I'll always have a warm spot in my heart for the liberal/progressive mindset because I grew up in the immediate aftermath of the 1960's. The era brought lots of changes for the better -- the free speech movement, the expansion of civil rights, Miranda and Gideon -- but the one that most vividly affected me at the time was the abolition of the draft. I was only 8 years old -- … [Read more...] about The Unreal Liberal Argument for Conscription
George Bush is History’s Greatest Monster
George Bush is History's Greatest Monster. No, not W -- he's another matter -- I'm talking about his father.I just finished using an auger to unclog a toilet for what must be the 200th time since we had to replace our old, reliable toilet with one of the low-flow models. We used to have good, working toilets in this country. Reliable toilets. Toilets that we could count on … [Read more...] about George Bush is History’s Greatest Monster
Why Don’t Authors’ Websites List Their Books in the Right Order?
Monday night I finished reading Linda Nagata's far-future epic series The Bohr Maker, Deception Well and Vast back-to-back-to-back, and I wanted to take a break from amazing stories of super-science and find something a little more down to earth, so I looked at my Kindle's recommendations and something about Mark Gimenez's Accused caught my eye. Yeah, a new courtroom drama … [Read more...] about Why Don’t Authors’ Websites List Their Books in the Right Order?
Fighting Crime the Easy Way
Apparently, iPhone theft is a big enough problem in San Francisco that police have come up with a special solution: ...these cops are taking a different approach than just running after iPhone robbers and cuffing them. Instead, they are going after the buyers of the stolen products, in a scheme that they call “cutting the head off the snake”. San Francisco Police Captain Joe … [Read more...] about Fighting Crime the Easy Way
Here Come the Naked Rescuers
Hallandale Beach Police have got a great job: The police officer lay face down on the massage table, on duty, unarmed and naked.For 30 minutes Shu Yuan Sun worked the muscles of the officer's back, his shoulders and legs, and then told him, "Turn over." And that, said Hallandale Beach Police Sgt. Todd Crevier, is when the crime went down. (Went down, get it?) During one … [Read more...] about Here Come the Naked Rescuers