Wednesday, May 31, 2006

The National Geographic Bee

What a wonderful concept! It follows the same format of the widely renown National Spelling Bee, in which kids have to correctly guess the spelling of a word, but in this competition the participants have to guess the right geographical location of a city, river, mountain or whatever other geographical landmark.

It's incredibly important to have a basic knowledge of geography, especially in this wired world where things happening thousands of miles away can have a real and profound impact where we live (take the Middle East cauldron of simmering troubles).

And if you doubt American kids could benefit from some lessons in geography, check this out from this New York Times article:
Yet Americans continue to be relatively clueless about geography. A survey released this month by National Geographic showed that 60 percent of college-age Americans couldn't find Iraq on a map, while half couldn't find New York State.
Incredible? Hardly. That's why competitions like this are extremely important.

Another good reason:
Whereas students who ready themselves for the spelling bee typically begin with the bee's word list, geography bee contestants have no such handy resource. Instead, they must be more creative and resourceful, relying on a combination of atlases, almanacs and publications. They also usually become voracious newspaper readers; my son often began his mornings boning up on international news in the daily paper.

The geography bee's questions, too, require a different level of thinking. The spelling bee contestants rely on memorization or knowledge of etymology. The geography bee asks competitors to connect many more dots through a broad understanding of political, cultural and environmental factors.
And a final thought:
Geography, on the other hand, asks more. But it offers more in return: to know the world is to know how to make it a better place, from a path to peace in war-torn regions to a promise to conserve our planet's natural resources.

Voyager II

Another man-made object reaches the edges of the Solar System. From CNN:
Voyager II could pass beyond the outermost layer of our solar system, called the "termination shock," sometime within the next year, NASA scientists announced at a media teleconference Tuesday.

The milestone, which comes about a year after Voyager 1's crossing, comes earlier than expected and suggests to scientists that the edge of the shock is about one billion miles closer to the sun in the southern region of the solar system than in the north.
Barring any unforeseen hardware failure, Voyager I and II should have enough power and communications capability to keep radioing back to Earth until 2020.

Fascinating.

Il Vigile

A funny 1960 comedy with Italian "superstar" Alberto Sordi, Il Vigile tells the story of Otello Celletti, a former army guy who's been unemployed for years now, expecting the right job, that of traffic cop, to be simply offered to him because of his service to the State.

In the meantime, he just seats around while his wife, young son, and brother-in-law have to work to support the family.

When he finally gets the long-sought assignment, thanks to his son, it becomes very clear that the guy is just plain delusional.

The movie is very simple both in its conception and in the presentation, but is funny to watch and the casting is excellent, especially Sordi, Marisa Merlini (his wife) and Vittorio De Sica (the Mayor).

Grade: 7.5/10

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg

"The U.S. Constitution should be something that unites, rather than divides Americans."

"I do not believe that government should be in the business of telling people who they can and can't marry."

"I believe New Yorkers should have the right to marry whomever they choose, regardless of sexual orientation."
He's a Republican and was talking about same-sex marriage.

All Hail the Mayor!!

The Vicious Cycle

Global warming will be with you momentarily:
Greenhouse gases are known to spur global warming, but scientists said on Monday that global warming in turn spurs greenhouse gas emissions -- which means Earth could get hotter faster than climate models predict.

Two scientific teams, one in Europe and another in California, reached the same basic conclusion: when Earth has warmed up in the past, due to the sun's natural cycles, more greenhouse gases have been spewed into the atmosphere.

As greenhouse gas levels rose, so did Earth's temperature, the scientists reported.

Earth has not endlessly warmed up, though, because these natural solar cycles ended, letting the planet cool down and prompting a corresponding drop in greenhouse gas emissions, the scientists reported.

But these previous periods of heating and cooling were not influenced by the burning of fossil fuels, and the current resulting trend toward higher global average temperatures, according to Margaret Torn of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
[...]
The European team estimated that global warming in the next century may be 15 percent to 78 percent higher than current estimates because these predictions fail to take into account the feedback mechanism involving carbon dioxide emissions.
Time to start saving up for that air conditioner...

Doing what's best for your kids, even if it's not easiest for you...

Parents have used television sets to "babysit" their kids ever since TV was invented. It's very effective and can keep kids occupied for a long time, virtually silenced.

The question is, Is TV good for kids? The answer seems to depend on the age of the child. TV is very bad for kids under 2, some TV is ok between 2 and 4, and after that the right programs can even help the child's development.

You can therefore imagine my surprise and shock when I read this CNN article:
One-third of the nation's youngest children -- babies through age 6 -- live in homes where the television is on almost all the time, says a study that highlights the immense disconnect between what pediatricians advise and what parents allow.

TV in the bedroom is not even that rare for the youngest children anymore. Almost one child in five under 2 has a set, even though the American Academy of Pediatrics advises against any TV watching at that age.

Eight in 10 children younger than 6 watch TV, play video games or use the computer on a typical day. They average about two hours of screen time, compared with 48 minutes when they are being read to, the Kaiser Family Foundation concludes in a study released Wednesday.
Am I the only one who sees a problem here? KIDS YOUNGER THAN 2 WITH A TV IN THEIR BEDROOM?! And the TV on ALL THE TIME?!!

Ray and I both agree the kids will not have a TV set in their bedroom just as he and I didn't have it growing up, let alone putting one in there now!! Why? Because television hinders communication and socialization. You want your kids to interact with you or other people? Don't put a TV in their bedroom, or they'll never come out of there, and you'll have no clue whatsoever what it is they're watching, and not everything is appropriate for their age. Period.

Same goes for a computer, if not more. At least on TV they don't show porn during the day and nobody can sexually harass kids from a TV screen.

It's incredible, and it's the parents who are to blame without any shade of doubt:
A generation of parents raised on TV is largely encouraging the early use of television, video games and computers by their own children, often starting in infancy.

These parents say TV teaches how to share and the ABCs when they do not have the time. Television provides time for parents to cook or take a shower. They use screen time as a reward or, paradoxically, to help kids wind down at bedtime.
[...]
Where some parents limited scary shows or video games, others found youngsters unfazed. "It's something gory, but it doesn't seem to bother her," said a California mother whose toddler joined her on the couch for "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation."

Despite studies that link bedroom TVs to kids' sleep problems, the most common reason cited for giving children their own set was that it freed up other TVs so parents or their other children could watch shows of their choice.
These people should take some parenting classes, or not be parents at all. Encouraging infants to watch TV so you have more free time to take a shower? No limitations on the types of shows the kids watch? Give them their TV so we can all watch what we want in separate rooms, like total strangers do in hotel rooms? I can't even imagine the damage done to the psyche of those kids.

And this is why I know I'm right:
The pediatrics group recommends no TV or other electronic media for kids younger than 2 -- advice that just 26 percent of parents followed, Kaiser found -- and no more than two hours of total "screen time" daily for older children.

The organization is not anti-TV, said Dr. Daniel Broughton of the Mayo Clinic, an academy member who co-wrote the recommendations. But before age 2 is time of the brain's most rapid development, and interaction -- the live give-and-take that TV cannot provide -- is crucial during that period, he said.

Some studies also link TV watching at younger ages to youngsters' attention disorders.

After a child reaches 2, the idea is to balance a little TV with riding bikes, playing with friends, household chores and the other activities of childhood, Broughton said.
Amen.

Giulietta degli Spiriti

Federico Fellini was most certainly a visionary, and this movie showcases this quality of his from beginning to end.

I liked the movie but wasn't sweeped off my feet by it. I certainly enjoyed the cinematography, costumes and settings, and the acting was good, but the plot itself, while intriguing, left me somewhat unsatisfied.

I actually had the impression that Fellini threw a bunch of ideas (and symbolisms) in a big pot and tried to make some sense out of it, but the end result is not totally convincing.

Maybe it's just that this is a movie from another era, an era when movies required more work on the part of the audience, when more was told with less, unlike some movies (or TV shows) from today, when they drown you in ridiculous and senseless dialogue, but I did feel like the editing forced us to jump from here to there without giving us the exact location of the there.

Giulietta Masina, Fellini's wife and the lead actress in many of his pictures, is very charming and sweet and her character's anguish and innocence certainly come across, thanks to Masina's mastery of her craft.

Her portrayal of a wife who suspects her husband's infidelity and has to decide what to do about it is gripping, especially considering the society in which she lives and the consequences her decisions might have on her future.

Grade: 8/10

Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Desperate Housewives

Season 2 was a little clobbered by critics, but I didn't think it was that much worse than the series' freshman year. Yes, our ladies were shown together (their best moments) way less than the year before, but that doesn't mean that the show didn't deliver.

What I noticed was more campiness in the plotlines, but nothing to seriously frown about. The most disappointing thing was the complete under-utilization of Alfre Woodard, a spectacularly talented actress that was given little or nothing to do, unless you consider looking worried and delivering food to one of her sons locked up in the basement particularly enthralling storytelling.

For that reason, maybe it's just as well that she departed Wisteria Lane. At least, Ms. Woodard will be able to sign up for other shows or movies, furthering her career and delighting us with more interesting performances.

While the season wasn't too lively or terribly exciting (at least not constantly), the finale delivered one punch after the other, leaving you wanting more and longing for the return of the series in the fall.

Which makes me ponder, What's more frustrating? A show that is so-so for most of a season but goes out with a bang of a cliffhanger, literally shaking the ground (i.e. Desperate Housewives), or a show that is nail-biting for most of the season, but goes out with a wimpy finale that leaves you bitter and miffed (24 -- here and here)?

Lost

Season 2's finale was, dare I say, excellent. It answered lots of questions (mainly: how and why the plane crashed on the island; what was the accident the Darma videotapes hinted at related to; was the pushing of the button an idle task or an important one), and also posed a few more in preparation for season 3 (mainly, what will happen to Jack, Kate, and Sawyer; will Michael and Walt really be able to escape; what was the fate of Desmond, John, and Mr. Eko; what's with Desmond's former belle?)

Lost is a really good show that can be hard to follow if you miss an episode or two, but thus far has done a great job of keeping the audience's interest and curiosity at the highest levels. It's not easy to toil the line between serious and silly, credible and overblown, acceptable and just plain preposterous. Lost's sophomore's season only implemented on the strengths of its predecessor, showing its writers, creators, and producers really seem to know what they're doing.

Let's hope for another great season starting in the fall (and many more to follow).

Plus, who can complain with all those hot dudes on a beach anyway??!

.


.

Thursday, May 25, 2006

You've got to be kidding me!!

My opinion of 24's Monday season finale just went from bad to worse in less than four days.
That's got to be a record.

From TVGuide:
Despite how Monday's season finale left off, the sixth season of Fox's 24 will not pick up with Jack Bauer riding a slow boat to China as a political prisoner. "I don't think much of the story will take place in China," executive producer Howard Gordon tells the trade mag TV Week. "It's just an impractical thing given the real-time constraints, because it would take Jack 16 hours -- three-quarters of the [season] -- to get back to L.A."
Which basically means that the lousy finale they came up with wasn't even intended as a springboard for the show's next season. It really means that they just ran out of ideas and creativity at the very end of the season, and threw in whatever they could think of.

So, help me understand here: it would be impractical to follow up on the Chinese storyline because it would take Jack too long to come back to the US. NOW you realize that?!! Are you trying to tell me that nobody foresaw that during a brainstorming session, nobody said anything about its impracticality, and/or nobody considered it a problem to put it in the finale anyway?! Who writes for this show? George Bush?

I ranted about 24's lousy finale in this previous post. This development makes it that much worse, because now we know that Jack's kidnapping won't lead to anything. Either it won't be developed at all (which is like telling us, "Forget about the finale we just showed you" -- to which I reply, "Then why should I bother sticking around the next time if you tell me that I wasted my time?") or will be quickly glossed over, maybe in some kind of flashback or dream sequence.

This also implies that there will be the usual passage of time between seasons, thereby precluding any closure on the part of President Logan's cabal's future and whether they were ever caught and brought to justice.

Thoroughly unsatisfactory.

Wednesday, May 24, 2006

The Tristan Betrayal, by Robert Ludlum

Having found myself on the verge of a nervous breakdown because of the very long daily commute to work and back (I'd say it's an average of 65-70 minutes each way, enough to drive you insane with road rage), I decided to follow a friend's suggestion and try listening to audio books.

I was earnestly hoping that they'd take my mind off the road enough to reduce the incredible amount of stress that built inside of me with every trip, while at the same time allowing me to concentrate on driving, so as to avoid getting into a car accident.

Well, I can honestly say that audio books were my salvation. From the very first trip, the stress was completely gone. I got to work calm and rested, and I actually found myself eagerly awaiting the next trip, just so that I could go on "reading" my book.

Since audio books are prohibitively expensive, I didn't want to just go out and buy one, because I didn't want to end up still being stressed by the commute and upset for having spent all that money on something that didn't work.

Luckily, Ray's dad had received one as a gift in the past, so I was able to borrow it for my little experiment. The book was The Tristan Betrayal by Robert Ludlum, and I loved every minute of it.

Not knowing the writer at all, I had no idea what kind of book this was going to be. It turns out, it's a thriller about espionage in two key moments of the 20th century, World War II and the crumbling of the Soviet Union. The story is very interesting and wonderfully written, full of twists and loaded in suspense.

At first I was taken aback by the fact that only one person, Paul Michael, read the whole book, performing both male and female characters, but the feeling vanished quickly, especially since he's VERY good at what he does, and there's never any doubt about who's saying or doing what.

I wholeheartedly recommend audio books to anyone forced into a long commute. I already bought a few on eBay for very little money and will also borrow them from the library, and I don't think I'll ever give them up, given the immense physical and mental benefits I enjoy by listening to them.

Anyway, I'm currently "reading" The Da Vinci Code, and I love it (Paul Michael reads this one too). The movie came out last Friday, and I've been struggling to avoid reading or seeing anything about it (thanks in big part to Ray too) in order not to spoil the unfolding of the story in the book, and it's very hard.

Obviously, I can't wait to finish the book so that I (we, Ray read it before me. Yes, he's hooked too!!) can go see the movie.

Grade: 8.5

Sola Come un Gambo di Sedano, by Luciana Littizzetto

An Italian book by arguably the most famous comic in the country at the moment, Luciana Littizzetto. It was the last book on paper format I read (more on that later...) and extremely enjoyable.

Basically, the book is made up of short chapters that are either a series of situations the author found herself into or topics that are of interest to her.

I don't know if there is an English translation, and quite likely not all the gags would translate well, because a big part of the effect of humor in general is encapsulated in the language with which it is delivered, but I would definitely recommend it.

Some chapters weren't as interesting as others, but occasionally I found myself laughing so hard I got teary eyed. I'm definitely looking forward to reading her other books now.

By the way, the title translates into: Lonely (or, alone) like a celery stalk.

Grade: 8

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

What a sore loser

Silvio throws another temper tantrum:
Opposition leader Silvio Berlusconi threatened Monday to withdraw his coalition from Parliament if it turns out that his side won general elections in April and the president refuses to call a new vote, according to news reports.
[...]
He vowed Monday during the taping of the late-night TV talk show "Porta a Porta" that if a check of the vote shows that he won rather than Prodi, and Napolitano did not call for new elections, he would order "the immediate withdrawal of all the deputies and senators of the House of Liberties coalition," according to the show's transcripts cited by the Apcom and ANSA agencies.
This guy is just pathetic. I'm just glad he's not the leader of my party, 'cause I'd hate having to support and vote for him.

How many Latinos are still going to hurt themselves by voting Republican in the future?

In a survey by the Pew Research Center, conservative Republicans were by far the most opposed of any demographic group -- 83 percent -- to providing social services to illegal immigrants. Conservative Republicans were, in addition, the only group in which a majority supported a constitutional amendment barring citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants born in the United States. They also supported the activities of citizen militias known as Minutemen that attempt to guard the border.
Incredible.

And don't forget, these are the people that supposedly follow the example of Jesus Christ. Didn't Jesus say that the son is not responsible for the father's mistakes?

I can't say for sure, but I'm quite positive that in any country in the world (although maybe it's not true for the Arab countries in the Middle East), if a person is born in that country, citizenship is automatic.

Now, the Republicans want to take that right away from innocent kids whose parents risked their lives to provide their children with a brighter future. They would like to make those kids illegal aliens (and immigrants) forever, even if they are born in the US.

I really don't see how this rhetoric is going to help the GOP in the fall. Especially considering that Latinos are the fastest growing ethnic group in the country.

It's totally puzzling.

Same-Sex Marriage Amendment Struck Down

It passed in Georgia in 2004 but because the proponents broke the law, a federal judge has now struck it down. Fine by me:
A state amendment banning same-sex marriage was struck down Tuesday by a judge who upheld the voters' right to limit marriage to heterosexual couples but cited procedural flaws in the wording of the amendment, which was approved by more than three-quarters of voters.
[...]
The Georgia amendment defined marriage as between a man and a woman, banned same-sex civil unions and said that same-sex unions performed in other states would not be recognized. The judge, Constance C. Russell of Fulton County Superior Court, ruled that the amendment violated Georgia's single-subject rule, which limits each amendment put before voters to one topic.

"People who believe marriages between men and women should have a unique and privileged place in our society may also believe that same-sex relationships should have some place, although not marriage," the judge wrote. "The single-subject rule protects the right of those people to hold both views and reflect both judgments by their vote."
Isn't it amazing how some people can be so idiotic that they'd go all out to amend the Constitution (an Herculean effort in and of itself) only to screw it all up because they don't want to follow the existing law in the process?

The law is pretty clear, but they thought they could do whatever they wanted because they are God's representatives. Boy, were they wrong.

Idiots. Now start over.

It goes far, but is it safe?

This guy has invented a car that can travel 8,000 miles with one gallon of gas, which is great, but it only weighs like 75 pounds, so I wonder how safe it is.

I'm all for cars that use as little gas as possible, first of all to protect the environment, second to save money. But I also want to feel safe behind the wheel.
A British inventor unveiled a car he claims is the world's most fuel efficient -- capable of doing 8,000 miles (12,875 km) to the gallon (4.5 litres).

Andy Green, 45, spent just 2,000 pounds (2,925 euros or 3,732 US dollars) over two years creating the three-wheeled contraption in his spare time.

The car, named "TeamGreen," is 3.1 metres (10 feet 2 inches) long and a mere 0.6 metres (2 feet) wide, weighing just 30 kilograms (four stone).
[...]
"I think the car is important because it is a reminder to us all that the way to achieve fuel-savings is to drive lighter cars -- it's the weight of this car that is the main reason for its fuel-efficiency," he said.
He's unarguably right, a lighter car requires less energy (= gas) to move it along, but what happens during a collision with another vehicle? I'd like to take a look at its safety ratings.

Bush Readies for War with Iran

And the military and intelligence communities aren't happy about it. From Raw Story:
Concern is building among the military and the intelligence community that the US may be preparing for a military strike on Iran, as military assets in key positions are approaching readiness, RAW STORY has learned.

According to military and intelligence sources, an air strike on Iran could be doable in June of this year, with military assets in key positions ready to go and a possible plan already on the table.
[...]
Other military and intelligence sources are expressing concern both privately and publicly that air strikes on Iran could come earlier than believed.
[...]
All sources, however, agree that given the administration's interest in regime change, an attack on Iran is likely, regardless of international support or UN backing. Furthermore, all sources agree that Gardiner's scenario is the most probable, including an estimated duration and "pause" assessment.
[...]
As previously reported by Raw Story, a terrorist organization known as Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) is being used on the ground in Iran by the Pentagon, bypassing US intelligence channels [...]

Military and intelligence sources now say no Presidential finding exists on MEK ops. Without a presidential finding, the operation circumvents the oversight of the House and Senate Intelligence committees.

Congressional aides for the relevant oversight committees would not confirm or deny allegations that no Presidential finding had been done. One Democratic aide, however, wishing to remain anonymous for this article, did say that any use of the MEK would be illegal.
[...]
The increase in violence on the southern border of Iran, the movement of aircraft carriers into the region, the insistence of Iran's leadership that they intend to be a player on the nuclear stage and the Bush Administration's focus on regime change make military and intelligence sources nervous.
Be afraid. Be very afraid.

24

What a disappointing finale!!

Season 5 was arguably the best one to date, that is, until yesterday. The final two hours of the grueling 24 the show takes to spool its plot were broadcast last night and the ending of the season left an important piece of the puzzle unanswered.

What happened (or happens...) to the high-powered men behind President Logan? Those we were introduced to halfway through the show, the ones represented by a bald guy whose only activity was talking to the President through an earpiece? A guy so powerful, he could actually ask/convince the President of the United States to off himself for the good of the country?

For all intents and purposes, the writers had us believe these men were the extremely powerful cabal that masterminded the terrible day's events with (or without) the President himself. Are we supposed to just forget about them as if they never existed? Are we supposed to think that they got away with murder, while the President got caught? Are we supposed to believe no one would think, at CTU, the Department of Defense, the Attorney General's office, or any other agency, that the President had to have had powerful accomplices in order to put such a complicated machinery into motion?

For the producers/creators/writers to leave such a huge piece of the puzzle missing is criminal. A show like this is supposed to tie all the pieces together before the end. That's the rule for a thriller whose purpose is to save the day and bring the bad guys to justice.

Another absurd scene was Jack Bauer's kidnapping at the hands of the Chinese right before the end titles started to roll. I'll allow that they are powerful and probably have their spies working in our government just as we have ours working in their's, and as soon as Jack's name resurfaced, they moved to intercept and capture him, in order to avenge his (accidental) assassination of their Consul in the previous season.

But, c'mon, after all the places Jack's been to in the past 24 hours, how on earth could they be in the right place, at the very end of the show, in a building swarming with federal agents (Jack has to make his way through a group of SWAT team agents just to reach Audrey), and kidnap him with nobody, NOBODY, noticing anything. And smuggle Jack all the way on a boat headed for Shanghai in a matter of seconds.

Like I said, a very disappointing finale for a show that started out great and fizzled toward the very end (I recently posted about my fears that the plot was tumbling toward disaster). Then again, the next season has already been set up, since obviously (well, at this point nothing is certain anymore) the writers will have to rescue Jack from the Chinese. And it could very well be that this turns into a two-parter, with the next season rescuing Jack and answering our questions about the cabal behind the President, but nothing really points in that direction.

No other 24 season was a follow-up and there has actually always been quite a long stretch between the seasons, from one to two years (let's give the guy some rest, shall we?), so while Jack could reasonably be held captive by the Chinese for a good year before the Americans are able to find and rescue him, nothing hints at the possibility that the bald guy's posse will be brought to justice.

And to think that it would have all been so easy and quick to set up. Just show us the bald guy witnessing the President being escorted out by the Secret Service, tipping him off that something went wrong and the plot was uncovered, or have Logan mutter the words, "It's not over yet", or something to that effect, just so we're not left staring at a painting whose center has been carved out.

Grade
  • season: 9
  • finale: 2

Monday, May 22, 2006

The Amazing Race 9

It ended last week with BJ and Tyler winning the one million dollar prize by arriving first at the last pit stop.

It was the perfect ending for a show that strongly needed to redeem itself after its disappointing 8th outing, the one with families of 4 instead of teams of 2 as participants, remember it? Me neither. I stopped watching it as soon as I started feeling like I was wasting my time, never a good feeling when watching TV.

Anyway, this season, Amazing Race was back to its roots and the show was back to being great. We enjoyed it as usual and in the end were both very, very happy to see a "cerebral" team win over a more "physical" one.

And for that, we have to thank whoever had the brilliant idea of inserting a final road block right before the pit stop, which increased the teams' nervousness and tension to the extreme. The task was both mental and physical, unlike the usual foot-race ending that always favors physically strong teams.

The winning team and the runner ups were both strong throughout the race (BJ and Tyler won 5 out of 13 legs of the race, Eric and Jeremy won 6) but the two were clearly different.

Although Eric and Jeremy weren't dumb, they clearly relied heavily on their physical fitness. BJ and Tyler, on the other hand, knew their strong suit was their ability to think.

And in the end, brains won over brawns.

The only sad thing was seeing gorgeously handsome Eric so disappointed...

Friday, May 19, 2006

The terrorists have already won...

Great cartoon by Tom Toles on the controversy about Bush spying on every American citizen's phone calls:

The Religious Right Zealots' agenda for the country

This Raw Story article details how some Republican party supporters from the religious right are very upset that the Republicans aren't doing more to deliver on their campaign promises now that they control all branches of the government.

The religious right poured enormous resources into making sure Bush won the White House, twice, and the GOP gained majorities in both chambers of Congress, all in hopes of seeing their agenda turned into legislation. But apparently they now realize that the GOP just used them to gain power and then they did what they wanted, including wreaking havoc on the nation's finances to give tax cuts to their rich friends and invading a Middle Eastern country for the only reason of stealing their oil, regardless of how many people were going to die in the process.

So now the homegrown zealots are almost hoping the GOP loses the midterm elections, just so they learn a lesson, threatening to withdraw their full support unless the GOP leadership (and Bush, the Voyeur) deliver some results between now and November.

And don't think that they want results in ending the war in Iraq, improving the economy, lowering the price of gas, protecting the environment, reducing the number of people living below the poverty line in the US of A or any other such noble cause.

No, their agenda consists of the following items:
  • gay marriage
  • immigration
  • pray in school
  • obscenity/porn
  • abortion
Hmm, I wonder how many people in America are as worried about these topics as the Made in the USA Zealots are, especially with all the aforementioned problems the nation faces.

The religious right can't gain anything from a GOP loss of power, but I guess we'll have to wait for the fall to call their bluff. However, this tidbit is alarming:
"When a president is in a reasonably strong position, these kind of leaders don't have a lot of leverage," said Charlie Cook, a nonpartisan political analyst. "But when the president is weak, they tend to have a lot of leverage."
That's great, all we need now the Bush is weak and can't do much damage, is to see the zealots grow more powerful and cause their brand of damage.

More here.

Same-sex parents deserve equality

That's the comment of Alistair Nicholson, former Chief Justice of the Australian Family Court, in relation to the recent passage of civil union legislation in the main territory of Australia.

He said much more, and it deserves to be spread around as much as possible:
SAME-sex parents should have the same rights afforded to heterosexual parents, a former chief justice of the Family Court said today.

Alistair Nicholson said it was time the rest of Australia fell into line with modern notions of marriage and what it meant to be a good parent.

"I just don't see why same-sex couples should not be able to receive the same freedoms and rights as other people - and I don't see why their children should be discriminated against, either," Mr Nicholson said on SBS.

Traditional notions of marriage were changing and it was time Australia considered what was best for the children of same-sex couples, Mr Nicholson said.

"There is no formal recognition of it (gay relationships) in the law, which I think is an act of cruelty both to them and to the children," Mr Nicholson said today.

There was "not a shred" of credible evidence to support arguments that children brought up in a gay relationship were significantly disadvantaged.

"It seems to me people are forgetting the children in all this equation ... (and) the important thing for children is loving parents," Mr Nicholson said.

"It is highly likely that children would be much better off in a homosexual relationship than a heterosexual relationship that is not a good one."
How about that!

And in relation to a concept so dear to Justice Scalia (that of interpreting the law - and the Constitution - according to the original intent when the law was written, with no regard to the passage of time), Mr. Nicholson said, "It seems to me that to freeze a concept in time is a mistake."

Why don't we have more jurists like that in this country?

Wasting scientists' work and taxpayers' money

NASA's future was laid out by President Bush a couple years ago when he proposed going back to the Moon first and from there to Mars. He obviously didn't care diddlysquat about NASA, the Moon or Mars (he was probably thinking of the Mars chocolate bar, not the planet).

He wanted to divert attention away from some scandal (or his shortcomings as the Commander in Chief) and tried to show he's a leader with a vision, but failed on both accounts, since people have this amazing ability to concentrate and understand more than one topic at a time, and, above all, no one blessed with cognitive thinking would ever seriously cogitate: "Bush, a visionary leader" (I just wrote an oxymoron... about a moron).

The thing Bush doesn't seem to realize is that, because of the immense power that comes with his job title, whatever he says, has consequences. He just used the "space frontier" topic in hopes that it would put him in the same league as President Kennedy, when he laid out a policy to get to the Moon during the Cold War, but it takes more than a speech, a nice suit and a camera to look into.

So now NASA is left to carry out Bush's desires without any extra funds toward it. Kennedy had given NASA immense resources to accomplish the goal to get to the Moon. Bush, ensnared in his oil-war in Iraq that's sucking up billions from the federal budget, just told NASA to find the funds within its budget, by either reallocating resources, or canceling existing projects.

And that's precisely what NASA is doing. Among the victims, however, there are two projects for which they've already spent millions, and one that is almost complete:
Dawn Asteroid Orbiter
  • What we'd Lose: Insight into our planet's birth. If launched later this year, Dawn would study two rare asteroids containing building blocks of the early universe.
  • Money saved: $40 million, which is the cost to complete the project. (NASA has already spent $371 million to build the orbiter.)
  • The rationale: Dawn's ion engine is weaker than it should be, and the processing units that provide power to the orbiter's thrusters are not functioning properly.
Prometheus Nuclear Systems and Technology
  • What we'd lose: The ability to reach Mars in two months instead of six. The program would build nuclear reactors to power and propel spacecraft.
  • Money saved: $2.1 billion over five years. (NASA has already spent about $900 million on the project since its inception in 2003.)
  • The rationale: NASA hopes to share the cost of the research by partnering with countries including France, Russia and Japan, all of which are investing in nuclear propulsion.
Both projects are clearly worth carrying out. The first one seems to have encountered some technical hurdles, but NASA has already spent 9 times the amount of money it would save by scrapping the mission, and the amount saved is probably wasted in Iraq every two hours. Wouldn't it be wiser to carry it to conclusion at this point?

The second one seems to me of paramount importance for the goal of reaching Mars in the future (hell, I've never been in a spaceship, but I'm sure that a trip of 2 months would be preferable to one of 6). Yes, partnering up with other nations to share the costs would be nice, but scrapping our project would mean trashing NINE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS!!

Are they crazy!?

Thursday, May 18, 2006

Scolding Bush

Listen to what US Representative John Conyers had to say on the issue of Bush's spying on ALL American citizens' private phone calls (and certainly emails, instant messages, etc...):
"It is a sad day when the Congress of the United States must compel the President to abide by the Constitution," said Congressman Conyers, the Ranking Member on the House Committee on the Judiciary. "I regret that we have to legislate once again on an issue that was clearly settled by this Congress nearly 30 years ago in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act."

Congressman Conyers added, "This legislation could not be more timely. Today's USA Today article made clear that the Administration's eavesdropping is larger than anyone imagined and sweeps in the activities of millions of innocent Americans. If this Congress does not rein in the President and his Administration now, there is no telling how far it will go."
He accompanied his words with the introduction of a bill meant to kill Bush's secret snooping program at the NSA:
The Act would require any attempt to listen in on Americans or collect telephone or e-mail records to be conducted in accordance with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA), or Title III of the criminal code. In both cases, court warrants based on probable cause are required. The Act states that FISA is the exclusive way to conduct electronic surveillance of U.S. persons on U.S. soil for intelligence purposes.

It also explicitly states that the Authorization to Use Military Force, passed by Congress in October 2002, did not constitute authority to engage in electronic surveillance outside of FISA.
Good man. Will he ever run for President??

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Sweet words of hope, for all of humanity

The recent White House shake-up was an attempt to jump-start the administration and boost President Bush's rock-bottom approval ratings, but have those efforts come too late to salvage the presidency? A prominent GOP pollster thinks that may be the case.

"This administration may be over," Lance Tarrance, a chief architect of the Republicans' 1960s and '70s Southern strategy, told a gathering of journalists and political wonks last week. "By and large, if you want to be tough about it, the relevancy of this administration on policy may be over."

On the side of Russia

As we all know, Bush wants to attack Iran to lift his sagging poll numbers and keep control of Congress into the hands of the Republicans.

Thankfully, the Russians (and the Chinese) are (so far successfully) hampering his plans. This is one of the smartest comments on the issue I've heard so far, from the Russian ambassador in London, Yury Fedotov:
"We have serious doubts sanctions would work. [They] could pave the way to a military action. The military option is a nonsense. It's [an] adventure that could threaten international stability in this region and beyond."

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Better late than never

A memorial to all gay and lesbian Holocaust victims has been planned in Vienna:
Gay and lesbian holocaust victims are to get their own memorial in Vienna, officials revealed today.

A large basin filled with pink water will be built in 2007 in Morzinplatz, Vienna, at the former Gestapo headquarters, to remember the homosexual victims of the Nazi regime, according to plans published today.

The basin will be inscribed with the word "queer."
[...]
It is thought that between 5,000 and 15,000 gay people, who were seen as "sexual deviants" were sent to concentration camps and gas chambers, and forced to wear a pink triangle.

Educating kids about gays' place in history

What an inspiring law has passed the California State Senate:
The California State Senate approved a controversial bill on Thursday requiring public school material to include "age appropriate" lessons on the historical contributions of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. The measure was based, in part, on the belief that presenting positive role models could help ease negative feelings and battle high suicide rates among gay and lesbian students.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the measure -- the first of its kind in the nation -- also prohibits teaching or textbooks that reflect adversely on people because of their sexual orientation.
Obviously, the legislation's opponents aren't thrilled at all, and will fight with their nails and teeth to keep it off the books. Unfortunately, it looks like the Governator is on their side, since his approval ratings are pretty bad these days and he can't afford to lose any supporters, especially from the far right of the Republican party, in an election year, and will likely veto the bill.

Another great example of why elections matter: if a Democrat had won against Governor Davis or if his recall election had failed, we would by now have same-sex marriage in California and we'd soon have gay history taught in schools.

The most disturbing (and annoying) part of the article, however, is this:
"If you're a black American, you can't help it. You are born that way," said Republican Senator Bill Morrow. "There is not one scintilla of credible scientific evidence that homosexuality is biological in origin. That is a myth. It is behavioral." Morrow said he believes the bill is dangerous because it puts sexual orientation -- which he categorized as a "cultural or behavioral lifestyle" -- in league with race and sex, which are biological. According to the Times, Morrow also objected to textbooks pointing out historical figures' sexual orientations, because "their contribution to history has nothing to do with their sexual proclivities."
First of all, Mr. Morrow, you should take a look at my recent post on the biological origins of homosexuality, or at least inform yourself by checking the latest scientific information available. Unless, of course, you're not interested in being fair and objective, and all you care about is actually serving the religious zealots who put you in office.

Second, Mr. Morrow, you should avoid handing out judgment on other people's lives until and unless you have experienced what you're talking about first hand. Since, Mr. Morrow, you are, I assume, straight, you cannot and should not tell any gay person what their life is or isn't with absolute certainty. You shouldn't dare.

I can assure you, Mr. Morrow, that at least 99% of gays and lesbians on earth would prefer being born straight into this world, given the hardships of being gay. It is no fun, I can assure you, and it's precisely the narrow mindedness of people like you, who have no clue what they are talking about, that makes it that much harder.

When same-sex parents split up

A lesbian couple has been fighting for custody of their daughter after their split 5 years ago and finally the Supreme Court declined without comment to take the case, letting the Washington State Supreme Court's ruling in favor of the non-biological mother of the girl stand.

She will now be allowed to maintain contact with the 11 year old girl.

The two women started dating in 1990 and their daughter was born in '95. They broke up in 2001 and the biological mother didn't want her ex to see "her" daughter anymore. Too bad she was her mother as well.

I cannot imagine how two people who have loved each other for over a decade, have decided to have a child together and raised that same child, together, for over 5 years, end up hating one another so much that one would deny the other the right to see their offspring.

I can't imagine Ray and I ever splitting up, but if it happened, I cannot fathom either of us denying the other the right to see our kids, no matter how much we despised each other (it pains me to even write those words hypothetically).

It's really sad if you think about it. That poor girl has already been through so much in her short lifespan. Let's just hope their mothers saved up some money to pay for her therapy when the time comes, 'cause I'm sure she'll need it.

I'm very happy that the Supreme Court let the previous ruling stand. Both justice and the interests of the child were upheld yesterday.

The Eavesdropper

Great Pat Oliphant cartoon on Bush's eavesdropping habits. We should start calling him The Big Voyeur.

Save your $$$, at least for now

Great New York Times article on why you should hold off on buying one of those brand new Hi-Def DVD players just put on the market by Toshiba (besides the price tag, obviously).

Basically, there is a war going on between two giant electronic makers, Toshiba and Sony, each making its own version of hi-def DVD media, hoping to see it establish itself as the market leader.

It's our generation version of the VHS vs. Betamax war from what feels like eons ago, and it's not yet clear who will emerge as the winner. After all, all agree that Betamax was a better media, but VHS in the end prevailed, so it's anyone's guess at this point which format will become dominant.

Both brands have lined up big Hollywood movie studios, whose stakes are huge, since their products will eventually end up on the winning format, but I read that the deciding factor might hinge on a different movie industry, just as busy and powerful. The porn industry, which releases far more titles each year and whose budget for each picture is far less than the average Hollywood production.

At any rate, no sense wasting your money buying an expensive DVD player format that might not be usable at all in a couple years and that will eventually be cheaper and better once the technology has improved anyway.

I can't say I don't want one. We just bought a 61" flat screen DLP TV and are now enjoying all sorts of programs in high definition. It certainly is a totally different viewing experience. Whenever we have to watch a show that isn't on a high-def channel we are reminded of how cool high-def is.

Anyhow, I guess that for now we'll have to hold off on a high-def DVD and enjoy high-def TV. Regular DVDs render greatly in their current format anyway.

The unexpected repercussions of global warming

Interesting story from Canada. Apparently they found a bear that is an offspring of a grizzly and a polar bear, which in the wild is extremely rare because of different mating rituals and roaming territories.

But apparently global warming is responsible for this too, since the grizzly bear population seems to be pushing its territory's boundaries northward now that the weather is warming up.

Obviously, this is a worrisome development because the interbreeding will diminish the gene pool of the polar bear, threatening it's survival and ultimately existence:
"As grizzly bears expand their range north, (inter-breeding) becomes another potential threat to polar bears," said [geneticist] Mr. Paetkau. "If there’s too much inter-breeding, the grizzly bear genes could eventually wash out the polar bear, and they could become basically grizzly bears with a little more northern habitat."

Farewell, The West Wing

Last Sunday, NBC broadcast the final episode of the highly acclaimed, award winning series The West Wing.

It was a decent, gracious, appropriate finale for a series that always strived to talk about important and serious issues without ever becoming a tearjerker or a pompous soapbox.

Ray and I always watched the show, from the very beginning, and saw the end coming from afar, slowly induced by declining ratings.

Overall, it was one of the best shows ever produced under any aspect, casting, scripts, sets, believability, and its ability to completely involve the viewer. It could make you cry and laugh in the same episode, all the while teaching you something new about how the world of politics works.

It will be sorely missed. Farewell, The West Wing.

A neutral Net

A debate is currently under way in the US about whether the Internet should stay as is, a leveled playing field in which multinational companies' websites are just as accessible to anyone as the blog journal you're reading now, or if the cable and telephone companies that provide the Internet service (its infrastructure if you will) should be allowed to charge a premium fee that would allow those who pay it to have their websites' information travel faster and be delivered more readily on the digital highways than that of a regular guy's personal website.

Naturally, my position is that the Internet should remain neutral and free, as is now, so that we can all express our opinions and, when necessary, take on the big guys without being faced with insurmountable obstacles that the Internet service providers now say would never be put in place, but that we all now will rise up as roadblocks all over the webosphere.

Just imagine. A company screws you over with lousy service or defective merchandise. You want to make sure they don't screw other people, so you set up a web page where you tell everything about it. However, as soon as the company sees your website, they pay off you provider to slow down access to your website, make it particularly hard to navigate, or outright refuse you service, since the carriers also want the power to block access to sites they don't like or approve of.

That's just wrong and should never come to pass. Especially in a world where even democracies like the one here in the States can be hijacked by a corrupt administration bent on world domination, it is of utmost importance that the individual retain a space where he can express his views and opinions without impediments.

Here are some excerpts from the article:
Cable and telephone companies that provide Internet service are talking about creating a two-tiered Internet, in which Web sites that pay them large fees would get priority over everything else. Opponents of these plans are supporting Net-neutrality legislation, which would require all Web sites to be treated equally.

One of the Internet's great strengths is that a single blogger or a small political group can inexpensively create a Web page that is
just as accessible to the world as Microsoft's home page. But this democratic Internet would be in danger if the companies that deliver Internet service changed the rules so that Web sites that pay them money would be easily accessible, while little-guy sites would be harder to access, and slower to navigate. Providers could also block access to sites they do not like.

That would be a financial windfall for Internet service providers, but a disaster for users, who could find their Web browsing influenced by whichever sites paid their service provider the most money.

Monday, May 15, 2006

Mel Gibson should be in marketing

I'm not a big fan of Mel gay-hater Gibson because of the type of marketing campaign he put in place for his hugely successful The Passion of the Christ, pitching moderate believers against conservative ones and minimizing the Holocaust, all in order to fan a fire of free publicity for his movie among churches and moviegoers.

Since it worked so well, he seems to be at it again for his next pet project, Apocalypto, this time using the growing public distrust and displeasure with George Bush:
Film star and director Mel Gibson has launched a scathing attack on US President George W Bush, comparing his leadership to the barbaric rulers of the Mayan civilization in his new film Apocalypto.

Gibson reveals he used present day American politics as an inspiration, claiming the government callously plays on the nation's insecurities to maintain power.

He tells British film magazine Hotdog, "The fear-mongering we depict in the film reminds me of President Bush and his guys".
I can't say I don't agree with the statement that Bush is a fear-monger and I sure welcome any and all criticism of him, his administration, and his policies, but methinks Mr. Gibson is just taking this position to stoke interest in his new picture, not because he's really worried about the situation in the US under Bush.

Gibson is so damn rich, he could buy all the publicity he wants, without taking advantage of the public or our misfortunes under this régime.

What a courageous man

A Boston College professor just quit his job over the college's decision to invite well-know liar Condoleezza Rice to speak at its graduation ceremony.

I'm reporting his open letter to the college's president in its entirety because it is very rare to witness such a display of ethical judgment, especially when paired with such drastic actions as quitting one's job. Not just because it's the right thing to do, but because it's the only thing to do.

I sure hope he'll have another job lined up as soon as possible. A man like this should certainly be rewarded for his stand, not punished.

Here's the letter:
DEAR Father Leahy,

I am writing to resign my post as an adjunct professor of English at Boston College.

I am doing so -- after five years at BC, and with tremendous regret -- as a direct result of your decision to invite Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to be the commencement speaker at this year's graduation.

Many members of the faculty and student body already have voiced their objection to the invitation, arguing that Rice's actions as secretary of state are inconsistent with the broader humanistic values of the university and the Catholic and Jesuit traditions from which those values derive.

But I am not writing this letter simply because of an objection to the war against Iraq. My concern is more fundamental. Simply put, Rice is a liar.

She has lied to the American people knowingly, repeatedly, often extravagantly over the past five years, in an effort to justify a pathologically misguided foreign policy.

The public record of her deceits is extensive. During the ramp-up to the Iraq war, she made 29 false or misleading public statements concerning Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and links to Al Qaeda, according to a congressional investigation by the House Committee on Government Reform.

To cite one example:

In an effort to build the case for war, then-National Security Adviser Rice repeatedly asserted that Iraq was pursuing a nuclear weapon, and specifically seeking uranium in Africa.

In July of 2003, after these claims were disproved, Rice said: ''Now if there were doubts about the underlying intelligence . . . those doubts were not communicated to the president, the vice president, or to me."

Rice's own deputy, Stephen Hadley, later admitted that the CIA had sent her a memo eight months earlier warning against the use of this claim.

In the three years since the war began, Rice has continued to misrepresent or simply ignore the truth about our deadly adventure in Iraq.

Like the president whom she serves so faithfully, she refuses to recognize her errors or the tragic consequences of those errors to the young soldiers and civilians dying in Iraq. She is a diplomat whose central allegiance is not to the democratic cause of this nation, but absolute power.

This is the woman to whom you will be bestowing an honorary degree, along with the privilege of addressing the graduating class of 2006.

It is this last notion I find most reprehensible: that Boston College would entrust to Rice the role of moral exemplar.

To be clear: I am not questioning her intellectual gifts or academic accomplishments. Nor her potentially inspiring role as a powerful woman of color.

But these are not the factors by which a commencement speaker should be judged. It is the content of one's character that matters here -- the reverence for truth and knowledge that Boston College purports to champion.

Rice does not personify these values; she repudiates them. Whatever inspiring rhetoric she might present to the graduating class, her actions as a citizen and politician tell a different story.

Honestly, Father Leahy, what lessons do you expect her to impart to impressionable seniors?

That hard work in the corporate sector might gain them a spot on the board of Chevron? That they, too, might someday have an oil tanker named after them? That it is acceptable to lie to the American people for political gain?

Given the widespread objection to inviting Rice, I would like to think you will rescind the offer. But that is clearly not going to happen.

Like the administration in Washington, you appear too proud to admit to your mistake. Instead, you will mouth a bunch of platitudes, all of which boil down to: You don't want to lose face.

In this sense, you leave me no choice.

I cannot, in good conscience, exhort my students to pursue truth and knowledge, then collect a paycheck from an institution that displays such flagrant disregard for both.

I would like to apologize to my students and prospective students. I would also urge them to investigate the words and actions of Rice, and to exercise their own First Amendment rights at her speech.

Steve Almond is the author of the story collections ''The Evil B. B. Chow" and ''My Life in Heavy Metal."

Are we born that way?

Another scientific study has come out in favor of this theory in the ongoing debate on whether gays and lesbians choose their homosexuality or it chooses them.

This same group of scientists had already carried out a similar study a year ago, whose results clearly showed how gay men's brains behaved more like those of straight women then straight men (DUH!!).

This study concentrated on lesbians' brains, and although the results were less pronounced than in the previous study, it still concluded that lesbians' brains behave more like those of straight men that straight women.
Homosexuals' brains respond differently from those of straight men and women when exposed to sex hormones, but researchers now say the difference is less pronounced in lesbians than in gay men.

Lesbians' brains reacted somewhat, though not completely, like those of heterosexual men, a team of Swedish researchers said in Tuesday's edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A year ago, the same group reported findings for gay men that showed their brain response to hormones was similar to that of heterosexual women.

In both cases the findings add weight to the idea that homosexuality has a physical basis and is not learned behavior.
[...]
"The important thing is to be open to the likely situation that there are biological factors that contribute to sexual orientation," added Witelson, who was not part of the research team.
This is naturally very good news for us, since it enforces our long held position that we shouldn't be criminalized or marginalized for who we're attracted to, because for us it's only natural, and these studies prove exactly that.

We're as normal as heterosexuals are and therefore should be treated as such.

Not something any religious zealot would ever agree on, and certainly a position they'll fight hard to keep out of the mainstream way of thinking.

Spiraling down...

Bush's approval numbers have fallen below the 30% mark for the first time in a poll. He's at 29% in the latest Harris Interactive poll:
President Bush's job-approval rating has fallen to its lowest mark of his presidency, according to a new Harris Interactive poll. Of 1,003 U.S. adults surveyed in a telephone poll, 29% think Mr. Bush is doing an "excellent or pretty good" job as president, down from 35% in April and significantly lower than 43% in January.

Roughly one-quarter of U.S. adults say "things in the country are going in the right direction," while 69% say "things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track."

The Harris poll comes two days after a downbeat assessment of Bush in a New York Times/CBS News poll. The Times, in analyzing the results, said "Americans have a bleaker view of the country's direction than at any time in more than two decades."
The mystery is how can they still find 29 people out of 100 who say that what Bush does is "excellent or pretty good" or about 25 out of 100 who think that "things in the country are going in the right direction." I guess if you think that heading at full speed toward a cliff is ok, than you like where the country is going.

This jackass sure still has plenty of morons who owe him a favor, need something from him, or are somehow related to him.

The Ceremony - Update

The ceremony went well and in the end the weather was great, but they had already set up everything inside (since it had been raining for like four days and everything outside was soaked anyway). Afterwards, Mary took us all out for a late lunch, and that was fun too. The kids were angels throughout the whole day (and they looked very puzzled, but at least not spooked, but all those people, and their papà, in black gowns and funny hats). It felt really good to participate in the graduation ceremony, even though I know I'm not completely done. I can't even imagine how it will feel when I am really done. I started school in the US in 1998. It's been a long time since the last time I didn't have to worry about some homework, or test, or upcoming project, even just on a subconscious level. But it's all coming to an end now. I think I'll be done within a couple months. And then we'll have to celebrate my freedom from school. And both Ray and I will be able to put this all behind us, for good. Won't we darling?

Saturday, May 13, 2006

The Ceremony

My Master's Degree Graduation Ceremony is today at 1.00 pm. I still have to finish my last class, but the school allows me to participate in the ceremony anyway, since I'll be done by August and there's no ceremony then. It will be nice even though the weather isn't that great. Ray, the kids and Grandma Mary are coming. More on it later on.

Friday, May 12, 2006

The New and Improved Democratic Iraq

Well, I have to say, things in Iraq are really improving by the day, especially for gays. From Towleroad:
"There is mounting evidence that fundamentalists have infiltrated government security forces to commit homophobic murders while wearing police uniforms. Human rights groups are particularly concerned that the Sadr and Badr militias, both Shia, have stepped up their attacks on the gay community after a string of religious rulings, since the US-led invasion, calling for the eradication of homosexuals."

Is this something that the U.S. military is aware of? Apparently, and here's maybe the most cowardly crime of all:

"Mr Hili, whose Abu Nawas group has close links with clandestine gay activists inside Iraq, said US coalition forces are unwilling to try and tackle the rising tide of homophobic attacks. 'They just don't want to upset the Iraqi government by bringing up the taboo of homosexuality even though homophobic murders have intensified,' he said."
Now, I don't know how bad gays must have had it under Saddam's rule, probably pretty bad, but it's starting to look like more and more Iraqi segments of the population are worse off now then they were when he was in charge.

At least back then they had power and water continuously (certainly in Baghdad), women were freer than in other Muslim countries and people didn't run the risk of being murdered freely by the police, or by people who fake being the police.

Nice work, Mr. Bush. Iraq is really a beacon of liberties in the Middle East now that you have taken it under your wing.

For the sake of every single human being, let's just hope someone finds the way to stop this insane individual from attacking Iran.

If he does, we might really witness the end of civilization in our lifetime.

Caprica

Great news for all Battlestar Galactica fans out there (and I'm a huge fan!!):
SCI FI Channel announced the development of Caprica, a spinoff prequel of its hit Battlestar Galactica, in presentations to advertisers in New York on April 26. Caprica would come from Galactica executive producers Ronald D. Moore and David Eick, writer Remi Aubuchon (24) and NBC Universal Television Studio.

Caprica would take place more than half a century before the events that play out in Battlestar Galactica. The people of the Twelve Colonies are at peace and living in a society not unlike our own, but where high technology has changed the lives of virtually everyone for the better.

But a startling breakthrough in robotics is about to occur, one that will bring to life the age-old dream of marrying artificial intelligence with a mechanical body to create the first living robot: a Cylon. Following the lives of two families, the Graystones and the Adamas (the family of William Adama, who will one day become the commander of the Battlestar Galactica), Caprica will weave together corporate intrigue, techno-action and sexual politics into television's first science fiction family saga, the channel announced.
Needless to say, I can't wait for this series to begin. Battlestar Galactica is one of the best shows I've ever seen, and arguably the best sci-fi series ever.

And given that Caprica would be produced by the same people that produce Battlestar Galactica and a writer of 24 (which I like as well), the show should end up being pretty good.

Way to go SCI FI.

What a cry baby

A couple days ago, the new President of Italy was elected by the Parliament. It's Giorgio Napolitano, the center-left candidate and a former member of the Communist Party, dealing another blow to Silvio Berlusconi's center-right movement.

He'll take office on Monday, and will immediately instruct Romano Prodi, the newly elected Prime Minister, to form a new government, finally ending the grip on power of Berlusconi that officially ended only after he was forced to resign by the election of new Speakers in both chambers of Parliament (and not by the election of a new Prime Minister, as is customary).

Up until that moment, he had refused to step down, citing voting irregularities (no significant ones were found) and the injustice of a system that was giving the center-left movement more seats in Parliament than the votes they got would have granted them in the past.

A new system that Berlusconi himself, overcoming a fierce opposition, put in place, hoping it'd help him and his coalition keep their grip on power. But it backfired, and Berlusconi showed the world what a grown up baby looks like, refusing FOR THREE WEEKS to concede his loss to Prodi, and even stating, at some point, that he'd never formally concede.

Unfortunately, given Prodi's slim majority of just 2 seats in the Senate, Berlusconi can make life really hard for him, especially when you read quotes like this:
One of Prodi's next tests, in the face of the right's threat to block every move his government makes, will come when he seeks a vote of confidence.

"Our objective is to bring it (the government) down as soon as possible," said outgoing Welfare Minister Roberto Maroni on Friday.

"Berlusconi knows that if it lasts five years, he will find it difficult to run as head of government again. But if it doesn't last even a year, he will go forward," he said.
And this:
Outgoing Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who waited three weeks before conceding defeat, on Thursday vowed that the opposition would give Prodi "no honeymoon period."

"We will present an opposition without pity," he said.
So puerile. So childish. So shameful.

Someone gets it

It's nice to see that the horizon is finally opening up. This is what Judge Stephen Reinhardt, of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, had to say regarding gay students' rights:
"Public school students who may be injured by verbal assaults on the basis of a core identifying characteristic such as race, religion, or sexual orientation have a right to be free from such attacks while on school campuses. As Tinker clearly states, students have the right to 'be secure and to be let alone.'... Being secure involves not only the freedom from physical assaults but from psychological attacks that cause young people to question their self-worth and their rightful place in society. The 'right to be let alone' has been recognized by the Supreme Court … as the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men."
This is the link if you want to know more about the case.

Apropos my previous post...

Ok, this must be one of the funniest pictures of Bush I've ever seen. Just read the caption (I believe he was referring to Hurricane Katrina, but it doesn't really matter)

Thursday, May 11, 2006

Getting judged ahead of time

This Rolling Stone article really does have all the goods. It's really long, but a great read.

Basically, they looked at Bush with the help of US presidential history experts and made comparisons between his presidency and that of the US presidents considered among the worst ever, to see where he stands.

For starters, it's amusing to see how nobody even entertains the thought that Bush's name might end up among the best presidents, which in and of itself makes me want to send them flowers.

But their analysis is so precise, extensive and objective that it's really worth reading in full. However, since it's really, really, (no, trust me, really) long, I decided to post the best parts. Enjoy.

George W. Bush's presidency appears headed for colossal historical disgrace. Barring a cataclysmic event on the order of the terrorist attacks of September 11th, after which the public might rally around the White House once again, there seems to be little the administration can do to avoid being ranked on the lowest tier of U.S. presidents. And that may be the best-case scenario. Many historians are now wondering whether Bush, in fact, will be remembered as the very worst president in all of American history.

In early 2004, an informal survey of 415 historians conducted by the nonpartisan History News Network found that eighty-one percent considered the Bush administration a "failure."

[Great Presidents] Presented with arduous, at times seemingly impossible circumstances, they rallied the nation, governed brilliantly and left the republic more secure than when they entered office. Calamitous presidents, faced with enormous difficulties -- Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Hoover and now Bush -- have divided the nation, governed erratically and left the nation worse off. Bush, however, is one of the rarities in presidential history: he has not only stumbled badly in every one of these key areas, he has also displayed a weakness common among the greatest presidential failures -- an unswerving adherence to a simplistic ideology that abjures deviation from dogma as heresy, thus preventing any pragmatic adjustment to changing realities. Repeatedly, Bush has undone himself, a failing revealed in each major area of presidential performance.

Yet even then, Bush wasted his chance by quickly choosing partisanship over leadership. No other president -- Lincoln in the Civil War, FDR in World War II, John F. Kennedy at critical moments of the Cold War -- faced with such a monumental set of military and political circumstances failed to embrace the opposing political party to help wage a truly national struggle.

But no president has surpassed Bush in departing so thoroughly from his original campaign persona.

The heart of Bush's domestic policy has turned out to be nothing more than a series of massively regressive tax cuts -- a return, with a vengeance, to the discredited Reagan-era supply-side faith that Bush's father once ridiculed as "voodoo economics."

The monster deficits, caused by increased federal spending combined with the reduction of revenue resulting from the tax cuts, have also placed Bush's administration in a historic class of its own with respect to government borrowing. According to the
Treasury Department, the forty-two presidents who held office between 1789 and 2000 borrowed a combined total of $1.01 trillion from foreign governments and financial institutions. But between 2001 and 2005 alone, the Bush White House borrowed $1.05 trillion, more than all of the previous presidencies combined. Having inherited the largest federal surplus in American history in 2001, he has turned it into the largest deficit ever.

The rest of what remains of Bush's skimpy domestic agenda is either failed or failing -- a record unmatched since the presidency of Herbert Hoover.

Far from being the conservative he said he was, Bush has blazed a radical new path as the first American president in history who is outwardly hostile to science -- dedicated, as a distinguished, bipartisan panel of educators and scientists (including forty-nine Nobel laureates) has declared, to "the distortion of scientific knowledge for partisan political ends." History may ultimately hold Bush in the greatest contempt for expanding the powers of the presidency beyond the limits laid down by the U.S. Constitution.

By contrast, the Bush administration -- in seeking to restore what Cheney, a Nixon administration veteran, has called "the legitimate authority of the presidency" -- threatens to overturn the Framers' healthy tension in favor of presidential absolutism. Armed with legal findings by his attorney general (and personal lawyer) Alberto Gonzales, the Bush White House has declared that the president's powers as commander in chief in wartime are limitless. No previous wartime president has come close to making so grandiose a claim. More specifically, this administration has asserted that the president is perfectly free to violate federal laws on such matters as domestic surveillance and the torture of detainees. When Congress has passed legislation to limit those assertions, Bush has resorted to issuing constitutionally dubious "signing statements," which declare, by fiat, how he will interpret and execute the law in question, even when that interpretation flagrantly violates the will of Congress. Earlier presidents, including Jackson, raised hackles by offering their own view of the Constitution in order to justify vetoing congressional acts. Bush doesn't bother with that: He signs the legislation (eliminating any risk that Congress will overturn a veto), and then governs how he pleases -- using the signing statements as if they were line-item vetoes.

Bush seems to think that, since 9/11, he has been placed, by the grace of God, in the same kind of situation Lincoln faced. But Lincoln, under pressure of daily combat on American soil against fellow Americans, did not operate in secret, as Bush has. He did not claim, as Bush has, that his emergency actions were wholly regular and constitutional as well as necessary; Lincoln sought and received Congressional authorization for his suspension of habeas corpus in 1863. Nor did Lincoln act under the amorphous cover of a "war on terror" -- a war against a tactic, not a specific nation or political entity, which could last as long as any president deems the tactic a threat to national security. Lincoln's exceptional measures were intended to survive only as long as the Confederacy was in rebellion. Bush's could be extended indefinitely, as the president sees fit, permanently endangering rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution to the citizenry.

The president came to office calling himself "a uniter, not a divider" and promising to soften the acrimonious tone in Washington. He has had two enormous opportunities to fulfill those pledges: first, in the noisy aftermath of his controversial election in 2000, and, even more, after the attacks of September 11th, when the nation pulled behind him as it has supported no other president in living memory. Yet under both sets of historically unprecedented circumstances, Bush has chosen to act in ways that have left the country less united and more divided, less conciliatory and more acrimonious.

Having confused steely resolve with what Ralph Waldo Emerson called "a foolish consistency . . . adored by little statesmen," Bush has become entangled in tragedies of his own making, compounding those visited upon the country by outside forces.
Amen.

24

Last night Ray and I watched this week's installment of 24 and were a little disappointed.

The season has been, thus far, the best one yet, but this week's episode was chock full of "americanate," those scenes so ridiculously overblown and ludicrous no sentient being would actually believe any part of it, weather you're more or less inclined to suspend your disbelief.

Let's just hope it was just a fluke, given the high quality of the plot's structure and development so far. I would hate for the last 3 hours left of the show to ruin it completely.

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Will MI3 be it?

Mission: Impossible III opened the past weekend to a "disappointing" $47.7 million, well below expectations and forecasts.

I'm very pleased for two reasons.

First, this way Tom 'Asshole' Cruise won't be able to go around saying that his crazy statements and actions don't influence his movies' performance. They do and his star clearly lost some of its sparkles in the past year or so.

Second, maybe Hollywood will stop and think twice (I know, I know, I'm dreaming here) before milking a franchise by releasing sequel after sequel up until the one that finally ruins the series' name. They do it all the time, just look at Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Star Wars 1-2-3 (as in the prequels vs the trilogy), Basic Instinct 2, Alien: Resurrection (the 4th chapter, although some also hated the 3rd), or Superman III. So far the only one Hollywood was able to resurrect is Batman, with it's recent fifth installment, Batman Begins, but it took 8 years, and for a long time it looked like it would never happen.

I personally really liked the first Mission: Impossible. It was a good story, well put together and, above all, did not feel like a vehicle for Mr. Cruise alone, given the all-star cast involved. The second one was overblown and stupid and because of that I'm not even going to bother with the one currently playing in theaters across the world (the movie actually made $70.3 million overseas, a rare instance of a blockbuster making more money abroad than domestically), which by the look of it (and it's $150 million price tag) looks just as silly if not more.

I'm sure Cruise will pull all the strings he can to make a fourth installment if he feels like ending it here would tarnish his reputation (or if the movie actually ends up making enough movie to warrant another episode), but I hope Hollywood will learn a lesson here: that sometimes, it's better to come up with a fresh idea than soil a movie's reputation with the umpteenth sequel.

But I know I'm kidding myself here.