Month: November 2003

Bashing Greens Won’t Help. Enough of chads, butterfly ballots and the whole lot. Let’s say that we should have a democracy, and that it should work. After all, people died for the right to vote, and everyone’s vote should count. I also happen to think that people should be able to vote their conscience, and vote for what they believe in. I’d like to work on making a democracy that lives up to that potential, which means that even third parties should be able to participate (remember that the Greens had to litigate to get on the ballot in nine states, which is somewhat of a challenge to democracy in itself).

But here’s a bit of advice for those who don’t support Nader or other Greens. If you don’t like the Green candidates, don’t vote for them. And if you want to win an election, go out and get some folks to vote for you — like that 50 percent of the American voters who represent the largest party in America, the nonvoters. On the way, you might build a party and a platform with some integrity, not just insults. (link)

There’s a lot of Democratic partisans that need to listen to this. If you want the Green vote, go out and win it, don’t try to intimidate Greens to vote Democratic by blaming them for Bush. This is a democracy not a playground. [Al-Muhajabah’s Islamic Blogs]

The same applies to libertarians. What’s the point of voting if you don’t vote for people who will actually represent you?

Emancipating Hard Drives. Eric Canuteson, whose real estate investment company is registered as a Los Angeles County vendor, reports receiving the following notice the other day from Joe Sandoval, manager of purchasing and contract services at the county’s Internal Services Department:

The County of Los Angeles actively promotes and is committed to ensure a work environment that is free from any discriminatory influence be it actual or perceived. As such, it is the County’s expectation that our manufacturers, suppliers and contractors make a concentrated effort to ensure that any equipment, supplies or services that are provided to County departments do not possess or portray an image that may be construed as offensive or defamatory in nature.

We would request that each manufacturer, supplier and contractor review, identify and remove/change any identification or labeling of equipment or components thereof that could be interpreted as discriminatory or offensive in nature before such equipment is sold or otherwise provided to any County department. Thank you in advance for your cooperation and assistance.

As Canuteson notes, Master/Slave is a standard designation not only for involuntary servitude (and kinky sexual relationships) but also for computer components. L.A. County presumably also frowns on references to “male” and “female” plumbing and electrical parts. [Hit & Run]

Wouldn’t this silly directive constitute a “discriminatory influence” against electrical engineers?

Difficult Days…. They’ve been bombing houses in Tikrit and other areas! Unbelievable

Does Not Compute!. Danger, John Derbyshire! Danger! Danger! The recent Massachusetts decision on gay marriage appears to have caused the equivalent of a divide-by-zero error in the circuitry of conservative brains, which are short circuiting en masse. The spate of frantic comments seen in the last twenty four hours may collectively make less sense than everything conservatives have said on the topic up to this point… which is pretty impressive.
It takes a special kind of hostility to equal rights, for example, to descend to the point where the following inane arguments count as “thoughtful“:
bq. Under the traditional restrictions, a man cannot marry his daughter, or, a fortiori, is son, and so if he leaves them a very large inheritance, it is taxed, although what he leaves his wife is not taxed. But under a general license to ‘marry’ another man, a man could marry his son, and thus pass his property to the son tax-free. […]
[W]hat if two men who are partners in crime take the precaution of marrying, so that they can each be sure that the other one won’t turn state’s evidence at trial, should they be caught?
So, despite the fact that a general right to marry someone of the opposite sex hasn’t compelled us to allow father/daughter marriages, a general right to marry someone of your own sex is (apparently) going to require us to license father/son marriage. And while the spousal privilege loophole is apparently not cause for concern when it comes to mixed-gender partners-in-crime, so many male criminal partnerships will “take the precaution” of marrying first that we’ll have to dispense with it.
Derbyshire earlier wondered whether cellmates might now marry (the point? your guess is as good as mine), while fellow Cornerite Stan Kurtz linked an only barely more coherent piece that pushes the limits of even Maggie Gallagher’s prodigious powers of vacuity. Apparently, the notion that you should be allowed to marry the person you love, whether or not you intend to have children, is equivalent to the claim “that children don’t need mothers and fathers.” Permitting childless couples also, it seems, amounts to “conduct[ing] a great social experiment on children.” Because, you see… err, no, I can’t even come up with a facetious line of argument on which that follows. [Hit & Run]

Christina Stokes at Scotsman.com –

Strip search that spares your blushes – millimeter wave technology
that replaces the declothed body with a computer-generated
mannequin. This somehow makes it “OK” to search you without your
consent and without a warrant. It’s fighting terrorism, don’t you
know. For the children. Not yet ready for prime time, but the
jackboots are working furiously. [claire]
bq.
The powerful scanner, which was developed by American scientists, uses
millimetre waves to see through clothes. It works because the fibres
in clothes are less than a millimetre across, allowing the light waves
to pass right through them.

A special camera using the waves can see through clothes as easily as
we can see through glass. And the picture it creates can be seen on a
screen so operators can see not just if a person is carrying arms, but
also drugs and plastic explosives. Non-metallic illegal substances
like these are not picked up by normal airport scanners.

…

The scanner could eventually be used not just in airports and train
stations but in all public places.

Petillot explained: “At the moment there is no real way of checking
fans coming into a football stadium or pupils going into a school to
see if they are carrying knives.

“The millimetre wave technology needs people to pause for a second at
the moment. But it’s possible that when the scanning software is
developed it could get quick enough to scan crowds passing through
turnstiles into a football match.”

Another advantage of millimetre wave scanners over current technology
is they do not interfere with pacemakers.

Petillot said: “The camera just receives the rays a person emits,
rather than sending out waves itself. So it doesn’t interfere with
pacemakers and there are no risks involved in people going through the
scanner.”

And Petillot believes similar technology could be used to scan lorries
and trains crossing borders for illegal immigrants.
[End the War on Freedom]

Gay Marriage OK in Bay State. bq. Massachusetts’ Supreme Judicial Court on Tuesday opened the door for marriage licenses to be issued to same-sex couples, ruling that the state may not deny them licenses.

Article here.

Update: decision here.

[Hit & Run]

It’s a pleasant surprise to read of a pro-freedom decision coming from the People’s Republic of Massachusetts.