts, cocaine cuts, etc.) But I note it here because it is a handy reference for folks not familiar with show business, especially the kids.
Meanwhile, back at the House, I’m sure you’ve all been asking yourself: What does John Carter (the member of Congress from Round Rock) think of “John Carter” (the motion picture)?
He kind of liked it. I guess that’s the one thing they’ve got.
Happy Pi Day!
March 14th, 2012I’m getting a slightly late start, due to work-related issues (which I haven’t decided whether I’m going to discuss or not), but the Pi Day celebration proceeds.
Courtesy of my great and good friend Commvault Bryan.
The lineup of pies for Pi Day 2012. We went a little over the top this year (thanks to generous co-sponsorships from my great and good friends Chris and Barry). Not pictured; the chocolate cream pie, which vanished before I got any. (But we had key lime, lemon meringue, a Kahlua cream pie, apple, cherry, no sugar added “razzleberry”, banana cream, coconut cream, and pecan. No shortage of pie here in the bunker.)
My great and good friend Nate brought in a paelo pie. The crust is ground walnuts and organic, grass-fed butter. The filling is pumpkin, sweetened with natural maple syrup. If there’s general interest, I might try to pry the recipe out of him; it is a really good pie.
Edited to add: This is absolutely not a bookmark for the LAT‘s list of recipes for Pi Day. (Crawfish spinach? Yum!)
Very, very carefully.
March 13th, 2012This is a multi-purpose punchline. In addition to “How do porcupines make love?” it also serves as an answer to the question: “How do you steal a three foot tall active beehive?”
Seriously, I have no idea how or why you’d want to steal an active beehive. But let’s watch some Nicholas Cage anyway.
Edited to add: You can get three pounds of bees with a queen for $105 shipped to your doorstep (when these people have them in stock). Other folks have them as low as $90. I realize criminals are a cowardly and superstitious lot, and generally not able to do subtle economic calculations. But still, this seems like a really stupid crime. Perhaps the criminals will try to fence them, and the police can set up a sting operation.
Sorry.
More South by So What?
March 12th, 2012Unless Algor’s definition of “improving government” is “getting it out of our lives”, or unless the tools he’s talking about include autonomous Glock and heroin vending robots, he might as well just sit the f–k down and shut the f–k up.
What evidence is there that “Wiki-democracy” will work any better than Wikipedia? “a government square that holds people accountable”? What does that mean?
... Votizen, an online network of voters that leverages social networks to campaign for their issues.
I actually kind of like this idea. Here’s why: the thing about “leveraging social networks” is that it can turn around and bite your ass. Look at “Kony 2012“. Their plan was to “leverage social networks” to get the word out about their film and get donations to Invisible Children. But the social media campaign ended up bringing a lot more attention to Invisible Children’s critics, and a lot more skepticism directed at the project. Remember: this is the Internet. We can fact check your ass.
Paging Mark Clifton. Mark Clifton to the white courtesy phone, please.
March 12th, 2012I’m sure this study is going to be extensively analyzed, refuted, the refutations refuted, and the refutations of the refutations themselves refuted. I don’t expect any clarity on this before I die in a supermodel’s bed at the age of 115.
However, as soon as I read that headline, the first thing I was reminded of was “The Dread Tomato Addiction”, the essay that taught me “Correlation does not equal causality” before I could even pronounce “correlation” or “causality”. (Okay, that’s a slight exaggeration. But I still commend the essay to your attention. Please note the original publication date.)
(For more about Mark Clifton, you could start with this Wikipedia article. You might also, if you ask Glen real nicely, get him to weigh in on They’d Rather Be Right, “perhaps the most contentious novel ever to win the [Hugo] award.” He’s the only person I know of who has actually made the effort to find a copy and read it; I’m not sure Lawrence has done that, but he can correct me in the comments if I’m wrong Edited: see comments.)