Stupid Human Tricks

OK, so Bigfoot was a bust, but there have still been a lot of great little weird news items recently. I thought I would pass on a few of my favorites, and ask for yours in comments.

Well, they used to hold naval battles there, so why not Pirates of the Colosseum?

Would this be Soylent Brown?

Rat snacks can solve world food price crisis: Indian official

Yum! And not to be outdone, the Aussies are saying we can save the planet by switching to 'Roo Burgers! Hmm, reminds me of a song...

There's a line from a Babylon 5 episode (I'm a big fan of the series) which has always stuck with me. Several characters are discussing the political situation on Earth following the imposition of martial law. One character says that people love it - crime is down, things are calm, peaceful.

"Yeah, the peace of the gun," replies another character.

And that, my friends, is what we have today, here in the US. Specifically, in one small city in Arkansas:

HELENA-WEST HELENA, Ark. - Officers armed with military rifles have been stopping and questioning passers-by in a neighborhood plagued by violence that's been under a 24-hour curfew for a week.

On Tuesday, the Helena-West Helena City Council voted 9-0 to allow police to expand that program into any area of the city, despite a warning from a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas that the police stops were unconstitutional.

When I was a kid, I loved all manner of woo - ancient astronauts, psychic abilities, Atlantis, crystal skulls, the whole bit. Just go down the list of crazy shit in the 1970s and I pretty much believed it.

Most of us are this way. We grew up believing in God or other types of magical thinking. And it usually takes a while to divorce yourself from this junk, because it is so deeply ingrained in our culture and it is *so* appealing. Who wouldn't want an answer to their natural fear of death? Why not seek a solution to the threats of disease? Wouldn't it be cool if there really were alien visitors who were watching us, just waiting for the human race to mature enough to become citizens of a galactic civilization?

Last week, in the investigation of a major drug distribution network, police staged a no-knock entry into a private residence. They seized over 30 pounds of marijuana. Two guard dogs who were a threat to the police had to be killed in the execution of the raid. Two people in the residence at the time were handcuffed at the scene and questioned as to their involvement in the crime.

Sound pretty straight forward? More or less standard procedure when police are investigating a large quantity of narcotics?

Well, how about this version of the story?

It now appears that the entire raid on Berwyn Heights, Maryland Mayor Cheye Calvo may have been illegal. Last week, police stormed Calvo's home without knocking, shot and killed his two black labs, and questioned him and his mother-in-law at gunpoint over a delivered package of marijuana that police now concede may have been intended for someone else.

From today's Wall Street Journal:

You Still Can't Write About Muhammad
By ASRA Q. NOMANI
August 6, 2008; Page A15

Starting in 2002, Spokane, Wash., journalist Sherry Jones toiled weekends on a racy historical novel about Aisha, the young wife of the prophet Muhammad. Ms. Jones learned Arabic, studied scholarly works about Aisha's life, and came to admire her protagonist as a woman of courage. When Random House bought her novel last year in a $100,000, two-book deal, she was ecstatic. This past spring, she began plans for an eight-city book tour after the Aug. 12 publication date of "The Jewel of Medina" -- a tale of lust, love and intrigue in the prophet's harem.

It's not going to happen: In May, Random House abruptly called off publication of the book. The series of events that torpedoed this novel are a window into how quickly fear stunts intelligent discourse about the Muslim world.

Random House feared the book would become a new "Satanic Verses," the Salman Rushdie novel of 1988 that led to death threats, riots and the murder of the book's Japanese translator, among other horrors. In an interview about Ms. Jones's novel, Thomas Perry, deputy publisher at Random House Publishing Group, said that it "disturbs us that we feel we cannot publish it right now." He said that after sending out advance copies of the novel, the company received "from credible and unrelated sources, cautionary advice not only that the publication of this book might be offensive to some in the Muslim community, but also that it could incite acts of violence by a small, radical segment."

It's Primary Election day here, and in a bit I'll be going to the polls to make some careful, considered choices.

But things like this sometimes make me wonder why I bother. The human race is clearly doomed.

Jim Downey

(Via PZ.)

Via PZ, the latest screed over crackergate comes from a Dallas Morning News editorial. Here's an excerpt - see if it makes your head explode:

The Eucharist is merely a "sad little cracker," Dr. Myers wrote, and the Quran nothing more than words on paper. That may be true, and no one is bound to believe that Catholics or Muslims are correct. What we are bound to do, especially in a pluralist democracy, is show basic respect for the human beings who hold beliefs we don't respect. People don't lose their dignity because they believe implausible, even offensive, things.

There's something about these new atheists, for whom P.Z. Myers is a folk hero, that's profoundly inhuman.

Yeah, you got it right: in one paragraph he states without equivocation that all people deserve respect regardless of beliefs, and in the next he says that atheists are inhuman.

What. The. Fuck?

In May, Bruce Schneier wrote this:

Crossing Borders with Laptops and PDAs

Last month a US court ruled that border agents can search your laptop, or any other electronic device, when you're entering the country. They can take your computer and download its entire contents, or keep it for several days. Customs and Border Patrol has not published any rules regarding this practice, and I and others have written a letter to Congress urging it to investigate and regulate this practice.

Well, we now know the response:

Travelers' Laptops May Be Detained At Border
No Suspicion Required Under DHS Policies

“He refused to comply with the officers and so the officers had to deploy their Tasers in order to subdue him. He is making incoherent statements; he's also making statements such as, ‘Shoot cops, kill cops,’ things like that. So there was cause for concern to the officers,” said Ozark Police Capt. Thomas Rousset.

Makes it sound almost reasonable, doesn't it?

Small problem - the 'he' was a 16 year old kid who had fallen from a highway overpass and had broken his back. So, naturally, since he didn't respond to the authoritah of the cops on the scene, the cops had to Taser him. 19 times.

See, kids, never make the mistake of not instantly jumping up to comply with instructions given by a cop. Just because you're severely injured is no excuse.

And of course, the multiple "rides" on the Taser didn't help his injuries. I'm sure there was the usual spasmodic response that happens when about 50,000 volts of juice hit you. And it also delayed surgery to correct the damage of the initial fall:

A clear case of 'common descent' if I've ever heard one:

Body of ballooning priest found at sea

RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - The body of a Brazilian priest who floated out over the ocean suspended by hundreds of helium-filled party balloons, has been found off the coast of southeastern Brazil, police have confirmed.

The corpse of Father Adelir Antonio de Carli was spotted by a tugboat at sea near the city of Macae, three months after he disappeared while flying a contraption buoyed by balloons over the Atlantic Ocean in a fund-raising stunt.

Too bad he didn't pray to the Flying Spaghetti Monster, eh?

*sigh*

No, I'm not going to say "how sad". Guy tried to pull an idiotic stunt (even if it has been done multiple times). That he was a priest who was doing it so that he could help spread the 'Good News!' doesn't change the fact that he took a risk and got caught. Nothing tragic to see here, move along folks, move along.

Man, this is like a real-life version of Snatch:

Would-be Vegas hitman’s story ends in Irish jail

We all nurse private ambitions. Essam Ahmed Eid, a 53-year-old Egyptian man living in Vegas and dealing poker at the Bellagio, dreamed of becoming a hit man. He longed to take off the casino clown suit, the Nehru shirt and simpering smile — and replace them with a gun and a grimace.

So Eid did what any enterprising 21st century contract killer would: He created a Web site — hitmanforhire.net — and waited for the clients to come.

And what a site it was, too. From the home page:

Hitman is the perfect solution for your killing needs. We offer a variety of professional assassination services available worldwide. Whether you are trying to put an end to a domestic dispute or eliminate your business competitors, we have the solution for you.

Via Reason, this not-at-all-surprising glimpse into the intersection of drug forfeiture laws and corruption - from my old hometown!

St. Louis — During Labor Day weekend 2002, St. Louis city police responded shortly after midnight to an unusual call.

The police chief's daughter, Aimie Mokwa, then 27, had crashed a car.

It was a car she didn't own. St. Louis police had seized it during a drug arrest and turned it over to a private company that holds a lucrative towing contract with the department. That company gave her free use of it.

Oh, it gets better from there. This was not the only such time she got such a sweetheart deal. Nor the only time that she crashed a vehicle and then walked away (including once when her blood alcohol level was recorded as being twice the legal maximum).

Via Reason, this news item:

OKLAHOMA CITY — Some Oklahoma County voters can expect to receive comic books in the mail soon, but the subject matter will have a serious tone.

The 16-page publication prepared by Commissioner Brent Rinehart's re-election campaign lampoons gays and criticizes Rinehart's political opponents. It also features an angel who supports the embattled commissioner and Satan, who supports his critics.

"It's more or less a story of my experiences of the last four years of being the county commissioner of District 2," Rinehart told The Oklahoman, which obtained the comic on Wednesday.

Toga-wearing gays, political figures, trench coat-clad henchmen, concerned residents and Rinehart make up the rest of the comic's characters.

So, say you own a nice home in a nice neighborhood, with a view. But the taxes on the place are killing you. What to do?

Declare your home a church!

Man's home is castle—and church

State gives Lake Bluff estate a religious break worth $80,000 in property tax, but village says not so fast to pastor-owner

When George Michael placed a cross on the side of his lakefront mansion, neighbors assumed the decoration was simply a display of the man's religious faith.

What his neighbors didn't know is that Michael had decided to convert his $3 million residence into the Armenian Church of Lake Bluff, qualifying him for a nearly $80,000 break on his annual property tax bill.

Now, locals are questioning whether the property is a church at all. Village officials wonder how they'll be able to make up the lost revenue, and residents worry that their share of the tax burden will grow as a result.

Well, here's some good news:

Strip Search of 13-Year-Old for Ibuprofen Ruled Unconstitutional

If you have a problem with school officials strip searching 13-year-olds for Advil – or if you care about the government’s standards for informant use and invasive searches – you can take relief in yesterday’s ruling by a full panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, which ruled 6-5 that students cannot be strip-searched based on the uncorroborated word of another student who is facing disciplinary punishment.

Yeah, good news. Barely.

And you can probably guess why this whole thing happened - our old friend, "Zero Tolerance". From Reason Magazine this spring:

OK, you've probably heard about the little dust-up that PZ Myers has been having with a bunch of Catholics. If not, here's the initial post at PZ's site, with follow-up posts here, here, here, here, with this being the most recent post, featuring some of the hate mail sent to Myers. That's over 6,000 comments on his blog alone, by my count. And of course lots of others have weighed in on the subject, including UTI alum DarkSyde yesterday at Daily Kos.

The Washington Times ran an interesting story last week:

Want some torture with your peanuts?

Just when you thought you’ve heard it all...

A senior government official with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has expressed great interest in a so-called safety bracelet that would serve as a stun device, similar to that of a police Taser®. According to this promotional video found at the Lamperd Less Lethal, Inc. website, the bracelet would be worn by all airline passengers (video also shown below).

This bracelet would:

• Take the place of an airline boarding pass

• Contain personal information about the traveler

• Be able to monitor the whereabouts of each passenger and his/her luggage

• Shock the wearer on command, completely immobilizing him/her for several minutes

Here in the Midwest there is a real and significant problem with meth - to the point of paranoia on the part of both the population and government. This has led to laws restricting access to certain precursor drugs and chemicals, reports of environmental damage (meth labs tend to produce some really nasty chemical contamination), and the development of special task forces of local, state and federal police agencies to target meth production and distribution. It is the War on (Some) Drugs on steroids.

So it is fairly easy to see how something like this can happen:

Town Finds Drug Agent Is Really an Impostor

GERALD, Mo. — Like so many rural communities in the country’s middle, this tiny town had wrestled for years with the woes of methamphetamine. Then, several months ago, a federal agent showed up.

Have you ever been a tourist, and taken pictures of your trip? Have an interest in architecture or large engineering projects? Perhaps like to draw or paint plein air? Or maybe you're a writer wanting to make notes about a particular location you want to use in a book or story?

Welcome to the Terror List:

Terror watch uses local eyes

Hundreds of police, firefighters, paramedics and even utility workers have been trained and recently dispatched as "Terrorism Liaison Officers" in Colorado and a handful of other states to hunt for "suspicious activity" — and are reporting their findings into secret government databases.

It's a tactic intended to feed better data into terrorism early-warning systems and uncover intelligence that could help fight anti-U.S. forces. But the vague nature of the TLOs' mission, and their focus on reporting both legal and illegal activity, has generated objections from privacy advocates and civil libertarians.

* * *

This is my first original post, so I hope I get the damned thing right.

Did you know that the Texas Supreme Court takes separation of Church and State very seriously? They do, really. In fact, they take SoCS so seriously that they ruled that they couldn't let a church be punished for abusing a girl because "the case unconstitutionally entangled the court in religious matters."

In a 6-3 decision, the justices found that a lower court erred when it said the Pleasant Glade Assembly of God's First Amendment rights regarding freedom of religion did not prevent the church from being held liable for mental distress triggered by a "hyper-spiritualistic environment."

So the Church's freedom of religion does mean that they can get away with abusing a girl (they call it "exorcism"), cutting and bruising her, and scaring the hell out of her (no pun intended). Ruling otherwise infringes not only on their rights, but "entangles the court in religious matters."