My Heroes, (Oddly Enough,) The U. S. House Of Representatives

House votes to counter Eminent Domain Abuse

The House legislation, passed 376-38, was in response to a widely criticized 5-4 ruling by the Supreme Court last June that allowed eminent domain authority to be used to obtain land for tax revenue-generating commercial purposes.


That decision, said the House's third-ranked Republican, Deborah Pryce of Ohio, "dealt a blow to the rights of property owners across the country."

Finally, the House gets something right. You may remember me yelling at the residents of New London, Connecticut about this a few weeks ago; I was really angry about it, and you should be too. Basically, in brief, the case was decided by the Supreme Court, and essentially said that it was perfectly legal for the government to boot you out of your house in order to build things that give them better property tax revenue, like gas stations and office parks.
Now, in a rare stroke of sanity, the House has voted to deny federal "economic development" funds for two years to any locality using eminent domain as a means of economic development. The Senate still has to approve it, but with support that wide (look at the quote, 376-38) it seems fairly likely to pass. Astonishing: in an era of wide-spread governmental corruption, ineptitude, and general malfeasance, they actually managed to get something right. Now if only they would do away with eminent domain entirely...

Wishful thinking, I know. But still. I'd like to one day own my own home, without being afraid that 20 years of my work and earnings can be wiped out in an instant because they want to build a road.

You know you're a mom whose kids love you when: your 19-year-old son hears you getting attacked, and bludgeons a knife-wielding thug unconscious with a frying pan to protect you.

I had just made sausages with the frying pan and I was in the kitchen when I called the police. The pan was the first thing I saw so I brought it outside and gave it to Shaun. It broke in half when Shaun hit him but I didn't mind under the circumstances. The police took it away as evidence anyway!

...says Coreen Forsyth. You gotta think of the cricket-bat-wielding scene in Shaun of the Dead, don't you? Hey, now that I think about it, Shaun, Shaun, where do I know that name from, anyway?

Yet again, so-called "intelligent design" is in the news and the courts again. Oddly, this time the ACLU is doing something right- trying to keep the religionists out of the classroom, and science in it. Now, you may remember my article about this a few weeks ago, to which I'd like to add the following:
Science classes are concerned with the mechanisms by which things happen. The "intelligent design" theory, propounded by religionists (although they are trying to cover it up by cleverly not using the word "God," and instead using "a guiding force") claims that God is responsible for species change. However, proving that it is in no fashion a scientific theory, it makes no attempt to explain the mechanism through which said deity actually effects the species changes; it merely states that it happens. Well, DUH. The theory of evolution, on the other hand, doesn't concern itself with "Life, the Universe, and Everything," instead confining itself specifically to the physical mechanism through which species change occurs.
What's that mean? It means that although "intelligent design" might in fact be true (I myself believe in it,) it does not disprove or exclude evolution as the mechanism by which species change happens, and thus is not a competing theory. Further, not only is "intelligent design" not an opposing theory to evolution, it is a theory which is not based on any scientific evidence whatsoever, and therefore is inherently a non-scientific theory, and therefore does not belong in a science class. (Oh, and before I forget, and interesting and related side note: Even the Catholic church recognizes that science and theology are different. Really.)

Ever hear about cold fusion? Well, if you haven't, don't worry; that power source you've never heard of may be obsolete before it ever actually gets made. A scientist at Blicklight Power claims to have figured out a way to violate the established understanding of quantum physical "laws" which would potentially produce more power than conventional fuels by a factor of up to 1000. Is it possible? I'm not sure, but his arguments are certainly sound, and there's no reason he couldn't be right; physics has been completely turned on its head, with established "laws" completely disproven several times in the last few centuries, and this might just be the next such overturning.
Quantum physicists, of course, are violently opposed to even discussing his theories; one scientist at the University of Antwerp went so far as to say

Physicists are quite conservative. It's not easy to convince them to change a theory that is accepted for 50 to 60 years. I don't think [Mills's] theory should be supported,"

What's interesting about this, of course, is the fact that the people who are the most qualified of anyone in the world to discover if he's actually correct are basically sticking their fingers in their ears and yelling "LALALALALA" until he goes away, rather than actually trying to disprove his theory. It shouldn't be "supported" ?!? WTF?!? Um, this is SCIENCE, kids, not politics. Either prove or disprove, and move on with life, "Support" has nothing whatsoever to do with it.

The U. S. Patent Office has done something so astonishingly stupid that words fail to adequately express it. All I can really say is lawyers will love it: they have allowed someone to patent a movie plot. I just don't see a way this will fail to generate lawsuits.

Just in time for the theatrical release of Chicken Little, come the Taurid meteor showers. If I didn't know it was impossible, I'd say Disney planned this; but failing that: THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING! AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!

Cleveland police Tazered the same guy twice in one week. Oddly, he was wandering around naked both times. More oddly, the second time he was trying to pull people out of their cars and bite their heads. Not oddly at all, the cops think he's on PCP. Even less oddly than that, the cops made sure they did a better job this time, zapping him 3 times instead of only once.

The MPAA is at it again, folks: this time it's a 67-year-old grandfather being sued for "up to $600,000." Of course, what makes this really ridiculous is that they're holding this guy responsible for his grandson, who is 12, downloading four movies to his computer - three of which they already legally owned on DVD. That, of course, doesn't matter; it's the DOWNLOADING that's bad. They're blaming the guy for something that's actually impossible, too: they say that since his grandson DOWNLOADED the movies from a service known as iMesh, the files are now available to anyone who uses iMesh, and it's HIS FAULT.
Of course, if his grandson downloaded them from iMesh in the first place, they were already available on iMesh before this poor guy even got involved, and therefore it's impossible to attach $600,000 worth of legal liability to him for allowing his grandson to use his computer, even if his grandson DID illegally download a whole, scary $60 worth of kids' movies. Especially since they deleted the files as soon as they got the letter and found out about it.
Only thing I can say: however the court case turns out, that's one grandkid who will get a stocking full of coal for Christmas, you bet your ass.