Politics

Truth is, I don’t much care what Dean supporters will do if he loses the primaries (original). I think Dean’s veiled threats are pretty childish; they’re also stupid. He’s not gonna tell his supporters to stay home, and the vast majority of them will vote for the Democratic nominee anyhow. I also agree with Atrios on this one, in that the real question is what happens to Dean’s campaign machine. In the ideal Democratic Party world, he keeps running it on behalf of the primary victor. In our world, he probably tunes it down and keeps it humming so as to keep himself well-positioned for 2008/2012, unless of course he gets the VP nod, which is what he’s angling for when he makes threats about taking his toys and going home. ...

Speaking of God, may I point out that it is just pathetic that the National Parks Service is putting creationist texts on sale in the Grand Canyon park bookstore? Not to mention the rest of the fundamentalist ideology-mongering revealed in this article. Edit: there’s been a bit of backpedalling. Unclear how much.

I try to stay away from entries entitled “ Dave Winer has gone barking mad,” but from time to time I suspect I just won’t be able to avoid it. Background: Dave got miffed (original) because Lawrence Lessig’s big speech included an exhortation to get off your butts and do something about the political arena. Dave, to be perfectly fair, is in fact fairly active in a scattershot kind of a way. He also deserves applause for his rejection of patents, although he couldn’t have actually patented everything he thinks he could. ...

Above the main door of the Cambridge City Hall is a stone bearing these words: God has given Commandments unto Men. From these Commandments Men have framed Laws by which to be governed. It is honorable and praiseworthy to faithfully serve the people by helping to administer these Laws. If the Laws are not enforced, the People are not well governed. The asserted motivation behind Roy Moore’s monument to the 10 Commandments (original) was acknowledgement of the law’s moral foundation: namely, the Commandments inscribed on his monument, which are certainly the Commandments referenced in the inscription above. ...

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decided that the government may not hold Jose Padilla as an enemy combatant (original). Padilla is an American citizen. This will wind up going to the Supreme Court, I imagine.

Saith Dor: “Yeah, maybe Al Queda had a training camp in Iraq somewhere, at some point. There are militia training camps in Idaho. Does that mean that the US government sponsored the Oklahoma City bombing?”

Good news (original), without question. Doesn’t make people on US soil a whole lot safer, but it may make a difference for soldiers in Iraq, and it’s excellent news for the Iraqi people. I could speculate all day on the possible effects of this. “Aha, now the attacks on American troops will slow down.” “Aha, now the Iraqis won’t feel the need for US protection and will demonstrate against the occupation.” “Aha, there will be a major boom in Saddam bobblehead dolls.” I don’t have any idea what will happen, though, so I’m not going to try and say something authoritative and convincing. I’ll just be happy the guy’s caught. ...

Everett Ehrlich starts out talking about the basic value of the Internet (original), which is that it makes it really cheap to gather and transmit information. I’d never heard of Ronald Coase, but the basic outlines of the theory as Ehrlich explains it make complete sense. The Internet allows very focused tribes to form very quickly, because one no longer has to look very hard to find other people who consider bowling shoes to be the pinnacle of modern art. ...

We’re restricting Iraqi rebuilding contracts to coalition countries. That’s pretty short-sighted. Bush’s take on it: “Coalition, friendly coalition folks risked their lives and therefore, the contracting is going to reflect that, and that’s what the U.S. taxpayers expect.” Actually, I expect Bush to choose the course which results in high-quality reconstruction at the lowest possible cost to the taxpayer. I suspect that opening the bidding to more firms will lower the costs. I would prefer, thusly, not to exclude non-coalition firms. ...

There are more reports that Bush has sanctioned assassinations. Except they’re not assassinations, because the targets are enemy combatants and thus legitimate targets for lethal force. Well, OK, but I really don’t want to see any complaints about atrocities if Colin Powell or Bush gets assassinated by Al Qaeda. If it’s OK to target leaders on the other side of a war, and we’re in a war, then it’s gotta be OK for both sides. ...