A question for everyone who's making a fuss about Abu Ghraib
If you thought it could have saved you or some of your family, would you have permitted torture of captured suspected terrorists?

Those who say Yes are cordially invited to STFU.
posted by J Bowen at 6:25 AM ~

Pilgrimage
I might have been on TV on Thursday. Yes, I was one of the thousands in line to pay respects to Ronald Reagan at the Capitol rotunda.

I figured it might take an hour to get there, an hour in line, and an hour to get back. Yeah right - I was there from about 2:15 PM and didn't make it out of the rotunda until about 6:30. That was plenty long for me, but for others it was far longer. Then finally around 2AM on Friday the stragglers were shooed off because it was clear that they wouldn't have time to make the rotunda.

I don't know what kind of crowds they were expecting, but they had all sorts of support people around. Huge fans were all over, as was complementary ice water. Fortunately it wasn't really hot.

A Reagan crowd, especially one to honor his memory, wasn't likely to go too crazy with dress (imagine a Clinton crowd...). Even so, it wasn't quite up to the standards of a man who insisted on wearing a jacket in the Oval Office. Having come from work, I was in "business casual". WaPo has more here.

When I got there the line was doubled back on itself several times on the west side of the Capitol reflecting pool. From there it ran around the south side of the pool, just to the inside of the statue of James Garfield, then around the south side of the Capitol.

Eventually there was a frisker shack on the south end of the Capitol grounds, beyond which about everything inorganic was contraband. The line moved rapidly though, and whatever was not permitted to pass was tracked and forwarded ahead to a point past the Capitol for later recovery.

From there it was up to the outside of the Capitol, then up a flight of stairs to the rotunda. We were split into two semicircular groups - I chose the line with backs to the press because if I was going to lose composure it didn't have to be published.

There was profound silence but for press cameras, despite probably 100 or so of us being lined up behind the velvet ropes. That couldn't have lasted for more than a minute or so before we were herded out. Even more silent were the representatives from all of the armed services who stood at attention around the catafalque - they were so still that they almost appeared stuffed.

Finally we were sent back down another flight of steps and back outside. Conversation started again, and people with feet so sore they could barely walk and several blocks of walking yet to go swore they'd do it again.

Bryan Preston went also - his account is here.
posted by J Bowen at 6:14 AM ~

What do you do with a kid like this?
A sex offender I happen to know is about to go to jail shortly for a parole violation. He failed to register with local authorities as a sexual predator when he changed his address. (Changing addresses in this case meant spending a few nights at his latest bimbette's place).

Alright, he violated the law. New Jersey's Megan's Law has specific mandates for active community notification which ensures that the community will be made aware of the presence of convicted sex offenders posing a risk to public safety. The actual case occurred elsewhere, but the issue is the same. What could be wrong with busting the guy?

I guess it depends on what you call a "convicted sex offender posing a risk to public safety". The perp's original offense was for having sex with a 13 year old girl. He was 18 or so at the time.

All of you who have ever had sex with a 13 year old girl, regardless of your own age at the time, please turn yourselves in immediately. You too can have your picture and address posted on the Internet labeled as a sexual predator for the rest of your life. Gulp....I'm guessing that that would catch more men than you think.

He broke the law for sure. And that there's plenty of evidence that this was rape only in the statutory sense is irrelevant - her Lewinskian prose was not admissible. He knew better, or certainly should have. But is this the kind of sex offense Megan's Law was intended to address?

To my knowledge this kid (he's 21 now) is not violent and doesn't have any weapons. In fact, if you knew him only casually you wouldn't suspect a thing - you might even think he was bright and glib and thus had potential. When he showed up for school and actually paid attention he did well, but he could never be as smart as he thinks he is. Nowadays he's learning about PCs, but his brashness and perpetual attraction to lowlives has already cost him a few new Windows reinstallations via viruses et al.

Can he be rehabilitated? Hmm - while he was locked up prior to his probation he did get his GED. But this was out of boredom rather than any change of heart IMO. He's the kind that used to get taken for a ride by persons unknown, beaten senseless and told to straighten up or get to hell out of town. It's ugly, but I have to call them like I see them.

I could be wrong. But one thing is for sure - the fact that he has a felony on his record and is labeled in perpetuity as a sex offender is not going to make it easier.
posted by J Bowen at 1:52 AM ~

Fowl Play
Right here.
posted by J Bowen at 1:29 AM ~

Civilization is a very elastic term
Now that we've seen a week of the coverage of Ronald Reagan's funeral activities, let's recall what happened when the Ayatollah Khomeini died. Wasn't it cool when the legions of swarming jackasses managed to dump Khomeini's corpse onto the ground?
posted by J Bowen at 3:13 PM ~

40 years too late...
The press is finally finding out that Ralph Nader has ethical problems. I'm sure the fact that at last he is perceived as being harmful to the interests of the Democrats has nothing to do with this.
posted by J Bowen at 3:12 PM ~

Theocrats?
Can we reserve the word "theocrats" for those who really deserve it, such as Moqtada al-Sadr and the like?
posted by J Bowen at 12:53 PM ~

Just doing his job?
TV cameramen really don't have to have the manners of papparazzi, do they? I saw one scene of a camera stuck in the face of a serviceman who was losing his composure, and the @#$!@# cameraman wouldn't go away. What kind of voyeuristic BS is that?

Of course that could have wound up on the cutting room floor, but no, the producers used it. So they're no better.

IMO the cameraman and his entire management chain up through the likes of Sumner Redstone deserve 24/7 live in-their-face press coverage until they swear to treat the rest of us with respect and dignity.
posted by J Bowen at 12:44 PM ~

Hang in there...
Best wishes to Matthew Yglesias and his mother.
posted by J Bowen at 12:16 PM ~

Tivo and home networking
Right here.
posted by J Bowen at 4:55 PM ~

UN inspectors: Saddam shipped out WMD before war and after
Right here.
posted by J Bowen at 12:25 AM ~

The best advice for graduates
Right here.
posted by J Bowen at 10:22 PM ~

We only want to have to do this once
Abusing your children is bad. But IMO coaching them to say that the other parent has abused them is also abuse of the children, not to mention abuse of the legal system. Hence we see this.

See the girls cry in the picture. Of course they will - they're 4 years old, they don't know what Mommy is so upset about and they're about to leave with a near-stranger who would have had them aborted when he found out his "fling" was pregnant. If ever ignorance were bliss...

Was justice done? I doubt it - for two cents I'd say horsewhip Mom and Pop both and have the kids raised by a third party with no visitation for either. A pox on both houses!

Then again, the worst Daddy appears to have done is to have a change of heart. Once they were fit for nothing but scrap, in case someone could suck some stem cells out of them - write one check and they're medwaste, and he doesn't even have to divorce his wife. But now they're apparently healthy twin girls, potty trained and ready to show off. Little did their mother know that she was a surrogate.

Mother OTOH has not only lied and accused Daddy of something beyond the pale of civilization, but she's made it harder to convict the next creep who really is guilty. She's paying a huge price, but it still beats the years in prison suffered by the Amiraults and others when they were falsely accused.
posted by J Bowen at 6:13 AM ~

C'mon, Lileks, just try it...
Oh sure, he'll post a bunch of old stuff in Jetsam Cove, like the 1953 grocery store ad. But would he walk the walk like this guy, who was to live for 10 days in the city using the technology of 50 years ago?
posted by J Bowen at 8:56 PM ~

"Still, I'm not a knee-jerk left-wing guy,"
Who said it?
posted by J Bowen at 8:30 PM ~

John Curulewski
Who? Well, some of you who lived near Chicago in the 1970's might have heard of him. He was one of the original 2 guitarists with Styx, which stormed out of the south side of Chicago to sell millions of records in the late 70's and early 80's. I'm not sure, but I think he's the genius behind the immortal "Plexiglas Toilet" song that they included without acknowledgement on one of their early albums.

Curulewski was there during the lean local years. He sang, played guitar and wrote some songs, along with fellow guitarist James Young (JY is the tall blondheaded one, who happens to be an engineer). Twins Chuck and John Panozzo played bass and drums respectively, and Dennis DeYoung was the keyboardist who wrote much of the music and sang most of the leads.

Yeah, they had a hit with "Lady", but that didn't come about until a couple of years after its album "Styx II" was released. Mostly they were a Chicago phenomenon, and they recorded on Wooden Nickel records. Good luck finding any of those albums. (Styx, Styx II, The Serpent is Rising, and Man of Miracles).

Then came their 5th album, Equinox. It had hits on the top 40 (Lorelei), AOR (Suite Madame Blue), an anthem (Light Up), and the rest were good too. It got them a national contract, and then Curulewski decided to leave the band to spend more time with his family.

That didn't exactly wreck the band - JC was replaced by Tommy Shaw, a blondeheaded singer/guitarist who the babes seemed to think was just too cute for words.

The band's first album after Curulewski, Crystal Ball, scored no hits. But then they released The Grand Illusion and Pieces of Eight and suddenly they were everywhere.

Did Curulewski regret missing the ride? We can't ask him - he's dead. Not a musician's death though, from drugs or an accident - he died of a brain aneurysm in 1988.

The rest of the band isn't doing so well either. John Panozzo is dead of alcoholism-related problems, Chuck Panozzo is HIV positive, and Dennis DeYoung has some sort of chronic condition that keeps him from touring much (near as I can tell he's not so easy to get along with either). So only the Mutt and Jeff singer-guitarists are left to carry the banner with some new guys.

Need a Styx fix? Check out Paradise Radio here.
posted by J Bowen at 10:55 PM ~

Ted Nugent and Toby Keith in the war zones
...at HughHewitt.com
posted by J Bowen at 7:40 AM ~

Payback?

WASHINGTON, June 6 — From the shores of Normandy to President Bush's campaign offices outside Washington, Mr. Bush and his political advisers embraced the legacy of Ronald Reagan on Sunday, suggesting that even in death, Mr. Reagan had one more campaign in him — this one at the side of Mr. Bush.

At last the truth can be told. Those ghoulish Republicans have had Mr. Reagan on life support for all these years. His last words were "Dick and Karl, sometime when the polls are bad and the breaks are beating the boys, pull the plug and let the Gipper win one for you".

< /sarcasm off>Memo to NYT - the man died after years with a miserable illness. Even John Kerry managed to say something respectful without choking to death on the words. Can't you lay off long enough for the corpse to cool a couple of degrees? Don't you have some biases to deny?
posted by J Bowen at 6:56 AM ~

Does he ever shut up?