Dear Puerto Rico

I humbly ask that you consider declaring independence. I realize that you may enjoy your position as an unincorporated territory of the United States, but the fact is, our federal government is, to put it nicely, insane. In this day and age, who still lives without representation at all levels of government? (dictatorships don't count!) I think it is only fair for Puerto Rico to take the reins of governing its own country and have the ability to assess and collect taxes and tariffs for its own well-being. Think of all that EEZ that you control and can make money off of. Or how about getting rid of the tariff for Roquefort cheese that Bush II passed out of spite? Such wonders (and more!) await a people that throw off the shackles of Western Imperialism!

(Note that that is not in any way related to my trying to get NSF to give me international travel money to visit your fine state in February for a conference.)

If only the US had this problem.

Apparently, the Netherlands are importing criminals from Belgium because there aren't enough in the Netherlands. (and Belgium is paying them a cool 30 million euros to do so.)

Hmmm, let's see, the Netherlands have 16 million people (according to Wikipedia) and 12,000 criminals in prison. That equates to about 75 detainees per 100,000 in the population.

By comparison, it is 751/100,000 in the US, or about 1% of all adults. Is crime rate actually 10 times higher in the US, or are we 10 times more likely to put people in jail for the crimes they commit (compared to the Netherlands)? My guess is that it is more of the latter than the former, given that the Netherlands has much laxer laws on drugs, which is one of the main causes for the high prison population in the US.

Unfortunately, I'm not convinced that the US will ever change on this, because there's very much a self-righteous view on punishing people for their crimes (rather than rehabilitating them to be useful to society). That, plus the prison union is pretty sizable and has an obvious interest in keeping themselves employed by supporting laws that put more people behind bars for longer.

this is NOT fiscal responsibility

Apparently, the governator intends to take the unconstitutional law on selling violent video games to minors all the way to SCOTUS after having been rejected by the 9th Circuit court of appeals. (via ars technica)

Still, I guess it's chump change compared to the massive amount of bond-based borrowing that was authorized by last year's Prop. 1 to build a high speed rail.

Is this what you call change?

This is exactly what I was worried about when Obama turned around and supported telecom immunity after he said he wouldn't...

From Salon:

But the Obama DOJ demanded dismissal of the entire lawsuit based on (1) its Bush-mimicking claim that the "state secrets" privilege bars any lawsuits against the Bush administration for illegal spying, and (2) a brand new "sovereign immunity" claim of breathtaking scope -- never before advanced even by the Bush administration -- that the Patriot Act bars any lawsuits of any kind for illegal government surveillance unless there is "willful disclosure" of the illegally intercepted communications.

One step forward, one step back...

Why Carbon Sequestration is Probably a Bad Thing

The US Department of Energy is planning to start this week on a large-scale project for carbon sequestration in Illinois. So why is this a bad thing?

Well, let's suppose, in hypothetical candyland where government projects do what they are supposed to, without negative side effects, on-time and on-budget, that this project succeeds. Ok, good for us, we've removed CO2 from the atmosphere. I applaud your efforts DOE.

This does NOT solve the problem of rising energy needs. Rather, I believe the effect may even be in the opposite direction. Psychologically, the idea that CO2 emissions can be reduced "magically" will diminish efforts to change behavior to reduce CO2 emissions in the first place. And that IS a major problem. Fossil fuels WILL run out (or be hideously expensive) within a few decades at current rates of consumption (and growth in consumption). Running out of fossil fuels without the energy infrastructure to replace them is going to cause a major global crisis that will not be resolved easily. Not to mention, petroleum by-products (plastic) have vital uses and are even more important for a lot of products we commonly use.

Climate change is only one of the major global problems that needs to be addressed in the near future (i.e. this century). And CO2 emissions are only one facet of that problem. As reported by Arstechnica from the AAAS meeting, the numbers for replacing fossil-fuel energy production with "renewable" sources is already extremely daunting. The most economical/efficient way to address that problem is to tackle it from multiple directions: improved efficiency (less usage, less waste), increased production from "renewable" sources (e.g. solar, tidal, wind, etc.), and finally carbon-scrubbing to reduce CO2 concentrations back to pre-industrial levels (i.e. 280 ppm atmosphere, and slowly equilibrate the oceans to that level). Introducing a carbon sequestration project is putting the cart before the horse: we should be focusing on the SOURCE of the problem (energy consumption) rather than simply mitigating the aftereffects because it is the most publicly recognized facet of the problem.

But, in the end, I guess Congress is a lot better at punting the problem and buying time, than in spending preemptively to alleviate future problems. Unfortunately, I happen to be one of those young'uns who is going to end up paying for the mistakes of the past. (*cough* war on terror, social security, etc.)

election summary

the good: Obama won a pretty resounding victory. Now the people who previously held the opinion that we HAD to support Bush because he was our president, have no excuse not to support Obama. Then again, pointing out their contradictions (*cough WMD in Iraq *cough) hasn't worked that well in the past.

the bad: it looks like Prop. 8 is going to pass in CA. (I didn't have much hope for the similar amendments in other states.) CA is different, of course, not just because it is generally quite liberal, but because it already granted gays and lesbians the right to marry. This proposition is, in effect, not only taking that right away, but also calls into question, the legality of those marriages that have already occurred. It's still quite shocking to me, that people would vote for this proposition on such ludicrous grounds that it "protects" marriage, when in fact, it is quite literally, going to destroy marriages that currently exist.

Don't give me that bullshit about how the people have spoken, either: the "people" should never be allowed to vote on something as important as the taking away / giving of rights to certain groups of people. It is fundamentally bullying on a state level, that 52% can fuck over a minority group. As pointed out elsewhere, all you have to do is replace gay and lesbian couple with any other minority or non-minority group to see just how discriminatory this proposition is.

the mindboggling: Ted Stevens still has a narrow lead in Alaska, with 99% reporting. Yes, apparently you can still run for US senator, even with 7 felony convictions. You can even still vote in the election, as long as sentencing hasn't occurred yet, according to the Alaska Law Department. I disagree with not allowing felons or ex-felons to vote because I think it's against the spirit of the original US law, but I think if your law says convicted felons can't vote in an election, that should occur when he/she is convicted, not sentenced!

I don't think there is anything in place that actually prevents a felon from being US senator, although the Republican party clearly wants Ted Stevens to step down.

The big question is, of course, can you filibuster from prison?

Oh, you silly Republicans

I see what you are trying to do, Sacramento Republicans. When McCain asks "Who is the real Barack Obama?", lesser people might use wikipedia. But no, Sacramento Republicans, you and I are too nerdy to do that. As TRUE Firefly fans, we turn to the works of Xiang Yu. My only regret is that active volcanoes are hard to come by in California. I guess waterboarding is the next best thing...