Happy Halloween!

Boo!

Inside Higher Ed has a fun piece about scary Halloween costumes for academics. And of course, yours truly provided the best and most pithy answer.

Someone explain to me why I do NOT need these boots

I know that there's a new Supreme Court nominee--Samuel Alito--and I'm already getting emails from progressive organizations explaining why his conservatism is a threat. I'll have to read up and do a li'l research before posting anything other than "aha, we had Miers and she got scuttled so so much for the idea that we should replace O'Connor with a woman. You get one chance and then, tough shit ladies."

In the meantime, though, I have a truly pressing issue that I need some help with.

Even though these are elegant, comfortable, fully waterproof, salt-proof, AND thermally lined, please explain to me that I shouldn't buy them. Even though I don't actually have a pair of thermal winter boots and I am a tad sick of my feet freezing every winter. I should buy a cheap pair of clunky snow boots rather than these beauties that have a row of crystals that interlock right up the back as you zip them up.

I am in love with them. I've tried them on at a shoestore in Big City, and they look fantastic on me. But I shouldn't spend $400 on gorgeous winter boots, because the price of gorgeous winter boots is outrageous since winter boots are almost always hideous and therefore people who can't bear to wear hideous boots will pay almost anything for good-looking ones, especially if they're also practical and comfortable to wear. I shouldn't give in to my vanity. We have to pay off the $1300 we just spent fixing the car. I should be practical, and get something like these, and join the crowds who lug their decent shoes along to change into once they arrive indoors, or else pretend no one can see below my knees.

Right?

Rosa Parks lying in state

Kathy A. left a link in the previous Rosa Parks comment thread to this Yahoo slideshow. It's pretty nice; pics of her body (well, coffin) lying in state at the Capitol; pics from back during the Civil Rights era (all of which feature women; the descriptions make a point of noting the central role women played in the civil rights movement); pics of the services at the St. Paul AME Church and the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church, both in Alabama. There's even a couple of pictures of Bush looking genuinely moved. Here are some of the pics I liked best.

Here's one of some young people viewing her coffin at the U.S. Capitol. I like the way that their age and their signs, in conjunction with the formality of the occassion, really bring home what her life meant.

These two, both from Detroit, are amazing. I love the idea of an entire city bus system honoring this woman, and all the folks riding the bus automatically knowing who she is and why it matters and respecting the seats that have been set aside. Buses in Alabama also set aside front seats in her honor.

And finally, I really like this and the other images of Rice at the AME service in Montgomery. Much as I dislike the administration she serves in and the role she's played in it, I do appreciate the reminder that she wouldn't be in that position were it not for women and men like Rosa Parks. And that we've come a long way in a very short time when we can have a black woman as secretary of state, one who many people think is a likely presidential candidate in two years--and judge her not by the color of her skin but by our perception of the content of her character and mind--as well as a black woman lying in state at the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. It's a nice aide-mémoir that we live in interesting times for good reasons, too.

Mr. B Posts Verse and Reviews the Initial Indictment

Verse or prose?
Prose or verse.
Verbatim, from Fitzgerald's press release
(http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/iln/osc/documents/libby_pr_28102005.pdf),
2 copy & pastes, only the line breaks were altered.

The obstruction count alleges that
Libby made the following materially false
and
intentionally misleading statements:

When Libby spoke with Tim Russert of NBC
on or about July 10, 2003,
Russert asked Libby if
Libby knew that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA,
and
told Libby that
all the reporters knew it;
and
Libby was surprised to hear that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA;
when, in fact,
Libby knew
Russert did not ask Libby if
Libby knew that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA,
nor did
Russert tell Libby that
all the reporters knew it.
And,
at the time of this conversation,
Libby was well aware that
Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA
and
Libby had participated in multiple prior conversations concerning this topic;

Libby advised Matt Cooper of Time magazine
on or about July 12, 2003, that
he had heard that
other reporters were saying that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA,
and
further advised him that
Libby did not know
whether this assertion was true;
when, in fact,
Libby did not advise Cooper
during that conversation that
Libby had heard
other reporters were saying that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA,
nor did
Libby advise him that
Libby did not know
whether this assertion was true.
Rather,
Libby confirmed to Cooper,
without qualification, that
Libby had heard that
Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA;
and

Libby advised Judith Miller of The New York Times
on or about July 12, 2003,
that he had heard that
other reporters were saying that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA
but
Libby did not know
whether that assertion was true;
when, in fact,
Libby did not advise Miller
during that conversation that
Libby had heard
other reporters were saying that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA,
nor did
Libby advise her that
Libby did not know
whether this assertion was true.


The perjury charge in Count Four alleges that
Libby lied while testifying
under oath before the grand jury
on March 5, 2004,
about his conversation with Russert
on July 10, 2003,
because, in fact,
Russert did not ask Libby if
Libby knew that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA,
nor did
Russert tell Libby that
all the reporters knew it,
and
at the time of their conversation,
Libby was well aware that
Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA.

Count Five charges Libby with perjury
before the grand jury
for allegedly lying when
he said that
he told reporters that
he was telling them what
other reporters were saying
– first, on March 5, 2004,
about his conversation with Cooper
on or about July 12, 2003,
and second,
on March 24, 2004,
regarding conversations with reporters.
In fact,
Libby well knew that
he did not advise Cooper
or other reporters that
he had heard
other reporters were saying that
Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA,
nor did Libby advise Cooper
or other reporters that
he did not know
whether this assertion was true.

---
And now for something completely similar
From Lewis Carroll.

They told me you had been to her
And mentioned me to him;
She gave me a good character,
But said I could not swim.

He sent them word I had not gone,
(We know it to be true);
If she should push the matter on,
What would become of you?

I gave her one, they gave him two,
You gave us three or more;
They all returned from him to you,
Though they were mine before.
 
If I or she should chance to be
Involved in this affair,
He trusts to you to set them free,
Exactly as we were.

My notion was that you had been
(Before she had this fit)
An obstacle that came between
Him, and ourselves, and it.

Don't let him know she liked them best,
For this must ever be
A secret, kept from all the rest,
Between yourself and me.

----

And now, what some of you have been waiting for: Mr. B reviews the indictment.

My initial gut reaction was that the five count indictment against a single person is less than what I expected. My expectation was an indictment on mishandling, specifically illegal disclosure of classified information.

My reaction after carefully reading the indictment and listening to Fitzgerald's news conference is, in the end, satisfaction that so far justice is being served very well by the special counsel, his investigators, his legal team, and the grand jury.

Now, I used to work with classified information, in the military. There revealing classified information to a uncleared person was a very black and white issue. Intent didn't come into it. As someone with a clearance, it was your job, responsibility, and duty to know with certainty what was classified. If you revealed classified information to a person or persons not cleared to receive that information, you were guilty of a crime, whether or not you knew the information was classified, and, whether or not you intended to disclose it to the uncleared persons.

Therefore, I am, or rather was, somewhat at a loss to explain why intent seems to be a lynchpin of Fitzgerald's approach to the prospect of serving an indictment for disclosure of classified information.

In the context of the The Intelligence Identities Protection Act, I get that intent is needed. However, this is a only a specific statute among several. As Fitzgerald points out, whether or not she was "covert" as defined in the IIPA, Ms. Wilson's association with the CIA was a classified fact. Disclosure of classified information is a crime apart from whether that disclosure is also a violation of the IIPA. The disclosure being investigated here may have endangered Ms. Wilson, her associates and her contacts, revealed CIA methods, damaged national security and thereby the security of the public of the US in general.

From Fitzgerald's press release:
"The indictment alleges that Libby had frequent access to classified information and frequently spoke with officials of the U.S. intelligence community and other government officials regarding sensitive national security matters. With his responsibilities for national security matters, Libby held security clearances giving him access to classified information. Libby was obligated by federal criminal statute, regulations, executive orders, and a written non-disclosure agreement not to disclose classified information to unauthorized persons, and to properly safeguard classified information against unauthorized disclosure. "

That sounds exactly like my understanding of classified information security from my experience in the military.

I find that Fitzgerald is putting a lot of weight into the seriousness of the outing of Valerie Plame Wilson as a CIA employee. He states:

"In an investigation concerning the compromise of a CIA officer’s identity, it is especially important that grand jurors learn what really happened. The indictment returned today alleges that the efforts of the grand jury to investigate such a leak were obstructed when Mr. Libby lied about how and when he learned and subsequently disclosed classified information about Valerie Wilson,”

So, even though intent seems to be a lynchpin in a currently hypothetical official indictment for disclosing classified information, Fitzgerald is saying that Libby disclosed classified information and lied about it.

The current unhypothetical indictment is all about just the lies.

And yet the seriousness of these lies is tied to the fact that the investigation was about a national security issue, namely the improper disclosure of Ms. Wilson's being in the CIA.

"The over-arching obstruction of justice count alleges that while testifying under oath before the grand jury on March 5 and March 24 2004, Libby knowingly and corruptly endeavored to influence, obstruct and impede the grand jury’s investigation by misleading and deceiving the grand jury as to when, and the manner and means by which, he acquired, and subsequently disclosed to the media, information concerning the employment of Valerie Wilson by the CIA."

So, while intent seems to be a lynchpin to prosecution of disclosure of classified information, disclosure of classified information is the lynchpin for the seriousness of the crime of lying to the investigation.

An this is contrary to what many have been saying are Republican damage mitigation talking-points which state that Ms. Wilson's outing was no crime as her identity as a CIA agent was already known. Fitzgerald makes no bones about it, saying that her outing was a disclosure of classified information, that it was very damaging to national security, and that this was done knowingly by Libby.

He makes it sound like the kind of thing that a prosecutor would want to prosecute.

So why isn't he?

Clues are few and one must read between the lines at least a little, which is really a fun exercise.

First off, if the indictment of Libby results in a conviction, then what is alleged becomes, for legal purposes, fact. In other words, if in court it is established that Libby said what the reporters said he did, (rather than his alleged lies), then he can be shown to have disclosed classified information. This might then be prosecuted.

Secondly, Fitzgerald makes plain that it is all connected. From a prosecutor's point of view, you indict for what you can. He says, I paraphrase, that if a person commits a crime and is convicted of perjury (committed in relation to investigative and court proceeding stemming from that crime) and yet not convicted (or even charged with) the crime itself, then justice is still served, perjury being a serious crime in itself, with serious penalties.

Thirdly, Fitzgerald says that the statutes which actually make disclosure of classified information a crime are significantly vague and can be potentially variously subjectively interpreted [Lolly Lolly Lolly's, help I'm drowning in adverbs] and that this has meant that there is a dearth of precedence in the court as prosecutors have been and are reluctant to make their cases test cases for the virgin interpretation of a vague set of laws. I infer from this that he is similarly reluctant. He has also stated that some conceivable court interpretations may result in transforming the existing base of statutes regarding unauthorized disclosure of classified information in the US into something like the British Official Secrets Act, and that such a transformation may not be desirable in the US. I read between the lines here that Fitzgerald may not be adverse to seeking an indictment if the case for disclosure of classified information could be made with intent, with knowledge, because if, thereby, the violations of law would not lie within the grey areas of existing statutes, the resulting interpretations of those statutes by the court would thereby, conceivably, not create potentially undesirable precedence, namely it might avoid judicially re-casting the existing US statutes into the mold of the British model. If I am right, then, as in the first case above, the existing indictment may result in a conviction which would then serve as a firm foundation for further charges specific to the disclosure of classified information.

Lastly, Fitzgerald may have sought an indictment for the disclosure as a crime and been turned down by the grand jury. However, I doubt this for two reasons: Fitzgerald implies strongly that he didn't seek such an indictment by his own choice, and, if he had been turned down by the grand jury, I doubt he could have basically stated as fact, within the indictment, that Libby has improperly, in violation of statute, disclosed classified information. The fact that the grand jury approved an indictment that contains this, albeit without it being a count within the indictment, makes me pretty sure the jury does not feel the evidence suggests Libby is innocent of this.

Now all this may be moot. Libby may die in prison without further indictments. According to now non-binding sentencing guidelines, Libby, could serve up to 30 years and owe $1.25 million. As Fitzgerald will be the prosecutor and despite his saying that talk of sentencing is getting ahead of the matter, I believe that all the substance in the indictment that so forcefully states the grave damage to national security by the disclosure of classified information is laying the ground work for Libby to request extreme sentencing when the time comes. Perhaps we saw a foreshadowing of this in Fitzgerald's apparently faulty math when he said Libby could get as many as 50 years. He had just listed a by-the-guidelines maximum sentence of 10 years for obstruction of justice plus 2x5 years for false statements, and 2x5 years for perjury totaling to the aforementioned 30 years, not 50.

50 or 30 years, he may well die in prison. Therefore I am satisfied that justice may be served whether or not he is eventually prosecuted for disclosure of classified information.

Of course, the indictment and potentially a conviction become a crowbar by which Fitzgerald can pry open other closets, if they exist, of course...

Mr. B.

How does Emergency Contraception--including Plan B--work?

Ema explains over at The Well-Timed Period. Which by the way is, imho, one of the very best, if not THE best, expert blogs going: informative, well-written, focused, aware of the larger implications of its subject (she doesn't shy away from politics, but politics isn't the main point--information is). If and when I get around to send her my address so she can send me a copy of her book, I'll review it; I would expect it to be excellent, given the quality of her blog. Here's a link, if you're interested, or you can buy it directy from her site.

Anyway, the point here is that I was wrong. Plan B does not work by preventing implantation. It works by preventing or blocking ovulation. Just like the regular pill. The deal is that you take it on an "emergency" basis b/c, if you have unprotected sex (or are raped) during the time around ovulation, you need to take it asap in order to prevent ovulation if it hasn't already occurred. Read her whole post for much better detail. Bookmark it for linking purposes the next time you get into an argument with someone about whether or not pharmacists (or the FDA) should prevent women from getting it.

Good friday

Ok. So Libby gets indicted for one count of obstructing justice, two of perjury, and two of lying to the FBI. I got home from work about halfway through the press conference, so I have to re-listen to the whole thing (available, by the way, here, via the NYT), but I found Fitzgerald's caution and specificity on the whole question of "why not indict for disclosing a CIA agent's identity" question really interesting. It seems like he's leaving the door open to indict later for release of classified information, but for the time being, given that Libby lied, it's impossible to prove what happened, so only if Libby is found guilty of lying do we have evidence that classified information was released. So, he's neither confirming nor denying that classified information was released illegally (and he certainly seems to be talking about it as if it were), but he's saying that, given that those whose evidence was needed to determine if that happened lied, there's no way to prove it for certain.

Yet.

Mr. B., who watched the whole thing very carefully (and has been glued to C-Span for ages now), has a more careful and detailed argument about all of this, so I think I'll be making the supreme sacrifice of turning the laptop over to him later this afternoon / evening so that he can regale you all with his lecture on the subject. In the meantime, you can get the indictment, Fitzgerald's press release, and a bunch of other info off off Fitzgerald's web site.

I know we all heart the onion

For its clever political commentary. But fuck that. This is probably the most brilliant thing ever written. I laughed 'til I thought I would choke.

I can't help myself...

Obviously I'm a bit giddy this evening, b/c I can't resist this picture. Anyway, on the heels of Sheryl Swoops, now George Takai is now officially publicly out. Apparently he hasn't been exactly closeted for a long time, but hey, I didn't know.

I do have to say, though, for a 68-year old man, he looks damn good. But you've gotta follow the link to see what I mean, b/c here we get Takai in his oiled-up, slightly maniacal Suluesque prime.

Totally playful conspiracy theory

When Fitzgerald issues his indictments, Cheney is included. He resigns, allowing Bush to nominate someone new to fill the VP post, setting up the new VP nicely to run in '08.

Bush nominates Miers.

(Kidding. It would really be Jeb. Run for the hills!)

Brace yourselves

Miers has "withdrawn" her candidacy to SCOTUS. Is it just a coincidence that this happens the day after the WaPo reports that, at least once, she said that that "we gave up" a long time ago on "legislating religion or morality," she said. And "when science cannot determine the facts and decisions vary based upon religious belief, then government should not act"? I kinda doubt it.

So, though I was always suspicious of Miers, I don't think her nomination was withdrawn because of suspicion on the left. Nor do I think it had anything to do with protecting executive privilege or that she did so nobly, over Bush's objections. I agree with Salon on this one: her nomination was scuttled because of a lack of support on the right.

Which means here's the question: will Bush respond to this by nominating a hard-right anti-abortion wingnut to fill O'Connor's seat? Or does he court the center by moving to the left and nominating a moderate who will respect Roe as settled precedent? If he were smart, he'd do the latter. But unlike Miers, I don't think Bush is the smartest man in the world, and I very much fear that he's going to opt to be a divider, not a uniter.

(And isn't it amazing how these SCOTUS surprises always seem to happen just when Rove and Plamegate seem to be the biggest story around?)

Heroine of the week

Sheryl Swoops, who came out today as a lesbian. Here's her ESPN story.

And by the way, did you know that she helped the Comets win their first championship six weeks after giving birth? Take that, Michael Jordan.

Link dump

I've been grossly negligent in posting all the links various folks have sent me: here are some interesting things going on.

1. Tonight, Move On is hosting candlelight vigiils to honor the now 2,000 dead American soldiers in Iraq. You can check here to find out if there's one near you. The Freeway Blogger is also calling for nationwide freeway blogging asking "2K Why?"

2. I've somehow gotten on the press release list for John Conyers--did you know, by the way, that he's got a sometime diary up at Kos? Be sure and check out this entry, which describes a number of newly confirmed security flaws in voting machines. See also out the letter he wrote to the GAO asking them to investigate the impact of the new bankruptcy law--it's available for download on the House Judiciary Committee web site, in the right-hand sidebar, third link down. (Conyers as South Park character found here.) Update: Ben Greenberg points me to Conyers' "real" blog.

3. Camera Obscura has a really interesting post about a little-known provision of the ADA which makes it illegal to fire or discipline someone because of their association with a person who has a disability. So, for example, you can't be not hired because your employer is afraid you'll take too much time off to care for your disabled child. How this would play out if you already had a job and needed, say, flex time to care for the same child, I don't know, but it's an interesting question. Maybe Elizabeth at Half Changed World has something more to say on this?

4. Here's some more charming bullshit from the far right bigots at the American Family Association: they're apparently implying that Walgreen's sponsors the Gay Games because--as we all know--gayness causes AIDS, and Walgreens wants people to get AIDS so that they'll have more customers. Lovely bigot-baiting rationale there, no? So you might want to drop Walgreen's a line either through that link or this one thanking them for supporting the Gay Games. We all get pissed off when the big chains do things wrong; it's worth while to let them know that we notice when they do something right.

5. The House of Representatives is/was supposed to vote today on H.R. 1461, the Housing Finance Reform Act. It supports creation of affordable housing. Good, right? Well, there's a little provision that's been tacked on by the Republican Study Committee to disqualify non-profits from applying for that money if they've engaged in any voter participation activities in the previous year--including non-partisan registering of voters. In other words, this provision ties funding low-income housing to suppressing low-income voting. According to today's House minutes, it looks like a final vote on the bill has been postponed; do contact your Representative to ask them to pass the bill without the RSC provision attached. Update: Sergei was kind enough to do a li'l free lawyering for me and find a pdf of the relevant amendment.

6. Finally, did y'all notice that Salon's got a new women's blog up? You can also find it on their main page, listed in the teeny-tiny "Blog Box" under the main headlines. Of course I am irked that they didn't ask me to do it (hmph!) but on the up side, it's nice to see women/feminist bloggers getting a high profile. Unsurprisingly, just like with every other feminist thing Salon writes (and like some of the kvetching women bloggers have grown not only used to, but bored with), they're getting complaints because, you know, focusing on women's issues is so "narrow" and "divisive." Go give them some love: the editors need to know that the whiny misogynists aren't the only ones out there.

New Get Your War on Up

With lots of news links, even.

Sorry, my religious beliefs require you to bear your rapist's baby

At least, that's the end result of this whole pharmacist's rights bullshit w/r/t Plan B, if it keeps going on: Arizona rape victim denied EC.

What I really love is this:

"We have all kinds of compassion for a rape victim - in that case, Plan B is OK, the church has no problem with it," said Ron Johnson, with the Arizona Catholic Conference, which supports the right of any health-care worker to refuse to dispense emergency contraception and lobbied hard for passage of the Arizona law to allow it.

If you're raped and want to prevent conception, that's fine. But if you're one of those dirty whores who has sex voluntarily, then no.

Look, for the umpteenth time. Plan B is not an abortificant. It prevents conception. So there is no goddamn reason for anyone to refuse to provide it, period. Even the goddamn Catholic Church (I can get away with cursing it, I'm Catholic) allows contraceptive use in some circumstances, and has no position on non-Catholics using contraception.

So get over this bullshit about pharmacist's "consciences" and hand out the goddamn pills, already.

Rosa Parks, dead at 92.

This is a very sad passing. I met her once, when I was a very young girl--the school I attended until fourth grade was, I believe, one of the first named after MLK Jr., and both Parks and Coretta Scott King came out to visit it. I don't remember anything Parks said, but I do remember knowing who she was and that meeting her was a very big deal.

Here's a picture I've always really liked, taken in 1956 right after the Supreme Court declared discrimination on public transportation unconstitutional.

NYT obituary.

Detroit Free Press obituary.

WaPo obituary.

A 1995 interview with Parks.

Nice gallery of photos from the WaPo.

"I hate men"

But I have to admit, this is damn funny. PNSFW--the graphics are innocuous (don't let the kids see it, or they'll want to listen to the song), but the song is, well, you have to just listen to it.

Miscellanea

1. Yes, Haloscan commenting is kaput at the moment. No idea why. The haloscan forums are all griping about it, though, so presumably the haloscan people are working on it. Update: All fixed now. Comment away.

2. Thanks for all the email! Yes, after sleeping on it (and reading all your emails--this blog thing is better than a magic 8-ball!) I am applying for the job. It's precisely the kind of job I'm interested in (and was applying for this summer)--I'm not unqualified by any stretch, just a tad underqualified by the specifics of this particular job announcement. We shall hope that my case for why it is precisely the kind of job I want, and the fact that I have had a particular interest in this campus since its (fairly recent) inception, will help put me on the "interview" pile.

3. Did you all see today's First Person article on trailing spouses in the Chronicle? Truly, one of--if not the best First Person article I've ever read. Very sound advice, imho, for trailing spouses, junior faculty, women, folks from non-academic backgrounds, people of color, etc. In other words, anyone who is inclined to underestimate themselves academically.

4. Are you in or around Boston? There's a rally tomorrow at the statehouse to support the in-state tuition bill, a Massachussets version of the national push for the DREAM act: a law that would grant undocumented students who have been in the U.S. for five years (three years at a Mass. high school, plus graduation for the Massachussets bill) in-state tuition, contingent on their filing for legal permanent residency. If you live in Mass but can't attend the rally, you can still contact your legislators. Laws like this help erase the invisible lines that keep poor students and students of color in low-wage, low-status jobs; by letting kids who've grown up in the state pay lower in-state tuition, this law would help make higher education available to all the smart, ambitious students in the state--and, as a consequence, it'll add to the educated human capital that collectively benefits us all.

Ok, back to job applications now.

A question

Should I apply for a job I'd love, at a university I'd give my eye teeth to be at, for which:

(1) the original closing date was about 10 days ago, although they "will review late applications at the discretion of the committee" and the position is listed as "open until filled";

(2) they want to hire an assoc. or full professor;

(3) they want someone with more experience than I currently have in a subfield in which I have a fair bit of practical experience, but virtually no training.

I seriously doubt that I'd make the cut, but I'm really tempted to apply anyway, b/c this would be such a dream job for me.... whaddya think? Worth a shot, or waste of time?

Oh, Kay!

D'you think Kay Bailey Hutchinson's head is spinning?

10/23/05: "I certainly hope that if there is going to be an indictment that says something happened, that it is an indictment on a crime and not some perjury technicality where they couldn’t indict on the crime so they go to something just to show that their two years of investigation were not a waste of time and dollars."

02/12/99: "Lying is a moral wrong. Perjury is a lie told under oath that is legally wrong. To be illegal, the lie must be willfully told, must be believed to be untrue, and must relate to a material matter. Title 18, Section 1621 and 1623, U.S. Code.

If President Washington, as a child, had cut down a cherry tree and lied about it, he would be guilty of `lying,' but would not be guilty of `perjury.'

If, on the other hand, President Washington, as an adult, had been warned not to cut down a cherry tree, but he cut it down anyway, with the tree falling on a man and severely injuring or killing him, with President Washington stating later under oath that it was not he who cut down the tree, that would be `perjury.' Because it was a material fact in determining the circumstances of the man's injury or death.

Some would argue that the President in the second example should not be impeached because the whole thing is about a cherry tree, and lies about cherry trees, even under oath, though despicable, do not rise to the level of impeachable offenses under the Constitution. I disagree.

The perjury committed in the second example was an attempt to impede, frustrate, and obstruct the judicial system in determining how the man was injured or killed, when, and by whose hand, in order to escape personal responsibility under the law, either civil or criminal. Such would be an impeachable offense. To say otherwise would be to severely lower the moral and legal standards of accountability that are imposed on ordinary citizens every day. The same standard should be imposed on our leaders.

Nearly every child in America believes that President Washington, as a child himself, did in fact cut down the cherry tree and admitted to his father that he did it, saying simply: `I cannot tell a lie.'

I will not compromise this simple but high moral principle in order to avoid serious consequences to a successor President who may choose to ignore it."




Tip o' the bloghat to Sisyphus Shrugged.

“This book is like an ungrateful girlfriend."

Via M. le Apostropher, hilarious one-star Amazon reader reviews of classic novels from that Time's Best Novels since 1928 list.

Although I kinda have to admit that the guy who reviews The Great Gatsby has a point. I've never really liked that novel.

Chez bitch

Scene: We are playing Mousetrap. Pseudonymous Kid has wandered off to go to the bathroom for the third time. I am still in my pajamas. I've been cranky and tired for a couple of days. This may have something to do with needing to get rolling on academic job applications, like, now.

Mr. B.: I'm worried about you. You seem more depressed the last couple of days.
Me: I think I hate the weekends. Please go wipe his ass so we can finish playing this stupid game.
Mr. B. (giggling): There's that spark I love about you!

I heart Patrick Fitzgerald

What is this man thinking? No one knows quite yet, but check out the product of a clever, perhaps slightly mischievious mind at work. Yesterday, with no announcment that I am aware of, Fitzgerald put up a website. So far, it merely provides the documents that grant him his powers in this case. Keep a close eye on it, though: Fitzgerald, quiet as he's been until now, is obviously aware of the court of public opinion.

The grand jury expires next Friday, so whatever is going to happen will happen this week. I dunno about you, but I am sitting on the edge of my seat. And Fitzgerald's surprise little opening act here has me grinning from ear to ear.

Happy birthday, Pseudonymous Kid

We are the luckiest parents in the world. Pseudonymous Kid had requested a mouse-shaped cake for his bday; yesterday, the oven stopped working. Today, he woke up a little grumpy because his birthday was on a school day, but cheered up when I asked him if he wanted to go downstairs and open presents before school.

He took cupcakes to school (baked before the oven crapped out) and party invites for his upcoming party. When I picked him up at school today, he reported that everyone liked the cupcakes. There was one left, and he said, "oh wait, Mama, I want to take this cupcake to the woman in the front office," so he took it to the school secretary.

Then I took him to my afternoon class with me (Mr. B. had a doctor's appointment). He sat quietly through the entire hour and a half, watching Monsters Inc. He had quite a civil conversation after class with one of my students, who asked about his mouse drawing, and they also discussed black holes. Mr. B. called just before we left for home to ask if we wanted to eat in or go out, and I asked PK which he preferred, and he opted to go out for Vietnamese food.

On the way home, he changed his mind and asked to go for sushi.

On the way back from sushi, we stopped at the grocery store to buy a birthday cake, which would obviously not be mouse-shaped. Pseudonymous Kid, again of his own volition, opted for a cheesecake with fresh glazed fruit (kiwis, strawberries, and blueberries) on top.

Then we came home to put candles on the cheesecake, sing happy birthday, and play both Mousetrap and Candyland, which I'd promised to do this evening (he got both for his bday--he's in a big games phase). He won Mousetrap, I won Candyland--and he didn't throw a fit over my winning, or over my refusing to play again (since it was about 11 pm).

I surprised him by presenting him with treats I found at a fancy chocolate store--a chocolate rat and three mouse-shaped truffles. He was genuinely surprised and pleased and thought they more than made up for not having a mouse-shaped cake. Much to my and Mr. B.'s surprise, he ate one of the truffles, then soberly presented one to me and the final one to Mr. B.

He brushed and flossed his teeth on his own, as per an earlier agreement that "after his birthday, he would be old enough to do it." He actually did a remarkably thorough job, brushing for several minutes.

Then he played with his new magnet kit for a little while, until it was time for bed, when he went to bed without protest.

So: I have a kid who, offered his choice of dinner and dessert, opts for sushi and cheesecake with fresh fruit; who can sit quietly through an hour and a half seminar; who is gracious enough to remember that he should share treats with the school secretary; who is finally old enough not to have a tantrum when he loses at a game, and to brush and floss his own teeth; and who considers sharing sweets a matter of course.

I really couldn't be any more pleased with him. What a great kid he is, and how lucky I am.

WTF is going on?

Miers gets asked to resubmit her questionnaire for the SCOTUS, b/c her first set of answers was inadequate.

Tom DeLay gets arrested.

Things are fixin' to bust wide open on the Rove / Plamegate affair any day now.

The only FEMA official who was in New Orleans when the hurricane hit is now saying that the official response was appalling and that an aide of Michael Brown's responded to one email saying the situation was a crisis by saying that Michael Brown had reservations for dinner.

Colin Powell's former chief of staff says that the "Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal" has made the country less, not more safe.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is apparently grilling Condoleeza Rice.

Carnivalesque

If you think feminists do go on, try the Teaching Carnival--that's one heck of a reading list.

I expect everyone to have finished it all by Monday. Yes, there will be a quiz.

Announcing...

The first blog Carnival of the Feminists. Lots of good links, including one by yours truly. Go check it out.

PK was bad (but he redeemed himself)

This morning, PK and I were wrestling, and he bit me--HARD. Hard enough to break the skin and leave a very sore set of teeth marks on my forearm that have been hurting all damn day. He knows he's not supposed to bite, but sometimes he does in these wrestling games. Not really to be mean, but out of excitement, although of course the point is that his motives are irrelevant as Biting is Bad. So I whacked his butt a couple of times, instinctively, to get him to let go, and he did, and I showed him the bite, and he was instantly very quiet.

Pseudonymous Kid: I'm sorry, Mama.
Me: It really hurts. You know you're not supposed to bite.
Pseudonymous Kid: I know, I'm sorry. (Hides under the covers.) I'm not going to tell my father about this.

Silence ensues. PK is hiding, ashamed, and I'm still pissed. Enter Mr. B.

Mr. B. (Cheerfully): Hey PK, are you dressed yet? Do you want to come downstairs and watch a little kid's tv before school?
Pseudonymous Kid (Coming out from under the covers): Okay, sure.
Mr. B. You are dressed! Good boy. Ok, let's go fix you breakfast.
Pseudonymous Kid (Under his breath): Papa's being nice to me, at least. (Glances at me.)

I say nothing, giving him instead a very sober-faced "look." PK and Mr. B. continue to chit-chat while I get out of bed and put on my slippers. I think it is dawning on PK that I am not going to tattle on him.

Mr. B.: C'mon PK, time to go downstairs.
Pseudonymous Kid: Papa, I have to tell you about something I did.
Mr. B.: Something you did? What? Did you upset Mama? She's kind of quiet.
Pseudonymous Kid (Quietly): I bit mama.
Me: Oh, PK, I am so proud of you. That's really hard to admit, and you did the right thing to tell Papa. (I give him a hug.)
Mr. B.: You bit mama? Did you say you were sorry?
Pseudonymous Kid (still ashamed): Mama, I'm sorry.
Me: Yes, you said you were sorry before too. Thank you. (I show Mr. B. the bite.)
Mr. B.: Ow! That's a really bad bite!
Me: Yes, I know, it hurts. PK, you must really never bite. But it's really hard to admit when you've done something bad, so that was a really good thing to do.
Pseudonymous Kid: I didn't want to tell Papa because I was afraid he wouldn't let me watch kid's tv.
Mr. B.: You were?
Pseudonymous Kid: Or you would be really mad.
Mr. B.: Well, you shouldn't have done that, but Mama's right: it was good of you to admit it. Let's go downstairs and get breakfast and watch a little kid's tv.
Pseudonymous Kid: Is that okay, Mama?
Me: Sure, go ahead. I love you, buddy.

The little shit. I am honestly proud of him, I didn't think he was going to tell Mr. B. My arm still hurts, though.

Miers is bad news

Finally, we have some evidence of what we've suspected: Harriet Miers pledged support in 1989 for a constitutional amendment banning abortions. Although the White House, and Miers herself, are attempting to plant the seeds of reasonable doubt--""A candidate taking a political position in the course of a campaign is different from the role of a judge making a ruling in the judicial process." said Jim Dyke, a White House spokesman", and according to Chuck Schumer, "She said nobody knows my views on Roe v. Wade. Nobody can speak for me on Roe v. Wade" (first link)--this seems to me very clear evidence that we should oppose her confirmation with all our power. To my knowledge, even Roberts never said anything that so clearly indicated his desire to eliminate Roe v. Wade.

"If Congress passes a Human Life Amendment to the Constitution that would prohibit abortion except when it was necessary to prevent the death of the mother, would you actively support its ratification by the Texas Legislature," asked an April 1989 questionnaire sent out by the Texans United for Life group.

Miers checked "yes" to that question, and all of the group's questions, including whether she would oppose the use of public moneys for abortions and whether she would use her influence to keep "pro-abortion" people off city health boards and commissions.

For the time being, abortion is still a Constitutionally-protected right: the current Court, under Roberts, refused to allow Missouri to overturn a federal judge's ruling that the Missouri prison system must transport a prisoner in order to achieve an abortion. "Jane Roe" has been seeking a second-trimester abortion because the prison has been stalling since she first requested the procedure late in the first trimester. Putting the lie to the claim that the state's resistance to her abortion was motivated by its reluctance to spend $350 to transport her, "Gov. Matt Blunt expressed disappointment and said the high court's order "is highly offensive to traditional Missouri values and is contrary to state law, which prohibits taxpayer dollars from being spent to facilitate abortions." Notice that that "state law" excuse, like all such arguments about spending "taxpayer dollars," is essentially an afterthought, an attempt to rationalize refusing someone their rights on the grounds that rights are only as deep as one's pocketbook.

And that's the issue in a nutshell. If we believe that the rights we recognize as Americans extend to all Americans, we have to oppose Miers and all those who, in the name of "judicial conservatism," would prevent the United States court system from protecting American rights.

This kind of shit is why the Supreme Court matters so much

Missouri officials are arguing that an incarcerated woman who needs an abortion can't have one--because providing transportation for her is an unnecessary expense, takes two guards away from their regular duties and may delay transit for other inmates with medical needs. That's right: her medical needs are less important than the medical needs of other inmates. Why? Well, because she's a pregnant woman, of course!

Despite the fact

that courts have repeatedly upheld inmates' access to abortions.

Nixon's office has argued that the policy would not harm Roe or impose an "undue burden."

"It is not the prison that has imposed the burden, but the prisoner's violation of the law that resulted in her incarceration that has imposed the burden," Assistant Attorney General Michael Pritchett wrote.

Though of course, really, the point is that we loooove the babies so much:

"And, even if the result were plaintiff carrying her child to term, it ought not be held that this result - having a child - is a harm at all, much less an irreparable one," the filing says.

Because the "medical, financial, and psychological risks" thatthe plaintiff's attorney points out are associated with pregnancy aren't harms at all.

Where do the Supremes come in? So glad you asked. Clarence Thomas--"acting alone"--blocked the judge's order that she receive transportation for medical treatment "pending a further decision by himself or the full court." Of course, since she's 16 or 17 weeks along, and Missouri doesn't allow abortions after 22 weeks, she's got about a month to wait for Thomas or the entire Supreme Court to get off their asses and make a decision.

What'll happen if she has the baby? Well, if her pregnancy is healthy and the birth isn't too difficult--that is, if she doesn't develop high blood pressure, diabetes, or any other life-threatening complications, and if she and the baby don't require major surgery or emergency interventions--then the baby will, one assumes, be placed in foster care. And we all know how wonderful foster care for infants is. Of course, I suppose if the baby is lucky enough to be white, and the mother is motherly enough and/or unmotherly enough to be willing to place it for adoption, it might be adopted. If it's black, chances are a lot slimmer. But hey, no harm done as long as the baby emerges from the womb alive. What happens to the mother in getting it there, or to the baby afterwards, is just tough shit and can't possibly be considered harmful in any way.

Gah, it makes my blood boil. All the woman needs--her family has agreed to pay for the abortion, since the state of Missouri won't--is $350 for transportation. But I guess that, despite her right to medical treatment, she's not entitled to actually *get* the medical treatment unless she can pay for it herself.

Welcome to the new America, where you've only got rights if you can afford to pay for 'em.

'Course, they're also doing their best to make sure little girls grow up ignorant of their rights, even if their parents can pay for them.

American Girl, manufacturer of a highly popular line of dolls and children's books, has become the target of conservative activists threatening a boycott . . . directed at an ongoing American Girl campaign in which proceeds from sales of a special "I Can" wristband help support educational and empowerment programs of Girls Inc., a national nonprofit organization which describes its mission as "inspiring girls to be strong, smart and bold."

And god forbid that the haves in any way try to ensure that the have nots think of themselves as having rights.

Girls Inc., which traces its roots back to a center founded in Waterbury, Conn., in 1864, serves about 800,000 girls a year, many of them black or Hispanic and most from low-income families.

The "advocacy" page on its Web site lists some of the positions that roused conservative ire — for example a clear endorsement the 1973 Roe v. Wade court decision establishing a woman's right to abortion.

Girls Inc. also supports a girl's right to have access to contraception and pledges support for girls dealing with issues of sexual orientation.

So let's just sum up. You have the right to medical care, for now, only if you can pay for it. You have the right to contraception, abortion, and sexual freedom--for now--but they'll do their best to deny funding to any organization that tries to tell you about those rights.

And people say that we don't need feminism any more. God damn, I'm glad I'm going to that Emily's List luncheon tomorrow.

Crying at the movies

It's the latest meme, apparently.

And it reminds me of my favorite crying-at-the-movies story. The first movie we took Pseudonymous Kid to was a revival of Singing in the Rain--he even brought his own little-kid umbrella. He was entranced and behaved really well throughout the whole film, until the big scene where Gene Kelly dances in the rain...

Right at the end of the scene, you'll recall, he hands his folded umbrella to the beat cop, who opens it as Kelly walks away, "just dancin'... and singin'... in the rain."

Pseudonymous Kid BAWLED. I had to grab him up and swoop him out to the lobby.

Me: "Pseudonymous Kid! What in the world is wrong?!?"
Pseudonymous Kid, sobbing: He.... lost..... his....... UMBRELLA!!!! It's so SAD!!!

More on Harriet Miers

Ok, I'll totally admit that yes, just because she is Bush's nominee, I am suspicious as hell. Screw the idea that we're supposed to "reserve judgment": the current administration's record on many of the constitutional issues I care about does not incline me to trust first and ask questions later.

And what little hints are coming out don't incline me to think the answers to the questions that will surely not be answered would be ones I'd like to hear. Salon and the NYT point out that James Dobson (you know, that Focus on the Family guy) is behind Miers, following a phone call from the White House about which he declared, "Some of what I know I am not at liberty to talk about." Dobson knows something we don't know, and he likes it. The friend of my enemy is not my friend.

And now Bush has this whole argument that he's nominated her in part because of her religious beliefs--although later the White House denied that her religion had any role in her nomination.

So I have to, for once, disagree with Scott Lemieux on this Miers question. His argument makes sense from the point of view of a legal scholar, and he may well be right. But I am wondering if, on the contrary, it might not be the case that an true believer who isn't a great legal mind--which is what I suspect Miers is--might not be far more dangerous, precisely because she will have the power to rule without the intelligence or background to respect either the precedents or the consequences that form the context for her ruling. Also, in terms of preparing cases to go before a court, if you know how the judges you're presenting to think, and you also trust that--whether or not you like the way they think--they have a judicial philosophy that is, at least, consistent and rigorous, then you can prepare arguments to appeal to that. If you've got someone who, as Miers is reported to have done, will generously agree to meet with people she disagrees with, listen to their arguments, and then simply dismiss them by saying that she doesn't agree--without giving you anything to go on about why she doesn't agree, or how to address the premises she uses to form judgments with--then there's nowhere to go. I very much fear that, as a judge, Miers will play the role of the fundamentalist you argue with about evolution or feminism or the ACLU, someone who no matter what evidence you present them with, simply says, "no, those things are wrong and evil because I believe they are."

And I think that having someone in power who is not amenable to reason is very dangerous indeed.

Looking for something awful to read?

I just finished reading We Need to Talk About Kevin. Jesus christ, is this a terrifying novel. Oh, it's good--it's fantastic, even. But it's creepy as hell.

I read it because both Flea and Elizabeth did, and they both said it was good--but they had different reads of it. Flea thought that the mother in the novel was basically a good mother--she did everything she "should" have, at enormous sacrifice--and that her dislike of her son was the honest kind of self-revelation that mothers are so seldom allowed. Elizabeth thought that the narrator wasn't a good mother. I can't find either of their original posts, alas, so I can't really say more about their arguments, but that dichotomy stuck with me, so I picked the book up about a week ago.

In contrast to both Flea and Elizabeth, I think that the question of whether or not the narrator is a good mother is, as she herself says towards the end, the wrong question. How do we define "good mother"? Doesn't the definition depend on the child? On the mother? On their own specific, particular relationship? We can't define it, really; the entire novel, really, consists (in part) of the mother asking herself that question, and in the end neither she nor we can answer it.

The real question the novel wants asked is the question that all parents know and that all children ask: why? In fact, as the novel makes clear, this isn't just a question for kids. It's the question we all ask when children turn out "badly," or even when they turn out well: why did we get this result? What did we do, or not do, right? Why is Pseudonymous Kid a really adventurous eater? Is it, as I like to think, because his papa and I have always taken him to restaurants and made a point of never, ever saying "are you sure you'll like that," of warning him away from trying new foods? Maybe. Or maybe it's just his nature. Who the hell knows. Why do some children grow up to be murderers? Is it because they were, say, beaten as children? Perhaps, sure--but then, a lot of children are beaten and tortured and don't grow up to be murderers. The reality, we all know, is that the "whys" of human behavior are extremely complex.

So in a sense, like the "is she a good mother" question, the "why" question doesn't really have an answer. But the thing about "why" is that, unlike "is she a good mother," it isn't a yes or no question. Answering it doesn't shut off discussion; it just continues it. The novel points that out, too, in a long sequence where the narrator surmises that children ask the series of "whys" not because they really want an answer, but because they want a conversation. Which leads to the other great thing about this novel: it's a novel about the process of trying to understand, of trying to create a story that's coherent and makes sense, of trying to create meaning, to construct causality. So that what's really horrifying about the novel in the end--and really great, too--is that it fails to answer its own question: we end up, like the narrator, not really having an answer to why Kevin becomes a killer. The novel, like Kevin, shocks us in part by not giving us the explanation we want, by eluding a kind of closure. Kind of like sudden death: it's just there, and the shock and senselessness of it is a big part of what's so awful.

Which makes it, of course, a pretty modern (postmodern?) novel--which it also gives us clues about, with the narrator's comments on American culture, on her ultra-American husband, and on her own ultra-American anti-Americanness. It's very much of its time and place, not only because of the subject matter, but also because it's so self-conscious; but what's really nice, even fresh, about its self-consciousness is that it isn't deploying the usual metafictional tricks (which, as much as I like postmodern metafiction, are kind of easy to spot by now). It reads like a good old-fashioned page turner, a genre novel anyway (horror). It draws you in.

And I'm not really sure if, in the end, it lets you go.

The wages of too much coffee and late-night grading is the death of reason

Last night: another hyper-detailed dream (but not very realistic). Adam Kotsko and I need to borrow PZ Myers' bunsen burner in order to make cookies out of some vinyl tiles we've pried from Bureinato's porch steps. Michael Bérubé comes along for the ride, in the capacity of wise fool. Riding on the bus, where frat boys are playing some elaborate practical joke involving sheep, I realize that I have missed my calculus final and will therefore fail calculus again. Bérubé tries to reassure me by making a joke out of it, but I am upset because, in fact, I am quite good at calculus, although I am forced to admit that I haven't attended a single class and would probably have failed anyway. The cookies turn out very crispy, yet slightly nauseating. We have to take a long trip by jet plane, in which we have to walk along one of the engines mid-flight. The woman who works the late-afternoon cafeteria shift at my university plays the Greek chorus, making amusingly sardonic remarks. I owe Myers $26.

Then in the dream itself, I wake up, think "I must write this dream down," and live it all over again, although this time Kotsko's role is played by a childhood family friend who was (and remains) very much like an older brother to me.

I still have five more papers to grade, quickly, before class.

October is breast cancer awareness month

And it's got nothing to do with pink ribbons.

This is what breast cancer is about.

Here's a place to start doing research on the latest news related to breast cancer: disease, diagnosis, treatment.

Here is an animated explanation of how to do self-exams. Do them. If, like me, you forget, order yourself a free shower card to help remind you.

October 21 is National Mammography Day. Call and schedule a mammography for yourself. And / or encourage your wife, sister, girlfriend, daughter, to do so.

Wanna donate to breast cancer research or activism? Think Before you Pink.

What's the secret to academic success?

1. Don't procrastinate; start work early, do a little at a time, take a break. This is what we tell students.

2. Procrastinate like your life depended on it; collect a set of essays, plan to grade some of them Tuesday night, but don't; plan to start grading Wednesday morning; but don't; plan to get started Wednesday afternoon, but take your kid shopping for shoes instead; realize that it's 7:30 pm and you have to get them all graded by tomorrow morning because the students have to revise the fuckers over the weekend and will need their papers back, obviously, to do so. This, of course, is what we actually do.

Corallary to (2): Make yourself a big ol' pot of coffee. Especially if you're a fucking idiot who was up 'til 3 am last night because you drank coffee.

Note to self

Coffee after dinner is a lovely tradition.

It is also a REALLY BAD IDEA.

Next time, order decaf.

Academic girlfriends

Head on over to Three & Eight's place--she's got a really rousing speech up there on the importance of women's networking and partnership in academia. And to her great credit, she means "all women -- no matter if our work is as a faculty member or an administrator, a researcher or a policy wonk." It's a great, uplifting piece, and right around this time of the semester, don't we all need a li'l inspiration?

I like squirrels

Now 'tis the season of high squirrel activity. The little buggers are running all over the neighborhood, up and down the light poles and trees, peering in our windows, digging around in the yard, frustrating the cat. The entire neighborhood is filled with the little scraping sound of squirrel teeth chewing, chewing, chewing on whatever they can get their little furry paws on: walnuts, chesnuts, whatever those little berry things that grow in our front yard are, even garbage. I sit out on the porch in the morning with coffee and a cigarette and the background noise: scritch-scritch-scritch.

They're damn cute, the squirrels. I don't want to hear any of that "rats with furry tails" crap; yeah, it sucks when they chew through your screen, crawl into the house, and steal the bread off the table (as one very clever beastie did last year, much to PK's delight), and it's frustrating, I suppose, if you're trying to feed birds, to have the squirrels bogart all the good seeds. But look at that little guy: isn't he as adorable as they come?

And I like their sassy, bratty little attitudes, too. Inevitably if I go into the backyard, there's some squirrel up in one of the neighbor's trees, or walking along the fence, that stops to scold my ass for intruding upon its sacred squirrel space. Furry tail jerking back and forth, sitting up on hind legs, bossing me: etta-etta-etta! They boss the cat, too, who ignores them as beneath her dignity. Really, of course, they fascinate her: she stares at them, fixated, when she's inside and they're sitting, less than a foot away, out the dining room window gnawing on whatever those dang berries are. But outside, she's learned to her embarrassment that catching squirrels is beyond her skill, so she pretends she doesn't hear them when they bitch about her presence. The dog next door isn't quite so composed, and he growls and barks and sometimes you can hear him scrabbling on the porch trying to catch a particularly brave squirrel that's decided to take the shortest route between houses. The cat ignores the dog, too; idiot animal that doesn't know better than to make a fuss over things he can't do anything about.

I don't ignore them, though. Sometimes I talk back to them, and I always watch to see what they're doing. This morning one ran, walnut in mouth, across Joe's roof, along a wire, to the utility pole, then down, bouncing across the street to someone's yard where it proceeded to bury its finding. Then it bounced back and climbed to the top of the utility pole on the corner and sat there, furry tail blowing in the wind, master of all its little squirrel eyes could survey.

Depression update

Effexor rox. Apparently I am one of the few lucky people for whom it has no significant side effects: a li'l dry mouth, a li'l shaky leg while I ramped up to full dosage, that's about it. The only thing that's bigger than that is this whole "vivid dream" side effect. When the doctor warned me about it, I thought, no big deal--unless they're nightmares, which might kinda suck. Well, they're not nightmares, but they do kind of suck for an unexpected reason: I spend all night having incredibly vivid dreams about incredibly mundane things--updating my class pages on WebCT, finding out that the vacuum cleaner has heretofore unrealized features, reading web pages, discussing travel plans with Mr. B., loaning a book to Ben Wolfson--only to wake up and not be able to remember if those things were true. After I think about it for a bit, I can separate the dream from the reality, so that's not the big deal. The big deal seems to be that because, as far as I can tell, I am dreaming about these weirdly normal events all night long, I'm not really getting any non-REM sleep, or something, and as a result I feel like I've been waking up all night, even though I'm sleeping more than usual (but less than I do when I'm not on the drugs).

Of course, part of the sleeping thing could itself be a side effect, although it feels like it's related to the weird dream-thing. It could also be related to the fact that fall is upon us--a particularly nice fall for this part of the world; we're mostly still having sunny clear days that aren't even particularly cold--and the days are shorter. After returning from Grandma's funeral, I was definitely exhausted for several days, which I chalked up to weird mid-semester travel. But I don't really seem to be recovering from it, and I've been sleeping later and later and I can feel my mood and engagement with the world sliding again. I see the psychopharmacologist this week again, and I imagine he'll up the dose. I also plan to ask him about what the steps would be for taking medical leave of absence from work. I don't want another semester like the last one, which was absolutely hellish, and though I'm not there yet and in fact my classes seem to be going pretty well, it's getting harder and harder to drag myself out of bed and I don't want to end up back where all my energy is focused on showing up for class, leaving none for anything else (like showering and getting dressed on the weekends).

But all in all things are a lot better. Yay Effexor. I'm not, however, really up to having anything to say about the flooding in Guatemala, the earthquakes in Pakistan, or the bombings in Bali. There's been an incredible number of terrorist attacks in Indonesia in the last few years; while Bush prances about talking about how we've avoided attacks here at home, you'd think he might have something to say about that, but no. Then again, neither do I, apparently, although thankfully I'm not the leader of the free world, so-called.

Back to depression. You absolutely must read this book. Here's a website where you can download the first chapter and read some of the other essays the author has written. Seriously: if you are depressed, if you know someone who's depressed, if you're interested in the political and social context of mental health, or even if you're just interested in the human condition, I can't recommend it too highly. It's one of the best books I've read in ages. It's kind of a memoir, kind of sociology, kind of cultural studies, kind of a history, kind of a medical treatise. The author, Andrew Solomon, writes absolutely beautifully, on top of everything else; I kept finding myself pausing to admire a turn of phrase or a particularly lovely metaphor or an especially well-worked sentence. The chapters on depression and poverty and depression and politics were especially interesting: in them, I think, lies a new way of bridging political divides about poverty--the poor are lazy and should help themsevles, the poor are victims of circumstance and need more government intervention. Solomon points out that the rate of depression among the poor is twice that of the general population, and argues that even with programs in place, the depressed are often too ill to take advantage of them. He tells several amazing stories of people whose lives were incredibly, shockingly miserable, who got treatment for depression and ended up outshining Horatio Alger; apparently, in an early essay on the subject, his editor told him to take some of the stories out because they were too incredible to be plausible.

But he grapples with the arguments about depression honestly; the book explores both sides of the deinstitutionalization argument, has a full chapter on alternative, non-pharmacological approaches to treating depression, engages fairly with debates about the pharmaceutical industry. He foregrounds his own prejudices (his father worked for drug companies) and frequently concludes by saying that he doesn't really know the answer, but only after having honestly examined as much evidence as he can muster from many different angles.

And speaking of neurological weirdness, PK amazed even me the other day when we went to the bookstore and he picked out The Great Brain Book as the book he really wanted to buy. I thought, there aren't a ton of pictures, it's too advanced for him, but he insisted: and darn if he isn't actually paying attention and understanding it as we read a chapter or two to him at bedtime every night. Unexpected bonus: it's made it easier to talk to him about what's going on when mama's depressed, because the concepts of neurochemistry--and the reality that there are a lot of things we don't know yet about how the brain works--are unfolding for him.

Of course, that doesn't prevent him from thinking it's funny to pour salt in my coffee, but one step at a time.

This'll keep you busy over the weekend

Chris at Explananda just provided the link that will eat up most of my free time in the short-term future: Best of Craig's List.

Here's a sample

So there are all these crazy rumors all over the place that Rehnquist is going to resign tomorrow. Sandy Day was one thing - there was hope that Bush might put in a Kennedy-style swinger, and we'd all be safe in our liberal beds - but now that there are going to be two vacancies on the SCOTUS, i just can't hold back any longer:

PLEASE IMPREGNATE ME SO THAT I CAN ABORT A FETUS WHILE I STILL CAN....

Definitive proof that I am insane

I just bought a plane ticket to go to this.

The event itself isn't crazy: Emily's List is an awesome organization. It's crazy because I'm running off, yet *again*, in the middle of the semester, for a secret event for my second, part-time, unacknowledged "job." I feel like I'm having an affair or something. Open marriage: fine and easy. Open employment: not so much! Thankfully my teaching schedule this semester means I can get away with this without cancelling classes, but this double life is starting to wear on me....

That said, I'm totally psyched.

Winning hearts and minds on the abortion question

Reader Carol sent me a link to this column, in which Dear Abby, of all people, says she doesn't support parental notification laws. Now, I don't know anything about Abigail Van Buren's (Jeanne Phillips') politics, and for all I know she's been a feminist all her life. But not only is her column is read by pretty much everyone and their maiden aunt, it also does a great job of reflecting the conventional wisdom on most social problems, so when she prints this letter (from a minister no less) and gives the response she gives, it's pretty cool.

DEAR ABBY: From time to time, you tell young women who think they might be pregnant and are afraid to tell their parents, to do so. I usually do not write letters like this, but I need to express my personal experience. I am a minister. Several years ago, I worked for Planned Parenthood and we had a young girl -- around 13 years of age -- test positive for pregnancy. We urged her to tell her parents, but she kept refusing, insisting, "Dad will kill me!"

Of course, we knew better, and finally convinced her that the best thing was to tell her parents, have the baby, and get on with her life.

Her father beat her so badly that she was in the hospital for more than a month. She lost the baby because of the beating and ended up in foster care.

I will never again tell a young person that her parents will not go crazy, and I don't think you should do that either. Thanks, Abby. I enjoy your column. -- REGRETFUL IN FLORIDA

DEAR REGRETFUL: Thank you for the warning. Even though we wish all teenagers could disclose to their parents, as your letter illustrates, it is a sad reality that some of them cannot. And we, who care about young people, have to first be concerned with their safety. Although most young girls do involve their families, there will always be some who are unable to do so.

For that reason, I do not believe that parental notification should be mandated by law. And because sex education is no longer taught in as many states as it had been before, I strongly urge parents to begin talking to their children early about the facts of life and their personal value systems, in order to create a safe and comfortable environment should a crisis occur.

Awesome.

If you've emailed me lately...

and I haven't responded, I'm really sorry. Hell, even some of you who emailed me not-so-lately, back in August when I was on vacation, never got a response. Please accept my apology, I hate not responding to email. I don't really have a decent excuse either: beginning of semester, occasional absent-mindedness, tendency to feel easily overwhelmed if I get behind on stuff, problem of forgetting email if I don't respond to it immediately b/c I'm out of town or b/c PK is yanking on my arm or b/c I'm at work when I'm checking it... the usual lameassery.

So, if I haven't said this to you personally via email, please know that I really do appreciate all the links you send and the blogging ideas you suggest, and the books you recommend, and the simple "hi, I like your blog" messages. And I promise that I'll try to be a lot better again about acknowledging email from here on out.

by the by...

It seems somehow appropriate that I posted an admittedly completely unidentifying picture of myself the same day that the ol' sitemeter passed over the million pageview mark. Cool.

Thanks, everyone. :)

Breasts

Funny things. Controversial. No matter what you do with them, someone's there to bitch about it.

Twisty will be losing one of hers next week.

Here is a safely anonymous picture of me using mine. The comment thread two posts down got sidetracked onto the subject of breastfeeding, so I thought I'd post something I said there on the main page:

I think the breastfeeding / feminism analogy is a pretty good one. Just as the point of feminism isn't (and shouldn't be) to interrogate or judge individual women's lives, the point of breastfeeding advocacy shouldn't be (although, regrettably, it sometimes is) to judge and interrogate the decisions of individual mothers. What both should seek to do is change the public culture: to create a "pro-breastfeeding" culture, or a "pro-women" culture that supports and enables breastfeeding or, say, women's public achievement and/or paid work, while also recognizing that there may be women who can't or won't or choose not to work for reasons of their own, and mothers who can't or won't or choose not to breastfeed for reasons of their own.

I think that the reason that the breastfeeding debate is so fraught--like every other blessed mommy debate: stay-at-home vs. work; part-time work vs. full-time work; public schooling vs. private schooling vs. home schooling vs. unschooling; city life vs. suburban life vs. rural life; straight families vs. gay families; two-parent homes vs. single-parent homes; marriage vs. cohabitation; and on and on and for god's sake on and on some more--boils down to the central problem of feminism. When it comes to people in general--and especially when it comes to women, and especially when it comes to mothers--we not only find it difficult to differentiate between the big and the small. It is one thing to say "in general, this is true" or "statistically, X leads to better results than Y under current conditions," or "most people think this." It is a completely different--and repressive--thing to turn those statements into "shoulds." What we should do is get off mama's tits: help her out, hand her what she asks for, offer to carry the groceries, ask what we can do for her, and then let her decide what the hell to do with her own body and her own children.

But I'm not advocating the simple abdication of concern with the "well, it's your choice" shrug, either. We have to hand mama that glass of water, pick up the groceries when she's lugging the baby, fetch the mail, run the errands, whatever. Standing around and saying, "well, it's up to you" without lifting a damn finger is a lame copout. Yes, in general, breastfeeding is a good and healthy thing. Yes, on average, it is healthier in some ways for both mothers and children. Yes, we need to work on normalizing it so that women breastfeeding on the bus or in the mall won't get hassled, shunned, or stared at (or pointedly ignored). Yes, I actually think that on balance it is a healthy social impulse when old women say, "that baby needs a blanket," or when friendly men say, sternly, to a misbehaving child, "now stop doing that and listen to your mother," or when you're looking around and starting to panic because your child just took off in a crowd and someone catches your eye and says, "it's okay, he went that way and is right there by the mailbox." It does take a village.

The flip side of village life, though, as everyone who's ever lived in a small town knows, is narrowness, gossip, and judgment. Offer to help, but for god's sake respect mama when she says, "no, he's not cold" or "actually, I told him that's okay," or, "no, I prefer to let her be a little independent." If mama tells you to mind your own damn business, keep in mind that mama life is tough; maybe she's had a bad day, maybe she's on her last nerve. It isn't about you. Don't make it about her.

And for heaven's sake, they're only boobs. The only people who really get a say about what gets done with them are mama and her baby (and, if mama allows, her special friend(s)). If you're not the one eating from them, then don't fuss.

But I would appreciate it if you'd let me sit down. Thanks.

Home remodelling advice

If you're washing the walls prior to painting, and you need to rinse the TSP off, it's probably not a good idea to just haul the hose in through the window to do the job.

I know you don't think that uterus is your own, honey

If you haven't yet seen the latest state-controlled-reproduction law over at Feministing or The Booman Tribune, check this shit out.

Every woman in Indiana seeking to become a mother throu gh assisted reproduction therapy such as in vitro fertilization, sperm donation, and egg donation, must first file for a "petition for parentage" in their local county probate court.

Only women who are married will be considered for the "gestational certificate" that must be presented to any doctor who facilitates the pregnancy. Further, the "gestational certificate" will only be given to married couples that successfully complete the same screening process currently required by law of adoptive parents.

As it the draft of the new law reads now, an intended parent "who knowingly or willingly participates in an artificial reproduction
procedure" without court approval, "commits unauthorized reproduction, a Class B misdemeanor."

You know how self-righteous assholes like to talk about how you should have to have a license to have kids? Well here it is, folks.

Welcome to the brave new world. Someone call Margaret Atwood.

Pseudonymous kid resists being tokenized

Me: Pseudonymous Kid, can I ask you a question?
Pseudonymous Kid: Sure. What?
Me: You know when I make this face? (I make the face, which I can only describe as "exaggerated false incredulity.")
Pseudonymous Kid (laughing): Yeah?
Me: Well, for some reason that face always makes kids laugh. Even babies. It always cracked you up when you were a baby too. And I don't know what it is about the fact that's so funny to little kids, and since you're a little kid, I thought maybe you could tell me.
Pseudonymous Kid: Well, Mama. I can't tell you why I think it's funny, because it just is. And I can't tell you why other kids think it's funny, because I am not them, and I don't know what they are thinking.

Who the heck is Harriet Miers?

I don't quite get the strategy here. The argument for Roberts was: "he's demonstrably well-qualified."* What's the argument here? That Miers is demonstrably not particularly qualified for this position, aside from having a law degree, but that her ideological ties to the Bush administration are clear and evident?

*(And his ideology is deniable, because everything he's ever said has been in support of Republican administrations, so arguably he was only speaking for his employer, and pay no attention to the fact that he's consistently chosen to work for conservative Republicans.)

Theories:

1. The classic Republican "diversity" appointment: if you oppose her, it's because you don't think women are qualified to serve in higher office. What kind of sexist are you? (Bush: "diversity is one of the strengths of the country.")

2. The Republican sexist code language: she's "loyal," which means that she'll know her place. (Bill Frist: "She is a woman who understands judicial restraint.")

3. The Dick Cheney strategy: You want me to help find someone to fill this position? After much consideration, I've realized the best choice is... me! (Chuck Schumer: Ms. Miers called him to ask for suggestions in a conversation that lasted less than five minutes. "There is no back and forth," he said. "It's just, 'Give us some names.' I said to her, 'Look, I'd like to know who the president is considering.' And she didn't say anything.")

Your theories?

"It's a choice they made"

I swear, I am so sick of having that used as an excuse for screwing women over. Imagine this: you're a doctor, say, or a teacher. And your husband is a highly skilled tech worker. He gets a job in the U.S., one that pays several times what he can earn at home, and maybe lets him work with one of the top software companies in the word. So he takes the job. Your "choice"? Move with him, in which case you will only get a "dependent" visa and not be able to work--or stay home, while your husband moves to another country, another continent even.

Some choice. In part, obviously, this situation is designed to allow software companies with deep pockets to get skilled labor on the cheap--if your employees cannot quit or find jobs elsewhere, and their families are entirely dependent on them, guess what? You can pretty much pay them what you like: they have no bargaining power. (It also, by the way, conveniently undercuts American workers--if you can hire someone on a B-1B visa for half of what you'd pay someone with U.S. citizenship or a green card, then it sure helps perpetuate the "permatemp" problem in high tech fields.)

And, of course, what happens to highly trained, ambitious women who are forced to stay home watching cable television all day? They get depressed. And their marriages are stressed. And, god forbid, if their husbands are abusive, they have no economic independence, and they are very far away from supportive friends and family. (So let's cut funding for domestic violence programs for immigrant women, by the way, while we're at it.)

And it's stupid, anyway. This country doesn't have work for doctors and special ed teachers and international conflict resolution specialists? We can't use teachers and lawyers and nurses and MBAs who are multilingual, particularly in the languages spoken by new immigrant groups? We've got some of the brightest, best educated, best travelled, most ambitious women in the world coming here and we think it's better for our country to let them sit around collecting internet recipes than it would be to, oh, say, put them to work in schools and nonprofits and hospitals and think tanks and businesses and universities? Where they'd contribute to the knowledge and skill base of this country, and earn salaries that would contribute to the tax base, and incomes that they could spend and save and invest? Stupid. Stupid waste of human talent and brain power and economic potential.

But hey. It saves Microsoft hundreds of thousands of bucks a year.

August Wilson

So August Wilson is dead. And pretty young, too. Lance Mannion has the quotation I was thinking of:

My mama ain't birthed me for nothing. So what I got to do? I got to mark my passing on the road. Just like you write on a tree, "Boy Willie was here."

Or, as Citizen hears, and says, in Gem of the Ocean, "Remember Me." It's interesting, thinking of the passing of a man whose work was all about memory and speech and legacies....

I'm sorry to say I've yet to see any of his plays live, and I've only read a few of them. I hope one of these days to see some of them on the stage.

Here's a nice NPR interview with Wilson from last year, in which he talks about language and the blues.

Speaking of lesbians...

Planet Xena has a moon: Gabrielle. Awesome statement by the man who discovered it, Michael E. Brown:

"Having a moon is just inherently cool-and it is something that most self-respecting planets have, so it is good to see that this one does too."

I don't know how she does it...

But Ms. Uffish's "Browsing To-Do List" always has the best links. And I can't do any better than to swipe her summary, either:

When you absolutely, positively have to get a phone call from a lesbian.

Don't forget to click on the "Douchebag" link (I won't link it directly from here, you have to go look for it) and take the "Douchebag Test." And be sure and check out the FAQ:

Q: What do your lesbians talk about?
A: That depends... our militant lesbians are often a tad brutal and don't put up with shit. The coveted on-the-fence lesbians are a bit wishy-washy and the Catholic lesbian is even more conflicted (we only have one) The transgender lesbians like to talk about football in a husky voice. Stoner lesbians say, "Dude" and "Man" a lot. Whereas our popular good ol' fashioned 'regular' lesbians talk the crooked walk. Guess what the lesbian film critic wants to talk about.

Oops, my bad--VAWA *did* get reauthorized

Samhita at Feministing was more on the ball than I was--according to Ms. Magazine's Feminist Daily News, VAWA was reauthorized on Wednesday. Catch, though: included in the legislation were cuts to programs for immigrants and women of color. However,

The amendment could still be removed in conference with the Senate as the two houses work out differences in the legislation.

Given that the amendment reducing those services passed by a narrow margin, hopefully they'll end up cutting it, rather than services for women who need them.

Is my 15 minutes up yet?

Check it! Dean Dad and I are in the Wikipedia entry for "blog"!

Super cool, in a totally geeky kind of way. I'm so proud.

Pseudonymous Kid is naughty: a parenting test

Read the following dialogue. Then answer the questions.

Pseudonymous Kid: Ewww! I HATE that kind of dinner! It's disgusting!
Mr. B.: What? It's fried rice. You like rice.
Pseudonymous Kid: I hate vegetables! I hate peanuts!
Me: What do you mean you hate peanuts? You like peanut butter.
Pseudonymous Kid: The smooth kind. I HATE the crunchy kind, and I hate peanuts.
Me: I see.
Mr. B.: Well, pick the peanuts out and eat the rest of it.
Pseudonymous Kid: I hate the rest of it. It's gross.
Mr. B.: Put a lot of soy sauce on it, it needs soy sauce.
Pseudonymous Kid (adding soy sauce, stirring): Yay! Now it has soy sauce!
Me: That's too much soy sauce.
Pseudonymous Kid: No it's not! (Taking a bite.) Ew! A peanut!
Mr. B.: Now the peanuts and the rice are both brown, you won't be able to tell them apart.
Pseudonymous Kid: Can I smash the peanuts with my fork?
Mr. B: That will make it harder to tell them apart from the rice.
Me: No. You may not smash the peanuts with a fork. Stop it.
Pseudonymous Kid (smashing peanuts with a fork): Why?
Me (having an epiphany): STOP smashing your peanuts. And don't eat any meat, or any rice.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Puts a forkfull of rice in his mouth, grins naughtily.)
Me: DON'T eat any vegetables. DON'T eat that green bean.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats the green bean.)
Me: DON'T eat any broccoli.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats broccoli.)
Me: STOP IT. Don't eat that carrot.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats the carrot.)
Me: NO RICE.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats rice.) It had a peanut in it.
Me: ABSOLUTELY NO PEANUTS.
Pseudonymous Kid: I couldn't help it, it was buried under the rice.
Me: No more rice, then. And no more peanuts.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats more rice.)
Me: No! Stop! Don't eat any more broccoli!
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats broccoli.)
Me: Not that last green bean! Leave it!
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats the green bean, then finds another. Puts it on his fork, waves it in front of me.) Heeeeere's another greeeeen beeeean....
Me: DON'T EAT IT.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Giggling madly. Eats the green bean. Picks up his soda.)
Me: Do NOT drink that soda. No.
Pseudonymous Kid: Hehehehehehe. I can't drink it, I'm laughing too much.
Me: Good. Because I don't want you to drink it.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Drinks.)
Me: NO!
Pseudonymous Kid: I was giggling so much some came up my nose.
Me: See? That's what happens when you don't listen to me. Now do NOT eat any more broccoli, or that last piece of carrot.
Pseudonymous Kid: (Eats them both.)
Me: Okay, no more food. That's it. You can't have any more.
Pseudonymous Kid: More! Papa, I want more.
Mr. B.: Okay. (Goes to get more.)
Me: No more food! You aren't allowed to have any more! Papa, why are you getting Pseudonymous Kid more food? I said no!
Pseudonymous Kid: (Giggling wildly, kicking his legs.) Hehehehehe, Mama, Papa got me more food!
Me: NOOOOO!!!

(later.)

Me: So, am I a genius or what?
Mr. B.: Well, it was kind of funny. And only slightly less annoying than listening to him complain about the food.
Me: Well yes, I realize it was annoying. But it worked.
Pseudonymous Kid: (From the other room.) Mama, can I watch a movie now?
Me: No. No movie. You cannot watch a movie unless you want pancakes for breakfast tomorrow.
Pseudonymous Kid: Yay!
------------------------
Questions:

1) How long will PK think this is funny?
2) How long before it no longer works?
3) How long until it backfires in my face?

Add up your score.
0-1: You are a perfect parent. Parenting Magazine will be calling soon.
2-5: You are an average parent. Sometimes things work, sometimes they don't. It's okay; read Parenting Magazine and you will improve.
5-10: You are a terrible parent, and there is no hope for you. Call me, we'll get the kids together sometime to play in the backyard or watch movies while we get drunk.

Why Pseudonymous Kid (and the rest of us) love our neighbor, Joe

Pseudonymous Kid: Mama! Mama! (running up the stairs)
Me: What?
Pseudonymous Kid: Joe emailed the people who control the streets, and tell us what we can and cannot do on them, to ask them if we can close the street to have a party for our birthdays! And if they say yes, we can close the street and have a party! We're going to have a party and explode things and smash pumpkins and all sorts of cool stuff! And if they say no, then we'll have a party in one of our houses instead!
Me: Wow. Did Joe just tell you that?
Pseudonymous Kid: Yes! And I think he meant to tell the whole family! So wake papa up to tell him! Joe emailed City Hall to ask if they will let people shut down the street for their birthdays! And their birthdays are both on fall! Close to Halloween, that is.