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April 23, 2014

Sotomayor’s Dissent

While our Constitution does not guarantee minority groups victory in the political process, it does guarantee them meaningful and equal access to

August 2, 2012

Agamben on Bandits and Werewolves

Agamben on bandits and werewoves: The medieval ban also presents analogous traits: the bandit could be killed (… “ ‘To ban’ someone is to say that

June 16, 2009

“Born Criminal” Found Not Guilty!

Activist and playwright Dakxin Bajrange was arrested on May 11th, 2003 for allegedly assaulting Prahlad Chhara. The real reason? Performing plays

September 17, 2008

No Smoking

I’m glad that Taiwan is going smoke-free in public spaces and offices, but this PSA just made me laugh. Its so Taiwanese somehow …

December 26, 2007

Human Rights Day

This is a very complex picture (by Cooloud). Taiwan’s President and Vice-President were prisoners in this building during the White Terror. On Human

December 23, 2007

X-Ray

In 2000 Shashwati and I travelled to Iceland for our honeymoon. We had a fantastic trip, but the flight back was very early in the morning on the

October 5, 2007

BBQ

This is one of those “only in Taiwan” stories: Police in Hsinchu 新竹 captured an escaped convict when they noticed a man attending a police-sponsored

October 3, 2007

Easement

iPhone owners are up in arms about the fact that Apple blocked third party applications. Personally I think these people should focus their wrath

August 26, 2007

Treo Woes

The Palm Treo is a decent device, but it costs twice what it should and it hasn’t been significantly upgraded in years. Unfortunately, I need one. I

May 24, 2007

Caging

From an interview with Greg Palast, where he argues that both the media and congress are missing the real story behind the US attorney scandal:

May 12, 2007

Disenfranchised

The following quotes and chart were culled from Jason DeParle’s New York Review of Books article, “The American Prison Nightmare.” The issue has

March 18, 2007

Free Choice Act

The Employee Free Choice Act passed the house vote, now it is going to the senate. If you are a US citizen, please go here to tell your senator that

December 26, 2006

Public Record

Just how many different ways has the Bush Administration tried to hide once-public information sources from the public record? Help us count the

December 22, 2006

Aura

In his classical work, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” Walter Benjamin wrote that modern technology would free art from its

December 2, 2006

Posada

A known terrorist enters the United States and the department of Homeland Security only arrests him after a Miami-based NY Times reporter points it

December 1, 2006

Algorithm

Did you know that a secret government algorithm assigns you a “risk score” every time you fly in or out of the country? That have no way of knowing

November 4, 2006

Alternative Interrogation Techniques

There are two important stories about the use of “alternative interrogation techniques” by US forces which deserve to get more attention: First, the

September 13, 2006

Gruesome

This really is gruesome, so don’t read it if you don’t want to spoil your day. Still the recent murder of five children in a home in Hualien has

July 23, 2006

Stupid Shoppers

This is a general shout-out to all the stupid people out there: Thank you! Thank you for buying your memory from Apple (or purchasing a black

July 8, 2006

Never Again?

This is so important that I can’t believe the NY Times wants you to pay to read it. So here it is: Kristof’s latest article on Darfur … and Chad.

June 23, 2006

Contract!

We are happy to announce some very exciting news … Today we signed a contract with Documentary Educational Resources (DER) to distribute two of our

June 21, 2006

Gujarat Police Academy

One of the most moving experiences we had when shooting the film was a performance arranged for the cadets at the Gujarat Police Academy. It will

May 27, 2006

Incarceration Rates

Kieran Healy recently posted this chart showing incarceration rates in the US compared to other “basically well-functioning advanced capitalist

May 18, 2006

Brave New China

In Aldous Huxley’s book Brave New World writers and intellectuals are banished to an island where they have complete freedom to say and do whatever

April 29, 2006

Murders

The NY Times has gotten into the whole Google Maps mashup craze with this map identifying every murder committed between 2003 and 2005. Between

April 29, 2006

Aggravating

Having never served on a jury, my knowledge mostly comes from the movie, “12 Angry Men“. But I’ve always found the instructions given to juries

April 21, 2006

Abu Bakker Qassim & A’del Abdu al-Hakim

A longish title for a Keywords post, but these names are important to remember. They are the two Uighurs who remain in prison in Guantanamo four

April 21, 2006

Abu Bakker Qassim & A’del Abdu al-Hakim

A longish title for a Keywords post, but these names are important to remember. They are the two Uighurs who remain in prison in Guantanamo four

January 29, 2006

Abuse

Guest post by tf Much of France is fixated on the televised parliamentary hearings concerning the Outreau sexual abuse scandal, named for the town

January 3, 2006

Maninagar

The other day we visited Maninagar with Dakxin Bajrange. Maninagar is now little more than a street lined with tents. The people there used to have

November 23, 2005

Declare

If the Bush administration has an ideology, it is that of executive power. John Yoo, now a Berkeley law professor, formerly a “mid-level attorney in

November 20, 2005

Passbook

Writer Dilip D’Souza, a long time advocate of India’s Denotified Tribes, or DNTs, has a moving post promoting our film. He draws from his book,

November 6, 2005

Falsity

Post of the month: It turns out that the false information about Iraq’s supposedly training al-Qaeda operatives in the use of chemical and

October 30, 2005

Presidential Seal

Bush v. The Onion: You might have thought that the White House had enough on its plate late last month, what with its search for a new Supreme

October 21, 2005

Legal Fiction

Jeffrey Rosen called Chicago law professor Richard Epstein the “intellectual guru” of a movement to “resurrect the Constitution in Exile,” meaning

October 3, 2005

Restraint

Regarding Harriet Miers, who was picked by Bush to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court, Senate Majority Leader Bill

October 1, 2005

Community Access TV

OK, I’ll admit that I consider most community access television shows to be a joke, especially Rabbi Mordechai Friedman’s “Judaism, The Series”

September 15, 2005

Hooch and Hamlet

This December, Shashwati and I are going to India to shoot a documentary film about the residents of one city’s slum who are using theatre to fight

September 14, 2005

John Roberts

I haven’t blogged about Roberts because there doesn’t seem to be any point. He will be the next Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. He may even be,

September 13, 2005

Garrison Keillor

I can’t stand A Prairie Home Companion, but it wasn’t something I was going to blog about until Ish brought my attention to the fact that Garrison

August 26, 2005

Kaohsiung

Seems that violent worker protests aren’t unique to China, and “Made in Taiwan” does not ensure that something is made under humane working

August 20, 2005

Undervotes

I’ve stayed out of the whole “stolen” election issue, because I tend to believe that both sides play pretty dirty whenever they can. I’m all for

August 15, 2005

Fraternizing

If, as Doonesbury suggests, the terrorists really are after us because they hate freedom, there may be no need to fear any longer. The NLRB has

August 3, 2005

Charles Sobhraj

Shashwati has been written up in the South Asian press! His eventful life makes for a perfect movie script — serial murders, young, beautiful women

July 15, 2005

House of Labor

I’ve added it to my blogroll, but it really deserves its own post. Nathan Newman has joined the borg at TPMCafe and is blogging up a storm about

July 14, 2005

Schmidt

Don’t blog Andrew Sullivan much around here, but this is a must: One great merit of the Schmidt report — which is otherwise riddled with worrying

July 11, 2005

Branded

This site, using Google maps to show the location of all convicted sex offenders in Utah has me really freaked out. On the one hand, having entered

July 10, 2005

Typosquatting

Last week Bill Poser of Language Log had a post about Leo Stoller, a Chicago businessman who claims not only to have copyright over the word

June 24, 2005

Eminent Domain

In many ways Kelo v. City of New London reminds me of Bush v. Gore. In both cases the court reversed its ideological course in order to serve the

May 31, 2005

Deep Throat

Nixon and his crew suspected Felt (because they mistakenly thought he was Jewish), but dismissed the idea (because they mistakenly thought he would

May 29, 2005

Mosquito Brother

is the alias of Hsu Hai-ching 許海清, one of Taiwan’s top gangsters, whose funeral procession yesterday included thousands of

May 22, 2005

Dilawar

Jeanne, who is going to join Tom Tomorrow in what is turning into a wonderful group blog, has been doing some good blogging on the Afghan prisoner

April 27, 2005

Cables

What really impresses me about President Bush is his almost instinctual ability to choose and elevate to positions of power people who go beyond the

April 25, 2005

Jail

The US prison population has risen further, with one in 138 people now in jail, new official figures reveal. There are more than 2.1 million US

April 23, 2005

Memos

Alan Berlow’s Atlantic Monthly article about death penalty memos written by White House counsel Alberto Gonzales to then-Governor George Bush is

April 14, 2005

Ivy Strike

Graduate student teachers at Yale and Columbia universities are on strike to demand the right to form a union (recently denied to private schools by

April 14, 2005

Crowley

Even though the new bankruptcy law will hit New Yorkers harder than the population as a whole, New York congressman Joseph Crowley was one of 73

April 12, 2005

Intercourse

Andrea Dworkin, who died today, never claimed that all heterosexual sex is rape. statements that Dworkin makes about the meaning of intercourse are

April 12, 2005

MoveOn Moves

I suppose late is better than never, but MoveOn has finally decided to get onboard with the fight against the bankruptcy bill — the day before the

April 12, 2005

Hostages

I’m glad to know that the United States Army does not take hostages. Because, you know, it wouldn’t look good if they did. Also, see Body and Soul

April 12, 2005

Evidence

1,806 people were arrested in New York during the Republican Convention. It is now clear that the police were simply harassing people to limit their

March 31, 2005

Contracts

I don’t know what it is about bankruptcy law. It seems really difficult to get any kind of traction on this issue. Most people understand that the

March 26, 2005

Last Supper

This ad, by French clothing company, Marithe et François Girbaud has caused a big stir in Europe: It wasn’t just that it was based on Leonardo’s

March 24, 2005

Death

used to be viewed as a natural phenomenon. Now we know better. The average life expectancy of adult humans has more than doubled in the last

March 24, 2005

Chili

I recently described working in a coal mine in China as one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. The most dangerous factory job in the United

March 21, 2005

Finance

Campaign Contributions from the Finance/Credit Industry to Current Senators, ’99-’04 An analysis of the contributions shows that senators who voted

March 14, 2005

HR 685

I never liked Congressman Crawley, our congressman from Queens, so I wasn’t surprised to learn that he is one of the cosponsors of House bill H.R.

March 8, 2005

Free Speech

In my last post on Ward Churchill, I wrote: If Churchill did deliberately misrepresent the work of other scholars, his academic status should be

March 8, 2005

Jonquiere

Facing the threat of unionization, Wal-Mart closed its Jonquiere, Quebec store rather than pay its employees living wages and benefits. The Canadian

March 5, 2005

Arash Sigarchi

Human Rights First (formerly the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights) has a campaign to send letters on behalf of an imprisoned Iranian blogger:

March 5, 2005

Triskelion

In the Star Trek episode “The Gamesters of Triskelion” prisoners are controlled through collars around their necks. While Homeland Security

February 27, 2005

Why?

I tried mailing a document to a friend in Arizona. It got returned. Why? We regret that your mail is being returned to you because of heightened

February 15, 2005

Child Labor

The above is a picture taken by Lewis Hine for the National Child Labor Committee in 1909, titled “Photograph of Bibb Mill No. 1, Macon, GA.” The

February 13, 2005

Martinez

This is a story that would certainly be generating much bigger waves if it involved a Democrat, rather than a pro-torture (i.e. pro-Gonzales)

November 20, 2004

Civil Unions

It turns out that many of the states which banned same-sex marriage unwittingly also banned civil unions — even though most people in those states

November 9, 2004

Good Riddance

Good riddance! They can’t find anyone worse, right? … Right!? UPDATE: As Leila points out, it looks like Alberto Gonazales will be the next Attorney

October 31, 2004

November 3rd

If things go wrong on November 2nd, the No Stolen Elections website is the place to go: Our goal is to support existing election protection work

October 26, 2004

Cancer

Rehnquist is not the only member of the Court to have been diagnosed with cancer. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 71, had colon cancer, Sandra Day O”Conner,

October 22, 2004

Tort

I have always found it interesting that there is tremendous anger at tort lawyers, but not at the insurance industry. How bad is the problem of

October 18, 2004

Hate Crimes

Boy is David Neiwert mad! I guess I must be horribly out of touch with the Republican version of reality, because I’m still not really certain what

October 18, 2004

Gerrymandering

I was listening to Weekend Edition on NPR and heard a pollster say “gerrymandering” with a hard “G,” as in “gate.” It turns out that such a

October 10, 2004

Reading

Kevin Drum points to two very important articles (actually four, since the second one contains three parts). These are both really worth your time,

October 10, 2004

Poll Tax

From the Editorial Page of the New York Times, a sense of what we are up against: The Poll Tax, Updated When members of Mi Familia Vota, a Latino

October 10, 2004

Amy Fisher

AKA “the Long Island Lolita,” has a new book: If I Knew Then. Here is a snippet from the AP news story: Fisher speaks candidly in the

October 10, 2004

Iterability

Derrida (1930-2004) famously argued that writing preceded speech. By this I believe he meant that the “iterability” of language logically preceded

October 10, 2004

1969

My dad has a letter to the editor in today’s times, placing Afghanistan’s elections in a historical context: To the Editor: It is important to put

October 3, 2004

Student I.D.

Joi Ito just got his student I.D. card, and now he can access all those wonderful academic databases, like Lexis-Nexis. His thoughts on this are

October 3, 2004

Open Source Anthropology

My latest Anthropology News article, “Open Source Anthropology” is now available online as a fully editable wiki article. Please feel free to

October 3, 2004

Press Release

In Brazil the gangs send a press release before invading another favela

September 29, 2004

November

Why do we hold elections on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November? Why early November? For much of our history America was a

September 29, 2004

Extraordinary Rendition

A law to legalize torture of suspected terrorists was slipped into the bill implementing the 9/11 Commission Report. Jeanne has the details

September 27, 2004

Responsibility vs. Rights

I don’t normally resort to name-calling on this blog, but Ted Rall is an idiot. Here is what he says about voters who don’t know that Bush is rich,

September 23, 2004

0 for 5,000

Until it was reversed by a federal judge, a recent court case in Detroit was the only terrorist conviction obtained from the Justice Department’s

September 18, 2004

Labor Lobbyists

Mark Schmitt recalls being asked the question: “Do any of you seriously believe that it is possible to have a real progressive movement in this

September 17, 2004

Crackdown

Reporters Without Borders is outraged at this latest escalation in the government’s attempts to suppress the right to inform the public via the

September 17, 2004

Najaf Treat

The first day after 9-11 my Shashwati and I, worried by stories we had heard about a racist backlash, went to eat at our local Afghan kabob house to

September 16, 2004

Vigilante Convicted

In July I wrote about the case of Edward Caraballo, a journalist who was implicated in the trial of the American “vigilante” Jonathan Keith Idema.

September 7, 2004

VoIP

With Skype’s SkypeOut service, internet telephony has truly arrived, but this brings with it a whole set of questions. Most importantly, will VoIP

September 5, 2004

Predatory Lending

When I lived in North Philadelphia, check cashing places (which charge nearly 300% interest) were the only businesses I saw in the poorer

September 4, 2004

Indiscriminate Arrests

That’s the number of people they are saying were arrested in New York during the Republican convention. A judge ordered that 500 of them be released

September 3, 2004

Tribunal

The L.A. Times has a scathing editorial against the Supreme Court ordered tribunals for the Guantanamo detainees. (The Supreme Court didn’t order

September 1, 2004

The Great Firewall of China

while Google is accessible to Chinese users, not all of its functions are available; because of China’s content filtering technologies, users of

August 29, 2004

Freedom of Speech

From Boingboing.net, three stories on “freedom of speech” (1, 2, 3): First, a story from the ACLU, whose court filing was censored by the Justice

August 24, 2004

527s vs. 501(c)4

There has been a lot of talk about how hypocritical Bush is for asking Kerry to disavow 527s (such as MoveOn.org). As Nick Confessore writes: If

August 23, 2004

Making it Up

Whether it is taking pictures in public places, or using a wireless connection outside a library, it seems that the police and even the population

August 21, 2004

Wackenhut

Yes, there is a little gulag in New York City. It is located in Queens and its name is the Wackenhut Detention Center. And everybody should know

August 20, 2004

Absentee Ballots

There was a lot of attention paid to the fact that Republicans in Florida were pushing voters to cast absentee ballots. But it seems that this is a

August 17, 2004

Non-violence

In his book Stupid White Men, Michael Moore included an open letter to Palestinian President Arafat: I have the key to your success. I know how you

August 11, 2004

Card Check

Via Nathan Newman, an important article on the legal threat to use of card checks for union organizing and media coverage of the issue. What is Card

August 5, 2004

Announcing wiki.oxus.net

I’m very happy to announce, that after much thought and preparation, I have finally launched my own personal wiki! It isn’t the first time I’ve run

July 29, 2004

Vigilante

The New York Times reports that an award-winning documentary filmmaker was arrested in Afghanistan for allegedly participating in vigilante

July 18, 2004

Silence

This silence can not last. What are you still doing here? Click on the link! Now

July 18, 2004

Censure

Congresswoman Corrine Brown (D-FL) represents 600,000 Americans in the Duval County/Jacksonville area. She was censured by Congress for suggesting

June 28, 2004

Detention

[A]s critical as the government’s interest may be in detaining those who actually pose an immediate threat to the national security of the United

June 26, 2004

Access

78% of South Koreans have broadband internet access. But none of them can access most blogs. Why? Because the government is trying to limit access

June 22, 2004

URGENT

REQUEST FOR URGENT FINANCIAL RELATIONSHIP FIRST, I MUST SOLICIT YOUR STRICTEST CONFIDENCE IN THIS TRANSACTION. THIS IS BY VIRTUE OF ITS NATURE AS

June 21, 2004

Under God

There has been great discussion of the phrase “under God” as it is used in the Pledge of Allegiance over at LanguageLog. The long and the short of

June 18, 2004

Plea Bargaining

I was watching last night’s Frontline on “The Plea” (you can watch it online starting Monday), and I was struck between the similarity between how

June 14, 2004

Memogate

Ashcroft’s arrogance knows no bounds. For those of you who don’t know already, Ashcroft refused to hand over documents requested by congress. These

June 9, 2004

Photo Ban

The NYC subway system is considering a ban on photography on its trains and platforms — despite the long and honourable tradition of shipping

June 9, 2004

Satisfaction

I was contemplating purchasing a laser printer from a company called Legend Micro — until I read their return policy. Return Policy In order to

May 31, 2004

Police State

What is your definition of a “police state”? How about having one out of every 75 men in prison

May 23, 2004

Romney

Kevin Drum points us to a LA Times article on Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, which he boils down to its essence: Gay marriage opponents are

May 23, 2004

“Questioners”

The title of this post is in quotes, because that is how it appears in the 1983 Human Resource Exploitation Training Manual put out by the CIA. The

May 18, 2004

Safety

John Fabian Witt asks, Can China protect its workers? China and other developing Asian economies are experiencing an industrial accident crisis of

May 16, 2004

Apology

—> Sign the petition! Remember James Yee? Here is what Jeanne at Body and Soul wrote back in February: … James Yee, the Muslim chaplain at

May 15, 2004

My Lai

Anyone hopeful that justice will be served in the Abu Ghraib investigation might wish to take a look back at the My Lai prosecutions: In the end,

May 15, 2004

Torture

By using torture to question the top terrorists it has in custody, the government has effectively sabotaged any future prosecutions of al-Qaida

May 10, 2004

Blacked-out

The government is going to have to come up with new ways to block out information in public documents. Already there was a scandal when a sensitive

May 6, 2004

Taguba

Seymour Hersh, on the O’Reilly’s show (via Political Animal, emphasis added): O’REILLY: All right. Well, the damage to the country obviously is

May 6, 2004

Gulag

More on Abu Ghraib (in no particular order): Sidney Blumenthal: Bush has created what is in effect a gulag. It stretches from prisons in

May 3, 2004

Whoopee

Call it the whoopee cushion doctrine. It is hard to believe that the government now regards flatulence jokes, the lamest staple of gag gift stores,

May 2, 2004

Guantanamo-Ghraib

I hope the US Supreme Court takes this into account as it makes its decision on the Guantanamo Bay case: A month before the alleged abuses

April 30, 2004

Humiliating

Article 3, Section 1(c) of the Geneva Convention states that prisoners of war shall not, “at any time and in any place whatsoever” be subject to

April 28, 2004

Mandamus

(man-dame-us) n. Latin for “we order,” a writ (more modernly called a “writ of mandate”) which orders a public agency or governmental body to

April 27, 2004

Elected Dictatorship

A 3-page memo was leaked which reveals aspects of the links between Cheney and Enron. The three-page document contains eight points spelling out

April 25, 2004

IMAP

What is IMAP? It is simply a way of accessing your e-mail. Right now, if you use Entourage, Outlook Express, Eudora, Apple Mail, or some other

April 8, 2004

Executions

Amnesty International’s report revealed that China, Iran, the USA and Viet Nam accounted for 84 percent of the 1,146 known executions carried out in

April 6, 2004

Pregnant

It seems that expectant mothers who wish to carry their pregnancies to term are the ones most likely to be harmed by the Unborn Victims of Violence

April 5, 2004

Content

Via both BoingBoing and LanguageLog, a very disturbing story about how the Academy of Art University in San Francisco is attempting to control the

April 5, 2004

Libel

It isn’t news that, despite their racy tabloids, the Brits have less freedom of speech than we do in the United States. Well, formally anyway. I

April 5, 2004

Science Courts

Chris Mooney (who still doesn’t have an RSS feed) has an interesting post about how Republicans have undermined important public policy initiatives

March 23, 2004

Scandal

Wohohoho, it’s real, shame and scandal in the family Wohohoho, it’s real, shame and scandal in the family (Link via Cursor.org, lyrics from Peter

March 10, 2004

Pink

One group I never “got” are the “Gay Republicans.” But two news stories, one in the New York Times, and the other in the Washington Post, have

March 10, 2004

A-N-W-A-R

It sure is a shadowy world out there when you’ve got the wrong damned name

March 4, 2004

Gender

Mike at Ishbadiddle points out an interesting legal quandary: So amidst all the Gay Marriage backing-and-forthing, one thing I haven’t seen

February 29, 2004

Amendment

Notice, for example, that recognizing gay marriage will not require a constitutional amendment, but blocking it will. Even if Scalia and Thomas

February 27, 2004

Sharpton

I would like to retract an earlier post. I suggested that the Democrats try to use “states rights” to re-frame the issue of same sex marriage. But

February 23, 2004

Majoritarian

There has been considerable discussion (see the comments over at Lessig’s blog) about whether or not San Francisco’s mayor was right to go against

February 18, 2004

Spies

An excellent two part (one, two) article by Michelle Goldberg in Salon about how Ashcroft is encouraging local police departments to spy on anti-war

February 15, 2004

Joyce

This is an upsetting abuse of copyright laws. On what grounds can anyone justify giving Joyce’s heirs 70+ more years of copyright to his work?

February 10, 2004

Marriage

Advice to Kerry (or whoever the Democratic candidate turns out to be): Re-frame the issue of “gay marriage” as an issue of women’s rights. Efforts

February 10, 2004

Boobs

Looking for Janet Jackson’s Boobs? More here

February 4, 2004

Apple

UPDATE: Apple has finally extended the Logic Repair Program to cover late 2001 iBooks!!! Took them long enough, but I’m glad they did the right

January 31, 2004

Consistency

Sometimes I wish that conservatives would make an effort to be logically consistent. I suppose some do, but most seem to have no problem switching

January 30, 2004

Bragging

Remember when Bush bragged about his human rights record? No President has ever done more for human rights than I have. Billmon had a good

January 28, 2004

Ambivalence

I’ve written several times about my ambivalence towards General Wesley Clark. This Democracy Now interview, in which reporter Jeremy Scahill

January 26, 2004

AWOL

Saying Bush was AWOL is perfectly, wholly, and completely factual

January 25, 2004

Lunch

When I was studying Chinese the school had a policy that we had to speak Chinese all the time, even during our lunch breaks. A well intentioned

January 23, 2004

Expression

From the National Coalition Against Censorship newsletter, an important article about students being punished for dark or violent writing (emphasis

January 21, 2004

Brown

For those who didn’t look at the “Education Life” supplement to this week’s Sunday Times, there was a nice collection of articles covering the

January 21, 2004

Rigged

Read this article!!! It explains very clearly what is at stake if Bush wins the 2004 elections. …if President Bush is re-elected, we will be close

January 20, 2004

Bandanna

Now the french are proposing to ban Bandannas, in addition to “Islamic headscarves, Jewish yarmulkes and large Christian crosses.” I posted over the

December 30, 2003

Mercury

is bad for you: Mercury is one of those unambiguous poisons. It’s a known nerve toxin and a cause of birth defects. Minnesota and 40 other

December 29, 2003

Bribe

A question for Ashcroft: What does a guy have to do to get a congressional bribe investigated

December 28, 2003

Incarceration

The trouble with prison isn’t that it doesn’t work; the trouble is that it doesn’t work very well but does cost a fortune compared with other ways

December 8, 2003

Pareve

I’ve never been overly picky about my vegetarianism. I eat seafood, eggs, and often eat food cooked together with meat dishes as long as I can’t

December 5, 2003

Accountability

The answer to problems like the Pentagon’s accounting system clearly is not more flexibility — what is needed is more accountability. Accountability

December 3, 2003

Bounty

At least 20% of the Guantanamo detainees have been held without charges for years even though they were innocent. These are just the ones that the

December 1, 2003

Speech

I totally missed this brilliant post from Nathan Newman, written about three weeks ago. He discusses allegations of liberal censorship of

November 25, 2003

Corruption

In my travels in the developing world, I’ve often been struck by how even those who hate the United States for its foreign policy have a very

November 24, 2003

Hooverism

“Attorney General Ashcroft has dismissed critics of the Justice Department’s tactics as ‘hysterical’ and has even said that such criticism aids the

November 14, 2003

Hate

Talk Left opposes hate crimes legislation because he sees it as an ineffective and unnecessary extension of federal power. Debasish Mishra, a board

November 14, 2003

Fungus

Let me start with a personal revelation: I have toenail fungus. It is a very common problem, one that can easily be cured with a pill. The problem?

November 14, 2003

Politicization

Marstonalia has some interesting ideas about what can be done to “stop” the downward spiral in the politicization of the judicial confirmation

November 10, 2003

Subcontracting

America shouldn’t be subcontracting torture. From a Washington Post editorial, which TalkLeft takes to task for not going far enough. Much more

November 6, 2003

Re-regulation

A recent article in The Nation starts with an account of the grass-roots mobilization (from both the right and the left) against further

November 5, 2003

Train

Sometimes you stumble upon a character from history who seems like they must have been made up — then you realize that is because they are probably

October 22, 2003

Mental

One in six U.S. prisoners is mentally ill. Many of them suffer from serious illnesses such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and major depression.

October 22, 2003

Disobedience

I haven’t written anything about the Diebold electronic voting scandal because Body and Soul has done such a good job, there seemed very little to

October 21, 2003

Rape

Frankly, I’ve been quite shocked at the number of male bloggers who seem to feel that rape is justified if some certain “point” has passed in a

October 17, 2003

Gummy

FYI: Soft and chewy candy is generally categorized by the industry as either “gummy” if it has a primarily gelatin base, or “juju,” if it has

October 16, 2003

Rafah

The above is a frame from Cartoonist Joe Sacco’s NY Times Article on the Israeli destruction of homes in the Gaza Strip. The International

October 5, 2003

Lexmark

We got a “free” Lexmark printer with the purchase of one of our computers. Don’t ever fall for such a trick. It is like giving crack out for free.

October 4, 2003

Liability

Nathan Newman reports some good news: A federal district court in Texas ruled on Wednesday that Ken Lay and other Enron executives are liable to

October 4, 2003

Whap!

Newspaper articles are usually pretty boring stuff, but this one uses Batman (the T.V. series) style sound effects to describe a … book signing

September 29, 2003

Frog-march

FROGMARCH verb [mid-19th century and still in use] to carry someone face down, one person holding onto each limb; used on drunks or recalcitrant

September 23, 2003

Portability

Escape Cell Hell — And Take Your Phone Number With You

September 22, 2003

Threat

Attorney General John Ashcroft has become a threat and a menace to our criminal justice system and to the civil liberties that have been the

September 19, 2003

Islamic

It seems that working for an organization with the name “Islamic” in it, or having a common muslim name are both likely to get you locked up in a

September 18, 2003

Impeachment

Well, they probably won’t impeach Bush, but it seems he pretty much just admitted that he lied to congress

September 17, 2003

Happiness

Jonathon Delacour, writing about Japanese aesthetics, says the following: One of the reasons for my strong interest in Japanese literature and

September 12, 2003

Crime

Some interesting facts about crime rates and prisons: …crime rates in America, after rising sharply through the 1960s into the early 1970s, began

September 4, 2003

Cocktail

The New York times reports that “Africans Outdo Americans in Following AIDS Therapy.” This is a serious issue because failure to take medicines

August 29, 2003

Anonymity

On the one hand … our government is funding the internet service Anonymizer.com to protect Iranians from the prying eyes of their government. On the

August 28, 2003

Neon

Pictured here is a typical Taipei street scene, captured wonderfully by a computer science professor at Columbia. (I found the picture using

August 28, 2003

Babel

Amptoons is right, Pedantry’s series of posts about language policy is one of the most interesting things in the blogsphere right now. (Right up

August 26, 2003

Racism

Over at Nathan Newman: … a white criminal gets more job interviews than a black person with no record at all. It almost boggles the mind that there

August 22, 2003

Evidence

I’ve been following an excellent series of posts over at Alas, A Blog about the Kobe Bryant Case (1, 2, 3). In particular, a link to this article by

August 21, 2003

Liberty

As many of you may know, Ashcroft is running around promoting the Patriot Act and his new Victory Act as if it were snake oil. He also launched a

August 9, 2003

Gaydar

I was reading Noy Thrupkaew’s discussion of recent Gay-themed TV shows in The American Prospect, when this caught my eye [my emphasis]: Indeed, the

August 8, 2003

Conspiracy

I’m starting a new campaign: Arrest Ashcroft for “Conspiracy against Civil Rights“!!! This law dates back to the reconstruction era and has mostly

July 29, 2003

Fuck

There goes my site’s “G” rating! Probably means you won’t be able to visit my site from a school or public library web site anymore! Oh well… The

July 2, 2003

Privacy

Following on my marriage post, I think this link to Balkinization deserves an entry of its own. Jack Balkin has an excellent post which clarifies a

July 1, 2003

Marriage

One of the interesting things about the recent Supreme Court decision on the Texas anti-Sodomy law was the way in which it went out of its way to