Aurora, Colorado police chief Dan Oates used to be chief of police in Ann Arbor. He was a dick then too.

"Aurora, Colorado Police Chief – and four star 'general' – Dan Oates [...] describing the trampling of 40 innocent people’s civil liberties in pursuit of his Greater Good as a reasonable exercise of what he called 'investigative detention' for a 'reasonable' period of time.' " [Eric Peters]

Surfing the net

Two gangs of Detroit teens started a gunfight over who makes the best Kool-aid last week. Not kiddin'. That's just how gangsters roll. You can be shot any time over anything there. Seriously. [Huffington Post/Detroit News]

Surfin' the net!

Driver's licenses are not about driving a motor vehicle on public roads. That hasn't been the case for a while now. Driver's licenses nowadays are actually a De facto  national ID card. Some people understand this, but sadly most people do not. [Hooligan Libertarian]

Putting a bio-electronic "bar code" into each and every human being on Earth would make "society more organized", and therefore (presumably) "better" says some unknown sci-fi writer. Whatever. The statist bureaucrats can't even make the trains run on time let alone regulate human society. And even if they could I'd still be against it. We're not cattle. [New York Daily News] [Hat-tip to Infowars.com]


Popular Science has this story about the Pentagon's latest intrusion/intel gathering technology which is currently being field-tested in Afghanistan. Little golf ball-sized sensor devices that transmit data for up to two years. The snoops sure could have fun with that technology. Scatter them around and send an armed UAV drone to check any "suspicious activity". Scary.

DC Comics' super-hero Green Lantern is gay.  North Star is too, if you care. [io9]

"How Chemistry Stymies Attempts To Regulate Synthetic Drugs" [Slashdot.org/]
Make a molecule illegal and amateur chemists will build an analog to it. Every time you try and make something "fool-proof" nature evolves a better fool. Just sayin'. 

If you spy on the "governance class" it is a felony. Now, if they spy on you, well then it's: "Got something to hide citizen?" [Ann Arbor.com]

Pot shots

My alma mater has decided that now is good time to start up a Jewish Studies program and so undergrads can now get  a Jewish Studies a minor with their bachelor's degree. Two issues: Why, with money being so tight, is the university even doing this? There are many better ways those funds could be used other than to study Jewishness. Second, this opens the door still yet further for every ethnic group, religion, race, or sexual preference and etcetera to demand their own "studies" program too.

A tech columnist at C/Net decries some guy shooting himself in his ample gut to test the effectiveness of his body armor (AKA  a "bullet-proof vest") and posting it on YouTube. I guess the thought that this moron is getting the attention that he seems to crave from people like the columnist and that it might encourage him or others like him to do it again or with bigger, better weapons didn't occur to Mr. High Tech Columnist.

If you put your Doomsday Survival Library on a tablet, laptop, or cellphone you don't have lug all those books around with you while trying to survive the apocalypse. But ah, electronics are also prone to failure, breakage, and need to be recharged at frequent intervals, so there's that. A conundrum to be sure.

Digital age pioneer Scott McNealy's admonition notwithstanding, I think it's a good idea to clear your Google web history ASAP because (as Google has duly warned us) "all your information and data is belong to us"(Google = "us") to do with what they will once their new [sic] "privacy policy" comes into effect this March. Time to just embrace the suck and opt out. Some privacy is better than none.

A fair warning: Two lines from a country music song by Josh Thompson:

"Our houses are protected by the good Lord and a gun/
You might meet 'em both if you show up here not welcome, son."

I'm thinking of having that stanza printed on a floor mat for my front porch. A gentlemen is supposed give fair warning and all.

Friday potshots

How would we in America feel about having Iranian aircraft carriers "patrolling" in the Gulf of Mexico or Iranian paramilitary commando teams operating on the border? A little empathy test for the warlike neo-cons and their dupes. Just sayin'.

Trolling on the website of a county Sheriff's Department that is trying to find and arrest you is truly stupid. But some people have this show-off mentality and so they do. Go figure?

There is a bill in the NJ legislature now seeking to ban most handgun and rifle ammo. The anti-gunners couldn't manage to legally ban guns but ammo, they say, is another story.

People who desire privacy on the Internet may be terrorists says the FBI.

The strange addiction that control and power have on some people is just plain baffling, not to mention kind of scary.

Silly boondoggle or law enforcement theatre? Does it matter?

InfoWars and the AP are reporting that East Orange, NJ cops are gonna put red colored spotlights on telephone poles in high crime areas to shine red colored light beams on suspicious persons or activity to let the potential culprits and the public know that the cops are watching them and/or on the way.

I guess the crooks and thugs in East Orange have never heard of shooting out lights or wearing masks to disguise their identity. The cost of this bullshit is to be borne by the federal treasury of course.  Given the human cesspool that inhabits East Orange demographics-wise perhaps that is the case. However they will no doubt quickly learn and adapt. After all even amoebas learn from simple stimulus-response cycles. What a laugh. Scary and funny at the same time.

Ann Arbor city council still acting like goofy tweens with their first cellphone

Some of council members are mortified at the prospect of the public reading their "personal" messages sent and received during council meetings using city issued computers and so they have directed the applicable bureaucrats to redact all that shit from publicly available transcripts. WTF are they even doing sending texts, IMs and emails during meetings for? They are supposed to be present, alert, and paying attention to the proceedings at hand, no?

An example of why term limits for the Michigan legislature are a good idea: Jeff Irwin

A lame political hack who spews treacly bromides and feel-good, simple-minded solutions and trash talks  the opposition. What a guy. Good thing Irwin's a first-termer who is in the minority party so his bullshit doesn't count for much. Thank god for term limits too, eh? Four more years and Irwin will be forced to go find a real job. Sheesh.

Same old story...

Ann Arbor residents are now very concerned about street crime. They bitch about having too few cops due to layoffs and that AA is also becoming a police state in the same breath. Go figure? They despise the ideas of surveillance cams in high crime areas but want to build a wall around the city to keep "out-of -towners" out? Welcome to the People's Republic of Ann Arbor! A high-crime, low common-sense zone surrounded by reality in southeast Michigan.

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Ann Arbor spent $30k hiring a new school superintendent (Kyle Feldscher, annarbor.com)

Sign of the times...cont'd.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions:"The [Allen Park, MI fire department] layoffs affect all 27 firefighters except for the chief, who is appointed. City officials could not say how much they need to save to avoid following through with the layoffs or how deep the city financial troubles are in the city. They also did not say whether they have a backup plan if the firefighters are laid off." (Det Freep)

The city of Allen Park is laying off its fire department. All of them.

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Kalamazoo cop with 23 year long record of misconduct allowed to resign - MLive (Kalamazoo)
I don't usually bother with cop misconduct stories. But this guy was a well-documented fuck-up for 23 years and only got the boot when he showed up drunk to the Obama speech at WMU last summer and seriously acted the fool and embarrassed the K-zoo police brass in front of the Secret Service. That a goof like this wasn't terminated a long time ago says a lot about public safety agencies, public employee unions, police brass and city bureaucrats in K-ville and the much ballyhooed  blue wall of silence. The story is so bad it's funny. Until you think about it.


The problem with today's intellectual class - Big Questions (James Mathew Wilson) via Front Porch Republic
"The modern intellectual engages in thought without end, for all purpose would be denounced as agenda or ideology. Restless before this convergence of freedom and uselessness, his occupation takes a critical turn and becomes the mere dissecting of all the interested buzz of the world of practical action. Because it lacks a sense of where thought might find fulfillment, the intellectual realm becomes not a place above the mundane world, but a parallel zone of criticism, where the beliefs of others may enter only to be seen through. The intellectual life reduces itself to functional nihilism, warding off despair only by means of attacking the latest ideology voiced beyond its doorstep."

What's a city council seat worth? In Ann Arbor about $300 or so a week. $700 or so if you're mayor - Ann Arbor Chronicle (Dave Askins and Hayley Burns)
I suppose salaries are better than per diem payments or expense accounts because when it's all out in open there is less opportunity for corruption. But as to council service being a "sacrifice" as some put it in this article, I beg to differ; No one gets drafted to serve. If it is a "sacrifice" of time, money, and whatever it is one made voluntarily. So there's that. Having a compensation committee made up of people the mayor and council agree on who's pay recommendations take effect automatically unless voted down is a sham though.

Sci-fi/fantasy author Robert Asprin has a new book out which is really amazing considering that he died a few years back. Asprin spent most of his life in and around Ann Arbor. Met him once and he seemed like a good guy.

Internet-controlled remote-fired shotgun battery set up by land owner to exterminate feral hogs - io9
Brilliant concept, but totally irresponsible, dangerous and illegal.