How to get CNN to cover the UN oil-for-food scandal

Tie it to a Texas businessman, which of course implies complicity by President Bush.

Winds of Change.NET: The Myth of Chinese Air Power

She hasn't been posting much lately, but now all of a sudden Susanna is busy. Start here and go down.

UPDATE: Great non-sequitur title, eh? It's what happens when you use the Google Toolbar's BlogThis item just to open an editor and forget to change the default title.

Let's get strategic

There's lots of good stuff about Chinese military ambitions and the Indian Ocean here. And don't miss Trent Telenko's comment, or the post he links to.

Andrea Dworkin, RIP

David Frum points us to this obituary in the NY Sun for radical feminist Andrea Dworkin.

Her ideas were well outside the mainstream, far to the left, but that's not to say that they didn't resonate elsewhere sometimes:

Increasingly pushed to the side in mainstream American feminism, Dworkin could deliver the odd zinger when provoked. "It will probably bring the FBI to my door, but I think that Hillary should shoot Bill and then President Gore should pardon her," she wrote in early 1998, at the height of the Lewinsky affair.

That quote was comparatively tame. The article goes on to say "For all her vituperation, interviewers and friends commented on Dworkin's sweetness in person."

Sears - the official history

Sears Archives Home Page leads to over a century's worth of history of the chain and American retailing.

I still haven't quite forgiven them for dropping the catalog though.

Man freed after 13 years

Cases like this don't do much for my faith in the justice system.

Michael Schiavo in hiding after death threats

Awwwww....

Anger at Mr Schiavo's actions has been fuelled by the revelation that a court order from a county judge, George Greer, who repeatedly refused the Schindlers' pleas to let their daughter live, will allow him to have her cremated and her ashes interred in Pennsylvania. The Schindlers' request for a share of the ashes or even a lock of their daughter's hair has also been refused.

Now why would anybody want to shoot a guy who behaves like this?

Change of heart

Did I say I didn't like cloning? Hey, make me a million copies of the woman who said this:

"On the bright side, after two weeks of TV coverage of the Terri Schiavo case, I think we have almost all liberals in America on record saying we can pull the plug on them. Of course, if my only means of entertainment were Air America radio, Barbra Streisand albums and reruns of 'The West Wing,' I too would be asking: 'What kind of quality of life is this?' "

Read it all.

Disgraceful

Anybody who blogs long enough will wind up writing something regrettable eventually. Here (above and beyond my own many contributions) I offer a couple of examples from what is ordinarily an excellent production, the Grand Rounds.

When so many people foul up the same facts the same ways you have to suspect a common source of disinformation. The post cited in Grand Rounds had the usual nonsense which failed to distinguish between adult stem cells (which have shown some successes) and embryonic stem cells (notable for their failures). One would think that if he wanted to write something snarky about this, the writer would take pains to know his topic first, especially if he's an aspiring medical professional.

The fact of the matter is that George W. Bush is the first President to push for *any* federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, and the minute the lefties want to "move on" embryonic stem cell research they can send in their money so they can do as much as they want with as many stem cell lines as they want. That they don't do so tells you that they're all about politics, not medical progress.

But the guy who put the Grand Rounds together is even snarkier. On his sidebar he offers this permalink to Terri's blog. And his post introducing the one above amounts to "Har har, Dubya sure shot himself in the foot this time! If his kind hadn't been blocking stem cell research maybe they could cure Terri Schiavo!"

Well, what he did say was "Those same people fighting for Terri’s tube reinsertion barred stem cell research from progressing." That's wrong on its face for reasons I discussed above.

But it's even worse yet. IMO it is fair to say that those in Congress who voted for the recent Terri Schiavo legislation would be among those who favor her tube reinsertion. Does he think that all of those solons also opposed increased federal funding for embryonic stem cell research?

And let's look at the Terri Schiavo angle. She can't be treated if she's dead, right? And who is it who has been fighting for her death and denying her treatment all these years? Uh huh, Michael Schiavo, her husband. Who do you think is more likely to let Terri receive such treatment - her hubby, who wants her dead, or her parents, who want nothing more than to care for her? Incidentally, look here to see how adult stem cells from bone marrow have been made to develop into functioning brain cells.

So these two can spare us their mock concern for Terri Schiavo. IMO it would ruin their day if Terri Schiavo were somehow cured with the "wrong" stem cells.

Here's an interesting stem cell link from the National Institutes of Health.

UPDATE: Ace has some similar comments here.

Michael Schiavo wants an autopsy?

That's contrary to my earlier information, which I can't source right now. Anyway, Michael Schiavo, husband and guardian of Terri Schiavo, and Mary and Bob Schindler, Ms. Schiavo's parents, have been engaged in a contentious public and legal dispute over the decision to remove Ms. Schiavo's feeding tube, but: both want an autopsy and both say the post-mortem exam will provide evidence to finally nail down Ms. Schiavo's diagnosis.

Let's keep going below the neck and see if there are signs of abuse. We have had Schiavo claiming that he found needle marks on her after her parents had visited. And we have a hospice staffer's affidavit claiming that after periods of being locked in the room alone with Michael Schiavo, Terri would be left suffering signs of hypoglycemia (which is something of an accomplishment on her very stable liquid diet), which suggests that Schiavo was trying to kill her by injecting her with insulin.

And let's not forget that 1991 bone scan. Terri is 5' 3", Michael Schiavo is 6'5" and 250 lbs. Unless he's really a candyass he could break her bones effortlessly and maybe even unintentionally. (why would he want a woman so much smaller, anyway? If they had had kids it would have been rough on her.)

Anyway, this could be interesting to watch.

At least try to think

Re this post from Bill Quick, saying that "ceasing food and fluid can be painless". In case one, BQ says "everything she ate, she painfully vomited back up". If that was more painful than doing without eating, than her choice is clear without assuming that it was also painless.

In case #2 with Mr. Quick's father, it's clear that the man had chosen not to eat. We don't know how much other pain he was in, and if he wanted to die this might well have been his only avenue after living 98 years and having a broken hip. Again, based on what he posted alone, it doesn't support his "Hooey" statement.

Perhaps Mr. Quick has better evidence. I encourage him to post it.

And I encourage Mr. Quick and some of those who commented on his post to look at Mr. Schiavo with a more critical eye. Don't let his possible complicity in her condition be obscured in the glare of right to life issues. And ask why it's so important for him to maintain control of her remains (he'd lose that if he divorced her), to the point of rejecting a big payday, and why he wants her cremated.

Miscellaneous Schiavo rants

Let's not hear another peep about "federalism" from people who don't agree that Roe v. Wade should be thrown out on its bloody ass. That's not "pro-life", it's respect for democracy and the Constitution.

Under what conceivable circumstances could we see an outcome where Terri Schiavo was to be neglected to death under armed guard and call it justice? If our legal system decides that she must die, at least do it in a way that would be permissible if done to a condemned prisoner, or even a rabid dog.

If we were putting a govt together from scratch, which idea would come up first? Justice, or federalism? If you could only have one of the two, which would you pick?

So the Republicans had the stones and compassion to pass a very narrowly tailored law explicitly described as not being a precedent with the intent of addressing a clear miscarriage of justice and preserving an innocent woman's life. Instead of hearing universal praise for political heroism in giving her the benefit of the doubt, we're actually hearing some whining about federalism. IMO those people were happy to see Terri Schiavo go all along, but wanted a more respectable reason.

Oh, the Republicans were just performing on cue for their masters, the Christian Right! Good grief. Yeah, there may be an unsigned memo out there alleging that, but then there's Powerline.

I don't hold out much hope for Terri Schiavo now. But once she's dead Michael Schiavo will no longer be in position to deny her parents things they want. You know, like seeing their daughter - what possible justification was there for him *ever* to deny them this? But with that inhibition gone, I wouldn't be surprised to see the Schindlers hit him with a big nasty wrongful-death suit, dragging in the 1991 bone scan and other things that suggest that the events that led to Terri's predicament were not accidents. And let's make sure he doesn't make a dime off her corpse with books, movies et al.

Advice to life insurors - don't write any policies for Jodie Centonze.

A guardian ad litem found that Terri Schiavo's care had been excellent. A nurse has testified that Michael Schiavo would modify her charts.

Or how about this:

When Michael visited Terri, he always came alone and always had the door closed and locked while he was with Terri. He would typically be there about twenty minutes or so. When he left Terri would would be trembling, crying hysterically, and would be very pale and have cold sweats. It looked to me like Terri was having a hypoglycemic reaction, so I’d check her blood sugar. The glucometer reading would be so low it was below the range where it would register an actual number reading. I would put dextrose in Terri’s mouth to counteract it. This happened about five times on my shift as I recall. Normally Terri’s blood sugar levels were very stable due to the uniformity of her diet through tube feeding. It is my belief that Michael injected Terri with Regular insulin, which is very fast acting.

That and numerous other tidbits appears on this affidavit, and if it's true, it's probably fair to say that Terri Schiavo *does* want to die rather than spend another minute under control of the monster she married.

Double take

Today I saw a Google ad like the following:

brain damage
Great deals on Brain Damage
Shop Today on Official eBay Site
www.ebay.com

It had to be a joke or a goof, right? See for yourself.

Judicial malpractice

I'm not a lawyer, so I may get some of the terminology wrong in what follows. But in essence, we have trial courts which make findings of fact, and appeals courts which can be used to remedy procedural or legal errors in trial courts or lower appeals courts.

Then there is technology. What is state of the art today is tomorrow's doorstop. Or, in the case of medical technology, what is invariably fatal today is routinely cured or ameliorated tomorrow.

Yet here we have Terri Schiavo trapped in a time warp. The trial court's findings of fact about her condition, however accurate they might have been by the standards of the time, can at least in principle at least become inappropriate in the light of new knowledge. Accordingly, there should be provisions for updating findings of fact or bases for appeal that can take into account this ever-improving technology. (But no, we can't even get her an MRI. Ha, we can't even feed her).

Will Terri Schiavo have to be neglected to death to make this happen? Or shall we ignore improvements in technology that might have occurred in the meantime lest we inconvenience some judges? (After all, they need time to handle all the process for prisoners on Death Row...)

I can't draw for beans, but try this punch line: "Sorry Galileo, but the court has already made the finding of fact that the sun and planets revolve around the earth".

UPDATE: I've had a bad case of fatfingers today, posting things twice instead of saving them as drafts. This post has been modified.

Explain this to me

Why is it that if I want to draft a Living Will I have to sign it before witnesses, but Terri Schiavo can be starved to death legally based on hearsay from a man with a conflict of interest?

Eat like a rock star

Add Custom Messages to your M&M'S® Candy in 13 Custom Colors OR create your own blend with 21 Colors to choose from!

They're hours of fun for OCD people too. You can count them, line them up by color like little histograms (or rainbows for you artsy types), eat them in a particular color sequence, turn them all so the little m's are aligned, peel off the shells,...they ought to advertise on "Monk".

Or with the right boards you could use them to play checkers, Chinese checkers, parcheesi, Aggravation, go, Othello....maybe even chess or Trivial Pursuit if there are enough different colors. Marbles? - maybe, but not for long. Got no board? - play Lite-Brite.

Snopes says that the green ones really aren't an aphrodisiac, but how could they know?- they never have any fun anyway, and some of us need all the help we can get. That and other M&Ms lore are addressed here.

Judicial Confirmation Statistics

...or "who's screwing whom"? Right here, via Betsy's Page.

Metaphor abuse

in this comment from Betsy's Page.

Paean this

Aside to Susanna - the red ink isn't so bad, it's that confounded Liquid Paper that's really a PITA.

America’s first known serial killers

Right here.