What’s in a name?

If naming cats is “a difficult matter,” how much more so is the naming of computers?

...Logically, I need a female anime character who’s the star of a 2008 series, is petite, and possesses remarkable powers.

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“They’re like rats. But rats with big, big, big teeth.”

Brigid has a report on how a bad day turns into a worse one.

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Veterans Day, 2008

Veterans Day Parade, Detroit, November 8, 2008.  Complete Set.

Some rights reserved

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Busted: Lawyers for illegal aliens try controlling the language in Arizona courts

John Feere:

...Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Ruth McGregor has advanced the demands of the Arizona Hispanic Bar Association by moving to ban the following language from all of the state’s courtrooms:

Aliens
Illegal aliens
Resident or non-resident aliens
Illegal immigrants
Illegal immigration
Illegals
Immigration epidemic
Immigration crisis
Immigrant invasion
Pro-illegal immigration activists
Open borders advocates
Anchor babies
Proponents for amnesty

Many of these terms have a precedent in the law that reaches back to the origins of this country.  The first five terms are used repeatedly throughout federal immigration statutes and case law.

Caught, they’re backpedalling.  AZ Supreme Court communications director Carie Gerchick:

“A letter was sent in from an organization, a local legal organization, asking a court to essentially ban the use of those words.  Under no circumstances did the Chief Justice McGregor ban any words.”

That’s after threatening to sue Judicial Watch for breaking the story.  And according to John Feere at the Center for Immigration Studies (source for the above quotes), the judge did “forward the request to all lower courts.”

So the question before the house:  Say you’re the judge of some state court. And you get a “Dear colleague” letter from the Chief Justice of your state’s Supreme Court.  Now it’s not really an order.  But what’s the likelihood that you’ll ignore it?


Elsewhere: 

Via:  “It’s Vintage, Duh” at doubleplusundead

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Guess what? The Los Angeles Times isn’t alone in withholding tapes...

On April 21, a driver living in Epsom, Surrey had watched online a BBC News clip intended to showcase the terrible consequences of speeding.  Using video footage taken from a safety camera van on a bridge overpass in Norfolk, the story inadvertently showed something BBC executives had not expected...

“The first part contained the usual dire warnings about the danger of speeding,” the motorist recalled.  “Later in the sequence actual videos made by the speed camera van were shown.  This included one video of a driver braking so hard on seeing the speed trap that he lost control and spun out all over the three lanes of the road.  After some violent fishtailing the car eventually collided with the central reservation and lost a wheel.”

The government broadcaster quickly pulled the video.

The motorist petitioned the BBC to release the video.  It refused.  He asked the Norfolk Safety Camera Partnership for a copy of the raw camera footage that the BBC had used in its story.  It refused.  He petitioned the UK Information Commissioner who ruled that “journalistic content” is exempt from freedom of information laws. - theNewspaper.com

Fortunately...

an individual who had taped the news program came forward with a copy of the censored video.

And you can see it here.

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Line extension noted

Neo-Neocon, in her “Necco post” (linked here Sunday), noted:

...when NECCO yielded to pressure and put out the all-chocolate roll it was somehow too much of a good thing. The sport was gone, the game of it—and then, alas, my ability to eat chocolate was gone.

A stop in the candy department during Sunday’s visit to Walgreen’s confirmed that the all-chocolate Necco roll is indeed no longer carried there (although it is still listed on the Necco website). But, in its place, there’s something new:

Yep, “Smoothies.” In an ice-cream-stand-pastels package (the photo fails to capture the sheer intensity of the package’s pink and yellow). The flavors are [reading label] “Blueberry, Banana Caramel, Tropical, Peach, and Strawberry Crème”^[1] The wafers look (and crunch) just like the regular Neccos, but the selection of colors is different: There are no black, brown, or purple, but they’ve added a robin’s-egg blue (blueberry), and the red (strawberry) is more peach-colored (duh!). That leaves yellow (banana), orange (peach) and the flavor fooler, white (“tropical”).

“So get on with it! What about the taste?” you say. Well, mixed impressions. (Disclaimer: I’m not a great appreciator of fruit-flavored candies in general. So take this FWIW.)

Regular Necco wafers have kind of “pastel” flavors, far different from brands such as Altoids. Neccos won’t melt your dentures, but they also don’t clash disastrously should you accidentally (or intentionally) get two different flavors at once.

The Smoothies are different. The flavors are stronger, and more distinctive, and although they are all “fruits,” IMO some combinations don’t play well together. Also, the orange has a lingering sour note that I didn’t like. For me, Smoothies might work better as a “candy with” (coffee?) snack, rather than by themselves.

Buy again? Probably not. But then, there’s always the original!

And by the way, Neo-Neo, when I opened that regular wafers package, it turned out to have five chocolates in a row.

Crunch.

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AoSHQ “drink your worries away” meetup: Date/time now firm

(I’m waiting on Roberta X’s go ahead to post this as a “joint meeting with the Indy Bloggers,” but I suspect that will occur shortly.  UPDATE 081111: Done!)

Here’s the scoop:

Roberta X sez:

This is combined with the Ace of Spades HQ "Moronapalooza/Happy Hour Meet-Up" post-election gathering, so hey -- new friends.  Be nice, now and remember -- no biting!  Mostly.

Bring your friends and your attitude.

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THAT’S telling ’em!

The people of Cincinnati have decided: Traffic Cameras Are NOT For Them:

On Tuesday, voters in Cincinnati, Ohio made it clear that photo enforcement is not welcome in the city.  A majority of voters approved an amendment to the city charter prohibiting local officials from ever installing either red light cameras or speed cameras.

The measure is pretty airtight:

“Section 3:  Any ordinance enacted prior to the passage of this Amendment that contravenes any of the foregoing is void.  After the enactment of this Amendment, the City shall not enact or enforce any ordinance that contravenes any of the foregoing.  In the event that any provision of this Article XIV is found to be unconstitutional or impermissibly in conflict with state or federal law, only such provision found to be unconstitutional or impermissible will be stricken, and the remainder of this Article XIV will remain in full force and effect.”

And talk about “coming together with common purpose:”

A diverse group of political activists from all ends of the political spectrum banded together to form the “We Demand a Vote” coalition to stop the idea. Members include regional chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Republican Party, the Green Party, the Libertarian Party, and others.

I love citizen involvement!

Via:  The Truth About Cars (where there’s a discussion), via C.G. Hill
(who says, “Nicely done.”)

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Sunday morning reading - November 9, 2008

Jeff Goldstein tees off on the importance of not using graciousness or high-mindedness as an excuse for avoiding truth:

...something classical liberals need to put at the top of their priority list: namely, a refusal to allow that tactics of progressives to pass unchallenged or even to be celebrated.

In an political environment wherein the left has managed to turn the introduction of inconvenient facts into “smears” or “racism,” this willingness, on the part of some conservatives, to believe themselves capable of seizing the moral high ground by essentially giving cover to the demonstrably bad by allowing that it is merely “misguided,” is yet another step toward the very kind of partisan pragmatism that has cost Republicans so dearly, and that, even more troubling, has served to devalue language and further institutionalize a dangerous idea of how interpretation works.

And Bill Quick mulls the consequence of words that might be offensive also being accurate:

A few days ago, nemo took exception to my use of the phrase “Black man on a white horse” to denote Barack Obama. nemo’s reasoning was straightforward - while the cheap play on words was attractive, it could too easily be taken as scurrilous racism by those who don’t know me.

I’ve been thinking about that ever since.

Dismal science:   First, go grab a beer.  Or pour a glass of wine.  Or something stronger.  I don’t care if it’s not noon yet!  Drink it!  Now, sit down.  Done?  Then read MaxedOutMama:

I am adjusting my forecast to 75% moderate US depression by 2010, lasting for perhaps two years.

In short, there are some dominos yet to fall.  The key domino-pusher will be Democratic stupidity about energy.  And as Dr. Sanity (who it seems is taking the rest of the year off) reminds us, the left will remain dysfunctional:

The beginning of the 21st century will surely be looked back on as a golden age of paranoia.  The headlines of today fairly ooze with the delusions and vast conspiracies dreamed of in the mind of the paranoid left.., as they attempt to keep the holes in their ideology plugged; thus preventing any reality from washing over them or flooding their cognitive processes.

Every time a leak in that ideological dike appears, the paranoid brand chewing gum is brought out to stop it up.  The TNG memos were a clever plot by Karl Rove.  The Bush Administration was behind 9/11.  Katrina was allowed to destroy New Orleans because Bush hates blacks.  George Bush is about to impose a theocracy on the unsuspecting U.S.  Pat Tillman was murdered because he wanted to meet with anti-war activist Norm Chomsky.  The list of the paranoid delusions goes on and on and on.
...
[Such] mental gymnastics allow the paranoid person to externalize blame and avoid responsibility for his situation in life, as well as his own feelings.  It is always someone else’s fault and not his.

Depressing, huh?

Oh well, there’s always Neccos:

A whole roll takes about 40 minutes to eat.

Beg pardon?  By whom?  Doing what?  I suppose if a person had the extreme forbearance to suck rather than chew every single wafer in the pack, it might take forty minutes.  But such iron control cannot possibly be a healthy sign.

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Oh Noes! Everyone’s fleeing our new socialist overlords

Must be something in the air.

First it was S. Weasel (latest post, here’s another).
Now it’s Rachel Lucas (and followup)!

Wouldn’t surprise me if the presence of both of these women in the U.K. raises the level of testosterone over there by at least 50%.

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