Enoch

Miles Davis Quintet -- Gingerbread Boy.

Rough morning. Played some hoops for a couple hours after work yesterday, and came home rather tired. Then there was a bit of an argument with the wife that kept us both up until around midnight. After prying myself out of bed, I discovered that it was almost painfully cold outside, mostly due to a biting wind, so the 3/4 mi. walk that begins my commute was awful. But then I got to the subway and switched my ipod to some Jimmy Smith. That helped brighten my mood immensely.

look up the definition of impeachment. it is the government analogy to indictment. Criminal procedure rights don't follow "analogies" (if they did, a corporate board meeting to discuss the dismissal of a CEO might well implicate them as well), they follow the 14th Amendment's "Life, Liberty, and Property." As pretty much every court has read these terms in the past, the right to continue in an elected office does not qualify under any of these 3 concepts. (But, as I mentioned a few days ago, the right to run for an elected office for which you meet the pre-defined qualifications almost certainly does quality as a 14th Amendment liberty, so I think Blags has a case with respect to the lifetime ban on Illinois public office.) Ultimately, yeah, the process does feel a little unfair, largely because there was nobody in the legislature who was sticking up for the Gov. But a slightly-unfair-seeming impeachment doesn't really bother me so much in that situation. If a Governor has zero support in the legislature, he's going to be the least effective governor imaginable, so it doesn't really bother me that there is a lower bar for tossing a Governor in that situation out of office. Consider it something like a vote of extreme no-confidence.

Seconded. But the whiners coming out of the woodworks are just part of the natural reaction any successful product has. It's the same reason people feel the need to complain about The Dark Knight. I thought it was very well done in most regards (exception: every time you got into your ATV). But it wasn't to my tastes. I like that they went for a cinematic feel, I just don't particularly care for the type of cinema they decided to imitate most directly (i.e., unsophisiticated 'yay hero! boo villain! ignore the plot holes!' summer popcorn flick).

Marketing probably has a role in this decision. It's too expensive to sustain continued serious hype levels to cover 2 months-apart release dates. Given the relative sizes of the markets (in the U.S., at least), if the publisher is going to time the hype for one release, it's going to be the console one. Release for PC first, and you risk actual independent assessments of the game interfering with your carefully crafted ad copy and "exclusive previews." Edit: Despite some misgivings about Bioware's record of "polished and enjoyable, but ultimately disappointing" games, I do find myself looking forward to Dragon Age. A lot of the underlying concepts they've talked about mirror some of my own prejudices with regard to fantasy universes (e.g., the idea that confirmable, repeatable Acts of God(s) and certainty regarding the afterlife undercut the creators' efforts to make characters who the audience can identify with), so the prospect of seeing a fantasy setting more in-tune with my tastes is exciting.

Yeah, I'm not looking forward to the taxes this year. I usually make it a point to do it all myself by hand, but in 2008 I got married, bought a house, and moved across state lines. That may be enough complexity to make hiring a professional worthwhile.

The press events are good news. Hopefully they mean more Alpha Protocol and Aliens info is going to be public soon.

The Roots -- The Seed (2.0)

I thought the game was too sloppy to be considered one of the best evar, but it did have an entertaining finish. I love me some Bruce, but the halftime show was weak. It's not the kind of venue that emphasizes his strengths, and they (whether it was Bruce, the event producers, or NBC) were trying too hard to get the impressive 'rock star' visuals.

This. Guitar tab = training wheels for people who can't read real music. Also, practice scales as well as chords. Essential for improvisation, and very helpful for understanding how all the chords are constructed (rather than just memorizing fingerings).

Haha! Silly auto-censor. Anyhow, I really should get myself some rye (or Canadian Whisky, which is normally made with at least some rye content). A bourbon Manhattan is a bit sweet for my taste. But still very good.

Tonight I made brownies. (They're so much better if made from scratch than from a mix-- the chocolate tastes like, well, an actual high-quality dark chocolate bar, which, oddly enough, is what I used.) Then I made myself a Manhattan. I didn't have any rye whiskey on hand (the traditional liquor to use), so I made it with bourbon instead (Maker's Mark).

taks, I think you're taking the "conduct legislative investigations" bit in the IL constitution too literally. When a court, law, or whatever refers to a legislative investigation, they're not actually requiring the legislators to go out and hunt down clues. They refer mostly to the legislature's subpoena power, which it can use to get documents (like, say, recordings of wiretaps previously conducted by a law enforcement agency) and compel witnesses to testify (like, say, criminal investigators who have been tracking potential illegal acts that the official in question may or may not have committed). So long as a majority is satisfied that they have found "the existence of cause for impeachment," I think the "investigation" requirement is moot. I think the system looks shady in this case because there was nobody in the IL legislature who was willing to stand up for the Governor. I think the drafters of impeachment provisions generally assume that the official under investigation is going to have at least a few allies in the legislature who would bring up any evidence in his favor. Also, the IL due process clause is almost exactly the same as the Federal 14th Amendment. IL might have a judicial definition of "liberty" that differs from that which the federal courts have come up with (which does not include the liberty to keep one's job as an elected official), but I really doubt it.

legal precedent where? illinois? their constitution is sufficiently vague, i.e., due process is not specified to criminal cases alone, to leave open plenty of wiggle room. the fact that evidence that will be used in a criminal trial was marched out without any opportunity for blago to contest it seems to be on pretty weak ground, too. I was basing my argument on federal constitutional law, which is what Blags would almost certainly have to rely on, since it would be rather difficult to make the argument that the IL state constitution should be read to describe an impeachment proceeding explicitly in one section, but implicitly add huge modifications (i.e., full criminal procedure rules) in an entirely separate section. And, after all the criticism that the Courts have taken over expansive readings of the "liberty" portion of the 14th Amendment (e.g., the "liberty of contract" cases in the early 20th century, as well as the reproductive rights cases more recently), they are very very reluctant to expand the scope of this requirement to anything beyond actual imprisonment.

Well, Marion Barry did get re-elected...

um, no, apples and oranges. this is an impeachment and senate hearing, the government office equivalent of an indictment and trial. That's not how legal precedent has seen it. A closer analogy would be a company's board of directors voting to oust the CEO-- there are internal rules to govern how it's done, but the CEO's due process rights don't come into the equation at all. The government office equivalent of indictment and trial is, well, indictment and trial. It did, a lifetime ban. That does make it a lot more problematic. Numerous court cases have held that the right to stand for election to a public office cannot be taken away from someone without due process. There was, of course, some process given here, but it was far short of the process he would get in a court of law. If Blago wants to spend a lot of money on lawyers, he can probably get that aspect of the ruling invalidated-- he might even be able to get a federal court to declare that portion of the IL state constitution void under the federal constitution. But such a suit would probably do nothing to reverse his removal from office.

not my point... he's being deprived of his liberty (his job) without due process. Wow. Do you realize that, by extending Due Process protection to employment, you've just made it impossible for employers to fire anybody for pretty much any reason without first having hearings, appeals, and piles of bureacratic mumbo-jumbo? And here I thought that you would be the last person around here to embrace the French perspective on employment law. Anyhow, based on a quick look at the IL state constitution, I doubt Blago has much hope of success in a court case to challenge his impeachment. The state constitution, unlike the federal one, doesn't require any "high crime or misdemeanor." Instead, it simply requires the legislature to find "cause for impeachment." That seems to be a deliberately low standard. (There are probably court cases giving more depth to this, but I'm not all that motivated to look.) He might have a case based on Due Process, though, in that an impeachment under the IL constitution can both remove an official, and disqualify him/her from holding public office in that state in the future. The former isn't a protected right under Due Process, but the latter certainly is. But I don't know if the removal that passed yesterday included a bar on future service.

40 years ago, today: The final public performance of one of the greatest bands in history.

Some kind soul has taken it on himself to give early warning to the population of Austin, TX. link.

There are dangers associated with both tracks. Letting businesses fail like the powers-that-be did with Lehman Bros. back in October risks spreading panic that undermines the rest of the industry (particularly in the financial industry, which to a large degree is built on trust). But, on the other hand, one contributing factor to the long recession that Japan endured in the '90s while the rest of the world was booming was that their government reacted to a financial crisis by keeping their big businesses alive long past the time when they were dynamic generators of economic growth. Government is good at providing regulations to make sure that certain standards are met (like, say, FDIC does with depository institutions), and the TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program, a.k.a. the bailout) could use some more oversight that follows the money to the individual companies to ensure compliance with the law and Treasury's rules. But government is not at all good at advising companies on how to make money and run their businesses.

Well, it depends on what level of government you're talking about. Generally, apart from municipal bond issues (which are having a tough time along with every other credit market), the Feds are the only ones allowed to deficit spend. So, federal level spending (and tax-cutting) wouldn't necessarily result in firing cops and firemen. At the state and local level, though, roughly-balanced budgets are usually mandatory, so any new spending or reductions in revenue have to come from somewhere. (One of the better arguments for a large federal-level fiscal stimulus is that it will offset the spending cuts and tax increases that lower-level governments are now being forced into by declining tax revenues.) The argument for tax breaks as opposed to direct employment provisions is that the private sector is generally more efficient than government is at deciding where to put people to work. In the long run, I agree with this outlook, but there are reasons why it probably isn't the best approach to take in this circumstance. Specifically, a tax break doesn't directly help people who have lost their jobs (you need income before you have to pay taxes). Instead, it depends on entrepreneurs and businesses taking the benefits they get from the tax break and investing it in expanding their operations. And, in the current business environment, no amount of tax breaks are going to get businesses to start meaningful expansions anytime soon. Direct employment (e.g., on infrastructure projects and the like), on the other hand, provides more guaranteed immediate help to people who are out of work, which provides a reasonably reliable boost to consumer spending that trickles through the rest of the economy. But in the long run, government programs to do this tend to outlive their usefulness (For example, the Tennessee Valley Authority was started as part of the New Deal's rural electrification programs, and it is still in existence today for no reason other than that local politicians have been skillful in defending it), and their decisions on what projects to focus on are often woefully inefficient and driven by politics rather than return-on-investment. Also, building low-income housing is a terrible idea right now. Housing prices collapsed because the market is saturated with oversupply.

Fan-freakin'-tastic.

Springsteen -- It's Hard to be a Saint in the City.

Pittsburgh is rightfully favored, and by any objective standard based on their performance so far this season, they should win. I'll probably be rooting for them, if only to restore some sanity to the League. Upsets are fun and all (and I'm certainly glad that my Giants won last year), but if Arizona wins, that would make 4 straight seasons where a team that didn't earn a first-round playoff bye came home with the championship. At some point, either the favorites are going to have to start re-asserting their dominance, or the regular season is going to lose its significance. By that I mean that teams will no longer care about playing for playoff seeding and start mailing their games in the moment they clinch a playoff berth, which would be a terrible thing for people who like to see interesting football games played in December.

Fair point. Widespread famine probably isn't all that likely with regard to China. (Although having sufficient food inside such a large country isn't necessarily the same as having it in the hands of people who need it. Outside the big coastal cities, China's internal infrastructure is not a strongpoint, particularly after last year's earthquake and the resulting floods.) But if they falter in maintaining employment levels because of declining demand for their exports, joblessness/poverty works just as well as a cause for internal strife.