Prosecutorial Immunity

The Supreme Court hears oral argument today on a case about whether prosecutors have absolute immunity from suit for misconduct. The misconduct in this case was criminal - the prosecutors and police actively framed two black teenagers they knew were innocent.

I suspect that the court will grant the prosecutors immunity. And I think that is bullshit. If prosecutors are so worried about getting sued for framing defendants, there is an easy solution - DON'T FRAME DEFENDANTS.

As far as I'm concerned, those police and prosecutors should be in prison for life, no parole, for what they did. As it is, I'm sure none of them will do a single day in jail and they'll probably get this immunity too. There is no justice in our system.

Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize - The Right Wing Will Go Apeshit

I was, of course, shocked, to wake up to the news that Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize. Like many, I was looking for the punchline - was this an April Fool's joke? But no, it is real.

My next thought was, the right-wing nutjobs are going to go apeshit over this. For that reason alone I wish this prize did not happen. The right-wing noise machine is annoying enough on a good day. Oh well, at least I'll get it filtered through Jon Stewart.

Roman Polanksi Raped a Child - Time to move on

As Kate Harding points out, Roman Polanski Raped a Child. But so what? After all, we should be looking forward, not backward. Any attempt to prosecute is just making criminal what is really a political matter (political protest of silly age-of-consent laws).

Time to move on.

Outsourcing Daycare

Gotta love the Onion for looking for a way to leverage the power of outsourcing for my largest expense. If only I were paying only 300 a week for child care.

Dungeons and Dragons Self-Defense

Who needs a gun when you have a sword? Brutal. And with the dismemberment, the sword-wielder must have rolled a "20".

The Public Option is Dead

It was clear from Obama's speech this week that the public option is dead. He is not pushing it. He is not selling it. Democrats are saying they won't even vote for a bill with it in it - I heard Senator Nelson on NPR (a Democrat) saying he would only consider voting for it as part of the bullshit "trigger" option put forward by Olympia Snowe.

So it is dead. To me, there is no reform without a public healthcare system (and the bullshit "co-ops" don't count - those are just another way for private insurance companies to get our money).

Once again, corporate interests and the Republican noise machine dominate. We are fucked. And fuck Obama for not even trying. He gave up on the public option without a fight. Democrats in Congress have also given up without a fight. Progressives yet again must just sit down and shut up and be ignored while the conservative agenda moves full speed ahead.

Revenge is Sweet

My four-year-old daughter likes to take toys away from my 18 month old son. She pulls on him, pushes him down, pushes him out of the way when he's snuggling with mom or dad so she can snuggle, and so forth.

Then this past weekend, my daughter was washing her hands in the bathroom after using it, and I was standing across the room from the door when my son opened up one of my daughter's dresser drawers, grabbed a bunch of her clothes, and then ran into the bathroom. I got there just in time to grab one end of the clothes as my son dumped all of them right into the toilet.

Revenge is sweet when you're a toddler. It is somewhat bitter when you are a parent who just put those same clothes, clean, in the drawer after doing laundry. I guess she deserved it. He is a very patient, sweet little boy and she pushes him hard. We now keep the bathroom door closed all the time. Not that he can't open it, but probably he couldn't with a handful of clothes, and it gives us more time to catch him if he tries to dump anything else into the toilet. Like a phone. (He did that a week ago - into the bathtub when my daughter was in the bath). Ah, the joys of parenthood.