Reason Magazine - Staff > Jonathan Blanks > Hit & Run Posts

Bah Bah Bah, Bomb Bomb Iran

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 15:27:00 EDT

Earlier today, Radley put up a short blog about the Stu Bykofsky column which says another 9/11 style attack on the United States would unify the country and refocus its policies on terror, the true threat to America.

As evidenced by the expanded eavesdropping bill that just made it through a Congress that gives the DOJ more unchecked power — see E.J. Dionne's rationalization for this latest instance of Democrats' callow incompetence here — another 9/11 attack would only embolden the government to encroach upon our civil liberties more and probably lead to more bloodshed worldwide.

Remember, one of the things that 'united us' in the days following 9/11 was bloodlust. Vengeance went hand-in-hand with the fervent patriotism in the bars and at the water coolers across the nation. If there was even the slightest bit of evidence linking a domestic attack to Iran — or if a tie could be made up — a four- or five-digit death toll would be more than enough to override common sense and skepticism against an invasion.

Attack or no, Cheney & co. are getting ready.

Thou Shalt Not Run Buck Naked

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 12:15:00 EDT

Another disgrace for the men of the cloth:

A Catholic priest faces an indecent exposure charge after police said he went jogging in the nude about an hour before sunrise.

The Rev. Robert Whipkey told officers he had been running naked at a high school track and didn't think anyone would be around at that time of day, a police report said.

Okay. So he's an idiot, but:

If convicted of indecent exposure, a misdemeanor, he would have to register as a sex offender, prosecutors said.

While you would think he would know better, there is no reason to make him carry around the additional burden of being a registered sex offender. For God's sake, he already carries the stigma of being a Catholic priest.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Aix-en-Provence

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 08:07:00 EDT

I usually support intellectual property rights, but in this case I'm not so sure:

Police arrested a teenager suspected of posting his own translation of the latest Harry Potter novel on the Internet weeks before the official French release, the book's publishers said on Wednesday.

The 16-year-old schoolboy, from the Aix-en-Provence region in southern France, was taken into custody by a police anti-counterfeiting unit and later released, said a spokeswoman for the Gallimard publishing house, which handles the French editions of the novels.

Hell, most American kids can't even write about books in their own language, let alone translating one into French. (It doesn't excuse it, I'm just sayin'...)

"It is not a young person or a fan we are talking about here -- these are organized networks that use young people," [Gallimard spokeswoman Marie Leroy-Lena ] told Reuters by telephone.

Then arrest them, not him.

The article doesn't mention how good or accurate the translation is. If the translation is not the same quality or better than theirs, Gallimard needs to drop the charges. If it is, they should probably offer him a job.

More from reason on the young wizard here.

Reading, Writing, and Envy

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 12:56:00 EDT

Parents and critics are lining up against NYC's plan to pay students for test scores, which I wrote about here:

Mrs. Windland wants [her daughter] Alexandra to do well [academically] for all the timeless reasons — to cultivate a love of learning, advance to more competitive schools and the like. She has on occasion bought her children toys or taken them out for dinner when they brought home pleasurable report cards, but she does not believe in dangling rewards beforehand.

“It’s like giving kids an allowance because they wake up every morning and brush their teeth and go off to school,” she said. “That’s their job. That’s what they’re supposed to be doing.”
Actually, Alexandra will probably not be eligible for the reward because the program, which has been adapted from a similar Mexican cash incentives plan, is aimed largely at schools with students from low-income families.

Actually, Mrs. Windland could opt out of the program if her daughter were, in fact, eligible. But, no matter:

Mrs. Windland predicts that the impact of the program may be paradoxical, with resentment depressing the achievement of hard workers.

“The kids who don’t get reimbursed are going to say, ‘Why should I bother!’ ” Mrs. Windland said...

It may be hard to explain to children, sensitive to any unfairness, why one child is getting money while another with better grades is not.

Have schools become bastions of fairness since I left? Inequalities have always existed within and between all schools, public and private. Maybe if schools with different programs for learning could compete for students, parents like Mrs. Windland would not have to be so upset about a program in a different school that doesn't affect her child and she could explain to her daughter why she chose her school in the first place.

More from reason on school choice here and Nick Gillespie's interview with voucher pioneer Milton Friedman here.

Fast Times In Caracas

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Mon, 06 Aug 2007 09:43:00 EDT

Of all the Americans who opposed the war, Hugo Chavez holds Sean Penn among the most important:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has praised Sean Penn for his critical stance against the war in Iraq, saying the two chatted by phone and soon plan to meet in person.

...
"Welcome to Venezuela, Mr. Penn. What drives him is consciousness, the search for new paths," Chavez said Wednesday in a televised speech. "He's one of the greatest opponents of the Iraq invasion."
...
Chavez said the two plan to meet Thursday. He called the actor "well-informed about what is happening in the United States and the world, in spite of being in Hollywood."

What's more, Chavez said, "he's made great films." The Venezuelan leader said he recently watched Penn's Oscar-winning performance in the film "Mystic River."

Perhaps Mr. Chavez is fond of Mystic River because it depicts a paranoid thug forcing a false confession out of an old friend before murdering him and throwing his body in the river. Or maybe he giggles whenever Spicoli orders that pizza. No, probably the first one.

So I've Good News, and I've Got Bad News...

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 16:09:00 EDT

The good news? The federal "black budget" for classified and clandestine activity is holding steady for the third straight year.

The bad news? The "black budget" is $31.9 billion.

We Don't Give No Education

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 12:10:00 EDT

More evidence that American public education is virtually worthless:

Several weeks into his first year of teaching math at the High School of Arts and Technology in Manhattan, Austin Lampros received a copy of the school’s grading policy. He took particular note of the stipulation that a student who attended class even once during a semester, who did absolutely nothing else, was to be given 45 points on the 100-point scale, just 20 short of a passing mark.

Mr. Lampros’s introduction to the high school’s academic standards proved a fitting preamble to a disastrous year. It reached its low point in late June, when Arts and Technology’s principal, Anne Geiger, overruled Mr. Lampros and passed a senior whom he had failed in a required math course.

The diploma the student, Indira Fernandez, received does not so much as meet the requirements of a 'participation' award:

After having failed to graduate with her class in June 2006, Miss Fernandez, who, through her mother, declined to be interviewed, returned to Arts and Technology last September for a fifth year. She was enrolled in Mr. Lampros’s class in intermediate algebra. Absent for more than two-thirds of the days, she failed, and that grade was left intact by administrators.
When second semester began, Miss Fernandez again took the intermediate algebra class, which fulfilled one of her graduation requirements. According to Mr. Lampros’s records, she missed one-third of the classes, arrived late for 20 sessions, turned in half the required homework assignments, failed 11 of 14 tests and quizzes, and never took the final exam.

Miss Fernandez was allowed to take the final exam and scored a 66, which did not bring her semester average even close to passing. Yet, Principal Geiger inserted a passing mark — over teachers' unions' objections! — anyway.

It is one thing, however ridiculous and self-defeating, to water down curricula to the lowest common denominator to increase graduation rates. It is even more preposterous to throw the most basic requirements out the window for the same purpose.

This isn't education — this is adolescent day care.

Update: Thanks to RiShawn Biddle from the Indianapolis Star for this information from my home state and its abuse of its graduation requirements. My high school's scores here.

The Kremlin's "Love Oasis"

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 14:37:00 EDT

Facing a dwindling population crisis, Vladimir Putin has created a program eerily similar to the Hitler Youth movement:

Obediently, couples move to a special section of dormitory tents arranged in a heart-shape and called the Love Oasis, where [young Russian couples] can start procreating for the motherland.

With its relentlessly upbeat tone, bizarre ideas and tight control, it sounds like a weird indoctrination session for a phoney religious cult.

But this organisation - known as "Nashi", meaning "Ours" - is youth movement run by Vladimir Putin's Kremlin that has become a central part of Russian political life.
Nashi's annual camp, 200 miles outside Moscow, is attended by 10,000 uniformed youngsters and involves two weeks of lectures and physical fitness.

Complete with veiled racist overtones, the organization resembles the Sturmabteilung (SA) and its intimidation tactics before WWII:

The group's leaders insist that the only connection to officialdom is loyalty to the president. If so, they seem remarkably well-informed.

In July 2006, the British ambassador, Sir Anthony Brenton, infuriated the Kremlin by attending an opposition meeting. For months afterwards, he was noisily harassed by groups of Nashi supporters demanding that he "apologise". With uncanny accuracy, the hooligans knew his movements in advance - a sign of official tip-offs.

Even when Nashi flagrantly breaks the law, the authorities do not intervene. After Estonia enraged Russia by moving a Soviet era war memorial in April, Nashi led the blockade of Estonia's Moscow embassy. It daubed the building with graffiti, blasted it with Stalin era military music, ripped down the Estonian flag and attacked a visiting ambassador's car. The Moscow police, who normally stamp ruthlessly on public protest, stood by.
...
Yet, by comparison with other outfits, Nashi looks relatively civilised. Its racism and prejudice is implied, but not trumpeted. Other pro-Kremlin youth groups are hounding gays and foreigners off the streets of Moscow. Mestnye [The Locals] recently distributed leaflets urging Muscovites to boycott non-Russian cab drivers.
These showed a young blonde Russian refusing a ride from a swarthy, beetle-browed taxi driver, under the slogan: "We're not going the same way."
Such unofficial xenophobia matches the official stance. On April 1, a decree explicitly backed by Mr Putin banned foreigners from trading in Russia's retail markets. By some estimates, 12 [million] people are working illegally in Russia.

Put mildly, this movement toward fascism in Russia is troubling. It is also disturbing that this story is not making more headlines here in the States.

Eine Kleine Bus Stop Musik

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 11:10:00 EDT

If there is one thing drug dealers can't stand, it's classical music:

Transit workers are installing speakers this week to pump classical music from Seattle's KING-FM into the Tacoma Mall Transit Center. The tactic is designed to disperse young criminals who make drug deals at the bus stop or use public transportation to circulate between the mall and other trouble-prone places...

The attack by Bach, Brahms and Beethoven follows the theory that prompted the city to stage pinochle games on dangerous street corners: Jolting the routine in such spots throws criminals off balance.

What is apparently lost on the proponents of this plan is perfectly clear to a bus riding teenager:

Vrahmel Obleanis, 19, playing a Nintendo GameBoy at the mall bus stop, said troublemakers won't like the orchestral strains, but they'll probably just move somewhere out of earshot.

"They'll say, 'This is whack,' and go over and hang out at the mall or by Babies 'R' Us," Obleanis said. "The music isn't going to change the attitude of the kids."

Potatoes, Football, and Miscegenation

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 13:18:00 EDT

The more things change...:

The Boise State running back who scored the winning points in the Fiesta Bowl, then proposed to his cheerleader girlfriend on national television, says he has hired security for their wedding because of racial threats.

Ian Johnson, who is black, and Chrissy Popadics, who is white, are due to be married Saturday in Boise.

When I saw the proposal right after the game, the thought occurred to me that this may not go over well in a good chunk of America--but surprisingly it was treated as a non-issue and I was glad for that.

It's times like these that I really hate it when I'm right.

Fairness Isn't Fair

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 16:20:00 EDT

Every once in a while even the FCC can get it right:

The Federal Communications Commission has no intention of reinstating the Fairness Doctrine imposing a requirement of balanced coverage of issues on public airwaves, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said.
Martin, in a letter written this week to Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., and made public Thursday, said the agency found no compelling reason to revisit its 1987 decision that enforcing the federal rule was not in the public interest.

Another victory for free speech, no matter how ridiculous the speech may be.

More from reason's Radley Balko on the "fairness doctrine" here. Also, Jacob Sullum's take on recent Supreme Court free speech cases here.

Self-Love Is a Battlefield

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 11:34:00 EDT

A Florida judges adds 60 days in jail to a convicted robber's 10-year sentence. The crime?

A Broward prisoner accused of committing a sex act while he was alone in his jail cell was found guilty Tuesday of indecent exposure...
In reaching the guilty verdict, jurors found that an inmate's jail cell is ''a limited access public place'' where exposing oneself is against the law.

The judge sentenced [Terry Lee] Alexander, of Lauderdale Lakes, to 60 days in jail, on top of the 10-year sentence he is currently serving for armed robbery.

While punishing a prisoner for exposing himself seems reasonable, the guard who brought the charges is not:

Alexander's attorney argued that the prison cell was a private place and that what Alexander was doing was perfectly normal.

''Did other inmates start masturbating because of Mr. Alexander?'' [Defense attorney Kathleen] McHugh asked [BSO Deputy Coryus Veal, the officer who brought the charges]. ``Did you call a SWAT team?''

''I wish I had,'' Veal answered...
Veal, who has charged seven other inmates with the same offense, insisted that she was not against the act itself -- just the fact that Alexander was so blatant about it.

As if this case weren't silly enough:

Defense attorney Kathleen McHugh faced 17 prospective jurors and asked point-blank who among them had never done that particular sex act.

No hands went up.

If BSO Veal can't find a way to discipline prisoners for this behavior outside of the court system, perhaps she should find a new line of work.

Don't Make Friends With Fat People...They're Contagious!

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 08:26:00 EDT

A new study in the New England Journal of Medicine reports that Americans should be wary of yet another public health contagion—obesity:

Obesity can spread from one person to another like the flu or a fad, researchers reported today in a first-of-its-kind study that helps explain -- and could help fight -- one of the nation's biggest public health problems.

The study, involving more than 12,000 people tracked over 32 years, found that "social networks" play a surprisingly powerful role in determining an individual's chances of gaining weight, transmitting an increased risk of becoming obese from wives to husbands, from brothers to brothers and from friends to friends.
...

The risk rose even more sharply among friends -- between 57 and 171 percent, depending on whether they considered each other mutual friends. Moreover, friends affected friends' risk even when they lived far apart, and the influence cascaded through three degrees of separation before petering out, the researchers found.

...

"What spreads is an idea. As people around you gain weight, your attitudes about what constitutes an acceptable body size changes, and you might follow suit and emulate that body size," [Nicholas A. Christakis of Harvard Medical School, who led the study] said. [emphasis added]

"Why Marjorie, what lovely cankles you have! Pass the lasagna, would ya please?"

reason's smorgasbord of writings on obesity here and public health here.

Chip Implants for "Aggressive" HIV Patients?

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 13:22:00 EDT

Authorities in Indonesia's Papua region are contemplating a new tactic to decrease the spread of HIV—microchip implants:

Lawmakers in Indonesia's Papua are mulling the selective use of chip implants in HIV carriers to monitor their behaviour in a bid to keep them from infecting others, a doctor said Tuesday.

Apparently, among other symptoms, HIV causes sociopathic behavior. Who knew?:

"Some of the infected people experience a change of behaviour and can turn more aggressive and would not think twice of infecting others," [John Manangsang, a doctor who is helping to prepare a new healthcare regulation bill for Papua's provincial parliament] alleged, saying lawmakers were considering various sanctions for these people.

"Among one of the means being considered is the monitoring of those infected people who can pose a danger to others," Manangsang said.

While Manangsang says this is only for a small number of the infected, specifying that it applies only to those "who can pose a danger to others" effectively limits the proposal only to those who are still breathing.

I wrote about governments using implants to track people here. reason Senior Editor Kerry Howley on tracking sex offenders here.

United Wild Kingdom

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 12 Jul 2007 16:24:00 EDT

In an effort to curb human trafficking and child exploitation, the Home Office study proposes tracking all children who enter the U.K.:

Every child entering the UK should have their biometrics taken in an attempt to stop the trafficking of children for sex, domestic slavery, street crime and drug smuggling.

The plan to track children after they enter the UK comes in a Home Office-sponsored study, which admits that human trafficking is now a “real and significant threat” to the country.

There is the obligatory Drug War tie-in:

Chinese boys aged between 13 and 17 were identified as a specific group being trafficked, while Vietnamese boys and girls were also highlighted as a vulnerable group that had been particularly exploited in cannabis production.

“The cannabis factories that have been raided highlight the highly organised business of cannabis cultivation in this country,” the study says. “Houses have been transformed into highly efficient industrial cannabis production works using technical knowledge.

While modern slavery is certainly a problem that should be fought vigorously, taking detailed inventory of all children who enter is not the answer.

But if the Home Office does follow through with this, the least they could do is give the children a fighting chance at freedom: I suggest give the kids a running start before officers bring out the tranquilizer darts and tags.

The effect is the same—my plan is just more entertaining to watch.

Obama, "The Salesman"

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 11:16:00 EDT

Like "The Salesman" in Frank Miller's Sin City, Barack Obama speaks to the NEA playing to their weaknesses:

Barack Obama has the teachers cheering. The National Education Association is meeting here, and Obama—like the Democratic candidates who have spoken before him—is telling the crowd everything it wants to hear.

He's "committed to fixing and improving our public schools instead of abandoning them and passing out vouchers." Washington "left common sense behind when they passed No Child Left Behind." Teacher pay must be raised "across the board."

And then he shoots them in the heart:

But then Obama tiptoes into the minefield of merit pay for teachers, so delicately that he does not actually utter the words "merit pay" until the question and answer session.
"If you excel at helping your students achieve success, your success will be valued and rewarded as well," he says -- but he hastens to add that this must be done "with teachers, not imposed on them, and not based on some arbitrary test score."
This is whispering truth to power. But for the teachers, Obama's words are fingernails on a chalkboard. They fall silent, except for scattered boos, as he mentions a modest new program in Minnesota.

Obama appears to be the only Democrat who is willing to really take on education reform, treating the NEA like a one-night stand political bedfellow instead of committing fully like his counterparts:

Of all the Democratic candidates who came [to Philadelphia] to pay homage to the NEA—the sole Republican was former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee—Obama was the only one to deviate significantly from the union line.
Not Hillary Clinton, who tangled with the Arkansas teachers union when she oversaw education reforms that included mandatory testing for new teachers.
Not John Edwards, who bemoans the "two public school systems in America—one for the wealthy, one for everybody else," but isn't willing to acknowledge how No Child could help bridge that gap.

Not Chris Dodd, who issued a press release zinging merit pay.

While Obama's educational goals will not be very palatable to a libertarian, it is refreshing to see a Democratic candidate who understands that the NEA is part of the problem with American education.

[Verboten Racial Slur], Please!

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 14:00:00 EDT

Yesterday, the NAACP laid to rest one of the most-beloved objects of Hip-Hop -- the N-word :

The "n-word" is dead according to the NAACP, which staged a mock funeral for the racial slur during its annual convention in Detroit yesterday, complete with a horse-drawn caisson, black roses and a plywood casket.

"Today, we're not just burying the n-word, we're taking it out of our spirit," Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick told hundreds of enthusiastic mourners, who slowly marched in the quarter-mile-long procession downtown.

As a black man who is also of Irish descent, I have to appreciate a man named "Kwame Kilpatrick." And while I hate the word as much as anyone, and probably more than most, I can't get over this ridiculousness:

"We gather burying all the things that go with the n-word. We have to bury the 'pimps' and 'hos' that goes with it. Die, n-word, and we don't want to see you 'round here no more," Mr. Kilpatrick said.

If the NAACP really wants to confront language issues, perhaps they should focus on the importance of subject-verb agreement and promoting education in the community instead of "burying" words that 'ain't goin' no where.'

Seedy Gonzales

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 12:36:00 EDT

Today's Washington Post asserts that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales knew about numerous FBI surveillance violations prior to Inspector General Glenn Fine's report on FBI abuses to Congress in March. Coincidentally, Gonzales decided not to tell Congress about them when the PATRIOT Act was up for renewal:

As he sought to renew the USA Patriot Act two years ago, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales assured lawmakers that the FBI had not abused its potent new terrorism-fighting powers. "There has not been one verified case of civil liberties abuse," Gonzales told senators on April 27, 2005.

Yet in his first weeks on the job, Gonzales' office was made aware of several instances that did not jive with that pesky document known as the Constitution:

Two of the earliest reports sent to Gonzales, during his first month on the job, in February 2005, involved the FBI's surveillance and search powers. In one case, the bureau reported a violation involving an "unconsented physical search" in a counterintelligence case. The details were redacted in the released memo, but it cited violations of safeguards "that shall protect constitutional and other legal rights." The second violation involved electronic surveillance on phone lines that was reinitiated after the expiration deadline set by a court in a counterterrorism case.

The report sent to Gonzales on April 21, 2005, concerned a violation of the rules governing NSLs, which allow agents in counterterrorism and counterintelligence investigations to secretly gather Americans' phone, bank and Internet records without a court order or a grand jury subpoena. In the report -- also heavily redacted before being released -- the FBI said its agents had received a compact disc containing information they did not request. It was viewed before being sealed in an envelope.

Gonzales received another report of an NSL-related violation a few weeks later. "A national security letter . . . contained an incorrect phone number" that resulted in agents collecting phone information that "belonged to a different U.S. person" than the suspect under investigation, stated a letter copied to the attorney general on May 6, 2005.

Well, the FBI can't be held accountable if businesses are too cooperative and give up too much information, can they? You know they'd at least report the oversight:

Some of the reports describe rules violations that the FBI decided not to report to the intelligence board. In February 2006, for example, FBI officials wrote that agents sent a person's phone records, which they had obtained from a provider under a national security letter, to an outside party. The mistake was blamed on "an error in the mail handling." When the third party sent the material back, the bureau decided not to report the mistake as a violation.

Ok, but the FBI would completely discard the information they didn't request, right?:

The memos also detail instances in which the FBI wrote out new NSLs to cover evidence that had been mistakenly collected. In a June 30, 2006, e-mail, for instance, an FBI supervisor asked an agent who had "overcollected" evidence under a national security letter to forward his original request to lawyers. "We would like to check the specific language to see if there is anything in the body that would cover the extra material they gave," the supervisor wrote.

But Gonzales had no idea this stuff was going on:

At least two other reports of NSL-related violations were sent to Gonzales, according to the new documents. In letters copied to him on Dec. 11, 2006, and Feb. 26, 2007, the FBI reported to the oversight board that agents had requested and obtained phone data on the wrong people.

Nonetheless, Gonzales reacted with surprise when the Justice Department inspector general reported this March that there were pervasive problems with the FBI's handling of NSLs and another investigative tool known as an exigent circumstances letter.

Either Gonzales lied to Congress or he is the most incompetent department head in Washington, and that's saying a lot.

More from reason on National Security Letters here and here. More on Gonzo here.

NYC's Department of 'SHHHHH!'

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 11:20:00 EDT

The New York City Department of Environmental Protection has begun to enforce a noise ordinance passed 18 months ago:

With his Mister Softee ice cream truck parked in a familiar spot, its presence announced by a sprightly metallic jingle, Costas Vamvakas was having a good day on Wednesday, the holiday business brisk despite the drab weather. But then two men pulled up in an unmarked car from the Department of Environmental Protection.
It was Mr. Vamvakas’s first encounter with the city’s noise police, a contingent that includes 45 environmental agents and thousands of regular police officers who are enforcing a sweeping new noise code that took effect on Sunday. Mr. Vamvakas, 24, who is part owner of a Mister Softee franchise in Queens with 11 trucks, had failed to turn off his truck’s jingle when he parked at the curb, as is now required of all ice cream trucks.
The fine is $350.

While New York City's crime rate has been consistently falling in recent years, has it become so safe that "thousands of regular police officers" are relegated to chasing parked ice-cream trucks?

Granted, I oversimplify. They're targeting air conditioners too:

Barking dogs, heavy construction, garbage trucks, nightclubs, personal stereos, poorly muffled motorcycles and loud air-conditioners are all covered.

So 894 noise complaints in four days can now compete for the attention of New York's Finest with the 2340 felony complaints of the previous week.

Lesson: While catching murderers, thieves, and rapists is important, it is not nearly as lucrative as turning off grandma's air conditioner in the middle of the summer.

Can I See Some ID, Grandpa?

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Sat, 30 Jun 2007 18:04:00 EDT

Tennessee has come up with a strategy to keep underage kids from buying beer: card everybody.

Comer Wilson hasn't had to show his ID to buy beer in a while. Maybe it's the 66-year-old man's long white beard.
Starting Sunday, gray hair won't be good enough. Wilson and everyone else will be required to show identification before buying beer in Tennessee stores - no matter how old the buyer appears.

How did 63-year-old Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen react to the new law?:

"I'll be very pleased when I'm carded, and in my mind I'll just imagine it's because I look so young," he said.

In my mind, I'll just imagine I live in a country where self-delusion isn't needed to make sense of the laws.

More about underage drinking from reason here .

"To Extort And Serve"

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 10:28:00 EDT

The NYPD, thousands of officers short, is having trouble finding and retaining new recruits. One possible reason :

[Police Commissioner Ray] Kelly speculates that the just-graduated class should have been almost double the size it was, and he calls the academy's near-record 16 percent dropout rate "high."...

What happened?

During the last round of contract negotiations, the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association promoted the rookie-cop salary cut in exchange for raises for senior serving cops....

Whereupon the PBA took to accusing City Hall of being responsible for the crisis the union itself essentially had created - in the expectation of keeping the higher pay for senior cops as public pressure forced big raises for rookies.

It must be great comfort to the newest members of the 'Thin Blue Line' to know their salaries were cut--by their own colleagues --to make them politically useful.

Plea Is No Bargain In Louisiana

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 11:04:00 EDT

Another example of legal prosecutorial misconduct:

Mychal Bell, 16, a former Jena High School football star, and five other black students had been facing the potential of up to 100 years in prison if convicted of attempted murder, conspiracy and other charges for the December beating of the white student, who was knocked unconscious but not hospitalized. The incident capped months of escalating racial tensions at the high school that began after several white youths hung nooses from a tree in the school courtyard in a taunt aimed at blacks.

But as jury selection was about to begin in Bell's case Monday, District Atty. Reed Walters reduced the charges to aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated second-degree battery, which together carry a maximum of 22 years in prison. Walters, who is prosecuting Bell as an adult, also offered the teenager a plea agreement including a suspended sentence, which Bell's father said the youth rejected.

Plea-bargaining tactics like this have become commonplace in American jurisprudence. Some may view the reduced charges as more reasonable -- but anything less reasonable would be hard to imagine.

Some more info on the new charges:

Aggravated second-degree battery involves use of a dangerous weapon, according to state statutes. Parents of the accused say they had heard no previous mention of a weapon.

"Well, anything is better than murder and a lifetime in prison," said John Jenkins, whose son, Carwin Jones, is among the charged. "But it's still strange. All of a sudden they're talking about a weapon. What weapon? We never heard anything about a weapon before."

Hanging a ridiculous sentence over defendants' heads and then offering a reduced plea (which, in this case, is still absurd) to avoid a jury trial is nothing less than an abuse of the judicial process.

More from reason on plea bargaining here.

Schools Won't Pay For Quality

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 09:50:00 EDT

As the baby boom generation of teachers retires, schools are facing shortages of qualified teachers:

"It's not that you don't have some terrifically talented people going into teaching. You do," said Richard J. Murnane, an economist at Harvard University's Graduate School of Education. "The issue is that you don't have enough. And many are the most likely to leave teaching, because they have lots of other opportunities."...

To offset a shortfall of 280,000 qualified math and science teachers projected by 2015, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics advocates more competitive pay -- a controversial move away from a fixed salary structure that some teacher advocates say reflects a mentality that teaching is a second income.

Only in government-run schools can people believe that paying someone on the bases of aptitude and performance is "controversial."

Bye-Bye BlackBerry

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 16:42:00 EDT

Give them time, and the French will always find something new to retreat from in fear. This time--BlackBerry mobile devices:

French government defense experts...have advised against [BlackBerry] use by officials in France's corridors of power, reportedly to avoid snooping by U.S. intelligence agencies.

OK, so maybe they have a point: If the U.S. government continues to monitor the transactions of its own citizens, why would they suddenly respect the French's privacy? We may even be starting to develop a reputation in the world...

More reason on government spying here. Wiretapping here.

Darwin, Help Us!

jblanks@reason.com (Jonathan Blanks) — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 13:58:00 EDT

Hate it when elections don't go your way? So does the National Association of State Boards of Education. In their upcoming election for president, Kenneth Willard, who supports "intelligent design" theory, is running unopposed. So they are, uh, "reviewing" their election procedures to see if there is any way on Darwin's green earth they can stop this from happening. For his part, Mr. Willard accuses the scientific establishment of having "blind faith in evolution."

If only there were some scenario in which not everyone would have to agree on the merits of creationism class...some sort of choice-based, individualized educational system. Oh well.

Read reason on evolution here and vouchers here .