Chez Chesler

Labels: 1969, moon landing, space exploration

Labels: inventions, sneakers

Labels: inventions, sayings

Labels: Obama, race

Labels: movies

Labels: anniversary, Diane

Over on the Volokh conspiracy they were talking about zeugmas and syllepses.  If I have it right, zeugma is any yoking in a parallelism (I went to work by bus and by bike) while a syllepsis has a mismatch (She blew my nose, and then she blew my mind.)

What is the word for a word that can be split two ways?  For instance:

• Is Petsmart "Pets mart" or "Pet smart".
• On Arrested Development, the combined Analyst and Therapist was called the AnalRapist.
• The site penisland wasn't about stationery, it was about penes.
• Is the online world Runescape "Rune scape" or "Run escape"?
• I used to work in Billerica - when I use that as a user name, people think it's Bill Erica. 

Labels: language, rhetoric, syllepsis, volokh, zeugma

Labels: contracts, free markets, laissez-faire, oil, speculators, zero-sum

Labels: economics

Officers on paid detail assisted Fenway Park security in removing 24-year-old Warren Woods and another fan for their behavior during the game. Police said the men became verbally abusive and continued to be belligerent once outside the park. Woods was charged with being a disorderly person and drinking in public.

Labels: beer, drinking, drinking in public, Fenway, Jagermeister

Hoping to lure a new generation of smokers, tobacco companies routinely manipulate levels of menthol so that their cigarettes prove more appealing and less harsh to novice users, Boston researchers reported yesterday. Scientists from the Harvard School of Public Health scoured thousands of pages of industry documents from the 1980s through 2006 and commissioned laboratory tests of cigarettes to confirm a long-suspected link between menthol levels and marketing strategies. The researchers found that tobacco companies embrace a Goldilocks approach when launching brands: Add too little menthol, a chemical that has an effect akin to anesthesia, and tobacco retains its intense bite. Add too much, and first-time smokers are overwhelmed. Add just the right amount, and cigarettes become powerfully seductive.

Labels: tobacco

Labels: Yankee Stadium, Yankees

Labels: DSS, Gloucester, YFZ

The environmental group WWF urged governments, businesses and households to turn back to candle power for at least 60 minutes starting at 8 p.m. wherever they were. ... Earth Hour officials hoped 100 million people would turn off their nonessential lights and electronic goods for the hour. Electricity plants produce greenhouse gases that fuel climate change. ... Darkened restaurants glowed with candlelight in San Francisco while the Golden Gate Bridge, Coit Tower and other landmarks extinguished lights for an hour.

My kids have been playing Runescape for a few years.  Recently the folks behind it, Jagex, have added a site devoted to games, FunOrb, and I've been playing rapid chess there myself (online games against other humans.)

Is this joke original with me, or did I hear it somewhere?

Two great chess masters sit down to play a game.  White opens with pawn to king four (e4 for you youngsters).  Black silently studies the board.  Minutes go by, and after an hour Black tips over his king and says "You have an unbeatable position."

I suspect that nobody who is not a mathematician or computer scientist would find this funny.

Labels: chess, joke, math

I’ll throw in my two cents.  I doubt I’ve got anything to say that hasn’t been said already somewhere in the blogosphere.

• Governor Spitzer was doing his part to help wayward girls.  That’s commendable.
• Dinesh D’Souza disagrees with Alan Dershowitz, pointing out the prostitution has victims, in this case Mrs. Spitzer, their daughters, the citizens of New York, and Professor Dershowitz.  No man is an island, so it follows that every choice has consequences, good or bad, for non-participants. That doesn’t make them victims, and doesn’t justify criminalizing the behavior, if freedom is to have any meaning.
• I agree with those who are enjoying the exposure of former-prosecutor Spitzer’s hypocrisy, and the irony of the situation.
• In his dissent to Lawrence v. Texas, Justice Antonin Scalia suggests that the holding, that "majoritarian sexual morality is not even a legitimate state interest" means laws against prostitution cannot "survive rational-basis review."
• Around here, the Woburn and Burlington police have been running stings and surveillance operations to find escorts who are working in private rooms in local hotels.  I understand that streetwalking may be as disturbing to other users of the public streets as other vendors and business nuisances, but they are going after the same sorts of Internet-based escorts as Governor Spitzer did business with.  They are engaging, in private, in activities which would be completely legal were it not for the commercial aspect.  There are enough crimes with actual unwilling victims here (things like bicycle and GPS theft) that I’d much rather the limited police resources be directed towards solving or preventing those crimes.
• I heard Professor Dershowitz on WBZ-AM (haven’t been able to find this in a transcript online) saying something along the lines that if every politician who engaged in some indiscretion had to resign, we wouldn’t have any elected officials.  I disagree.  If these laws, which the Professor seems only now to be loudly complaining about, were enforced against every minor violation, the bad laws would be repealed.

Labels: Dershowitz, Prostitution, Spitzer

I'm watching the new Fox show New Amsterdam, the one whose premise bears an entirely accidental resemblance to Pete Hamill's Forever, about an immortal guy living in Manhattan (hmm -- I wonder what kind of rent control he's got on his apartment!)

Besides the hundreds of girlfriends in the 400 years he's been alive, he's had so many identical dogs that he calls them by number.  (His current dog is "36".)

I don't know where the show is going.  Last night it seemed to go in a Quantum Leap direction -- theorizing that one can flashback within their own lifetime, John Anderson remembers a time with parallels to the present when he failed to set right what once went wrong, so he'll do the right thing now.  It's not clear how many interesting places he's been -- is it Zelig or Forrest Gump or Mr. Peabody and the Wayback Machine?  (Unlike Hamill's protagonist, he can leave Manhattan, and can even leave the five boroughs.)  Anyway, we learned that during the Civil War he was a medic in the Washington, DC area.

Which means we may well finally have a show that's about Abraham Lincoln's Doctor's Dog!

Labels: New Amsterdam, TV

Labels: Bissextile, bleg, Leap year

Labels: bleg, Leap year

According to an AP story, the central Japanese city of Obama (population 32,000) has adopted its namesake candidate, who has never visited.

Obama gives good speeches and has a good voice, so I want him to do well. And, of course, we share the same name," said Seiji Fujiwara, a hotel executive and leader of a local support group established earlier this month for the Illinois senator.

Isn't that racist, calling an African-American well-spoken?  Isn't that just a codeword for articulate, because as Joe Biden found out early last year, it implies that unlike white people, it is surprising that African-Americans are articulate.

I wondered about that reasoning by Eugene Robinson, or Jesse Jackson.  Would it be off-color or suggestive if someone compliments a white candidate because that implies this particular feature is notable because it is rare in whites?

Labels: race Japan Obama

Labels: rape, reporting, Wendy Murphy

Drug or alcohol abusers who relapse, even after long periods of abstinence, are often reviled as too weak or undisciplined to straighten themselves out. But a UNC Chapel Hill psychologist has found evidence that suggests, in fact, that addicts’ brains may be wired in a way that makes them more prone to give in to temptation. The research, published in the December issue of the Journal of Neuroscience, provides further evidence that addiction is a disease, not a character flaw, said Charlotte Boettiger, an assistant professor of psychology at UNC Chapel Hill and the lead author of the paper released last week.

“Winter is warming greater than any other season,” said Elizabeth Burakowski, who analyzed data from dozens of weather stations for her master’s thesis in collaboration with Cameron Wake, a professor at the University of New Hampshire’s Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans and Space.

Labels: guns, lockdowns, schools

Police investigate death of man hit by cruisers Associated Press - December 10, 2007 9:15 AM ET DOVER, Vt. (AP) - An autopsy is expected to be performed today on the body of a man who was struck by two state police cruisers in Dover. Police say they still don't know yet what killed 22-year-old Gerald Peterson of Dover, who they say was laying in the road when he was hit.

DOVER, Vt. - The Vermont State Police and Dover police are investigating what is being called the untimely death of a 22-year-old man hit by two state police cruisers while laying in the travel lane of Route 100 early yesterday morning. The victim is identified as Gerald Peterson of Dover.

DOVER -- The Vermont State Police and Dover police are investigating what is being called the untimely death of a 22-year-old man hit by two state police cruisers while lying in the travel lane of Vermont 100 early Sunday morning.

Labels: grammar

If they can make an entire movie in Aramaic, why isn't Beowulf being released in the original? [Then again, the same guy who made the Aramaic movie had to have his first movie dubbed from Australian into English.])

I heard that Blockbuster is going to downsize and concentrate more on new releases. (link?) Isn't that what they're already doing? I know this because I once asked a clerk there for  "Witness for the Prosecution"  "What?", and reminding him "with Tyrone Power" only got "Who?"

Any resemblance?

Labels: Aramaic, Beowulf, MelGibson, OldEnglish, TyronePower

Jordan's Furniture ran a promotion this past spring: If the Red Sox won the World Series, the entire purchase price of your furniture would be returned.  So that he could cheer for the home team, Eliot purchased an insurance policy.  (Soon after Warren Buffett bought the company, Barry stopped doing the commercials.)  Newsradio was interviewing folks and they kept saying "It's win-win, the Red Sox are happy, the fans are happy, the customers got free furniture, and Jordan's was insured."  Never mind the Indians and the Rockies, somebody has to pay for all this, namely the insurance company.  To be fair, the Boston Globe story cited does note this.

On the other hand, home prices are falling.  The bubble has burst, and prices, which aren't supposed to drop because "they aren't making any more" land, are down to a level not seen for, oh, two or three years.  This is supposed to be a tragedy, but people aren't buying houses for fuel.  One family moves out, another family moves in.  There are still millions of people (30% of the country, half of New Yorkers) who don't own the house they live in.  For every home-seller who loses a dollar because his house isn't worth as much as he hopes, there is a home-buyer who gains a dollar because he didn't have to spend as much as he might have - and there are some people who can afford houses who wouldn't be able to otherwise.

Labels: economics, housing, prices, zero-sum

Early this week the Herald ran a puff piece about the two million dollar house that Paul Pedini, a vice president at Modern Continental, the company responsible for the Big Dig built incorporating steel and concrete scrap from the Central Artery demolition.  The article mentioned that among the castoffs were two foo dogs that had been at the Chinatown Gate and have since been replaced as part of the contract.

The stories mentioned that the statues were gifts from Taiwan in 1982 - not exactly ancient history.

Herald muckraker Michelle McPhee is trying to make this out to be the Mayor Curley's Desk for the new century.  She featured quotes from Amy Lung from the Chinese Progressive Agency who said "The Big Dig contractor has no connection to China, and no right to the statues" (although she didn't say that there was nothing wrong with the pair that went to the Kowloon Restaurant which does have a connection to China.)  City Councilor Stephen Murphy said "They belong in Boston, not Lexington."  And City Councilor Sam Yoon said "These statues obviously had great sentimental value to the Chinatown community."

But the most recent article shows that sentimentality isn't what's most important.  Yoon wants the statues auctioned with the proceeds going to the Chinatown crime watch: "By auctioning these statues, Mr. Pedini himself could be the highest bidder for them," he said.  In other words, he doesn't care if the foo dogs are in Lexington, or if they belong to someone with no connection to China, as long as he gets the money.

Labels: BigDig, China, FooDog, News

"You break it, it's yours", or as the lawyers say, "Strict liability".

Carol Gotbaum died in police custody at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport.

Phoenix Police spokesman Sgt. Andy Hill defended his department saying in part: "Officers did everything they could to save the life of a citizen."

I suppose leaving her alone, and not putting her in the handcuffs that seem to be the cause of her death, or as the doctors say, "Primum non nocere" never occurred to them.

Researchers from the American Society for Microbiology and the Soap and Detergent Association made headlines lately when they hung out in public restrooms ("No, we're not watching you wash your hands, we're hoping to have anonymous sex with a US Senator") and observed that only 57% of men at Turner Field washed their hands after using the bathroom, compared to 95% of women. The gender gap got big play, and also that many more people reported in a telephone survey that they wash after using the bathroom than actually did. The ASM even maintains Washup.org, a site dedicated to hand washing. Their fact sheet notes that the CDC says "the single most important thing we can do to keep from getting sick and spreading illness to others is to clean our hands." That's fine, but what is it about unzipping my fly, or touching my own penis, makes my hands particularly more unclean than they were before?

Labels: germs, urine, wash

New Hampshire doesn't have a sales tax, except  8% on hotel rooms, restaurant meals, car rentals, and tobacco, electricity, communications and real estate transfers are also taxed.

New Hampshire doesn't have an income tax, except on income earned by deferring consumption and investing.

New Hampshire local property taxes go to local services, except $4.92 per thousand goes to a statewide education pool.

This dearth of tax revenue means that New Hampshire has to fund its roads with turnpike tolls.  Due to the locations of the toll booths, these tolls tend to hit folks traveling to and from Massachusetts, and within the town of Merrimack, particularly hard.

Formerly, New Hampshire sold tokens for 12.5 cents each ($5 for a roll of 40) that were good for 25 cents of toll.  In order to motivate people to use electronic transponders, which provide a discount of only 30%, New Hampshire stopped selling the tokens in 2005, and stopped honoring them on Janyary 1, 2006.

The NH State Senate approved a measure that would have allowed a partial redemption (the tokens would have been usable at 12.5 cents, no discount or interest)  in April 2006, but the NH House rejected the measure.

Praise is due to an elderly Braintree, Massachusetts man, Thomas Jensen, who showed more principle than the entire Granite State this week, choosing to spend 3 days in jail rather than pay $150 for allegedly stealing services by paying for his toll with the tokens New Hampshire had sold him with the promise that they could be used for that purpose.

There aren't that many tokens in circulation.  How much could it cost New Hampshire to accept them at tolls, as they come in, compared to the cost of holding a trial and keeping Jensen in jail for three days?

I had replenished my roll before they went off sale and I had less than a roll in each car.  I go through the Merrimack tolls to visit my parents about once or twice per month.  If I'd known New Hampshire wouldn't be keeping its promise I might have signed up for a transponder at the discount price of $5, or maybe not.  It certainly doesn't pay for me to buy one at $25 -- with its expected lifetime I'm better off paying full price ($5 per year for the transponder, versus $3.60 per year discount for one round trip per month), or taking the Burque and Daniel Webster Highways.  In any case, I don't like the loss of privacy.  (See this story about EZ Pass records being used by divorce attorneys.)

An earlier story in Fosters, on the trial, by Adam Krauss also illustrates the lying and lack of intelligence that is too rampant among police.  Trooper First Class James Downey testified that there was no contract involved in the sale of the token because "they're not signed ... If I go and buy a candy bar at the store, I don't have a contract with that store."  For a contract to be valid there must be offer, acceptance and consideration.  Senior Magazine's article specifically addresses contracts that exist in the selling of food.  (There was no argument that the sale of tokens was for real estate or couldn't be complete in a year or was otherwise subject to the statute of frauds.)$nbsp;But if Downey is right and there is no contract, why do we owe New Hampshire 50 cents as we exit the Everett Turnpike?

Labels: contracts, NewHampshire, NH, tokens, tolls

The article noted that she lives in Boston at South Cove Manor, "one of the nation's only all-Asian nursing facilities". That seems strange, but the web site for South Cove Manor proudly states "Serving the Chinese elderly is our sole mission," repeating that mission statement on the admissions page.

How do they get away with racial discrimination like this?

1. State Treasurer Tim Cahill

The Boston Herald reported on September 7 that Massachusetts State Treasurer Tim Cahill's daughter was busted at Logan Airport for trying to bring peaches home from Italy.  He had to pay a $300 fine for forgetting something was in a bag, and that seems a lot less than folks who forget there is a gun in their bags face.  (Here's a recent story about Kansas City Chiefs star Bill Maas who made that mistake, and facecs a $500 fine and 6 months in jail, plus a $10,000 TSA fine.)  A gun could be useful on a plane -- the heros of flight 93 had to make due with a serving cart.  But fruit from the Mediterranean?  There is a very real risk that it could harbor insect pests.  (That page from the USDA's APHIS site lists peaches first among the fruits that Medflies can attack.)  I don't leave the country very often, but I certainly know there's a restriction on agricultural products.

In any case what concerned me was Cahill's statement about the Customs agents: "It didn't appear to me that they knew who I was nor cared."  (He said he told the agents he was a government official but never identified himself as the treasurer -- and apparently he never asked "Do you know who I am?" -- maybe because that had just failed for Larry Craig in another airport.)

Why should Customs agents have cared?  Why does Cahill think state officials should be treated any differently than other people?

2. Law Enforcement

In early July (I'm way backed on stuff I want to blog about), Glen Johnson wrote a piece for the AP, "Vehicle stickers raise questions about police favoritism".   He describes a "thin blue line" sticker.  He quotes Kenneth Waters, "For what purpose does the spouse display the 'thin blue line' decal on their automobile? Why immunity from the law of course."

Over on Police World "La. Officer", also quoted by Johnson, in a thread from early 2004, tries to have it both ways. He writes "everyone that I stop has the same chance of getting a ticket or not" but he had just written "If I stop someone with one of these stickers, and they are not leo or direct family of leo, they are almost certain to get written for whatever I can write them for." He also wrote "I do know of officers stopping non leo with the thin blue line stickers and politely telling the suspects that if the sticker is gone by the time they get back to the unit to get the ticket book, then they will probably leave with only a verbal warning if there is no warrants out for them." -- which means that he is violating his own oath of office for allowing his brothers in blue to violate, under color of law, these drivers' constitutionally protected right to free expression.

Tpartrg310 on Police World explains that he puts the logo on his car "to identify [himself] as law enforcement officers. And that more than likely we were 'good guys' and probaly armed." I'm a good guy, and I might be armed -- I think I'm going to do my part for law enforcement and get one of those stickers.

Labels: Cahill, police, privilege, unequal_treatment

So J. Craig Venter has published his own human genome.  He used to run the Celera Genomics Group.  The CNN story says that when Celera satisfied the Human Genome Project in 2000 (or 2003 according to the project's link, above) what they published was a composite.

I remain confused.  What did HGP have?

HGP's site says there are between 20 and 25 thousand genes, but 3 billion base pairs.  There is no one human genome, because we're different.  And Venter has published 6 billion letters (is he counting each pair twice?  That would be like counting each letter in anything twice, once for the ink, and once for the negative space.)

I figure my readership (all one of you) is by definition interested in minutiae, so maybe you can explain the subtleties.

Labels: genetics

Labels: conundrum, quality, quantity

The Scooter is dead.

I'm too young to have seen him play, but I grew up with his Money Store ads and his announcing the Yankees on the radio.

I remember one call from a late 1970s summer, a pennant race not unlike the current season, except then the pennant meant more, and I had not yet gone over to the dark side.  Rizzuto's call went something like this: "It's a long fly ball.  It's going... It's going! (pause) Holy Cow!  (pause) What a fantastic one-handed catch!"

Baseball was a lot more fun to listen to when Rizzuto was announcing.

I never got around to sending him a fan letter, and I never got around to sending one to Milton Friedman before his death last fall.  I think that leaves only Yogi Berra still alive of my childhood heroes.

Labels: Heroes, obituary, Rizzuto, Scooter, Yankees

It is an ancient Mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three.
`By thy long beard and glittering eye,
Now wherefore stopp'st thou me ?

The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide,
And I am next of kin ;
The guests are met, the feast is set :
May'st hear the merry din.'

I've always believed in experiencing art with as many senses as possible, for better understanding.  When I watched Hamlet with my kids (it's a ghost story!) I served Havarti.  I read them The Cremation of Sam McGee while waiting for a school bus in sub-zero weather.  Last week I realized a long-held dream, reading to them Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner while out at sea (OK, we were barely out of sight of land while taking a ferry across Long Island Sound.)

The two boys wandered off, but my daughter stayed to hear the end, which I reached just as we pulled into Port Jefferson harbor.  I don't know how much they got, but like so many things that one understands only when older (10 is not about Bo Derek wearing nothing but corn-rows, it's about a mid-life crisis) I finally understand the poem.  It's about old people forcing young people to miss parties by telling long, pointless stories!

Labels: coleridge, mariner, poetry

I particularly like chrysanthemums, and different colors.

I've just watched the Boston Pops fireworks on television for the first time in years. (Having come back from the display two towns over in Wakefield -- a break in tradition, instead of watching the Merrimack, NH display from behind my parents' complex -- I was going to take whatever I had leftover illicitly brought back from New Hampshire and destroy it by fire, but it was raining and getting cold, so I watched the show. It's been so long I didn't realize that it wasn't on public television.)

I don't like shells that make shapes. A few ovals are OK, even a rectangle, but the smiley faces and stars were too much. I also don't like the shells they had at Wakefield that have a chrysanthemum and the a 4-direction white blast in the center. It's good to know the technology keeps improving. I once saw the Macy's display -- I hear that this year they were using shells that land on the water and keep burning.

Maybe next year is the year I see the Charles Basin live. The kids aren't old enough, and I'm too old, to grab a space on the Esplanade. Last year my employer was moving to an office in Kendall Square that had a view of the barge, and I figured that's where I'd be today, but I am no longer with that emp-loyer. All I would have needed were some battery-operated lights to put my recently-acquired canoe in at around Soldier's Field and paddle down to the Basin, but my crew wasn't willing. Apparently that's easy enough.

Labels: Boston, changes, Fireworks, pyrotechnics, technology

Answers.com cites West's Encyclopedia of American Law on Outlawry:

A declaration under Old English law by which a person found in contempt on a civil or criminal process was considered an outlaw—that is, someone who is beyond the protection or assistance of the law.

During the Anglo-Saxon period of English history, a person who committed certain crimes lost whatever protection he or she had under the law, forfeited whatever property he or she owned, and could be killed by anyone. If the crime committed was treason or a felony, a declaration of outlawry was tantamount to a conviction and attainder. Outlawry for a misdemeanor did not, however, amount to a conviction for the offense. The Norman Conquest led to significant changes in the law governing outlawry, eventually leading to its abolition.

It seems that New Hampshire has revived this status. An AP wire story seen in this morning's Boston Herald describes video of the police stop on May 11 during which Bruce McKay attacked Liko Kenney, who then shot and killed McKay before being killed himself by a passerby.

According to the story, "Prosecutors say McKay was justified in using nondeadly force on Kenney, 24, partly because of a violent confrontation between the two men four years earlier." 

We can't ask Victoria Snelgrove how nondeadly police pepper spray is, because she was killed by Boston Police using similar so-called non-lethal force.  And in any case deadly force is justified against an attacker using incapacitating force (cite?) because there is no reason to think that the attacker will stop once the victim is incapacitated, and if the victim doesn't defend himself while he has the capacity he will lose the opportunity to defend himself.

But what does that statement by the prosecutor mean?  McKay and Kenney had had a confrontation four years earlier.  This certainly justified McKay being cautious and calling for backup.  Why is that sufficient provocation to justify McKay attacking Kenney?

Moments after Kenney shot McKay, former Marine Gregory Floyd killed Kenney using McKay's gun.  Quoting further from the story, "The attorney general also said Floyd was justified in shooting Kenney."  McKay was already dead.  I haven't seen any evidence that Kenney was threatening Floyd or anyone else.  So what justified Floyd's executing Kenney?

Has New Hampshire revived outlawry, and had it declared Kenney to be an outlaw?

Update: The Concord Monitor story gives more details: Floyd claims to have killed nineteen people before Kenney, and Floyd threatened to murder passenger Caleb Macaulay unless Macaulay complied with his orders to either "stop crying" (per Macauley, note that Macauley had also just been pepper-sprayed by McKay before seeing his friend killed) or "to get out of the car and get on his knees" (per Floyd.) Macauley also noted that Floyd ordered him to pick up McKay's gun, which Macauley had the sense to realize would have given Floyd an excuse to murder him as well. The story notes that Kenney was apprehensive about the encounter with McKay and requested that another officer handle the stop instead.

Labels: murder, outlawry, police

Labels: cancer, Hodgkins, Lymphoma, Memoriam, obituary

In a January 25 article, Massachusetts House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi opened the testimony before the House Committee on Child Abuse and Neglect, which he forme dafter Haleigh Poutre allegedly was beaten into a coma by her adoptive parents in 2005 after the Department of Social Services decided against taking her away from the couple despite the girl's history of previous injuries by saying, "The number of children confirmed as abused and neglected in 2005-- 35,214 children -- would fill Fenway Park. Half were aged 7 and younger." He said said Massachusetts has the nation's third-highest rate of child abuse and neglect cases. DSS received court permission to remove Haleigh from life support, but when doctors said she showed signs of improvement she was moved to a rehabilitation hospital, where she remains. The state was criticized for moving too quickly to end life support. But then embattled DSS Commissioner Harry Spence acknowledged that cases such as Haleigh's grab public attention. But he said only about 100 of the 28,000 families DSS works with involve cases of grave danger to a child. He said Massachusetts has the second-lowest rate of death among child abuse victims, behind only New Hampshire, and the vast majority of cases his agency handles involve neglect such as failure to ensure a child is properly fed, bathed or supervised.

Labels: DSS

Let's just declared Christmas to be a secular holiday and move on. I just got a Christmas card from the most fervent atheist I know.

Sure, in fact why not declare belief in Jesus as secular, then all the unbelievers aren't practitioners of other religions, they're being unpatriotic. Nothing in the Establishment and Free Exercise clauses prohibits patriotism, right?

What is the message sent when SeaTac takes down all its Christmas trees and then blames it on the Jews?

Offender 1211 admitted sexually assaulting a girl in 1992, for which he was imprisoned for about a year. Since then, the man has become a Muslim, attends sex offender counseling regularly for treatment of pedophilia, and has been crime free. The board classified him as a Level 1; he wanted to be free of lifetime sex offender supervision because he maintained that he was not a public safety risk.

Justice John M. Greaney said the board got it right. "The fact remains that there is no objective certainty that Doe can be trusted to alone with children," he wrote.

• bc Calculus
• Computers self-designed elective, numerical analysis. I think I spent most of my time on a program written in BASIC and running on our time-shared HP2000E to calculate polar equations [cardiods and such], convert them to rectangular coordinates, and use the 110 baud TeleTypes to display them. Besides the polar-to-rectangular conversions, which were right out of the book, my biggest cleverness was to pre-scan each line, and only advance the typehead as far as the rightmost printing character before issuing a carriage return. At 110 baud, that mattered. At graduation I won a prize for Numerical Analysis for this work. My brother later used that driver for his Rubik's Cube solver.
• Senior Math Team (during lunch)
• Organic Chemistry (abridged college level, it later became a gut course, but it was serious, and taught by somebody with industry experience)
• Astronomy and Astrophysics
• Expository Writing (college credit -- my only wise move, I transferred into this class for the spring semester, realizing I needed a taskmaster like Mr. Sodikow for the discipline)
• Social Studies: US-Soviet relations, WWII to present elective (I wanted Constitutional Law, and that would have made all the difference, but it didn't fit in my schedule. The teacher, William Stark, later became acting principal, and the Board of Ed screwed itself by letting him get away instead of giving him the position permanently. We did a mock tri-party SALT talks [China got to play too], and I represented the Russian military expert. I wanted to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike, but my teammates rejected this. I wish I'd had Mr. Stark to explain things ten years later.)
• Russian (second year; I'd already completed 3 years of French)
• Gym

• My 97 out of 100 GPA unofficial placed me 7th out of a class of 750.

• Verbal 760 (second time, only 730 first time)
• Math 770 (both times)

• Key Club (co-founder, secretary-treasurer -- and I met my first girlfriend there)
• Chess Club
• War Games Club (then transitioning from Avalon Hill simulations to fantasy role-playing)
• Yearbook -- that was my homeroom, and I think I was a photographer, but I don't recall ever having anything published or doing much work for them
• Honor Society
• Math Journal -- I remember selling copies in classrooms
• Computer Society -- a kid gave a lecture about how with parts like the ICs in a TI-58 he thought you could design a computer that would fit in a briefcase
• I was a volunteer at Einstein Hospital before my junior year, as part of my pre-med bit, and a member of the local volunteer ambulance corps. I didn't do anything the summer before my senior year except try to sell Fuller Brushes (after paying for samples I ended up at a net loss for the summer) and sometimes visit Shorehaven which I'd finally joined the summer before my senior year.

• Nothing official
• I'd practiced with the Swim Team one off-season, but I wasn't quite good enough, and getting to DeWitt Clinton at 7am and then walking to school wasn't fun
• We played a lot of Ultimate after Chess Club
• My sophomore year I'd taken the wrestling elective in gym. I didn't grow until before senior year so I underweighed the next-lightest kid by 7 pounds and never won a bout. Juniors had health ed instead of gym. I used to like the trampoline until they took it away for fear of a broken neck and a lawsuit.
• I'd finally become disgusted with the public transit system, so I rode my bicycle the 5 miles to and from school almost every day that year

I didn't do any preparation for college admissions. I didn't visit a single school the summer before, but I did read "A Small Circle of Friends". I think the college advisor had given presentations during my junior year, but mostly I tuned her out. When she handed out the CUNY applications in the fall I asked when she'd be handing out the other applications, and she was aghast that I hadn't spent the summer collecting them. (I remember driving out to Queens late in December to borrow an application, maybe to MIT, from a classmate who'd decided not to apply.) My father gave me a lot of help with the application essays. I had a vague notion that I wanted to be away from home, but not so far away that I couldn't come home from time to time, which favored Boston.

Princeton had given me an early "unlikely" before they upgraded to "likely" and then admitted me, but that had soured me on them, which is too bad, because I might have done well at a smaller school. I think Yale was my Early Admission school, and they were very hard on Bronx Science that year -- it was my only rejection. MIT was an easy acceptance, but I was still pre-med, and that would have made a difference. We were allowed only six applications -- teachers were forbidden to write recommendations for students who had filed more. I think Columbia and U Penn were my safeties, but I got the fat envelope from Harvard and that was it.

The New York Magazine article makes me wonder if I would have gotten in, or even if I'd bother trying today. In 1979 Asians were beginning to take over from Jews as the dominant demographic at Bronx Science, but we didn't factor that into our guesses. We knew Blacks and women had an advantage.

But it also has me thinking about whether Harvard should have admitted me, if I should have accepted, and what should have been different.

I didn't know until years after college that I probably have a mild Attention Deficit or depression or Asperger's Syndrome. I was highly lacking in discipline and maturity, but mostly I needed to spend a year partying to get it out of my system. I needed to learn about alcohol, and smokable substances, and girls.

I was horribly misled. I listened to my father about pre-med (and when I finally dropped that after an advisor asked me, sophomore year, "do you want to go to medical school?" and I realized I didn't, the easiest major to complete with my math and physics credits was Applied Math/Computer Science) and didn't listen to him about not taking sophomore level courses. I listened to my high school teachers about putting a fact in every sentence, so when I took the writing test I didn't know that I would never finish the passage in time, and didn't provide analysis in my essay, so I was sent to the speed reading course (the one that is sometimes cited in the press as "Harvard is accepting freshmen so dumb they need to take remedial reading") but I already read some 800 words per minute, so that didn't help, and I started to ignore my Harvard teachers same as in high school. I took Harvard's placement exams and believed them when they said I should take sophomore math and sophomore chemistry, not realizing the speed and intensity of the instruction. I didn't have basic college inorganic chemistry. I only got a good grade in organic chemistry because William von Eggers Doering (who at 89 years old is still associated with the University!) played a dirty trick and told the class aromatic substitutions wouldn't be on the final exam, but they were, and I still remembered them from high school.

After a while I became an "invisible student". I went to sections, but few lectures. I learned to operate a machine shop, a radio station, a film projector, and a shuttle bus; hung out on the house committee, and got drafted into the Undergraduate Council. I played a lot of video games and slept in a lot.

“In five years, I fear there’ll be no Christmas,” said Marley, a self-made developer. “This is America. When you come to America, you come here because of what it offers you. Don’t come to this country and try to change things to suit you.”

Shopper Russell Smith, 40, of Boston, said, “It seems illogical to redefine a holiday. Either say nothing or say, ‘Merry Christmas.’ ”

“Christmas,” Marley lamented, “is under attack. This year, I will not shop in any store that does not display the words Merry Christmas. Christmas holds a special place in everybody’s heart who celebrates it. To each their own. It’s that simple.”

Despite warnings from their headmaster that costumes would be prohibited, about 50 students showed up dressed as superheroes, a life guard, a priest, a soldier in green fatigues, cows, clowns and the devil.

... a group of about a dozen seniors refused to change and were not allowed into school and are considered truant.

[Maria] Garcia-Aaronson, headmaster of the 1,700-student school for 15 years, said she stopped allowing students to wear costumes two years ago because of safety concerns. Previous students brought water guns to school on Halloween and sprayed classmates, causing fights, she said. Others rolled down school hallways on skateboards.

Under the Boston Public Schools School Uniform Policy, each school must choose one of three options:

• no school uniform;
• voluntary uniform or dress code; or
• mandatory (required) uniform or dress code.

The manual continues:

Even if your child's school has a mandatory uniform policy, you have the right not to participate. To do this, send a letter to the principal stating why your child is not participating. School staff must allow students who are not wearing uniforms to attend school.

John Walsh thought he was living the American dream. Until, that is, he ran head-on into Jonathan Winthrop. The two men come from very different worlds -- and Jonathan Winthrop has every intention of keeping it that way.

I'd meant to post on this before, but I've been busy, and as usual the Volokh Conspiracy blawg beat me too it.  They repost an item from the Ethics Scoreboard, asking:

On August 11 in Bristol, Conn., a Little League team from Colchester, Vt., only had to retire its Portsmouth, N.H. opposition in the top of the sixth inning (Little League games are six innings rather than nine) to win the game 9-8 and move on to the New England regional championship game.

But there was a problem. The Vermont team had made its third out in its half of the fifth inning before player Adam Bentley got to the plate. The Little League has a strict rule that requires every player to bat at least once a game, and the penalty for violating it is forfeit. Vermont's coach Denis Place realized, to his horror, that even though his team had the lead entering the last inning the only way it could avoid losing by forfeit was for Bentley to get an at bat. For that to happen, the New Hampshire team would have to tie the score or take the lead, requiring the teams to play the last half of the sixth inning.

Place held a meeting of his players at the pitcher's mound and instructed them to let New Hampshire score a run. The plan: walk the first batter, and ensure that he made it home with the assistance of wild pitches and intentional errors so the game would be deadlocked at 9-9. Then, hopefully, win the game in the bottom of the sixth inning, with Adam Bentley getting his mandated turn at the plate.

Not so fast. The New Hampshire team's coach, Mark McCauley figured out what was happening and ordered his players not to score. So after a walk and two wild pitches allowed a New Hampshire runner to reach third base, the player refused to advance to the plate despite another wild pitch and a fielding error. McCauley also told his players to strike out intentionally, preserving Vermont's lead but guaranteeing a successful New Hampshire protest that, under the rules, would require that New Hampshire win by forfeit.

This obviously led to a ridiculous spectacle: one team trying to give up a run while the other team was trying to make outs and avoid scoring. The perplexed umpires understandably chose to end the debacle by ejecting Place and his pitcher from the game. Vermont won 9-8…and then New Hampshire was awarded the victory by forfeit, because Adam Bentley never got his turn at bat. The New Hampshire team advanced to the next round.

The Question: Whose conduct was unethical?

I commented on the VC as follows:

It's already been written in this blawg (I can't find the reference, but it was in regard to Paul Hamm and the South Koreans in the 2004 Olympics, a situation discussed for example here) that all of sports is arbitrary rules.  Personally I <b>do</b> go to the game to watch the manager think.  (Actually if I go to the game it's to participate in a summer ritual and to drink a beer in the sun, and the only games I've been to since the 1994 strike were two at the Lowell Spinners last year: one was rained out after a long, wet, wait; the other my kids got bored, all the schtick notwithstanding, and we left halfway through. I won tickets to see the North Shore Spirit this year, and I'd planned to see the fireworks, but both Saturday night home games last month it was too cold)but if I watch the game I'm concerned about the strategy.)

There was a similar question a week before this game: With first base empty and one out left, is it wrong to intentionally walk the strongest hitter so that you can pitch to the next, much weaker batter, who happens to be a cancer survivor?

Of all the rules involved the stupidest is that the bottom of the last inning is skipped.  It makes a good deal of sense if the home team is already ahead and assured of the win (still discounting that individual players compete for records) but it makes no sense when, as here, the team that is nominally ahead needs to do something to assure its win.

Baseball in particular is a team sport.  The sacrifice fly is the most obvious example: the coach is asking the batter to do something that will not get him on base, in order to let another player score a run for the team.

The stupidest rule, in my opinion, is in effect in some forms of co-ed volleyball, requiring that if a side hits the ball three times on a single play, one of those contacts must be by a woman.  Players ought to be treated the same regardless of sex.

Side note: Ethics Scoreboard reports that there is a Little League Pledge, as follows:

Looming over all of this is the Little League Pledge, a statement that dates from the Eisenhower administration and is recited with reverence by the players before every game:

I trust in God
I love my country
And will respect its laws
I will play fair
And strive to win
But win or lose
I will always do my best

 I don't remember that pledge from when I played, but I don't see any inherent conflict.  Intentionally walking a batter is both playing fair and doing one's best.

I'd meant to post on this before, but I've been busy, and as usual the Volokh Conspiracy blawg beat me too it.  They repost an item from the Ethics Scoreboard, asking:

On August 11 in Bristol, Conn., a Little League team from Colchester, Vt., only had to retire its Portsmouth, N.H. opposition in the top of the sixth inning (Little League games are six innings rather than nine) to win the game 9-8 and move on to the New England regional championship game.

But there was a problem. The Vermont team had made its third out in its half of the fifth inning before player Adam Bentley got to the plate. The Little League has a strict rule that requires every player to bat at least once a game, and the penalty for violating it is forfeit. Vermont's coach Denis Place realized, to his horror, that even though his team had the lead entering the last inning the only way it could avoid losing by forfeit was for Bentley to get an at bat. For that to happen, the New Hampshire team would have to tie the score or take the lead, requiring the teams to play the last half of the sixth inning.

Place held a meeting of his players at the pitcher's mound and instructed them to let New Hampshire score a run. The plan: walk the first batter, and ensure that he made it home with the assistance of wild pitches and intentional errors so the game would be deadlocked at 9-9. Then, hopefully, win the game in the bottom of the sixth inning, with Adam Bentley getting his mandated turn at the plate.

Not so fast. The New Hampshire team's coach, Mark McCauley figured out what was happening and ordered his players not to score. So after a walk and two wild pitches allowed a New Hampshire runner to reach third base, the player refused to advance to the plate despite another wild pitch and a fielding error. McCauley also told his players to strike out intentionally, preserving Vermont's lead but guaranteeing a successful New Hampshire protest that, under the rules, would require that New Hampshire win by forfeit.

This obviously led to a ridiculous spectacle: one team trying to give up a run while the other team was trying to make outs and avoid scoring. The perplexed umpires understandably chose to end the debacle by ejecting Place and his pitcher from the game. Vermont won 9-8…and then New Hampshire was awarded the victory by forfeit, because Adam Bentley never got his turn at bat. The New Hampshire team advanced to the next round.

The Question: Whose conduct was unethical?

I commented on the VC as follows:

It's already been written in this blawg (I can't find the reference, but it was in regard to Paul Hamm and the South Koreans in the 2004 Olympics, a situation discussed for example here) that all of sports is arbitrary rules.  Personally I <b>do</b> go to the game to watch the manager think.  (Actually if I go to the game it's to participate in a summer ritual and to drink a beer in the sun, and the only games I've been to since the 1994 strike were two at the Lowell Spinners last year: one was rained out after a long, wet, wait; the other my kids got bored, all the schtick notwithstanding, and we left halfway through. I won tickets to see the North Shore Spirit this year, and I'd planned to see the fireworks, but both Saturday night home games last month it was too cold)but if I watch the game I'm concerned about the strategy.)

There was a similar question a week before this game: With first base empty and one out left, is it wrong to intentionally walk the strongest hitter so that you can pitch to the next, much weaker batter, who happens to be a cancer survivor?

Of all the rules involved the stupidest is that the bottom of the last inning is skipped.  It makes a good deal of sense if the home team is already ahead and assured of the win (still discounting that individual players compete for records) but it makes no sense when, as here, the team that is nominally ahead needs to do something to assure its win.

Baseball in particular is a team sport.  The sacrifice fly is the most obvious example: the coach is asking the batter to do something that will not get him on base, in order to let another player score a run for the team.

The stupidest rule, in my opinion, is in effect in some forms of co-ed volleyball, requiring that if a side hits the ball three times on a single play, one of those contacts must be by a woman.  Players ought to be treated the same regardless of sex.

Side note: Ethics Scoreboard reports that there is a Little League Pledge, as follows:

Looming over all of this is the Little League Pledge, a statement that dates from the Eisenhower administration and is recited with reverence by the players before every game:

I trust in God
I love my country
And will respect its laws
I will play fair
And strive to win
But win or lose
I will always do my best

 I don't remember that pledge from when I played, but I don't see any inherent conflict.  Intentionally walking a batter is both playing fair and doing one's best.

What is the archetype of the Origin of the Species or Ascent of Man picture, such as the one parodied above in the Mutts comic strip, or in the opening of the Dilbert animated cartoon, and so many other places, the one that shows either the fish and some early reptile crawling up the shore from the primordial swamp and various more "advanced" animals, or the one that shows an ape and a caveman and a moden man? One source hints it was a Victorian theme. Update: See also Lucky Cow, May 27, 2006: Update: And also Flying Mcoys, July 23, 2006:

The Herald has it correct: Sex offender registries are a good idea (Sex offender sites protect the public," April 24 [sic -- it appears the editorial ran April 19]). As the father of two young children, I demand to know if there is a convicted pedophile or rapist in my neighborhood. It is very easy not to be on the list -- do not commit a crime that would mark you as a sex offender. People who commit these crimes either know or should know the consequences of their actions, and should suffer because the victim will suffer for a lifetime after robbed of his or her innocence.

I found the numbers of those polled to be OK with bare breasts interesting ("More to breast flashing than meets the eye," April 24). Now let's see how many people would still be for it if there was a baby attached, using breasts for their natural intent?

In Massachusetts, and three other states, juries in criminal trials cannot be told if a defendant refused to take roadside tests or a Breathalyzer. ... But Yarmouth police are hoping to change that - through public education about the laws, visits to local town boards, and intensive efforts to stop and arrest drunken drivers. They have also spoken with state legislators about helping change what they consider a loophole rooted in the state constitution. ''I think it's the most serious crime,'' Yarmouth police Lt. Steven G. Xiarhos said. ''It kills thousands of people each year and many of them are innocent people. Is that the way we want to live?''

Michael Femmia, [attorney for the Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton] ... called allegations regarding the burned child “false.” [referring to a device used to administer electric shocks as part of aversion therapy.]

“No one has been hurt by the device,” Femmia said.

At yesterday's hearing, Mr. Finnerty -- dressed in a dark suit, white shirt and green tie and accompanied by his family's priest -- stood quietly as Judge John H. Bayly rescinded the terms of the diversion program Mr. Finnerty entered after being charged with simple assault.

According to the terms of the program, the charges would have been dismissed had Mr. Finnerty completed 25 hours of community service and stayed out of trouble.

The book, “King & King,” where a prince marries a fellow prince instead of a princess, was used in a lesson teaching different types of weddings. Lexington Superintendent of Schools Paul Ash said the school has no legal obligation to tell parents about the book, ''We couldn't run a public school system if every parent who feels some topic is objectionable to them for moral or religious reasons decides their child should be removed. ''Lexington is committed to teaching children about the world they live in, and in Massachusetts same-sex marriage is legal."

Every city, town, regional school district or vocational school district implementing or maintaining curriculum which primarily involves human sexual education or human sexuality issues shall adopt a policy ensuring parental/guardian notification. Such policy shall afford parents or guardians the flexibility to exempt their children from any portion of said curriculum through written notification to the school principal. No child so exempted shall be penalized by reason of such exemption.

Lancaster police say David E. Zoller, 33, of Littleton was driving a white van Saturday night [April 22, 2006] that crossed the center line on Route 62 and crashed into the side of the car where seat-belted, 21-year-old expectant mother [Katelyn M.] Disessa was sitting.

Danielle Simas of Shewsbury was killed in a crash on February 25, 2000 after her 1994 Nissan Maxima skidded off Interstate 290. State Police Sgt. Timothy White noted that Simas was ejected through the rear window even though she was wearing a seatbelt.

A number of prominent bicyclists are killed in accidents, and more often than not they're wearing helmets.

UpdateTrooper Paul Barry was wearing a seat belt in the early hours of June 15 when, driving-while-tired from working a detail after his regular job with the State Police, he apparently fell asleep at the wheel and drifted into the breakdown lane, where he struck a truck, and later died of his injuries.

The Massachusetts Sex Offender Registration law, MGL Chapter 6 section 178N, Misuse of Information says

Information contained in the sex offender registry shall not be used to commit a crime against a sex offender or to engage in illegal discrimination or harassment of an offender.

[Sergeant Steven A. ] Brown said police will also investigate whether Carmichael's footgear was a factor. Known as heelies, the sneakers have wheels in the heel that allow wearers to glide when they want to. The sneakers have been banned by many school districts around the nation due to safety concerns.

• Black knife sheath Mine is olive green
• Three Nazi flags taken off bedroom walls I've got lots of other flags
• Two cell phones
• Dog tags with Nazi symbols
• Aryan pin
• Samurai sword I've got a Ginsu knife
• Belt of approximately 85 rounds of ammo I don't use belt ammunition, but I shoot .22, which is bought by the brick
• Large knife and sheath I've got a machete
• Two bumper stickers: “I dress this way to scare your kids” and “My day is not complete until I’ve terrified a complete stranger.” Mine reflect my politics, nothing so cutesy
• Goodbye note addressed to his mother
• Books: “The Turner Diaries,” “The Hitler File,” “The Crime and Punishment of I.G. Farben” and “Spandau: The Secret Diaries” I bought "The Turner Diaries" after they got so much mention after the Murrah Building was blown up. I don't have much on the Nazis, but I do have a couple of books about Al Quaeda purchased after 9/11
• Two DVDs: “The Occult History of the Third Reich” and “American History X”
• Swastika rubber stamp
• German cross belt buckle
• Folder with racist notes
• Binder with “white power” symbols and slogans Mine are mostly "White Pride" -- my children attend the Malcolm S. White Elementary School
• Notebook of hate lyrics
• Sock and paper towels with possible blood stains
• Computer
• Digital camera
• Unmarked CDs

Kerry said the penalty for illegally downloading music was three times the penalty for downloading kiddie porn now. “Even though Masha’s despicable abuser is in jail and awaiting even further sentencing, the damage to Masha continues in a very real way every single day,” Kerry said.

women who were coached to push during labor fared no better or worse physically than those who were simply told to "do what comes naturally."

IT HAS long been the one task seized on by nervous husbands hanging round the delivery room: coaching their wives through labour. At a loss for the vocabulary or posture for the occasion, many men resort to pacing, perching and instructing, like a neurotic cox urging on his crew.

According to new research, however, regimented coaching of a woman through childbirth, whether by a hapless husband or trained assistant, is of almost no benefit and can even increase health complications.

The major problem with our existing laws is that it is legally permissible to have a drink or two or three and drive a car. Juries at drunk driving trials are actually instructed it is not against the law to drink alcohol and drive. It is only when the person is impaired or reaches the magical .08 blood alcohol level that he has committed a crime. This fuzzy line almost guarantees bad decisions. We have created a situation where people will inevitably drive drunk. We expect individuals who may be impaired to make rational, intelligent decisions about whether they are alright to drive. But unless someone is a toxicologist, he or she will not know if their blood alcohol level is a .08. They may feel fine because they are impaired. Many people confess they have consumed alcohol, felt fine and then drove home only to wake up the next day and realize their lapse in judgment. So what is the solution? Perhaps it is time to make it illegal to drink any alcohol and drive a car. The penalty does not have to be as severe as it is for drunken driving, but it can still send a message. We punish people for not having an inspection sticker or not registering their cars. Is it such a big leap to tell people to not drink and drive?

[Melrose Detective Sgt. Barry] Campbell said the air-powered weapon used on Bobby [Hansen, shot while trick-or-treating] is normally used to kill small animals.

State Sen. Dianne Wilkerson, whose stint in politics has been marred by campaign finances and tax violations, was sued by state officials yesterday for refusing to document nearly $80,000 in ques- tionable use of campaign funds over a two-year period, including purchases of pizzas and a bra.

Among items repaid by the cam- paign to Wilkerson were $71.88 in groceries from the Super 88 Super- market, submarine sandwiches, pizza, taxi rides, a stay at the Bev- erly Hilton in Los Angeles and a $60.76 brassiere, the suit states.

The article "Wilkerson's finances draw state lawsuit" (Sept. 29) reports an expenditure of $60 for a bra, when in fact the receipt was for Bras- siere Jo, a restaurant in the Colon- ade Hotel.

State Sen. Dianne Wilkerson, whose stint in politics has been marred by campaign finance and tax violations, was sued by state officials yesterday for refusing to document nearly $80,000 in questionable use of campaign funds over a two-year period, including purchases of pizzas.

Among items repaid by the campaign to Wilkerson were $71.88 in groceries from the Super 88 Supermarket, submarine sandwiches, pizza, taxi rides, a stay at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles and a $60.78 bill at a restaurant Brassiere Joe, the suit states.

Q: What is price gouging? A: The Attorney General has specific regulations in place concerning price gouging in petroleum-related businesses, such as gasoline. It is an unfair or deceptive act or practice, during any market emergency, to sell or offer petroleum products for an unconscionably high price. Q: What is a market emergency? A.: A market emergency means an actual or severe energy supply interruption. The Governor has the exclusive authority to declare an energy emergency in the Commonwealth. Q: What is an unconscionably high price? A: If the price charged represents a gross disparity between the price of the product, and either the price at which the product was sold by the business immediately prior to the market emergency, or the price at which the same product can be bought by other buyers in the same area, AND this price difference is not due to increased costs from suppliers or increased costs due to an abnormal market disruption.

• "There is no evidence that any officer on Lansdowne Street acted with any intent to commit a crime"
• police made a string of serious errors in the events leading up to her death, but that none of those mistakes rose to the level of criminal charges
• "Poor judgment, however, is not the standard for criminal charges."
• Police said some of the revelers were throwing bottles
• "The fact that the officers were placed in such a chaotic situation on Lansdowne Street was the result of poor crowd control planning by department commanders"
• "It's always easy to judge things in hindsight rather than from the eyes of the person who is living that moment out. No one could, obviously, suggest for a moment that Deputy Superintendent O'Toole or any officer present that night ever intended or thought for a moment that these consequences would ever come about," said Timothy Burke, attorney for Deputy Superintendent Robert O'Toole, who ordered officers who were not properly trained in use of the pepper-spray guns to use the weapons.
• "Officer Milien's decision to fire was negligent, but not wanton and reckless, a legal standard which must be met to support a charge of manslaughter," Conley said.

Milien's attorney, Thomas Drechsler, called Conley's report "a recognition that the officers were reacting to an extremely volatile and dangerous situation which presented a serious risk to public safety."

There is another case pending in Lawrence. Marine-of-the-year Sgt. Daniel Cotnoir fired a shotgun into the air in the early hours of August 13, 2005 after members of a noisy crowd leaving local nightclubs threw an empty bottle through his bedroom window. Nobody was killed, but two underaged drinkers were treated and released after being struck in the leg by fragments.

"It was never this man's intention, as he tells me, to hurt anyone," said his lawyer, Robert Kelley. "It was only his intention to fire a warning shot when he was placed in a threatening situation."

"I just thought he wanted to scare us to get away from the area," said [Stephanie] Tejeda [cousin of the shot 15-year-old], who attended Cotnoir's arraignment Monday in Lawrence District Court. "Who shoots at an open crowd?"

Update: Cotnoir was charged, and on June 29, 2006, acquitted.

As a nation, we are good at post-mortems, analyzing and explaining tragic events _ the '68 riots, the Loma Prieta earthquake, 9/11 _ and learning from the results. The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina demands a commission to answer this question: How did an event that had long been predicted and presumably prepared for turn into the New Orleans catastrophe?

At first it looked like New Orleans had dodged a bullet, with the greatest devastation falling on its hapless neighbors to the east. But then, after Katrina had passed, three levees failed, flooding the downtown, forcing the evacuation of a major city and turning much of its population into homeless, destitute refugees. How could this happen?

It's not as if the consequences of a levee breach were a surprise. Planners had long said a doomsday storm was a matter of when, not if, and an eerily prescient Times-Picayune story three years ago laid out pretty much what came to pass this week. And charges are coming to light that even though there were known defects in the system, the levees were seriously underfunded. Once the breaks occurred, there seemed no plan of action, with material and equipment in place, to repair them.

WASHINGTON -- There can be no subject more worthy of our attention right now than what happened when Hurricane Katrina rained catastrophe on the Gulf Coast. I predict that the world will be riveted by how quickly the thin veneer of civilization was peeled away in the most powerful nation on Earth, as looters ruled the streets of New Orleans, as dead bodies floated by, as thousands of the barely living waited in desperation day after day without food or drinking water or sanitation or power or a place to sleep or a way to contact their families.

...

How can we not be outraged when we think of the billions of dollars we've spent on homeland preparedness after Sept. 11, 2001, yet watched as babies died for lack of water and food and electricity three days after the hurricane hit?

We understand that the flooding was a separate catastrophe from the hurricane. But why were there no plans to evacuate the one out of every three residents of New Orleans too poor or disabled or incompetent or unwilling to leave just before the storm struck?

Thousands of reservists from Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama are serving in Iraq. Yet where was the National Guard as people in Mississippi and Louisiana desperately begged camera crews for help?

Why were water and food not airdropped to the thousands of the sick and the elderly and the children who went days with no help?

As the Rolling Stones "Bigger Bang" tour moves across the country with the force of a financial hurricane, it is time to ask the troubling question that will not be hear from the lips of the group's lascivious logo.

Do the Stones owe reparations to African-Americans?

Seriously.

Consider the Stones' company profile: there has never been a black member of the group.

Even the most drug-addled Stones fan knows that their product is a priated version of African-American music. In some cases the group paid royalties to living artists such as Chuck Berry, whose works they copied. In most other instances -- Robert Johnson's "Love in Vain," for example -- they were able to get what they want for free.

How tenuous is man's hold on civilization when survival becomes an issue? When the lights go out and stay out for several days, suburbanites Matthew and Annie learn the hard way that man is "by nature" a predatory creature. Matthew's long-time friend, Joe, happens by on the second day and a rivalry between the two friends simmers as Annie cares for her sick baby. When rumors of looting spread through the neighborhood, the two men buy a rifle for protection but Annie throws it in the pool. Later, that same night, Joe hears a prowler downstairs and awakens Matthew. They chase the stranger from the house and out into the street where a neighbor shoots him to death. No longer safe in their own home, they decide to drive to Annie's parents some 500 miles away. Before they reach their destination, more trouble comes their way when they stop to siphon gas from an abandoned car and discover the driver in the back seat... Is this what is meant by "man's inhumanity to man?"

FAA officials have decided not to require toddlers under two years of age to occupy their own airline seats, the Bloomberg news service reports. The rationale, according to the FAA, is that parents forced to pay for a toddler's plane ticket might decide to drive instead, putting the family at greater risk than if they flew, Bloomberg reported.

• "Let the bastards freeze in the dark"
• These victims knowingly lived in a hurricane-prone region, on land that is below sea level
• The federal government is going to contribute millions of dollars, which came from me and other taxpayers, for "emergency relief"
• That program was rife with corruption after last year's Florida hurricanes
• I'll be personally contributing one or two thousand dollars extra this year to petroleum companies, some of which extra, including the current spike, will be blamed on Katrina
• I'm an unemployed software engineer, while the industry is claiming visa quotas must be lifted due to a desperate labor shortage

If you were secretly disappointed yesterday when the roof of the Superdome failed to crash down on NBC anchor Brian Williams, you weren't alone. "I would say I was mildly disappointed," said Kiss 108 morning man Matt Siegel. "My colleague Bill Costa was devastated. Normally on Mondays he gets his manicure and pedicure but he stayed and watched TV for two hours waiting for the thing to cave in." When it didn't, Siegel said, Costa felt betrayed. All that build-up, anticipation. Hundreds of thousands at risk. Oil field devastation. Caskets floating out of cemeteries. Caskets floating out of cemeteries? Well that's what they said, those breathless reporters in slickers flapping so madly you expected both slicker and reporter to shoot off into the stratosphere, like human cannon balls.

I had to chuckle at Margery Eagan's column about disappointed nitwit media folks when the New Orleans Superdown wasn't wiped off the map. Having weathered Category 4/5 Ivan on Grenada, my wife and I are nauseated rather than thrilled by these types of disasters.

It is unlawful in Kansas for a person under 16 to have sex -- unless they are married, [Whitney] Watson [, spokesman for Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline] said. Otherwise, the law says they can't consent to have sex. He didn't know how many people under 16 might be married.

"The idea... is repugnant to me," said Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning. ... He said the marriage is valid, thanks to the "ridiculous" Kansas law, "but it doesn't matter. I'm not going to stand by while a grown man... has a relationship with a 13-year-old -- now 14-year-old -- girl."

Hoping to crack down on unruly behavior, the mall managers will ... require shoppers under 18 to be accompanied by an adult on Friday and Saturday between 4 p.m. and closing time [starting] on Sept. 9. The new restriction will be policed by security staff checking photo identification cards at the mall's entrances.

JUDGE: Counsel, you say that your failure to meet the deadline was an act of civil disobedience, designed to demonstrate the injustice of the court's approach in this case? And that as a result, we should reverse the trial court's dismissal of the case and remand? COUNSEL: Yes, your honor. JUDGE: Now counsel, you do understand how "civil disobedience" works, don't you? COUNSEL: I don't understand the question, your honor. JUDGE: Well, the way that civil disobedience works is that you believe the law to be unjust, and so you are willing to be punished for violating it in order to demonstrate the injustice of the law. For this to be a true act of civil disobedience, therefore, you would have to be willing to accept the punishment, and through that willingness to accept the punishment, you demonstrate the injustice of the law. So, for instance, Martin Luther King's act of civil disobedience was his willingness to be arrested and go to jail in order to demonstrate the injustice of the laws. So, if this was a true act of civil disobedience on your part, aren't we obliged to affirm the ruling of the district court dismissing the case? COUNSEL (after long pause): Um, your honor, I would like to amend my argument...

Funny story, but it raises a serious issue-- I don't think a lot of people understand how civil disobedience works.

The Pawtucket Red Sox canceled plans for Fourth of July fireworks at McCoy Stadium last night as a precaution after an explosion during Sunday's display slightly injured five employees of a pyrotechnic company. But Pawtucket fire and public safety officials urged the PawSox to cancel last night's fireworks until investigators could better understand why a fireworks shell exploded so close to the ground, setting off other fireworks prematurely. Pawtucket's ''public safety director, along with the fire chief and the police chief, thought it was best that we all sit back and analyze what happened before we rush into another show," said PawSox president Mike Tamburro. ''There are certainly plenty of other nights for fireworks." However, Tamburro stressed that he remains confident in Telstar's safety record, noting that the 26-year-old company has staged dozens of fireworks displays for the team over the last decade without injuries. ''This really might be a case of just a freak accident," he said. ''Sometimes it's freak accidents that cause the most problems." Telstar's Bergeron said the accident occurred midway through the show when a shell exploded either on takeoff or as it was falling back to the ground, sending a cascade of hot embers into fireworks that were supposed to be launched during the grand finale. Firefighters said one crate of fireworks tipped over, sending fireworks shooting toward a group of employees near the launch site, in a parking lot behind the right field wall.

the act of staying together, of persevering, in and of itself often ended up producing a happy marriage. Now that's connection. Another "connection" is understanding that marriage is about more than any two people. (Which means, for starters, that those two people don't have the right to pursue a fleeting notion of happiness at the expense of a child or spouse.)

If I am not for myself, then who will be, but if I am only for my self, what am I? And if not now, when?

I guess this is old news to anybody who reads the sports pages. I tend not to. Here are the matchups for MLB's crosstown interleague weekend.

Yankees	Mets	Subway!
White Sox	Cubs	Chicago
Astros	Rangers	Texas
LA? Anaheim? Angels	Dodgers	LA
Arizona	Detroit	Why?
Tampa Bay	Florida	Florida
Washington	Toronto	formerly Montreal
Philadelphia	Baltimore	If they say so
Cleveland	Cincinnati	Ohio
Colorado	Pittsburgh	Why?
St. Louis	Kansas City	I-70
Milwaukee	Minnesota	Upper Midwest
Oakland	San Francisco	Bay
San Diego	Seattle	Why?

"Your Primary Source for Secondary Metals."

Consider the mathematician who is sentenced to death. He is told that he will be killed some time in the next n days, and, because this is a humanitarian court, to spare him some dread, he will be killed on a day when he does not expect it. He is sent back to his cell. He realizes that if he makes it to the nth day, he will know that since that is the last possible day to execute him, that that is the day. But since he can't be killed on a day when he expects it, he can't be executed on that day. This means that on the day before that, there are only two days open for his execution. Since it can't happen on the following day, the nth day, he must be executed on that day, the (n-1)th day. But since he will have realized this, he will expect it, and he can't be executed on that day either. By induction, this applies to the (n-2)th day and so far, all the way back. Secure in the knowledge that he can't be executed he goes to sleep. The next morning the jailer wakes him up and hangs him.