swimming freestyle

"What I Tell You Three Times Is True"

I don't imagine many would argue with the idea that innocent people falsely charged should go free.  The problem with the current system is that guilty, dangerous terrorists will, undoubtedly, go free as well.  From the NY Times:

In the first case to review the government’s secret evidence for holding a detainee at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, a federal appeals court found that allegations against an ethnic Chinese man held for more than six years were based on bare and unverifiable claims, according to the decision released Monday.

With some derision for the Bush administration’s arguments, a three-judge panel said the government contended that its allegations against a detainee should be accepted as true because they had been repeated in at least three secret documents.

The court compared that to the absurd declaration of a Lewis Carroll character: “I have said it thrice: What I tell you three times is true.”

“This comes perilously close to suggesting that whatever the government says must be treated as true,” said the panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

No doubt some will suggest the DC Court of Appeals is full of liberal jurists out to embarrass the Bush Administration.  The unanimous decision included Justice David B. Sentelle's vote.  For the record, Sentelle is a Reagan appointee, chosen to replace Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia when he was confirmed to the high court. 
On the D.C. Court of Appeals, Sentelle voted to overturn the convictions of Oliver North and John Poindexter, along with Judge Laurence Silberman. He was one of the judges responsible for appointing Kenneth Starr to replace Robert B. Fiske as lead independent council to investigate President Bill Clinton.

In 2007, in Boumediene v. Bush, 375 U.S. App. D.C. 48, Judge Sentelle concurred with Judge Arthur Raymond Randolph, relying on Johnson v. Eisentrager, to uphold the Military Commissions Act's suspension of habeas corpus for enemy combatants as constitutional. Judge Judith Ann Wilson Rogers dissented. (Wikipedia)

The New Bond Trailer

"Quantum of Solace"?  What the hell does that mean?

A Picture for the Day

Natalie Coughlin swam to a new world record time at 59.03 during the women's 100-meter backstroke preliminaries in Omaha at the American swimming trials for the Olympics. (NY Times)

Cunningham for VP?

John Cole weighs in on the McCain/Clark brouhaha:

Since honorable military service is all you need to qualify for the White House, and gives you the only experience that matters, we may have a VP for McCain. Randall “Duke” Cunningham:

During his service, Cunningham and his Radar Intercept Officer “Irish” Driscoll became the only Navy aces in the Vietnam War, flying an F-4 Phantom from aboard aircraft carriers, and recording five confirmed kills. He was one of the early graduates of the Navy’s TOPGUN school that taught dogfighting techniques to F-4 Phantom pilots and Radar Intercept Officers (RIOs).

There is one wee problem.  Mr. Cunningham is currently in the U.S. Penitentiary in Tucson, Arizona.  He's in the midst of serving a 100 month sentence after a guilty plea to tax evasion, conspiracy to commit bribery, mail fraud, and wire fraud.  Mr. Cunningham is scheduled for release in 2013. (Wikipedia)

Whoa Dude, Chronotopic Anamorphosis

You might want to sit down for this.  This is a video test of new software that takes horizontal video lines and rearranges them spatially and temporally.  I have no idea what it's for, but it's sure cool.

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(h/t Gizmodo)

November Can't Come Soon Enough

It's getting just plain dumb out there:

At his Pennsylvania press conference today, McCain said that the Wesley Clark comment yesterday was "not an isolated incident." "If that is the kind of campaign that Obama and his supporters and surrogates want to wage, I understand that," McCain said, before adding that he would rather talk about issues like gas prices and the economy. (Link)

Now that would just be terrific, it it weren't for this bit of news today:

Sen. John McCain's allies have seized on a new and aggressive line of attack against Sen. Barack Obama by casting the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee as an opportunistic and self-obsessed politician who will do and say anything to get elected. (Link)

A Delusional White House

From US News:

There's another aspect of the White House's upbeat mood. When he travels around the country, Bush feels less "antipathy" than he used to in the crowds, along the motorcade routes, and expressed by the individuals who talk to him at his events. "He feels there has been a shift in attitudes out there that's not reflected in polling data," the aide says.

Reinforcing his point, the latest AP-Ipsos poll, released in mid-June, found that only 29 percent of Americans approved of Bush's job performance, one of the lowest presidential ratings ever. White House officials, by the way, say they aren't sure such polls should be believed because the questions are biased and the population samples are flawed.

When I read this, I thought of those folks auditioning for American Idol.  Not the ones that are clearly doing it as a joke, just trying to get on TV.  The ones that really believe they're good singers but are, in fact, just awful.

The McCain/Clark Brouhaha

Retired General Wesley Clark is making big news today for comments he made on yesterdays "Face the Nation".  During the interview, Clark repeated a theme he's employed a couple times recently; John McCain's military service, however meritorious, doesn't necessarily qualify him to be president.

Some are livid at Clark's comments, claiming Clark minimized McCain's service when pointing out McCain's command was not of "a wartime squadron" and asserting piloting a fighter plane and getting shot down were not qualifications for the presidency. 

Not exactly artfully worded, but Clark never questions McCain's service and the reaction by some to Clark's comments is way too faux hysterical.  Jeez, compare Clark's comments to Swift Boaters calling John Kerry a coward and liar.  They're not even close.  And alot of the folks that are so outraged today by Clark's remarks about McCain didn't even bat an eye when John Kerry's character was being dragged through the gutter without any proof whatsoever.  It seems, for some folks, respect for the troops only applies to those troops whose views are aligned with their own political agenda.  They're more than willing to throw the rest under the bus for political gain.

But it seems to me Clark's point is that war heroes don't necessarily make great presidents.  Ulysses Grant and Dwight Eisenhower are examples of great wartime generals who demonstrated tremendous character and bravery in wartime but are now considered as good, but not great U.S. presidents.  

Serving during wartime and having to endure time as a POW speaks volumes about John McCain's character and bravery.  Choosing to opt out of a lucrative Wall Street law position and working, instead, as a community organizer in South Chicago speaks to Barack Obama's character and priorities. 

Neither guarantees McCain or Obama will be worth a damn as president.

State Department Aided Oil Companies in Iraq

From the NY Times:

A group of American advisers led by a small State Department team played an integral part in drawing up contracts between the Iraqi government and five major Western oil companies to develop some of the largest fields in Iraq, American officials say.

The disclosure, coming on the eve of the contracts’ announcement, is the first confirmation of direct involvement by the Bush administration in deals to open Iraq’s oil to commercial development and is likely to stoke criticism.

For its part, the administration has repeatedly denied steering the Iraqis toward decisions. “Iraq is a sovereign country, and it can make decisions based on how it feels that it wants to move forward in its development of its oil resources,” said Dana Perino, the White House spokeswoman.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich made the argument last week: the war in Iraq was about oil.  That's a wee bit simplistic but, given this news, it makes it pretty hard for the Administration to argue oil didn't play a role in the decision to go in and oil sure seems to be a factor in the Administrations long term plans in Iraq.

Ms. Perino's knee jerk denial, now refuted, of Bush Administration involvement in the contract negotiations is a common pattern that's emerged of late.   First impulse: Deny everything. 

When my daughter was 3 years old and spilt grape juice all over the floor she denied it all.   Of course, holding the empty cup and the grape juice all over her t-shirt suggested she wasn't telling the whole truth.

Three year olds can get away with that stuff.  Ms. Perino and her cohorts should know better.

How To Lower The Price Of Gas

According to Ben Stein, by balancing the budget.  From the New York Times:

What is to be done? The federal government can do little to make the price of oil fall in the short run, except, perhaps, for one basic thing: balance the budget. The world price of oil is denominated in dollars. The dollar is weak for many reasons, but a big one is the immense budget deficits run by our government. If President Bush and Senators John McCain and Barack Obama were to stand together in front of a camera and solemnly swear that they would balance the budget in four years, even if it required tax increases on people earning millions, the dollar would rise against the euro, and oil would fall in dollars.

The U.S. dollar is the currency used to trade oil internationally.  The U.S. is suffering as a result of our weak dollar and those newly emerging rivals for gasoline (e.g. China and India) benefit.

You can't more than double a national debt in seven years and expect there won't be consequences.