FISA court upset by negative publicity

According to WAPO, the poor overworked judges of the FISA rubberstamp court are unhappy about their press treatment.  This is the court that OK'ed  all but 10 of 2000 requests to snoop. 
I feel so sorry for them.

Taking the Fifth, Lois Lerner

Nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.  They had Lois Lerner of the IRS up in front of a Congressional investigating committee.  She said " I didn't do anything wrong.  And I'm taking the fifth".
   Same committee has just decided that Lois's "I didn't do anything wrong" statement  prevents her from taking the fifth, and they plan to grill her some more.
  I don't approve.  The fifth amendment is intended to prevent judges and prosecutors from forcing defendants to confess.  As in "Sign this confession and we won't use this rubber hose on you any more."  That's an important safeguard for us plain citizens against the criminal justice system.  I'd rather let Lois Lerner slide by than give up on the fifth amendment.
   In Lois's case, we ought to fire her and cancel her pension and her government health care.  That would put the fear of God into that building full of bureaucrats.  And her sidekick, Rose-something-or-other, ought to be fired too.  That's well within the power of Congress.  And it's constitutional too.

A break in the weather

Yesterday dawned bright and sunny, and I decided to get on with a couple of household tasks that had been on hold, 'cause of days and days of rain.  I stained the deck and mowed the lawn.  Got both jobs done before sundown. 
   This morning I woke up to the sound of rain pattering on the roof.  But I felt real good about the deck and the lawn.  Rainwater is beading up nicely on the deck,  and the lawn is cut too short to assault the house, at least for a few more days.

From The Economist. Can Iran be stopped?

The Economist doesn't have a clue.  They spend a lot of time discussing an Israeli air strike.  They sort of conclude the because the Israelis have not laid down a "red line", they don't plan a strike.  That's not how the Israelis do things.
   The Israelis understand something that any parent learns pretty quick.  Namely, never make idle threats.  If you make a threat, you gotta be ready to carry it out.  If you make a threat and then back down at crunch time, things get worse for you.  One day Obama may learn this.
   As far as carrying out an air strike on Iranian nuclear facilities, there is reason to doubt the Israeli Air Force has the capability to do an effective strike.  Iran has a lot of sites,  some of them are buried really really deep, no one knows if the Israelis know which sites are critical, and which are dummies.  Iran has air defenses, and a suite of hot new Russian SAM's on order.  I don't know how many aircraft the Israelis have, if they have the range and payload needed to do the job.  I'm sure the Israelis have worked the numbers on an air strike, and  the answer is probably, "We would have to be awfully lucky to carry it off". 
  As long as that's the answer, the Israelis aren't gonna make threats, 'cause they aren't sure they can make good on them.  They may decide to throw the dice if things get sticky, but they won't make threats or announce their plans in advance. 
   There is one equalizer that doesn't get talked about much.  The Israelis are believed to have nuclear weapons, although they have never made any such claim and are not known to have conducted a bomb test.  If the Israeli's made the first strike on Iran with nukes, their odds go way up for them, you only need one hit with a nuke to take out damn near anything.  However, the big boys (Russia and the US) have made it abundantly clear that they disapprove of use of nukes by anybody.  Nobody knows just what the big boys might do, but nobody wants to find out either.

Voter Fraud and same day registration

Used to be, much voter fraud was prevented by registration.  On election day, they asked your name and looked you up on the voter registration list.  If your name was on the list, you got to vote.  Fairly airtight.  Then in New Hampshire we put in same day registration, show up at the polls on election day, and vote whether you are on the list or not.   The college kids at Dartmouth, UNH, and even humble Plymouth State loved it, didn't matter if you were an out of state student, you get to vote in NH elections.  The real citizens of Hanover, Plymouth and  Durham are completely swamped by hordes of college students on election day. 
So now we are wrangling over various voter ID requirements. 
   So I asked a couple of local politicos about the chance of just repealing same day registration.  They both said, "No can do, Federal law requires same day registration."
   Is that right?  Anyone know for sure?

 

Stainless Steel is so dated.

There have been repeated rants in the home decorating, Martha Stewart, kind of press declaring stainless steel kitchen appliances to be dead, as dead as avacado green.  This morning I saw a TV ad, showing a young couple, shopping for an icebox.  They are in a store aisle, completely surrounded by stainless steel iceboxes.  Like 20 of 'em.  Reports of the death of stainless have been exaggerated. 

The Supremes rule in favor of Gays today.

The Supremes overturned California Prop 8 which forbids gay marriage in the state of California.  They did it on a technicality rather that come right out and say "The US Constitution Article such-an-such means gay marriage is legal".  Probably they couldn't agree among then selves on such an interpretation.  Instead they decided that the plaintiffs lacked "standing", a lawyer's way of throwing out lawsuits.  And doing it this way, the ruling only affects California, it doesn't impose gay marriage on the non-gay marriage states, which would cause  political outrage. 
    It also supports judge made law.  It was a lower court that overturned Prop 8.  That ruling is what got appealed all the way to the Supremes.  The Supremes have said, "Doesn't matter what the voters say, we judges can make our own laws to suit ourselves."  Real democracy that is. 
    On the real issue, I'm neutral,  we have gay marriage here in New Hampshire, the legislature voted it in.  There has been some grumbling, but the bulk of the citizens are going along with a state law passed by majority vote in the state legislature.  The sky has not fallen. 
  While they were at it, in a separate case,  the Supremes overturned most of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)  Here at least, they ruled that DOMA violated the equal protection clause of the Constitution.  They didn't  mention that DOMA was as hard on lesbians as it was on gays. Far as I am concerned, that's equal protection, or at least equal prosecution. 
   But heh, they are the Supremes and we are stuck with 'em.