Academic

How incompetent was Capt. Picard, anyway?

Posted on November 19, 2009
Last night, while watching the preposterous but nevertheless entertaining "Star Trek: Next Gen" episode where a rampant virus makes everyone on the Enterprise "devolve" into giant spiders, lemurs, and other creatures, I had an insight. This is yet another episode...

US to prosecute KSM in federal court

Posted on November 13, 2009
Not all Guantanamo detainees are going to face trial in an Article III (federal) court, but September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his key associate Ramzi Binalshibh will. President Obama's statement was: ?I?m absolutely convinced that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed...

A quick thought on ABC's "FlashForward"

Posted on November 06, 2009
Spoilers up to 11/5/09! I've been watching ABC's serial sci-fi drama "FlashForward" almost in real-time, meaning that it just sits on my TiVo for an hour or so. (To put it in context, I haven't gotten around to the "V"...

I moved to the right state!

Posted on November 02, 2009
Because of Halloween trick or treating, I didn't get to see all of the Oregon-USC football game, but what I saw, including the end, was plenty satisfying. It's hilarious to think that the USC football team has not won in...

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Sleeplessness, state by state

Posted on October 29, 2009
This CDC study looks at sleeplessness rates by states. Oregon does pretty well, with only 8.8% of the population reporting insufficient sleep for 30 out of the past 30 days. (That's pretty severe, every night?!?) I don't know about other...

We're #3 (but we should be #1)!

Posted on October 29, 2009
Forbes has ranked the 40 biggest U.S. metropolitan areas in terms of safety, and Portland comes in at #3. The top five are Minneapolis-St. Paul, Milwaukee, Portland, Boston, and Seattle. While MSP certainly has a good claim to the top...

How law schools are like cruise ships

Posted on October 22, 2009
Like the last cruise I went on, our law school facility here is full of stand-up dispensers of hand sanitizers!

That's some love!

Posted on October 19, 2009
Wow, this is some love that the husband has for his wife, enlisting in the Army so that he can make sure she has health coverage for her cancer treatment!

Why I didn't ask for a Blackberry during my last at a law firm

Posted on October 16, 2009
This story sums it all up.

Overweight at 5'10" and 120 lbs?

Posted on October 14, 2009
This is pretty weird -- the model who was picture in the supposedly Photoshopped Ralph Lauren ad is 5'10" and 120 lbs, and she says she was fired for being "too fat." Wha??? It just happens that when I started...

NBC, Desperation, and Jay Leno

Posted on October 12, 2009
TV Guide has an interesting column titled "Is Jay Leno Killing NBC?," that basically wonders whether NBC's decision to give the weeknight 10-11 pm time slot to Jay Leno has doomed the network. To recap -- a few years ago,...

Don't have Amazon.com teach geography to the kids!

Posted on October 12, 2009
Amazon sure has some weird ideas about geography. I mean, I live in Oregon, which isn't *that* far from Nevada. Yet, look at the route that my package is taking: October 12, 200912:24:00 PMLOUISVILLE KY USArrival ScanOctober 12, 200911:42:00 AMLOUISVILLE...

Oh my, I don't think I can resist tuning into this

Posted on October 07, 2009
This is not a joke, apparently. Have you ever wondered what "COPS" would be like if Steven Seagal was the officer? Now you don't have to. I don't think I'll be able to resist checking this out to see how...

Roman Polanski, a flight risk?

Posted on October 06, 2009
Hmm, the Swiss Justice Ministry has denied Roman Polanski's request for bail, apparently because he's a "high flight risk." Why, there's no reason to believe that he would ever flee a jurisdiction . . . oh wait. . . .

Winning by losing, Olympic bid edition

Posted on October 05, 2009
My good friend Nick Johnson has a funny and insightful post arguing that Chicago is better off for not having won the bid to host the 2016 Olympic Games, because cities that host the Olympics usually end up paying for...

Just when I thought the Polanski saga couldn't get more disgusting

Posted on October 03, 2009
It's bad enough that there are people -- including French government officials -- who are jumping to defend Roman Polanski the fugitive. It's bad enough that his underlying crime, to which he pled guilty, is pretty heinous. What's even worse...

Last one standing?

Posted on October 02, 2009
I'm the last one standing in the house. . . . Last Friday, my older son woke up with a fever and threw up four times that morning by the time he saw the doctor. He had pneumonia in one...

I have good taste in movies?

Posted on September 30, 2009
Wow, I have seen exactly *zero* of the 100 worst movies of the 2000s, per Rotten Tomatoes. Of course, my moviegoing has dropped to pretty much zero since 2004, but even so, I haven't even seen these on TV. Well,...

Is this a good idea?

Posted on September 28, 2009
President Obama is calling for more school for kids -- a longer calendar, and a longer school day. One can only assume that he is speaking aspirationally, as opposed to setting a new federal agenda. Then again, maybe the Commerce...

Democracy -- does it mean what the NY Times thinks it means?

Posted on September 28, 2009
The New York Times has an editorial today against the death penalty that reiterates what seems to me to be the best argument against capital punishment: its cost. As the Times notes: Perhaps the most extreme example is California, whose...

Living without a fridge

Posted on September 25, 2009
Around the time I was deciding whether to move to Oregon, I read a story about a trend among some Oregonians to give up their refrigerators(!). The theory is that a refrigerator is one of the biggest energy eaters in...

I will never subscribe to Money Magazine (I think)

Posted on September 18, 2009
I don't think I'll ever subscribe to Money Magazine if its "analysis" of the soundness of Social Security is an example of its journalism. In its discussion of why you should be counting on(!) Social Security as part of your...

But I thought he was just a "person of interest" and *not* a "suspect"!

Posted on September 17, 2009
Just a couple of days ago, the police arrested, er, took into custody a Yale lab technician as a "person of interest" in the murder of a female Yale grad student. The TV news accounts that I saw showed the...

Obama and Kanye

Posted on September 16, 2009
I don't get why this is a big deal at all (other than the part about journalistic standards). . . . A recap of the alleged controversy: during the MTV Music Video Awards, 19-year-old country star Taylor Swift won the...

Revenge of TV lovers!

Posted on September 15, 2009
This is a pretty hilarious story by a TV writer for "The Simpsons," getting a well-measured dose of revenge against one of those annoying "I don't watch TV" pseudo-intellectuals!

Serena Williams' meltdown at the US Open

Posted on September 13, 2009
Wow, I read about Serena Williams' match-losing meltdown and then managed to catch a rerun of her US Open semi-final match against Kim Clijsters. The short version is that Williams was down 4-6, 5-6 (15-30) when she faulted her first...

Things that make you go "argh!" -- financial services edition!

Posted on September 11, 2009
I suppose I can't really fault these financial institutions for being extremely scrupulous, but it's still pretty annoying . . . . When we moved from Iowa to Oregon, we closed some of the local Iowa bank accounts that hadn't...

Disneyland and property rights in tickets

Posted on September 11, 2009
Due to a family matter, I had to head down to Los Angeles last week, so naturally my wife and I took our two little boys to Disneyland as well. While there, the following two possibly analogous incidents occurred that...

The declining stigma of strikeouts in baseball

Posted on September 09, 2009
My baseball brain having been warped by fantasy baseball long ago, I've long thought that strikeouts were overly stigmatized as being worse than other outs. I mean, they're usually not as bad as double plays (unless there are no outs...

Some thoughts on teaching at a new institution

Posted on September 02, 2009
After seven nice years of teaching at the Iowa law school -- 13 semesters' worth of classes, since I had one semester off on a pre-tenure leave -- I moved back to the West Coast and started teaching at Lewis...

Does this mean lawyers, especially in these days of market carnage, are mosquito repellant?

Posted on September 02, 2009
According to this story, it sounds like mosquitos can smell stress, and they don't like it!

"24" and baby names?

Posted on August 27, 2009
My new colleague Jack Bogdanski wonders about some of most popular baby names in 2008, including Chloe and Ethan. I say, it must be a "24" effect, with Chloe O'Brien (CTU tech goddess) and Ethan Kanin (first female President's chief...

You decide, sloppy lawyering, or sloppy journalism?

Posted on August 24, 2009
According to this article in the Chicago Tribune, my former employer is being sued for discrimination (again). Last time, it was a claim of viewpoint discrimination; this time, it's age discrimination: Dobkin, a veteran attorney, claims he was denied a...

The end of "Battlestar Galactica"

Posted on August 20, 2009
I finally finished watching season 4 of "Battlestar Galactica" -- all on DVD(!) -- and . . . wow. (Spoilers ahead, obviously.) From various heated comments on the TiVo users forum that were harshly critical of BSG creator Ron Moore,...

If an American corporation handled its pension plan like Social Security . . . .

Posted on August 17, 2009
I got my annual "Your Social Security Statement" in the mail today. This is the letter that estimates my benefits if I were to start collecting at age 62, age 67, and age 70. It also comes with a caveat:...

White men and Asian women

Posted on August 14, 2009
A former student linked to this story about how there's a trend of powerful, older white guys marrying younger women of Asian descent. Probably the most provocative paragraph is this one: While I'm sure that real love and affection is...

A really bad day in court(!)

Posted on August 11, 2009
Under the not mandatory but more or less kind of mandatory federal sentencing guidelines, even most white collar criminals are looking at some degree of prison time -- heck, Martha Stewart got a break from the judge and still had...

"1" is not a prime number!

Posted on August 07, 2009
While watching the summer season finale of "Burn Notice" (awesome stuff!), I caught a commercial for Sonic. The gist of it was some math nerd talking about how easy it was for him to remember some combination of numbers, one...

14 or so hours 'til my new HD TiVo goes online!

Posted on August 05, 2009
Back when I was setting up the utilities for our new home in Portland, I was confronted with the cable company vs. phone company dilemma. I opted for the cable company (Comcast) partly because I was concerned about having satellite...

New West casebook covers

Posted on August 03, 2009
I'm preparing the syllabus for my Criminal Law II course, for which I'm using Julie O'Sullivan's Federal White Collar Crime casebook. This is in a new edition (4th), and it's one of the casebooks for which West is using a...

Sotomayor, Supreme Court nominees, and a suggestion for Obama

Posted on July 30, 2009
If the Senate Judiciary Committee vote is any indication of things to come, it looks like Judge Sotomayor will be confirmed handily, but with nowhere near the commanding votes that Ruth Bader Ginsburg or Stephen Breyer got (well over 90%)....

Why is it 100+ degrees in Oregon?!?

Posted on July 29, 2009
It's always been sunny in Portland when I've visited, but I fully expect to get my share of gray, overcast days. What I didn't expect was that it would be in the high 80s or hotter just about every day...

On the road from Iowa to Oregon, part 1

Posted on July 14, 2009
At 5:15 am on July 10, the morning that our movers were arriving to load up our stuff for our move from Iowa to Oregon, I finally gave up on packing and woke up my wife, who'd gone to bed...

A nagging question about MP3s and married couples

Posted on July 05, 2009
While starting the pretty awful task of packing our house for the move to Portland, I noticed that my wife and I had two copies of two CDs. Which was kind of weird, because we have somewhat similar tastes in...

Sarah Palin and "Prison Break"

Posted on July 04, 2009
For some reason, when I first saw that Sarah Palin was quitting as Governor of Alaska, I wondered if it was an instance of life imitating art -- specifically, "Prison Break"'s season 2, episode 19 ("Sweet Caroline"), in which President...

Nice write up for my former employer

Posted on July 02, 2009
According to the ABA, my former employer, Munger Tolles & Olson, topped American Lawyer's A-list of law firms, based on its commitment to pro bono work, its diversity, and its associate satisfaction. Although I'm of course much happier in my...

The Mall of America and the Minn.-St. Paul airport

Posted on June 27, 2009
So the other day, I was flying from Portland to Iowa City, with a stop in the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport. Naturally, I arrived in the F terminal and had to head over to the A terminal, which gave me a...

Signs of the end of TiVo?

Posted on June 19, 2009
As I've blogged before, I absolutely *love* my TiVo . . . . But I'm afraid that I see signs of the end of its viability as a company. With my move to Oregon less than a month away now,...

7 years of separation(s)

Posted on June 19, 2009
I was just thinking today about how 7 years seems to be a defining period for me going back a ways now. I finished college in 1988 without much of an idea of what I wanted to do for a...

On clutter vs costs, when it comes to books

Posted on June 08, 2009
With our move to Oregon about a month away, we've started the packing process. As you might expect, we have a lot of books. And I have a penchant for collecting hardcover books (new, remainders, or used), which take up...

My unknown Good Samaritan!

Posted on June 05, 2009
You have to love Iowa City! Today, I was biking home from the law school (for the first time), and somehow, unknown to me, my bike bag fell off my rack. When I got home, I got off my bike...

Talk about an understated news headline . . . .

Posted on May 18, 2009
This story shouldn't be a surprise to any of you who are astronomy junkies, or anyone who's read the classic Larry Niven short story "Neutron Star," but check this out: the news headline reads "Neutron Star Crust is Stronger than...

You can't script stuff like this! (Celebrity Apprentice)

Posted on April 27, 2009
Oh, my, reality TV might not be all that "real," but you can't script stuff like last night's episode of "The Celebrity Apprentice," where Joan Rivers and her daughter Melissa both totally melted down after Melissa was fired.

Waterboarding, foreigners, and Americans abroad

Posted on April 23, 2009
The other morning, I was listening to a discussion on "On Point" on NPR about the release of the formerly classified torture memos, and one of the program guests -- I think it was George Washington law prof Jonathan Turley...

My confession about "The Celebrity Apprentice"

Posted on April 08, 2009
Let me confess that I like "The Celebrity Apprentice." I like it a lot! Nothing will ever match the first season, of course (Omarosa!; the Nick and Amy "romance"!; the Bill and Kwame finale), when it was sparkly and new,...

From Iowa to Oregon . . . not so economically happy?

Posted on April 06, 2009
According to this economic happiness survey, I'm going to be moving from the #2 state (Iowa) to the #50 state (Oregon). Hmm . . . .

Why is it snowing?!?

Posted on March 28, 2009
Come on, it's almost April! Why is it snowing right now?!?

My 2009 fantasy baseball team

Posted on March 28, 2009
It's springtime, which means it's fantasy baseball season. We had our live draft on Wednesday night, 11 managers including -- for the first time -- another law prof! I had the #9 pick, which was kind of a bummer since...

The sound you really don't want to hear when you're driving a truck full of bio/chemical weapons

Posted on March 24, 2009
. . . is "sssssssssssss."

Did "American Idol" become boring overnight?

Posted on March 18, 2009
Last night, I fired up my TiVo and started watching the "American Idol" performance show. It was country music night, which was not a good thing for me. I'll admit, when it comes to country music, Shania Twain, some of...

Jay Leno, a free show for the unemployed, and M*A*S*H

Posted on March 18, 2009
NBC's late night talk show host Jay Leno decided to put on a free comedy show for unemployed workers (or those just facing hard times) in Detroit, Michigan. That's pretty admirable; he's actually going out of his way to give...

What would have made "Dollhouse" more interesting

Posted on March 16, 2009
Joss Whedon apparently has something of a cult following based on his past works, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Firefly," which meant that his new show, "Dollhouse," started with a built-in fan base. Personally, I never got into "Buffy" or...

Why "24" is captivating my attention again this season

Posted on March 15, 2009
Last week's episode of "24" (day 7, 8:00-9:00 pm) was a pretty good microcosm of everything that's gone right with this season of the show. To be sure, looking better than the awful mess that was season 6 is not...

Of all of the books to get on Kindle . . . .

Posted on February 03, 2009
. . . "When Technology Fails" would not seem to be one. I mean, if there's an EMP attack, your Kindle or other e-reader is likely to be fried, so you won't have access to all of the good low-tech...

What is with David E. Kelley's shows not being released on DVD?

Posted on January 21, 2009
I'm teaching Professional Responsibility for the first time this semester, and as part of my class preparation, I've been dutifully watching episodes of "The Practice" while using the treadmill, looking for interesting scenes to trigger discussion of ethical issues...

The first elected woman President on TV is a Republican?

Posted on January 15, 2009
Over winter break, I watched the extended version of "24: Redemption," and of course, the 4 hour premiere of season 7 earlier this week.The most striking thing for me is that the new President of the country, Allison Taylor, is...

Baseball and university salaries

Posted on October 23, 2008
My good friend Nick Johnson has an interesting post in which he uses the Tampa Bay Rays as an example of how "you get what you pay for" isn't true in baseball. He then uses that example to spring forward...

Moving to Canada to escape the Republicans?

Posted on October 09, 2008
This is a pretty funny "Canadian commercial" for people who say they're going to leave the United States if a Republican wins the White House.

Tim Russert, RIP

Posted on June 13, 2008
I never watched "Meet the Press," but I've been impressed with Tim Russert's appearances on MSNBC during the primary coverage. I was heading out to fill the car's gas tank (heh, "only" $3.89/gallon) when I heard about Russert's death by...

Iowa trouble

Posted on June 13, 2008
For those of you who've been reading about the massive flooding here in Iowa in general and Iowa City in specific, yes, it is really bad. The 380 freeway, which connects Iowa City to the airport and Cedar Rapids to...

"In Plain Sight" -- out of sight for me

Posted on June 03, 2008
In recent years, summer has been a good time for television shows. CBS's "Survivor" and Fox's "American Idol" actually started as summer offerings and did so well they got moved into the "regular" schedule. My favorite reality TV show these...

HRC's "assassination" comment

Posted on May 25, 2008
Olbermann pretty much says it all: You have to wonder, at some point, does she violate enough core values of Democrats that they'll break free of party loyalty and actually consider whether they'd "win" if she took the White House?

Go away, winter, it's almost May!

Posted on April 28, 2008
Today, while looking out my office window, I saw something that suspiciously like snow drifting down from the sky. I mean, it's almost May! What is up with this winter?!?

Who's the real "4 more years of George Bush"?

Posted on April 24, 2008
I hear the constant refrain from the Clinton and Obama campaigns that John McCain can't be allowed to win, because that will be just 4 more years of the Bush Administration. It's not an implausible argument, given that McCain has...

Howard Dean to me: The Democrats are doing the Republicans' job

Posted on April 15, 2008
Well, that's not exactly what he said: We can't let John McCain get away with it.A recent report by the Associated Press has revealed that the Republican National Committee is pulling together a joint fund with John McCain called the...

Neal Stephenson & Iowa City

Posted on April 14, 2008
Neal Stephenson, who's one of the few American sci-fi authors that I can think of who can stand up to a recent wave of British space opera/cyber-punk writers (Richard K. Morgan, Alastair Reynolds, Peter F. Hamilton, and Neal Asher), turns...

Yes, men are *that* shallow, apparently

Posted on April 10, 2008
This explains a lot: Women seeking a lifelong mate might do well to choose the guy a notch below them in the looks category. New research reveals couples in which the wife is better looking than her husband are more...

Experience to be President

Posted on March 26, 2008
If Hillary Clinton's main claim to the Democratic nomination over Barack Obama is her greater "experience" (in what?), then can we safely assume that she also believes that the country made a mistake in electing her husband in 1992? After...

Why Eliot Spitzer's conduct matters

Posted on March 10, 2008
As you've no doubt read by now, the bombshell news is that New York Governor (and former New York Attorney General) Eliot Spitzer was identified as a client of a prostitution ring through a federal wiretap. Does it matter? I...

The Democratic Party's cheap shot at McCain

Posted on February 27, 2008
For some reason, I get spammed by the Democratic Party on nearly a daily basis, often DNC Chairman Howard Dean. Yesterday I received a seemingly personal e-mail -- it opens "Tung --" as if the sender were truly on a...

Jack Bauer and me

Posted on February 14, 2008
My colleagues have been teasing me about being "famous," because the local newspaper (Iowa City Press-Citizen) ran a front-page (below the fold) story in which I was interviewed about the Fox TV show "24" and national security; the subject was...

Re-enacting the Pentagon Papers argument

Posted on February 12, 2008
A couple of weeks ago, in connection with the play "The Battle for the Pentagon Papers," which was being performed at Hancher Auditorium, the law school presented a re-enactment of the Supreme Court oral argument in New York Times Co....

Oops, a constitutional law error in "Prison Break" season 2

Posted on February 10, 2008
I've been rewatching season 2 of "Prison Break" on DVD while using the treadmill, and I realized that the show contains a serious constitutional error. (Shocking, I know!) Specifically, part of the continuing plotline involves then-Vice President Carolyn Reynolds' offering...

An important lesson from election 2000

Posted on February 07, 2008
I had an epiphany while talking with a colleague today, which is that Democrats run a big risk of repeating the 2000 election (minus the Supreme Court drama, let us hope) if they nominate Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama. In...

How Hillary Clinton has lost my vote

Posted on January 29, 2008
It's kind of funny to think that back in October, I was prepared to caucus for Hillary Clinton. I thought that Barack Obama was perfectly acceptable as a candidate, though I was concerned that he seemed so overwhelmingly popular among...

This can't possibly be right

Posted on January 16, 2008
According to this quiz, my top three candidates for President should be: 1. Mitt Romney 2. Duncan Hunter 3. Mike Huckabee Though I can get Dennis Kucinich to be my third choice if I increase the weight allotted to the...

Is Senator Obama a "Bob the Builder" fan?

Posted on January 08, 2008
Just wondering, since his catch-phrase in his speech tonight was "Yes, we can!" Those of you who are parents of young kids are probably well familiar with the show "Bob the Builder," whose theme song includes the refrain, "Bob the...

"Prison Break" season 3 -- I'm still reeling over what was in the box in the alley . . . .

Posted on November 24, 2007
Obligatory warning about a massive spoiler for season 3 of "Prison Break" up through the fall hiatus . . . . Okay, let's get started. I thought season 1 of "Prison Break" was claustrophobically compelling despite the ridiculously complicated jail...

Sneak preview of "24" season 7

Posted on October 25, 2007
Someone uploaded the "world premeire" trailer for season 7 of "24" on YouTube. Apparently, the world does not include the U.S., since this doesn't seem to be available here yet. But here it is: There are, obviously, spoilers in this...

Jack Bauer . . . criminal?

Posted on October 10, 2007
Terrorists can't stop him, but the L.A. court system can. I was disappointed to read that Kiefer Sutherland was pulled over for DUI, and more so when I read that he was still on probation for another drunken driving offense....

So I was on TV yesterday . . . .

Posted on October 08, 2007
I forgot to mention for local readers that I was going to be on TV on Sunday morning, as part of a panel on the "Ethical Perspectives on the News" program that airs on KCRG. The topic of the panel...

Dan Rather's quixotic quest?

Posted on September 20, 2007
I was interested in reading that former CBS news anchor Dan Rather has filed a $75 million lawsuit against CBS, alleging that the network made him the scapegoat of the Killian document fiasco. The fiasco was a series of segments...

The new fall TV season?

Posted on September 17, 2007
Many new fall TV shows will be premiering or returning this week, but I'm not seeing a whole lot that intrigues me, unlike last year. On the other hand, some of the shows I was high on last year flamed...

Clerkship interviews and women's attire

Posted on September 10, 2007
I have to admit, this is not exactly a topic that I expected to be blogging about, but it did come up in a recent clerkship interview workshop for students and prompted a further serious discussion with a couple of...

Summer TV more than tides you over . . . .

Posted on August 18, 2007
It used to be that summer was a dreary season of TV reruns, but beginning some time in the late 1999s, shows like CBS's "Survivor" demonstrated that new programming could find an audience in summertime. Reality TV shows soon consumed...

Dumb signs

Posted on August 02, 2007
While on vacation last week, I came across this really dumb sign: I love how we're supposed to "keep 100 feet away when horn sounds," considering that "intense sound signal may sound without warning" . . . .

A random thought about Harry Potter (no spoilers)

Posted on July 31, 2007
I picked up "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows" (aka the end of the series), but I decided to reread the first six books in order, because I'd forgotten so many of the details and even supporting characters. I'm currently...

My pitch for season 7 of "24" (Fox, call me!)

Posted on July 18, 2007
After reading that Fox has scrapped the plotline for season 7 of "24" -- just weeks before shooting was set to start -- I've been thinking about how I'd plot the season if I were in charge . . ....

The best company in the world

Posted on July 14, 2007
. . . in my view is TiVo. Not just because it invented a device that has become indispensable for me, but also for truly incredible customer service. My upstairs TiVo, which had been having some problems already, died for...

What "American Idol" should do next season

Posted on June 15, 2007
Here's my suggestion: copy "Survivor" and "The Amazing Race" by having an "all stars" season with past winners and other memorable contestants. There have been six seasons of "American Idol" now, so you could have all six previous winners and...

You see, diversity is good for you . . . .

Posted on June 07, 2007
Woolly mammoths may have died off because of lack of genetic diversity, rendering them susceptible to disease and climate change. . . .

The occasionally unhinged Keith Olbermann (incorrectly) on Khadr

Posted on June 05, 2007
One of the cable news/talk shows that I enjoy watching is "Countdown with Keith Olbermann," partly because I remember back when he was a sports reporter on the local L.A. news -- yes, even before his ESPN days. "Countdown" is...

Season finales: "24," "Lost," "Veronica Mars"

Posted on May 31, 2007
The end of May means the end of the regular TV season, which means it's time to take stock of some season finales. First up is my formerly beloved "24," which sadly was an utter and complete mess this season....

Jack Bauer is "amateurish"!!

Posted on May 30, 2007
That's what interrogation experts would say about his techniques for questioning suspected terrorists: Some of the study participants argue that interrogation should be restructured using lessons from many fields, including the tricks of veteran homicide detectives, the persuasive techniques of...

Rabbit sexual harrassment

Posted on May 30, 2007
Yesterday evening, I saw two rabbits in our backyard, which is not uncommon in the spring. How sweet, I thought, they're playing together. I was filling the tub for my son's bath, so I had some time to relax and...

"American Idol" 6 finale (perfomance night)

Posted on May 22, 2007
I predict that Jordin will win. . . . Well, that's not going out on a limb, since that's what the judges think too. But if Jordin didn't get kicked off when she butchered Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer,"...