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Fire at will
So sayeth the Supreme Court. Dahlia Lithwick makes a great point at Slate. Justice Scalia wrote in his Boumediene dissent, concerning the habeas corpus rights of Guantanamo detainees, that “today’s decision will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed.” No such concern in the case of handguns, which kill more Americans in a year than terrorism has in the
Pause
I’m going abroad tomorrow for a week. Posting will resume again soon.
Phoenix has landed
On Mars (click to enlarge). More here.
The Wire PS
In my recent piece about “The Wire” I took issue with the writers’ call for jury nullification in drug cases. David Feige makes a salient point about this: The problem is that in taking their pledge to nullify, the authors have gently finessed a rather difficult and practical point. In order to acquit or hang a jury, one has to
“The Wire” in Philly
My report on the screening of HBO’s “The Wire” series finale at City Hall in Philadelphia, currently online at Philadelphia Weekly. Pics by yours truly!
On Rushdie
Salman Rushdie will speak in Philly this coming Monday. I have a little blurb in the current Philadelphia Weekly (scroll down).
The dark side of … Mercury
Pictures are in from NASA’s Messenger probe to the planet Mercury. The thing is 800 degrees in the sun, -300 in the shade. Cozy.
Zizek’s follies
Finally saw “Children of Men,” the acclaimed 2006 film by Alfonso Cuarón, starring Clive Owen and Julianne Moore. It’s set in Britain in the year 2027, a time of global societal collapse; illegal immigrants are herded into cages and camps and the human race has fallen infertile. For the first half-hour this felt didactic and heavy-handed, but in time a