Roundup on the CBS Memos, or "Ra^thergate:"



The CBS / big media initial response:



"I know that this story is true. I believe that the witnesses and the documents are authentic. We wouldn't have gone to air if they would not have been. There isn't going to be -- there's no -- what you're saying apology? . . . Not even discussed, nor should it be. I want to make clear to you, I want to make clear to you if I have not made clear to you, that this story is true, and that more important questions than how we got the story, which is where those who don't like the story like to put the emphasis, the more important question is what are the answers to the questions raised in the story, which I just gave you earlier." Dan Rather, in a CNN interview on 09/10/04/, transcript via the Drudge Report.





"The fear I have is: How do you know who's doing the Web logs?

"And what happens when this stuff gets into the mainstream, and it eventually turns out that the '60 Minutes' documents were perfectly legitimate, but because there's been so much reporting about what's being reported, it has already taken on a life of its own?" - Jeffrey Seglin, a professor at Emerson College in Boston, quoted in theLos Angeles Times





"JUST CAUGHT Jonathan Klein debating Stephen Hayes about the CBS forgery scandal. Klein says that 'Bloggers have no checks and balances . . . [it's] a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas.'" - Instapundit



So far, big media simply throws darts at blogger's reputations rather than engaging in the big debate. William Safire puts a great op-ed in the NY Times warning against this approach:



"What should a responsible news organization do? To shut up sources and impugn the motives of serious critics - from opinionated bloggers to straight journalists - demeans the Murrow tradition. Nor is any angry demand that others prove them wrong acceptable, especially when no original documents are available to prove anything. Years ago, Kurdish friends slipped me amateur film taken of Saddam's poison-gas attack that killed thousands in Halabja. I gave it to Dan Rather, who trusted my word on sources. Despite objections from queasy colleagues, he put it on the air. Hey, Dan: On this, recognize the preponderance of doubt. Call for a panel of old CBS hands and independent editors to re-examine sources and papers. Courage."



Amen. But it was still left to alternative media to start asking the hard questions.



The Evidence for Authentication:



Daily Kos points out that the memo could concievably have been reproduced on an IBM Selectric or possibly an Executive:



"To to sum up, the original document expert the "forgery" brigades were quoting checked the document typeface with Interpol, and now believes that these documents were consistent with an IBM Selectric Composer; that the Air Force had indeed purchased such devices as early as 1969; and that typeheads were indeed available with the 'th' keys in question. (I will further point out that it appears any IBM typeface available for the Selectric was also available for the Executive, but that is a likely irrelevant detail.)"



See the details here and here.



Basically, they show that: 1) The IBM Selectric Composer had the capability of using the superscript th and a font and spacing close to if not identical to the memo. 2) The IBM Selectric machines had been purchased by the military. 3) Another model, the IBM Executive, had the capability for the font and the superscript, but possibly not the spacing. As to why Killian would've bothered typing his CYA memo-to-self on this machine, the blog links to this post by an expert on typeography and printing presses:



"It's true that some whizbangs took a couple of extra steps. People ask, Why would Killian have gone to the trouble of creating a reduced superscript "th"? But we're talking about the early 1970s here. Let's be frank -- in those dear departed times, real men did not touch typewriters. Trust me on this. It's highly probable Killian scribbled a note and gave it to one of the office "girls" to type up for his signature. The office "girls" hardly ever bothered about putting their initials on such documents, in spite of what the secretarial practice books said. But the "girl" would have typed the document very nicely."



I would've been convinced that it was possible, except for some very coherent responses.



The most persuasive is from The Shape of Days:



"The machine sold for anywhere from $3,600 to $4,400, and fonts were extra and not cheap. . . . I'm talking about $3,600 to $4,400 in unadjusted 1973 dollars here. If you use one of the widely available deflation or purchasing-power calculators, you end up with an equivalent in 2004 dollars of between about $16,000 and about $22,000. . . .



(NOTE: The Shape of Days has Gerry Kaplan, who runs the website ibmcomposer.org, attempt to duplicate the memo. Go see the site, it's worth it. Shape of Days commentary continues:)



". . . pretty darned close to the original. But not close enough. The letterforms in the IBM's Press Roman typeface are very close to the letterforms in the CBS memo. Not surprising, since they're both based on the original Times New Roman font commissioned by the Times of London in 1931. But as we've seen already, different versions of the same font always exhibit subtle differences, usually in letterspacing. This case is no different. . . . Hey, what about that superscript? How'd he make it? I asked him via e-mail, and he replied:



"To make the superscripted th, I first typed "111", then switched the font to the 8pt font, switched the escapement lever to the smaller escapement (horizontal movement), reverse indexed the paper 1/2 line up, typed the "th", indexed 1/2 line down, switched the escapement lever to the wider escapement, then changed the type ball back to the 11pt font. . . ."



. . . when Gerry says he switched to the 8-point font, he's not talking about pushing a button. He had to remove the 11-point type ball from the machine and replace it with the 8-point type ball, which in a real office would involve digging in the back of a drawer to find the seldom-used thing. Creating that superscript wasn't quick or easy, and when he did it the carrier slipped and the superscript ended up offset. Unlike the perfectly formed and placed superscripts seen in the CBS memos. . . .



Another point that is very suspicious is the centered heading. This is a snap to do with fixed spacing (like courier), but the text is centered using proportional spaced text, which means that the typist had to carefully measure the text prior to typing to calculate its exact center point. . . . Each of those lines of type had to be centered by measuring it carefully, doing some math, then advancing the carrier to just the right point on the page. The margin for error would be pretty wide because type can be off by a few points in either direction and still look pretty well centered. It wouldn't be objectionable unless you went looking for it. So it wasn't necessary for Lt. Col. Killian — or his typist — to be millimeter-precise. And yet … he was. Two letterheads typed three months apart can be superimposed on each other so perfectly that no difference at all can be seen. It's the same deal as before: the red in front was superimposed over the black behind it. You just can't see the black copy because the red copy is perfectly aligned with it. These letterheads weren't centered to within a couple of points of each other. They were centered exactly the same. Three months apart. Remarkable."



Links on the Powerline lead to The Washington Post, only a few days behind the blogosphere, reporting that there are problems with CBS's attempts to authenticate the memos:



"The lead expert retained by CBS News to examine disputed memos from President Bush's former squadron commander in the National Guard said yesterday that he examined only the late officer's signature and made no attempt to authenticate the documents themselves. 'There's no way that I, as a document expert, can authenticate them," Marcel Matley said in a telephone interview from San Francisco. The main reason, he said, is that they are "copies" that are "far removed" from the originals.'" . . .



"'I am personally 100 percent sure that they are fake,' said Joseph M. Newcomer, author of several books on Windows programming, who worked on electronic typesetting techniques in the early 1970s. Newcomer said he had produced virtually exact replicas of the CBS documents using Microsoft Word formatting and the Times New Roman font.



Newcomer drew an analogy with an art expert trying to determine whether a painting of unknown provenance was painted by Leonardo Da Vinci. 'If I was looking for a Da Vinci, I would look for characteristic brush strokes," he said. "If I found something that was painted with a modern synthetic brush, I would know that I have a forgery.'" . . .



"An ex-Guard commander, retired Col. Bobby W. Hodges, whom CBS originally cited as a key source in authenticating its documents, pointed to discrepancies in military abbreviations as evidence that the CBS memos are forgeries. The Guard, he said, never used the abbreviation "grp" for "group" or "OETR" for an officer evaluation review, as in the CBS documents. The correct terminology, he said, is "gp" and "OER."". . .



"CBS News produced a new expert, Bill Glennon, an information technology consultant. He said that IBM electric typewriters in use in 1972 could produce superscripts and proportional spacing similar to those used in the disputed documents. Any argument to the contrary is "an out-and-out lie," Glennon said in a telephone interview. But Glennon said he is not a document expert, could not vouch for the memos' authenticity and only examined them online because CBS did not give him copies when asked to visit the network's offices. "



The upshot? Everyone is now fairly sure they were a forgery. One of the op-ed contributors of the Daily Iowan believes that it is a Republican forgery promulgated by Bush to divert attention from his war record.



The blogosphere has come in ahead of the mainstream media in both content and speed, with the incredibly elaborate posts on both sides of the issue putting CBS's lame denial to shame. Come on, if Kos can put up a very coherent defense, why can't a multi-billion dollar corporation manage to do the same? Beldarblog points out that most of the "big league" blogger's credentials are actually quite impressive:



"Hugh Hewitt's understated bio on his blog reveals that he is "the host of a nationally syndicated radio show heard in more than 60 cities nationwide, and a Professor of Law at Chapman University Law School, where he teaches Constitutional Law," and that he "is a weekly columnist for The Daily Standard, the online edition of The Weekly Standard, and a weekly columnist for WorldNetDaily.com." . . .



John H. Hinderaker, "Hindrocket" of Power Line, is affiliated with the Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Policy and is a partner in the Minneapolis law firm Faegre & Benson. His practice history includes "twenty-six years [in] a broad-based and varied commercial litigation practice. A veteran of more than 80 jury trials, he has appeared in courts in fifteen states." J.D. cum laude from Harvard; A.B. magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Dartmouth — yeah, I think I've heard of those schools. . . .



Scott Johnson, Power Line's "Big Trunk," is also affiliated with Claremont, and probably doesn't wear pajamas to his day job as "an attorney and senior vice president of TCF National Bank in Minneapolis." Power Line's "Deacon" is Paul E. Mirengoff, a partner in the Washington office of mega-firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld (where his partners include uber-Dems Bob Strauss and Vernon Jordan). In addition to government service in the Office of the General Counsel of the EEOC, his credential include an undergraduate degree, summa cum laude, in 1971 from Dartmouth College, and a J.D. in 1974 from Stanford Law School, where he served on the Stanford Law Review.



The Godfather of law bloggers, of course, is the InstaPundit himself, Glenn Reynolds. Again, his blog bio is pretty modest, but if you dig a bit deeper, you'll find that Glenn Harlan Reynolds is the Beauchamp Brogan Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Tennessee College of Law. (Endowed professorships are a very big deal, even for a full professor at any law school.) His legal and popular-press publications list is a mile long — the top-tier law reviews in which he's published scholarly articles include Columbia, Virginia, Penn, and Wisconsin — and he has a BA from Tennessee in 1982 and a JD from Yale Law School in 1985."



It just goes on from there.



And pajama jokes abound.



"They should have asked Professor Bainbridge to provide some adult supervision. Send those guys some pajamas!" Instapundit



"Actually, I'm in sweatpants and a tanktop. But of course, it doesn't matter a jot what a fact-checker is wearing as long as his facts are correct. CBS's apparently aren't." Andrew Sullivan



"We promise to be fully clothed for our appearances tonight, but I can't vouch for the Freeper." Powerline



"Now if they change it "sitting around in Bra and Panties." some of us.....errrrr I mean some you may be in trouble." Left Coast Conservative



James Lileks



And finally, The Truth Laid Bear, Amy and Jammie Nation suggest the blogosphere start a line of blogging jammies:



"We donate the proceeds to some worthy cause; perhaps Spirit of America, Operation Give, or the latest Strengthen the Good cause, under the banner of the CBS News 'We got our asses kicked by guys in pajamas' Fund."



Hmm. Give me a nice little set of cotton tank tops and shorts, and I'm soo there.

Link to a very important video via Iowa Geek.

FYI - Opening night was awesome! In the last scene, we float candles in clear crystal bowls in the pool, and the effect is incredibly beautiful. The performances were polished and moving. The only critique: some minor miking and special effects glitches. Though it's not tech's fault of tech if a mike doesn't work after it's been dropped in the pool.





Cast party at my house tonight, so I gotta clean it. Aaaugh.



(What is the sound of one actress freaking out??)

Update on the alleged 1972 memo by Col. Killian regarding Bush's failure to live up to the terms of his military service. According to this AP article on Yahoo, the issue of forgery has hit the mainstream media. This ABC article indicates several additional points regarding the font:



- The memos include superscript, i.e. the "th" in "187th" appears above the line in a smaller font. Superscript was not available on typewriters.

- The memos included "curly" apostrophes rather than straight apostrophes found on typewriters.

- The font used in the memos is Times Roman, which was in use for printing but not in typewriters. The Haas Atlas — the bible of fonts — does not list Times Roman as an available font for typewriters.

- The vertical spacing used in the memos, measured at 13 points, was not available in typewriters, and only became possible with the advent of computers.



Yowza. So I start cruising the left-leaning blogs to see what they've come up with in support of the memo. Found this article from Kevin Drum in Washington Monthly via Matthew Yglesias:



"Yes, IBM (and others) made typewriters with proportional fonts in 1972. In fact, my 8th grade teacher had one and showed me how to use it. They were a bit unusual, but they weren't wildly uncommon and they weren't wildly expensive.



IBM also made typewriters with interchangable fonts. This would have allowed Killian to use the superscript "th" that's gotten so much attention.



However, it does not appear that IBM made a typewriter with both proportional type and the capability to make a superscripted "th."



But: note that "appears" does not mean "didn't." There are legitimate questions about what kind of machine created those memos, but so far nobody has proven anything one way or the other.



However, although the font used in the memos is worth investigating, my own concerns are more related to the provenance and appearance of the memos:

- It seems odd that the memos were simply typed on blank sheets of paper instead of some kind of letterhead.

- It seems odd that no other document we've seen from George Bush's military file looks anything like this or was typed using this machine.

- It seems odd that one of the memos uses a different font from the other three. Did Killian's office have two executive typewriters with different fonts?

- Where did they come from? Killian has been dead for 20 years. Did someone with a lot of foresight decide to keep copies of just those four memos 20 years ago? Why?

- Are there copies of any other Killian memos around that we can compare these to? Or are these the only four memos of his still in existence?

- Has anyone looked through the microfilm records of the 111th F.I.S. to see if there are other examples of documents that look similar to these?"



Bottom line: these memos might be 100% genuine. But there are lots of legitimate questions about their origin and authenticity, and at a minimum CBS ought to make its own copies available for inspection and also ought to disclose the names of the typographic experts it consulted. Better yet would be convincing their source to either go public, allow inspection of the original memos, or at least allow a more thorough discussion of exactly where the documents came from.



Until then, I'm afraid skepticism is warranted. I hope CBS hasn't gotten burned by crude forgeries, but like they say, hope is not a plan.



Matt Drudge indicates CBS has launced an internal investigation into the matter, though I've seen no confirmation of that yet on the mainstream media.



Jeff at Tusk and Talon has this to say:



"Again, this is simply amazing. CBS News, with its million-dollar budget and hundreds of employees was outmaneuvered, outhustled, and outwitted by a handful of guys sitting around their computers, who don't know each other from Adam, who were able to exchange ideas, share their thoughts, and gather information from the vast array or readers who had knowledge or access to documents, methods, or sources, that could illuminate this issue. The tide has turned. This was a momentous day. This was not just discussing and promoting little-known stories until they caught on in the mainstream press. This was original reporting. This story originated in the blogs (Power Line, specifically, and then enhanced by others). And it may shake CBS News to the core.



The tide has indeed turned."



Beautifully put, Jeff. Like I said earlier, I'm getting beyond giving a rat's fuzzy behind what either of these people did when I was three years old. But the fact that the mainstream media fell for a forgery that the net could expose in a matter of hours is big news. We've progressed beyond being a passive audience spoonfed catchphrase headlines and quotable blurbs, to an interactive model of the press in which even "big media" have to respond to the legitimate critiques transmitted over the blogosphere.



Besides having about a gagillion links on the story, Instapundit points out this Chicago Sun-Times story that quotes blogs as sources in exactly the same manner as traditional news sources:



"The morning after the "60 Minutes II" airing, the Internet was buzzing with claims that the documents were forged.



Powerlineblog first aired speculation that there was persuasive evidence from the typefaces and spacing that the documents supposedly prepared in the age of typewriters in the early 1970s showed the unmistakable characteristics of computer printing.



Another blogger, Bill Ardolino at INDC Journal, who had read Powerline, said, 'I decided to find a top typeface expert and ran his analysis on my Web site.'"



Unfortunately, some members of "big media"don't exactly appreciate this new model of reporting. A quote from Edward Wasserman, the Knight professor of journalism ethics at Washington and Lee University in an article fisked by Eugene Volokh:



"The attack doesn't come from ideologically committed journalists and commentators who put together reports clearly selected and spun-dry to sell a political line. As long as such writers retain some minimal respect for fact, the transparency of their motives may even work to enrich the variety of information and interpretations available to all.



The more compelling danger concerns news organizations in the so-called mainstream. These are the country's best-staffed and most influential news organizations, and they're losing their nerve.



I understand why. It's hard now even to write for publication without being aware of just how thoroughly what you say is going to be inspected for any trace of undesirable political tilt and denounced by a free-floating cadre of rightist warriors."



Full text of the original article is available here, if you care to register. Although this critique was written concerning right-leaning blogs, you could apply the analogy equally to Talk Left, Daily Kos and the other members of the free-floating cadre of leftist warriors.



What I find ironic is that that great societal watchdog the 4th estate has it's knickers in a twist about being watched itself. God forbid we actually question the veracity of the great oracle. But I do feel for them. As any lawyer can tell you, it's a lot easier being the one asking the questions than the one answering them. Your capacity to look incredibly stupid is minimized when you don't have to vary from a nicely plotted script. The question is who among the mainstream media will raise the bar on accuracy and bias issues, and in order to rise to the challenge.



James Lileks puts it this way:



"Blogs haven’t toppled old media. The foundations of Old Media were rotten already. The new media came along at the right time. Put it this way: you’ve see films of old buildings detonated by precision demolitionists. First you see the puffs of smoke – then the building just hangs there for a second, even though every column that held it up has been severed. We’ve been living in that second for years, waiting for the next frame. Well, here it is. Roll tape. Down she goes. And when the dust settles we will be right back where we were 100 years ago, with dozens of fiercely competitive media outlets throwing elbows to earn your pennies."



Yup. What he said.



Side note: I also found another parody here: "Authentic Document Proves Kerry in Cambodia". I think the URL is a nice touch.

Final dress rehearsal for Metamorphoses tonight. Don't think I was kidding about the effects being worth the price of admission: I got a miscellaneous email on acting details from Chris Okiishi this morning, sent at 3:19 am after he and the tech crew got done with setting the cues and stuff. That's an incredible amount of work - they'd started at 7:30 or so.



We've got explosions, light effects, projection effects, microphones, a cherry picker (don't go there) and all kinds of stuff to coordinate, before even touching on the acting itself. We've got some awesome costumes, too. I seriously hope all the tech crew and Chris took today off.



Regardless, if everything works it should be reaalllly cool. If not, cross your fingers we don't get electrocuted. Given Allergist's Wife, I'm not kidding, guys. And I prefer a "good show" to "break a leg" for the forseeable future.



The actors got to go home early last night because we were basically freezing our behinds off. The pool is heated, but getting out is a bitch. Poor Rich had to lie half in and half out for a good ten minutes while they set light cues at the end of Alcyone and Ceyx. I think he was still half frozen when we left the post-rehearsal dinner at Old Chicago around midnight. I hope he'll be thawed by the time we start at 6:30.



We also got some press in the DI. Okay, the avid/Ovid bit? Not so incredibly funny. And Pat Keyes is not Narcissus, I don't know what's up with that. But otherwise, quite cool that we get a little publicity. I'm told we're even going to get reviewed in the Gazette, and possibly on 102.9 on Monday, so look for us.

The Iowa Libertarian pointed out some interesting posts here and here on Little Green Footballs regarding the new Bush memos. On Yahoo this morning, I read this article:



"Addressing questions that have lingered for years, newly unearthed memos state that George W. Bush failed to meet standards of the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam war, that he refused a direct order and that his superiors were in a state of turmoil over how to evaluate his performance after he was suspended from flying. One military official "is pushing to sugar coat it," one memo says of a proposed evaluation of Bush."



Now, actually, I'm getting really freaking tired of hearing about Vietnam from both sides of the spectrum. It was thirty years ago, people. While I agree it is a sub-issue, it should be vastly eclipsed by the candidate's recent records and political careers. In other words, what have you done for me lately?? So I've no interest in debating Bush's war record, Kerry's or the Jolly Green Giant's right now. Maybe I'm just bitchy today, but hey.



That said, I'm fascinated by the LGF postings because they links to the PDF of the memo in question:







Their point? The fonts are proportional and the darn thing's in Times New Roman. They claim that typewriters in 1973 didn't have access to that kind of kerning. The second posting has a comparison with a Word 2004 document, and I've got to admit it does look suspiciously similar:







So, is it a real memo or is it a fake?



Should be interesting to find out. Either way, trust the blogosphere to raise these kinds of issues within hours of the original story breaking.



UPDATE



Scrappleface gets in on the act with this post entitled:



"1972 Email Casts Doubt on Bush Guard Service"

Eric's back blogging at Wide Eyed Insolence, and he seems to have gotten his template issues addressed. Yay!



And I got an email from a new Iowa blogger - Robert Lucas has risen and is "gettin whiggy with it." Awesome concept.



Trivia: I went to Robert Lucas elementary in Iowa City.

The latest opinions from the Iowa Court of Appeals are up. A couple of cases caught my eye:



STATE V. MCMURRIN re-enforces the absolute necessity for a prosecutor to be meticulous in doing up a trial information. Anything less demands an acquittal.



The Facts

The State charged Douglas McMurrin with failure to register as a sex offender. Iowa Code §§ 692A.3(2), 692A.7(1) (2001). McMurrin agreed to a bench trial on the minutes of testimony. The record also included a single exhibit proffered by the State. After considering this evidence, the district court found McMurrin guilty of the offense and imposed sentence. However, the exhibit offered by the State - an April 1, 1999 registration record establishing that McMurrin registered as a sex offender with the Buchanan County Sheriff on July 21, 1995, November 21, 1996, and April 1, 1999 - provided no proof of his underlying sex offense or the dates of his release from incarceration.



The Law

The State had charged McMurrin with a violation of Chapter 692A of the Iowa Code for failure to register. The chapter reads:



692A.7 Failure to comply -- penalty.

1. A person required to register under this chapter who violates any requirements specified under sections 692A.2, 692A.3, and 692A.4 commits an aggravated misdemeanor for a first offense and a class "D" felony for a second or subsequent offense. A person required to register under this chapter who violates any requirements specified under section 692A.3A commits a serious misdemeanor for a first offense and a class "D" felony for a second or subsequent offense. However, a person required to register under this chapter who violates any of the requirements specified under section 692A.2, 692A.3, 692A.3A, or 692A.4 and who commits a criminal offense against a minor, sexual exploitation, an other relevant offense, or a sexually violent offense is guilty of a class "C" felony. . .



In order to prove up that charge, the State needed to show that McMurrin was "a person required to register under this chapter". Iowa law defines that in 692A.2:



692A.2 Persons required to register.:



1. A person who has been convicted of a criminal offense against a minor, an aggravated offense, sexual exploitation, an other relevant offense, or a sexually violent offense in this state or in another state, or in a federal, military, tribal, or foreign court, or a person required to register in another state under the state's sex offender registry, shall register as provided in this chapter. A person required to register under this chapter shall, upon a first conviction, register for a period of ten years commencing as follows:

a. From the date of placement on probation.

b. From the date of release on parole or work release.

c. From the date of release as a juvenile from foster care or residential treatment.

d. From the date of any other release from custody.



Obligatory Blog Commentary

The Court couldn't find the evidence it needed to support

that McMurrin was required to register by just looking at the fact he'd registered three times before. So despite the fact that the Iowa Courts Online website indicates that McMurrin pled guilty to indecent contact with a child in 1996 in FECR066188, and to lascivious acts with a child in 1993 in FECR04765, and is therefore a person who would be required to register under Iowa law, he walks because the State failed to dot the 'i' and cross the 't'. The appellate court had no choice but to release him. Which is how it should be - when you're dealing with people's freedom, you have to play utterly by the rules. Though I wonder how much of his 180 sentence on the new charge he'd already served. And if he's registered since.



MUNZ V. PENINSULA GAMING demonstrates that Iowa is not the highest priority state for tort reform.



The Facts

"On or about December 31, 2001, John Winkers and Linda Munz drove to the Diamond Jo Casino. They parked in a parking lot owned by the City of Dubuque. At this same time, Jeffrey Howell, a parking valet for the casino, noticed a man had fallen out of his wheelchair in the parking lot.[1] Howell attempted to lift the man, who weighed about 200 pounds, but could not do so. Howell asked Winkers and Munz, who were walking by at this time, to help him, and they agreed. After several attempts, Howell and Winkers were able to lift the man, while Munz held the wheelchair steady. Winkers and Munz then proceeded into the casino, where they spent several hours gambling.



On July 15, 2002, Winkers and Munz filed suit against Peninsula Gaming Company, doing business as Diamond Jo Casino, alleging they were both injured while helping the man into his wheelchair. They claimed the casino was negligent in (1) failing to provide safe premises; (2) failing to properly train employees on proper procedures when dealing with a fallen or intoxicated patron; (3) failing to follow proper procedure in asking plaintiffs for assistance; and (4) failing to report the incident in a timely fashion. They also raised claims based on theories of respondeat superior and dram shop liability."



The Court's Response

The Court of Appeals upheld the trial court's dismissal of the claim on summary judgment. Summary judgment is the tool to get rid of a case when there are no genuine issues of fact and a judgment must be rendered for one party as a matter of law. In other words, even if the plaintiff is right about the facts they have no case and they must lose. In upholding the summary judgment, the Court quoted the original dismissal ruling:



"In addition to the absence of a relationship that will support a duty, public policy doesn’t favor the plaintiffs. The only act of Mr. Howell which the plaintiffs can identify as being blameworthy is the act of asking them to assist him in helping the fallen man. Iowa has not yet reached the point where the act of asking others to help the less fortunate is actionable."



Obligatory Blog Commentary

Yeah, what they said.



It's suits like this that make me want to use a Curly-from-the-Three-Stooges accent: "What noirve!" Setting Winker aside, what injury could Munz have possibly claimed from simply holding the freaking wheelchair? I probably don't want to know.



I hope they won at the tables, because I could've told them that rolling the dice with our courts simply doesn't fly unless you've got a decent cause. That's why we don't have some of the sky-high insurance premiums found in suit-happy states. I'm going to send the link to Overlawyered.

We open this weekend for Metamorphoses, so blogging will be even more sporadic than usual.



(NOTE: Prior graphics moved. I'm going to keep moving the graphics up to plug the show, rather than bogging down my load time by repeating the info).



All in all, the play is going to be quite cool. I'm probably the least experienced actor in the crowd, the others are simply incredible. Actually, the special effects alone are worth the price of admission. Come out and see us if you can. Otherwise, just pray the rain stays away and we don't all freeze our behinds off.

Also opening this weekend is Glengarry Glen Ross at Dreamwell. From the Dreamwell website:







Glengarry Glen Ross

by David Mamet

directed by David Pierce

assistant directed by Kristen Ruddle

September 10, 11, 17, 18

Cast:



Shelly Levene - Gerry Roe

John Williamson - Matthew Falduto

Dave Moss - Adam Fauser

George Aronow - Chuck Dufano

Richard Roma - Matthew Brewbaker

James Lingk - Daniel Fairchild

Baylen - Michael Connell



To order tickets, go here. I know most of these guys. They play a mean game of poker and are phenomenal actors. Should be a great show.

In following links this weekend, I discovered the Gender Genie - an algorithm designed to analyze a piece and predict the author's gender. I pasted in all my blog entries since August 27th. My score:



Words: 2019



(NOTE: The genie works best on texts of more than 500 words.)



Female Score: 2363

Male Score: 4600



The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!



Am I right? The author of this passage is actually:



male



female





Hmm - twice as male as I am female?? I politely correct the genie, and receive this comment:



That is one butch chick.



According to Koppel and Argamon, the algorithm should predict the gender of the author approximately 80% of the time.



Accuracy Results

Am I right?

yes 141997 (62.33%)

no 85825 (37.67%)

227822 total responses since September 13, 2003



Geez. I know I tend to relate better with men than women, but I'd never describe myself as "butch." I'd think my proclivity for nail polish, high heels, miniskirts, and perfume should bar me from that category. Though this does tally with some recent dating advice that I should try to come off more "soft" (read: less overtly intelligent, at least in casual conversation). So can one be "high maintenance" and "butch" at the same time?

An email a friend sent me sparked the idea to post this excerpt from a biography of suffragist Alice Paul for any woman who might consider blowing off voting because it's such a hassle:



" . . .In January 1917, the first group of American citizens to dramatize its political protest by picketing the White House appeared. They were suffrage pickets, known as Silent Sentinels, holding banners with political slogans and demanding the right to vote. Although told by the chief of police that picketing the White House was prohibited, the picketers continued, becoming the first group in the United States to wage a nonviolent civil disobedience campaign. In July 1917, the arrests of picketers began. Eventually, hundreds of women were arrested on charges of "obstructing sidewalk traffic." Many, including Alice Paul, were convicted and sentenced to prison at the Occoquan Workhouse (now the Lorton Correctional Complex) in Virginia or the District of Columbia Jail.



The conditions in which the suffragists were held at the Occoquan Workhouse were appalling. Blankets were washed once a year. There were open toilets, which could only be flushed from outside the cell by the guard, who might or might not come when called. Women who were on a hunger strike were force-fed. Doris Stevens, one of the prisoners, wrote in the Suffragist of August 11, 1917:



No woman there will ever forget the shock and the hot resentment that rushed over her when she was told to undress before the entire company. . .We silenced our impulse to resist this indignity, which grew more poignant as each woman nakedly walked across the great vacant space to the doorless shower . . .



In a complaint filed by Lucy Burns concerning conditions at the Workhouse, Ms. Burns stated:



The water they [the suffragists] drink is kept in an open pail, from which it is ladled into a drinking cup. The prisoners frequently dip the drinking cup directly into the pail. The same piece of soap is used for every prisoner. As the prisoners in Occoquan are sometimes afflicted with disease, this practice is appallingly negligent.



Virginia Bovee, who had been an officer at the Workhouse, stated in an affidavit given after her discharge:



The beans, hominy, rice, corn meal . . . and cereal have all had worms in them. Sometimes the worms float on top of the soup. Often they are found in the corn bread.



November 15, 1917, was the Night of Terror at Occoquan:



Under orders from W. H. Whittaker, superintendent of the Occoquan Workhouse, as many as forty guards with clubs went on a rampage, brutalizing thirty-three jailed suffragists. They beat Lucy Burns, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head, and left her there for the night. They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head against an iron bed, and knocked her out cold. Her cellmate Alice Cosu, who believed Mrs. Lewis to be dead, suffered a heart attack. According to affidavits, other women were grabbed, dragged, beaten, choked, slammed, pinched, twisted, and kicked.



In all, Miss Paul served three prison terms in the US. During her imprisonment in the District of Columbia Jail in October 1917, weakened by her hunger strike, she was taken by stretcher to the prison hospital. There she was held incommunicado: no attorney, no member of her family, no friend was allowed to see her. Prison officials threatened her with transfer to the jail's psychopathic ward and St. Elizabeth's Hospital, the Government's institution for the insane, if she did not break her hunger strike. When she refused, she was taken by stretcher to a cell in the prison's psychopathic ward and treated like a mental patient. At night, she could not sleep for more than a few minutes at a time because an electric light was aimed at her face once every hour all through the night. She lived in dread of being transferred to St. Elizabeth's. After a week in the ward, through the intercession of a supporter, Dudley Field Malone, the well-known lawyer and liberal, she was returned to the jail's hospital. A week later she was released. Undaunted, she fought on.



In May and June 1919, Congress passed the Susan B. Anthony Amendment. Now it was necessary to secure ratification by the legislatures of thirty-six states (three-quarters of the-then forty-eight). Some believed that this would take twenty years, but they did not reckon with Alice Paul. With her leadership of campaigns throughout the country, the thirty-sixth state ratified in August 1920. The Nineteenth Amendment became part of the Constitution of the United States, and in 1920 the women of the United States voted in a presidential election for the first time. It had taken seventy-two years beginning with the first Woman's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, New York, in July 1848 -- spanning two centuries, eighteen presidencies, and three wars -- for American women to get the right to vote." . . . .



Copyright 1998 by Sonia Pressman Fuentes



Remind me again what's so important that we can't take ten minutes to go to the polls?

Just because you're crazy doesn't mean they're not all out to get you.



John Kerry's website maps out the major players in the great swift boat conspiracy.



Iowa Hawk uncovers a copy of the first draft.

Am I awake? If so, I think that someone has reversed the time-space continuum, Murphy's law has been ruled unconstitutional, and toast will be falling butter side up today. I actually agree with an article by Jane Yoder-Short and today's piece by Rhekha Basu.



Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket before this pseudo-reality collapses in on itself and forms a small black hole under some scrub pine tree near a trailer park in Hills.

Blogger pride.



Followed a link on Instapundit to this blog post by Tom Humphrey, the Knoxville News Sentinel's Nashville bureau chief (read: traditional media). He's been sent to blog the NY convention. He writes:



"But, what the heck, if I’m going to sit here the evening before deserting my family for almost a week to watch Republican worship ceremonies for George W. Bush, not so long Democratic devotional on caring for John Kerry, might as well ramble a bit.



After all, bloggers, I am instructed, do not have to follow those ironclad rules of attribution, fact-checking, logic and such that burden the daily production of stuff to print by traditionally ink-stained wretches. You can just babble like a talk show radio guy."



Yep. That's what we do, just babble like morons for your pleasure, we don't fact check before we post, like traditional media (say the DI??).



Rebuttal posts are raining down hard and fast, with examples here, here and here.



I particularly like James Lilek's response, which goes beyond the blogger slam to critique the rest of the rhetoric:



"It’s interesting for several reasons: 1. the site is described as a “web-only blog,” which of course makes it distinctive from blogs disseminated by carrier pigeon or smoke signals. 2. we learn that the bureau chief for a major newspaper has trouble writing clearly. My bureau chief in DC would have sent back that first paragraph with several red question marks indicating she had no idea what the words between the first and last comma actually meant. The second graf is even better: “logic and such that burden the daily production of stuff to print by traditionally ink-stained wretches.” Wow. The daily production of stuff to print. And by who? Wretches. What kind? Ink-stained! Why? Because it’s a cliché. And how are they ink-stained? Traditionally! Yes, we’re all taken to the basement where we have our palm sliced with an old piece of linotype; ink is daubed into the wound, and we face a portrait of Joseph Pulitzer while holding our genitals in our left hand."

From the "Oops - never mind" files:



On Thursday, the DI publishes this story:



"Watch out, upperclassmen: Your tuition may go up just because you're older. UI Student Government President Lindsay Schutte has spoken with the state Board of Regents about the possibility of instituting differential tuition, charging juniors and seniors more to attend the UI. Until now, the student government and Schutte's own Giant Sloth Party have wisely been against this sort of policy. Yet, as the budget crisis has grown, our student government is resorting to unfair and deleterious measures to pay the bills. . . "



The article goes on to rant about the unfairness of the whole system.



On Monday, it publishes this correction:



"In an Aug. 26 editorial, "Tuition discrimination based on age," the DI incorrectly reported that UI Student Government President Lindsay Schutte had spoken to the state Board of Regents about differential tuition. Differential tuition was not discussed at that meeting. The DI regrets the error."



Allrighty then.

You really can't blog these days without running into something about the 527 political groups. Kerry denounces the Swifties' right to exist while praising MoveOn. How very unbiased of him. Meanwhile, MoveOn has sponsored swift boat ads of their own.



Ah, but the difference, says the Kerry group is that MoveOn is independent, whereas one of the people in the Swifty ads, retired Air Force Col. Ken Cordier, was a member of the Bush-Cheney campaign's veterans' steering committee, and a lawyer advising the Swifties, Benjamin Ginsberg, has served as counsel for the RNC regarding a suit on campaign funding laws. So, the argument goes, that means that MoveOn's ads are fine and dandy, while the Swifties have to be denounced.



Unfortunately, you can't get anything past these pesky bloggers. Antioch Road points out that the AP article which discusses Ginsberg's involvement as both RNC counsel and informal counsel for the Swifties includes this quote:



"Joe Sandler, a lawyer for the DNC and a group running anti-Bush ads, MoveOn.org, said there is nothing wrong with serving in both roles at once.



In addition to the FEC's coordination rules, attorneys are ethically bound to maintain attorney-client confidentiality, Sandler said. They could lose their law license if they violate that, he said."



So then Kerry reciprocates and denounces MoveOn's anti-Bush ad regarding Bush's service record.



Now, the Des Moines Register points out that both sides are calling for the repeal of these groups.



Why?



If the money is not coming from the RNC or the DNC, can't politically-minded Americans choose to separately fund ads for (or most likely against) a particular candidate? Isn't that what the whole "free speech" thing is about?



If the ads slander someone, let the legal system take care of it. Don't muzzle all independent groups simply because you're afraid the campaign will get to negative. Negative campaigning is basically an American tradition.



Actually, I'm rather surprised Kerry took the tactic of calling for the denouncement of the Swifties, which eventually gave him no choice but to denounce MoveOn. He's had the advantage when it comes to 527 groups and independent campaigning. As the UI hastens to point out in this article to the DI, the Americans for Change concert with the Dixie Chicks coming to Hancher is all funded by MoveOn. And whether you agreed with Fahrenheit 9/11 or not, you have to admit it was a brilliant piece of propoganda. Do you remember the MoveOn ads comparing Bush to Hitler? The DNC denounced those, though Kerry didn't say much specifically about them. Regardless, they didn't create the flak we're seeing now.



The Daily Kos speculates that the Swifties' ads were actually a calculated plan by Bush to entice Kerry to shut down the 527's and deprive himself of the massive benefits he's been reaping from the "free" publicity.



Hmm. That would mean GWB is rather Machevellian, and Kerry silly enough to fall for it.

Greenman blogs on the district court judge from Pennsylvania who issued a ruling that basically copied a brief submitted by the winning side.



Two side points:



1) I've had an associate state judge or two ask me to write up the order on a motion I've won and submit it for approval. But of course, they have a ton of cases and no law clerks to write out their opinions for them like most district court judges.



2) Somewhere in Pennsylvania, I'll bet a law clerk just got fired.

This is scary:



From Overlawyered:



"71-year-old Joyce Hadl charitably allowed a homeless woman, Susan L. Sachs, to stay with her rent-free in exchange for work around the house. According to a friend of Hadl's, when Sachs started exhibiting signs of mental illness, "walking around the house and calling Hadl insulting names", Hadl became alarmed and tried to get her to leave, but police called to the home concluded that they could not legally remove her. Hadl has since disappeared, and Sachs is now under policy custody, having been charged with her first-degree murder."

The number crunchers are at it again. The Yin Blog posts on this USA today article regarding the demographics of female voters - you're supposed to vote for Bush if you're married, Kerry if single. Not surprisingly, the more "traditional" you are (2 kids, white picket fence) the more likely you're going to be for Bush.



One side note: apparently single women are going to be one of the courted groups this year, with special programs like this one set up to cajole them into going to the polls. Maybe I'm just in time to get in on some perks.

Just had this forwarded to me:



PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY DESTROYED BY FIRE

A tragic fire on Sunday destroyed the personal library of President George W. Bush. Both of his books have been lost. A presidential spokesman said the president was devastated, as he had not finished coloring the second one.

The new opinions for the Iowa Court of Appeals are up.



A file under my supervision was taken up on appeal, and the court upheld our verdict. Nice job, Janice.



Also, the Court notes that certain kinds of grade manipulation in higher education can be illegal.



And so darn weird on so many levels. A handkerchief??? How very "Gone with the Wind" of him.

A cool new site begins to answer the burning questions of the age:



What happens if I cook an egg with a blowtorch? Or feed a roll of toilet paper into a shredder?

The Tribune reports that men are actually shelling out cash to send to virtual girlfriends that live in their cell phone. (Registration required to read the darn thing: login=Randommentality / password=password). If you don't pony up for the gifts, the microchip minxes will ignore your butt.



And there's no virtual sex allowed. (Then shouldn't they be marketed as virtual wives?)



H*ll, if anyone's really that hard up call me and I'll ignore you for free.



UPDATE



I guess I'm behind the times. Homercles reports that female video game characters have agreed to pose nude for next month's Playboy.



Next up in the gender wars: the machines win when both sexes become obsolete.

I know George Bush is courting the religious vote, but isn't this is going a little too far?

Ampersand from Alas, a Blog points out there are actually two sides to the Palestinian/Israeli conflict.



"From StopTheWall.org's FAQ, answering the question "why does the Israeli public support the building of the Wall?"



"The majority of the Israeli public has supported the Wall, following the pretext of “security”. The idea of unilateral separation appeals greatly to those in their society who do not want to admit or take responsibility for their government’s racist actions."



That's probably true. But, y'know, it's just barely possible that the idea of unilateral separation also appeals greatly to those in Israeli society who'd rather not be blown to fucking pieces on a bus by some anti-semitic moron with a martyr complex and an explosive belt!!!"



On another link, Ampersand points out that there are some large non-violent protest going on right now in Palestine:



"This is a general pattern I've noticed in press coverage of Palestine and Israel. If a single Palestinian terrorist murders a dozen Israelis, that gets press coverage all over (as it should). But when thousands protest peacefully, it's ignored. The result is to spread the myth that the Palestinian resistance consists of nothing but terrorism."



A correlating question I have: I understand a story on these protests is not as "sexy" as filming the carnage from another suicide bomber. But doesn't the dearth of coverage on these organized non-violent events make the press indirectly complicit in continuing terrorist attacks? By rewarding only the terrorists with coverage they ensure the bombings continue as a tactic.

BTW - have you noticed the little ads at the top of blogs with Blogger are gone? In their place is a little search tool that let me type in "Jib Jab" and go straight to my earlier post to grab the HTML for the link today. Waaay cool. I always hated guessing when I'd blogged on something and wading through the archives.



It also lets you go to the "next blog." Not sure how they know which one is next, but it's been sending a lot of people my way, some from very strange locations.

Jib Jab Update:



Ludlow Music has relinquished the fight to make Jib Jab pay for the rights to Woody Guthrie's "This Land" in their cool political spoof. In exchange, Jib Jab is agreeing to include a link to the original lyrics and "donate" 20% of their profits to the Woody Guthrie Foundation, according to the article. I take this to be simply either a nice gesture or a chance to avoid court costs on the part of the Jib Jab guys: as I blogged earlier, Woody basically lifted the song himself, and even if he hadn't, the 1945 song's copyright had run out when Ludlow failed to renew its registration in 1973 (the term back then was for 28 years).

Expanding Iowa's entertainment options - now you can join a militia. Secluded compound and wild-eyed messianic leader not included.

This article just appeared in the Press-Citizen, stating that:



"A conservation officer with the Department of Natural Resources said criminal charges could be filed soon regarding a boating accident last month at Coralville Lake that killed a fourth-year University of Iowa medical student. . . .



While boating with friends on July 10, authorities said Hill fell from the boat at around 8:15 p.m. and was believed to have drowned. However, autopsy results show Hill died of “blunt and sharp-force injuries of his head and neck,” a clerk in the Johnson County Medical Examiner’s office said."



I first read this as implying an attack of some kind against Hill. But as I read more closely, this would also fit if the driver of the boat were intoxicated, as was Hill, and when the driver made too sharp a turn, Hill fell off the boat into the propellar. I guess we'll have to wait and see.



UPDATE

Yeah, it was OWI with a boat. But they carefully stated that the operator's level of intoxication had nothing to do with the death.

Meanwhile Wide-Eyed Insolence is back up - with vacation pictures. And Cornfield Commentary is now Hog Haven.

This is an illegal link according to the official Olympic hyperlink policy. If I get nabbed by the Greek police, you'll know what happened.

Another Iowa Blogger:



Greenman from Crap Flinging Monkey sets up his first blog. And pirates my link list. Cool! It should be an interesting addition to the great debate.

After the escape of two prisoners from Oakdale last year, the State has decided to reduce the staff. Yep. that's brains for you. Today's opinion piece in the DI points out that could be a bad idea, given the proximity to Highway 965 and the fact that one of the escaped prisoners was a murderer. I'd like to add that many of the convicted felons in Iowa (actually, I think all of them) go through there for classification into the appropriate prison. If I recall correctly, they also retain those prisoners a tad too mentally ill to play well with the other inmates for the duration of their sentences. Not exactly the kind of people I want jumping the fence and hitching a ride in the area.

Saw a similar bumper sticker on the way to work and had to giggle. I don't think they saw the implication. Or maybe I'm just weird. (Don't answer that, Pete.)

My mom has cancerous tumors all over her brain, metastasized from elsewhere, probably the lung. They're pressing on her brain and causing all sorts of entertaining neurological quirks.



We're waiting on the biopsy, but doctors seem to be talking in terms of "alleviating symptoms" rather than treatment. This isn't supposed to happen for another 20 years or so. I'm only in my thirties. Life pretty well sucks at the moment.



That said, I'll still be blogging, just more sporadically than usual. Got a small break today when the out of town relatives descended.



Say a prayer or two if you get the chance.

Space Monkey Leader laments the sparse dating scene from the male POV. The divorce papers were just filed in June, so I'm really not "out there" but let me tell you the view from this end doesn't look too pretty either. Though I'll have to use that buy-me-a-car line the next time I'm asked if I want to "hook up" by some drunk college freshman or middle aged burnout who still lives with his parents. It could be very entertaining. Maybe I'll start carrying a stopwatch?

An interesting observation on L-2 interviews at the Yin Blog.



I ended up going the prosecuting internship route myself. My friends were flying out for interviews in big city firms, while I made peanuts in Muscatine, Iowa.



But then, I was trying cases, not chained to a research room. Thank God.



Because frankly, it's the trial stuff I was good at anyway, and it gave me the confidence I needed to realize my skills were not inextricably tied to the almighty class rank. By the end of the summer I realized I'd never fit in the kind of firm that churns associates for the billable hour. Later I tried it . . . for about six months. I was right. If you can't be yourself in any job, you will eventually hate it no matter how well it pays.

A legal mental note: No BB gun fights in the courthouse. I suppose next they'll outlaw bottle rocket wars?

The PC indicates that the Crowded Closet is almost back in business. They can use some donations, though. I loved the old store - you could find some treasures in there, and they had tons of great stuff for sale directly from craftspeople in 3rd world countries. I always raided the jewelry section.

Don at Tusk and Talon posts on the Governor's own "no child left behind" plan. Key quote:



"The Iowa Learns Council no doubt conducted a thorough, objective and open-minded study of the needs of Iowa’s pre-school children before deciding that it should go along with its mission statement that says,



“The Iowa Learns Council plans to work toward achieving two primary goals: that 90 percent of Iowa children will have a quality preschool experience, and 90 percent of Iowa high school graduates will complete at least two years of college.”



In other words, the ILC believes: 'Between two and twenty, 90 percent of your children belong in institutions.'"



I understand making day care available to parents who need it, but why promote it for those who don't? I'm moving out of the age range when people ask if I'll ever have kids (answer: don't hold your breath), but in response I'd always point to my work schedule. If I had to wake a kid up at 6:30 to drop him/her off at daycare by 7:30, pick him/her up again at 6:30, with a reasonable bed time of 9:00, I'd be spending a grand total of three and a half hours a day with the child. I don't think that would be enough to qualify it as "my" child, regardless of biology. I'm much better off getting a pet.



I understand many people can and do make this kind of thing work. But to make it a goal?

Not all insurance law is boring.



This case from the 2nd Circuit involved a clause in a life insurance policy, providing:



"that the insurer 'will not pay if loss is caused by ...intentionally self-inflicted injuries' and that a compensable loss 'must result directly and independently of all other causes from accidental bodily injury.'"



The issue of the case is the same as asked in many criminal assault cases: if the person intended to do the act, but didn't intend the result, is it an intentional injury/death?



The particular case involved autoerotic asphyxiation. The deceased had rigged up some kind of harness and pulley system to choke himself . . . He accidentally died of strangulation.



(On a side note: would that actually be considered a malfunction? I think of it more as operator error.)



The insurer argued, and the 2nd Circuit agreed, that this was an "intentionally self-inflicted injury." The "independent of all other causes" part of the policy bolsters the argument, as the intentional self-strangulation could at least be considered related in some way to the death, even if an argument could be made for an accident/operator error to be classified as some superceding cause. The fact that the decedent didn't intend to die from this strangulation may make the death an "accident" but it didn't sever the relationship between that accident and the admittedly intentional act of autoerotic asphyxiation that was the cause of death.



At least, that's what they held last year.



In a rehearing this year, the 2nd Circuit reversed itself in this opinion. They focus on death as the "injury", not the strangulation, and drawing the distinction between what the decedent wanted - strangulation stopping short of death - and what occurred. They pointed to the safety mechanisms employed by the decedent:



"Daniel had apparently been in the middle of an auto-erotic act. He was tied up in various places by cord, and these cords had evidently been attached to a set of counter weights which were meant to give him an "out" if he started to lose consciousness."



Law.com has an article analyzing the new opinion here.



I've got a hypothetical for them to consider: how do you compare this to a mentally ill person making a serious suicide gesture? They intended to act as though they were committing suicide, but it is arguable they didn't intend death.



Another thought: why would the policy say intentionally self-inflicted injuries are an excluded cause of death, rather than simply saying suicide or intentional death is excluded? I believe the drafters intended the distinction. In this case, the injury - asphyxiation - was intentional, it is simply the death that was not.



(NOTE: I realized after posting only half the thing went up. Added the rest. Sorry).



UPDATE: In reading a similar 9th Circuit case posted here, I realize that the intentionally self-inflicted injury clause is separate from the suicide clause, and both were included in the 9th Circuit policy. So why are the courts interpreting this so as to make the self-inflicted injury clause duplicative of the suicide clause? That kind of redundancy doesn't make sense to me.

This article in Newsday discusses the problems military women overseas are facing re: pregnancy and abortion. As far as I can tell:



1) 5 to 6 percent of Army women are pregnant at any given time.



2) Women stationed overseas are allowed access to birth control, but are told if it fails they would be given a "harsh punishment." No mention made on the guy being in trouble.



3) However, the guys might bear some responsibility here, other than the obvious "two to tango" - there were 1,012 reported sexual assaults of service members in 2003 and 901 in 2002:



"The Miles Foundation, which assists servicewomen and female military dependents who have been victims of violence and sexual assault, has handled 187 sexual assault cases involving soldiers stationed in Iraq, Kuwait, Afghanistan and Bahrain, said Kate Summers, the foundation's director of victim services. It now is working with three servicewomen who were impregnated by the same senior officer in Kuwait, she said."



4) The focus of the article was on the fact these women have no access to an abortion: the same military hospitals that are allowed to give free boob jobs are prohibited from paying for abortions even in cases of rape.



My questions:



So what exactly are they doing about this? I'd imagine a pregnancy might be somewhat of a hinderance when running through the desert after an escaped terrorist. You've put them in the middle of nowhere, with no option to pop over to the nearest private-sector medical provider, and no plan for what might happen?



Were the 1,012 reported sexual assault victims told they'll face "harsh punishment" if a pregnancy results?



And in cases of consensual sex, are the men getting off (pun intended) scott-free? If we're going to have men and women serving together, shouldn't both sexes be treated the same?

I've not really been following the Scott Peterson trials, but did peek at an article this morning regarding the transcripts of the conversations with Amber Frey. Do we all sound this stupid when conversations are transcribed verbatim? I seriously hope not.



PETERSON: Different genres of movies.

FREY: Different like joggers?

PETERSON: Genres. Different types. Love story, a comedy, horror.

FREY: Oh!

[He says his favorite movie is "The Shining."]

PETERSON: I've asked you the best movie ever made in your opinion.

FREY: European ... oh, in my opinion?

PETERSON: Your opinion, yes.

FREY: My opinion? Oh, you know, I don't know how the answer that honestly.

PETERSON: Okay, how about if I give you a genre?

FREY: What? What are you saying gen ... I still don't know what you're saying?

PETERSON: Genre? G-e-n-r-e?

FREY: Gen ...

PETERSON: It's a type of movie. Genre.

FREY: Okay, I've never heard that before.

PETERSON: Okay, it just means like different types.

FREY: Okay.

PETERSON: So if I gave you a romantic comedy, what would be the best or what would be your favorite in that genre?

FREY: Romantic comedy/ I don't know. I'd have to hear some examples cause I don't know what ... I don't know.

PETERSON: Hum? Okay. Uh ... romantic comedy.

FREY: "Pretty Woman," is that romantic comedy?



BTW, given her old look and the new, I'd say somebody had one helluva makeover.

Today's new Iowa Supreme Court decisions are posted here, and today's Court of Appeals decisions are posted here.



Not much to blog about, but:



Stupidity awards and other nonsense:

1) Yep. Leave your debit card number and PIN sitting out on the dresser in the room where you're having your strippers change into their "costumes" for your party. They won't touch it. Really.



2) When stopped with a car full of illegal drugs, it's important to remember to take the drugs with you when chased by the police. And leave your legs sticking out from under the car so they can find you. That way you can use the brilliant defense "Man, the pot was just, like, there when I crawled under the car."



3) When making a motion to exclude evidence, you might want to be efficient by remembering that the evidence rules allowing in "excited utterances" will probably cover statements made by a victim who was repeatedly stabbed in the face and chest to the 911 operator immediately after the stabbing. Don't waste your time, it doesn't get much more "excited" than that.

A friend emailed me this link to Ike Turner's Guide to Restoring America's Honor. Whether or not you agree with the analogy (I don't), it's a wicked little essay.

Inmates break out of the 110-year-old Red Oak jail using a toothbrush.



I think I have a suggestion on how to use some of the money earmarked for the fake rainforest in Coralville.

Glenn Reynolds has a Tech Central Station column up on those annoying registration pages for newspapers. Key quote:



"Take a look at those lists of information you collect: how many people have given their email as 'nobody@biteme.com', and do you have an implausibly large number of 97-year-old black women living in Alaska as readers? I'll bet you do."



I generally put myself down as a 100 year old male living at either 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in DC or 555 Main Street, Anytown. The white house idea came when the registration page for the Washington Post got cute and started actually checking whether the addresses being inputted were real. Yep, I'm now the prez, as far as they're concerned. Or maybe just a hot 100 year-old intern.



But there is hope:



Bug Me Not. You input the URL of the news service and it gives you a valid username and password. Cool - now I can get onto the London Times again, one of the worst of the worst. I absolutely refuse to buy a subscription simply to gain online access for a few stories.



UPDATE:



D*mn it, the Times still expects a subscription. Oh well, back to the Guardian.

I suppose this is bound to happen every so often:



Twin brothers, both with records (prison time on a "home invasion" charge on one, something that requires sex offender registry on the other), have DNA that matches a semen sample from a 1999 rape case.



"Identical twins are born with identical DNA because they come from the same egg, but experts say the genetic material mutates from birth.



The mutations are so tiny, however, that standard police DNA tests can't find them.



A scientist from Boston said she believed she could detect the mutations, although it would take more than two years and she could not make any guarantees.



She offered to perform the tests, although she said it could cost at least $50,000. Other experts pegged the cost at $100,000 or more.



Authorities spoke with representatives of genetic scientists in Germany and Japan, but they could not provide a reliable test."



I suppose it's too late to thoroughly comb through any alibis? The article states both brothers were out and living in the area at the time, though they're both in jail now on unrelated charges.

Also via How Appealing:



10 Things Not To Say At A Supreme Court Oral Argument.



IMHO, #5 is the best.

A really cool article by Associate Justice William W. Bedsworth of California's Fourth District Court of Appeal was on How Appealing this morning, dealing with how the USDA standards can allow batter-coated french fries to be considered a vegetable, while their non-battered cousins cannot be. An excerpt:



"But I’m confident the USDA didn’t come to this conclusion rashly. After all, they studied it for three years before handing down the 'Batter-Coating Rule.' 9 And, as their lawyers argued to Judge Schell, 'It is still considered "fresh" because it is not preserved. It retains its perishable quality.'



To which I say, as, apparently, did Judge Schell, 'Huh? Oh. Sure, sure. Whatever. That sounds fine to me. Now, can you please hand me some of those onion rings?'"

Today's Bleat discusses a book I read a few months ago called "Devil in the White City." It's a fascinating book about serial killer H. H. Holmes and the creation of the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago. The author had to have put in about a million hours of research about the period, the murders, and the incredible logistics involved with building the World's Fair in the first place. It really pays off.



My favorite reads are those that offer what I call a painless education. A good example in novel form is "The Alienist" by Caleb Carr, a best seller from a few years ago. It's got some graphic violence, but if you can stomach it, the history of forensics, psychiatry, and legal issues such as the McNaughten Rule are all outlined in detail while not distracting from an absorbing plot. (I haven't found his subsequent novels as good, though, because they don't seem to be quite as well researched).

The Register has an article about a break in a two-year-old Cedar Rapids rape case:



"A man accused of sexual assault allegedly told the assault victim that he broke into her house two years ago because it was the only one with the lights on. Police say Anthony Hollen, 34, broke into the woman's home, tied her up and sexually assaulted her Nov. 18, 2002. He is awaiting trial on first-degree kidnapping and first-degree burglary charges that could put him in prison for life. . . .



The woman, who is now 37, was alone in the house taking a shower that morning when she heard two loud bangs, apparently the sound of someone breaking into her back door. A man, wearing a black ski mask with holes for the eyes and the mouth, entered her bathroom. He had a knife, the woman said, and he tied her hands together and took her to the basement."



I can't tell you how much these stories sometimes creep me out.



If only she'd kept her lights off. If only she'd had someone else home. If only she'd heard the door open.



These thoughts flash involuntarily across your mind as you assimilate the information under the vast category of "things I can do to keep from being raped someday":



Don't walk around at night.

Don't accept drinks/rides from strangers or casual acquaintances. Don't leave a ground-floor window unlocked.

Don't wear anything too provocative.

Don't look like a target.

Don't forget your basic self-defense tactics.



Then you realize there really isn't too much you can do. You can't live your entire life on guard. It could all turn very ugly very quickly, and it won't be your fault. But you'll still wonder what would have happened if you had gone to bed instead of taking that shower.

The NY Times has an interesting article about the Bush campaign seeking to rally conservative churches and their members.



(NOTE: Registration is required - use "randommentality" as the username and "password" as the password, if you don't already have one.)



According to the article, the Bush campaign "has asked 'people of faith team leaders' to help identify thousands of "friendly congregations" around the country. It asked religious outreach volunteers to petition their pastors to hold voter registration drives, and to speak on behalf of the campaign to Bible studies and church groups. . . .



As about 500 people gathered for the 5 p.m. Saturday Mass at the St. Peter Parish Church in St. Charles, his appeals appeared to fall on fertile ground. The Rev. John J. Ghio included a prayer for "reverence for all human life from conception" in the service. A Catholic voting guide in the program noted that Archbishop Raymond L. Burke of the Archdiocese of St. Louis has said it is a sin to vote for candidates who support abortion rights, a group that includes Senator John Kerry. The guide listed "non-negotiable" issues of abortion, euthanasia, stem cell research, human cloning and same-sex marriage.



"I don't know how a Catholic in good conscience could vote for a candidate who was pro abortion," Father Ghio said after the service."



Just to play devil's advocate, pun intended, I feel obligated to point out here that not everyone who is pro-choice is pro-abortion. It is possible to feel quite strongly that abortions should be functionally eliminated by providing the education, social services, and financial support necessary to allow for women with an unwanted pregnancy to choose adoption and/or keeping the child, without supporting legislation that puts these same women at risk for criminal prosecution or prison. Some of these people actually get out and do something to help, like funding women's shelters and aid for the needy. Can't they be considered "good Catholics" if they chose to support Kerry based on his pro-choice position?



What about people who are pro-life in every sense, want a constitutional amendment criminalizing it as murder, but also feel strongly against military action due to religious beliefs, and choose to weigh the balance of their vote in favor of stopping the war first and dealing with the pro-life issue later? You can disagree with their beliefs, but does it make any of them a "bad" (insert religious denomination of your choice)?



The article points to quotes by "team leaders" at a prayer breakfast in a St. Louis suburbian Assembly of God church:



"'He has proven that he will do what is right, and he will look to God first.' . . . 'Don't you feel it is a spiritual battle?'"



Are they implying John Kerry is in league with the antichrist? I mean, he does look a little like Lurch, but I don't think he exactly lights little black candles in chalk pentagrams in the back of the campaign train.



I've no problem with the church discussing social issues, it is after all there to provide guidance to parishoners on how to lead their lives in compliance with the religious beliefs of the faith. But choosing a candidate is a complex balancing process, and attempts to enforce conformity at the polls by religious leaders generally annoy me. It's hard enough to get voters to independently analyze the issues without either side resorting to "God wants you to vote for me."



I don't put it past politicians to try just about every trick while cruising along the campaign trail, but I'm disappointed in the churches that choose to go along for the ride.

WTF???



Stupid internet policies #29847:



In cruising the blogs, I note Instapundit's link to Blawg Wisdom -



"STARTING LAW SCHOOL IN THE FALL? Blawg Wisdom has collected all sorts of links and helpful advice."



I figure I'll check it out and link it, if it contains stuff that would've helped me - the "if only I'd known" type of material. So I click the hyperlink and up pops the window:







Adult content??? I know law school can be a bit rowdy, but geez. The internet nazis are taking their jobs a little too seriously.

I caught last night's showing of Psycho Beach Party, and it was quite cool. The cast was phenomenal and the script is hilarious. I understand Friday night's performance was sold out, and Saturday's was nearly so, so you might want to catch this one next weekend before it's gone. Go to the City Circle Website to get more info on tickets and times.

First we have Michael Moore, independent of the Democratic party, doing Fahrenheit 9/11 in a bid to oust Bush. It's an editorial in the form of a movie, and as such is inherently biased, but not illegitimate. You can debate the points of the movie forever, but it was within his rights to make it. Next, we have a commercial aired by "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" in a bid to defeat Kerry, again independent of the Republican party. It's a commercial, and inherently biased, but again not illegitimate and within their rights to make it.



Then the lawyers step in, according to Instapundit.



I think you can't implicitly condone Moore's opinion piece and simultaneously try to stifle the oppositions'. Yes, each has shaded the truth to one extent or another, depending on your point of view. But both sides of the political spectrum are feeding us phenomenal amounts of crap these days. Either resolve to play nicely together, or to give as good as you get. You can't have it both ways.



UPDATE:



That being said, I haven't seen the ad. I just read something here about a potentially false affidavit that Kerry had shot someone in the back. While I know each side has shaded things and included opinion/conspiracy theory/innuendo as "fact," if this ad turns out to have included flat-out lies, particularly about such a hot subject as that one, it will come back to bite the sponsors (and anyone implicitly condoning them).



UPDATE UPDATE



Don posts this news flash at Tusk and Talon.

The Press Citizen has an article against scrapping the driving simulator just because it costs us too much - like $1.3 million dollars too much, due to "unforeseen" circumstances:



"Following the events of Sept. 11, 2001, a lot of private research dollars vanished. . .Meanwhile, as state governments across the nation cut spending on higher education, universities increasingly turn to external funding for dollars, creating intense grant competition -- competition that wasn't anticipated when the facility was proposed and constructed."



Why do I get the feeling that they should save this document with fill-in fields, so it can be used again when the proposed fake rainforest in Coralville is added to the list?

Took the Bush and Kerry loyalty tests I saw on the Yin Blog. It is Friday, after all. Apparently, I have no loyalty:



Your score is 4 on a scale of 1 to 10. You think Bush has some redeeming attributes, but generally speaking you are not a fan. You may have supported him at one point, but now you have misgivings about the job he has done as president. There's a chance you could bring yourself to vote for him, but at this point you are leaning against him.



Your score is 4 on a scale of 1 to 10. You believe that John Kerry has some redeeming qualities, but not enough to entrust him with running the country, much less the nuclear launch codes. It's possible that you might change your mind about him, but at this point, you are leaning against him.

It's the perks, stupid . . .



If anyone wonders why a sane person would run for the presidency, check out the list of gifts the Bush family received in 2003 alone, posted on The Smoking Gun. Dang, if that's what a president that "the world hates" gets, what does one that's loved rake in?

British judges can sit part-time in scheme to attract women.



Sounds like an interesting dating service?

After viewing Fahrenheit 9/11 I made a mental note to look up the number of legislators with kids in the military and compare it to the population at large.



(I thought the "sign your kid up for the army" was an effective bit, but not a supportable argument on the war one way or another because no one can actually enlist another person).



Someone has done the numbers already:



Seven out of 535 congresspersons have sons or daughters in the military at the present time.



According to the census bureau,



there are around 130 million people in the 40 to 79 age group.



These are people statistically likely to have kids in military service range. I don't know how many congressional types have kids that fall into military service ages, so for the sake of argument I'll presume they all do.



Given that there are about 2.7 million active military personnel(armed forces and national guard).



Five of the seven of these congressional children is serving in Iraq. There are 112,000 troops in Iraq. So the ratio of congresspersons with kinds in Iraq is 5/535 or about 1/107. The ratio of total 40-79 year-olds to troops is 112,000/130,000,000 or about 1/1,160.



Now, that doesn't address Moore's issue about the disproportionately large service on the part of low income individuals. The rates of service per parent in Flint (his sample area, being his hometown) may well be larger than the congresssional kids'. If anyone gets those numbers, I'll post an update.



But it does undercut the idea that congressional kids are somehow dodging their responsibility to sign up for the military or be sent to Iraq, as opposed to the average American.

Could this explain a lot about Israeli foreign policy?



UPDATE: Fixed the link. Sorry!!!!

According to the Register, Iowa is considered a battleground state that both Kerry and Bush are eager to win over.



If that's the case, will someone please tell them we're not idiots? They apparently think we perform bizarre corn rituals to appease the prairie gods:



"Competing for votes in corn-growing Iowa, John Kerry waved to crowds with one ear in each hand. Not to be outdone by his Democratic rival, President Bush ate one raw."



I love to see what they'll come up with for New Mexico.



(Hat tip State 29).

D'oh" alert:



From this Register piece on the Kerry/Bush dueling fundraisers in Davenport:



"Gov. Tom Vilsack called Davenport "the safest city in America" as Secret Service for both candidates blanketed the downtown and police provided extra security."



Oh, really?

According to the Press-Citizen Kirk Ferentz just doesn't have a clue. Key quotes:



"Ferentz indicated that he thinks some people have used the controversy for their personal gain. He wondered why there was no backlash when The Daily Iowan published a similar story about students living in subsidized housing in 1994.



"The fairness of it, I guess, would be my question," Ferentz said.



"Somebody gave me a copy of an article written in October of 1994 in The Daily Iowan. It was basically the same article.



"So I was interested that some of the people took note this time. I was curious as to their interest 10 years ago. Without naming any names, I thought maybe an individual or two tried to cash in on an opportunity."



Ferentz said he thinks the issue should be resolved by the Department of Housing and Urban Development.



He also said that his son did nothing wrong, that he lives on a limited budget and that he receives no preferential treatment."



Yep, it's a conspiracy. It has nothing to do with the fact you're a millionare and have no problem with your son stealing housing from low-income families.



I've actually liked the guy as a coach, but this is just infuriating. Admit the kid was wrong for doing it, even if it is legal. Admit you should've guided him better as a parent, and apologize. The rest of us have to do it from time to time. It won't kill you.

I'll be away from the computer most of the day, and might not get to post much. Unless I get a sudden attack of verbosity in need of an outlet. . . .

This explains some things?



The subjects " . . . rushed through the courtship . . . which the females did not find attractive. The altered males essentially try to do everything at once. . ."

Also from Instapundit: non-legal synopsis of the Alabama dildo case:



"Most of the Alabama legislature is made up of men. Just who are they protecting here? It's a pretty sad state of affairs when the men folk have to get together and pass laws to keep their women from utilizing alternative methods for sexual gratification. What do you Alabama studs need? Lessons?"

Drinking half a bottle of wine a day makes women smarter. Why didn't they tell me that in law school? Hey, I'm only looking out for my mental health.



BTW, why do I get the feeling this study was sponsored by some secret society entirely populated by the kind of guy who sends drinks over with his phone number on the napkin?



Saw it on Instapundit (not that he needs the link).

Ve haf vays of making you vote. . .



I agree it's important to encourage people to vote, but do we really need the cost and expense of setting up a government office enforcing a fine if you don't? And if people are truly disinterested, is that so immoral that we want to fine them? Do we really want them voting anyway, if they are unaware of the issues and people involved? I'd argue a disinformed vote is actually worse than no vote at all.