Eugene Volokh on Home Schooling

...modest testing requirements are generally a political boon to the home schooling movement. California's attempt to clamp down on home schooling reflects the reality that many people, in the education establishment and out, are skeptical of these sorts of do-it-yourself measures. They probably shouldn't be skeptical, but they are. Politically, which is the more effective way fight this skepticism? By saying "OK, impose these testing requirements; you'll see the great results that home schooling produces, and won't have to worry about the possibility that some kids won't be learning their reading, writing, and arithmetic"? Or by saying "No, we will educate our kids ourselves, and we refuse to let you impose any testing requirements"?

In fact we have a genuine historical test of which method works best. From the dawn of compulsory state schooling until the 1970s it was accepted that home schooling (save under unusual circumstances) was illegal. Today, homeschooling is (effectively) legal in all 50 states.

What method was employed to work this change? Did homeschoolers "petition the government for redress of grievances". No. They deliberately violated the law and dared the authorities to arrest them (or quietly violated the law and ignored the authorities). There was a lot of litigation and some politicking but the primary tool was civil disobedience. They didn't trade "testing requirements" for legalization.

By any measure their approach succeeded completely. They achieved a complete reversal of the law in a decade or two. Mostly by civil disobedience and by forcing the courts to recognize that compulsory attendance laws were much more limited than was previously believed.

Avowed Utah Polygamist Could Go to Jail for Life

The man who lived with five wives and 29 children and has gone on national television to talk about his life was convicted in June of raping Linda Kunz Green after he married her in 1986, when he was 37 and she was 13. The marriage produced a son, Melvin.

His wife was the same age as Juliet when she married Romeo.

This is a new stupid marketing ploy by legislators. They changed the name of the crime from "statutory rape" to "child rape" without changing the nature of the crime at all. Pure marketing -- it's not rape at all it's "unlawful sexual intercourse". I haven't heard any of the recent perps or their lawyers point this out. Probably not sensitive to history or language.

Juab County prosecutor David Leavitt, brother of Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt, said investigators started looking into the case after seeing Green and his wives on television.

Classic example of selective prosecution based on exercise of a constitutional right. I hope he's preserved that argument for appeal. It even works in rare cases.

Libertarians accuse Senate candidate of promoting violence

So what's with the Colorado LP?

It's not a violation of the LP "oath" to advocate violence. It's merely a violation to advocate the "initiation of force".

In any case, once a party becomes an "official state party" it has to accept all comers and can't impose any "oath". That's the downside of the political route.

Free Ajmad Radwan.


The Wall Street Journal advocates freedom for the 19-year-old American trapped in Saudi Arabia because of lack of an exit visa.

Why not leave anyway? Small boat to Qatar or Iran or US warship in the Gulf, or somewhere. Meet mom with passport. Centuries of smuggling in Saudi.

In matters of Peace & War and Order & Law I always ask myself WWHD.

What Would Heinlein Do?

It helps.

There are probably good arguments against attacking Iraq but the anti-war crowd aren't making them.

We're stuck with stupid arguments about getting UN approval, Allies approval, Arab approval, Congressional approval, etc.

Those are weak arguments

I guess the opposition is too chicken to risk being called chicken. They should say "Invading Iraq would violate the Treaty of Westphalia" or "War is wrong" or something. But they don't want to.

The Day *My* House was Searched

I was reading the paper one day when I read that the City was going to conduct a sample inspection of all the houses on the 200 to 800 blocks of Oak Street to look for illegal drains. Apparently those sneaky house builders of the 1920's had not guessed that under the Water Quality Act of 1970, as amended, it would be illegal to connect basement drains to the storm sewers. The City wanted to perform this inspection to calculate how many houses in the City were likely to have illegal drains. Since I was renting a house in the 400 block of Oak street, the article interested me. Rarely does the government announce its searches in advance.

Some time later, an inspector showed up at the house.

Inspector: "I'm here to inspect your basement."
My wife: "Where's your warrant?"
Inspector: "I don't need a warrant, you can just let me in."
My wife: "Oh but you *do* need a warrant because I won't let you in without one."

Later, the inspector's boss called.

Senior Bureaucrat: "You aren't going to make me bother a judge for a warrant, are you"?
My wife: "Yes I am. Consider it a free lesson in Constitutional Law."

The house had a for sale sign on the lawn so the Senior Bureaucrat called the Real Estate Agent.

Senior Bureaucrat: "You're showing the house on Oak Street, aren't you?"
Real Estate Agent: "Yes"
Senior Bureaucrat: "Can you let us in because we have to inspect the house and the renter won't let us in"
Real Estate Agent: "I can't let you in because a renter has control of entry to the house as long as he's renting"

Some time later, several squad cars pulled up to the house with lights flashing.

Polizei: "We have a warrant to inspect the basement."
My wife: "Can I read it?"

Time passes while la lectrice sits on the porch reading the warrant.

My wife: "This warrant says you can inspect the basement. Come around to the back of the house and I'll let you down the basement stairs."

Polizei and Inspector inspect the basement and find Illegal Drain.

Some time later.

Neighbor at Garage Sale: "What were all those cops at your house."
My wife: "You know how the City was inspecting everyone's basement? Well we made them get a warrant to inspect our house."
Neighbor at Garage Sale: "Gee that's neat. I didn't know you could do that."

Had we actually owned the house and were we not leaving town anyway, the next step would have been to wheel on in to court and move to quash the warrant because it was a "regulatory search" without probable cause in violation of: "no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." Courts have upheld "regulatory searches" of businesses but generally have not in the case of "dwelling houses."

FT May 2002: God’s Justice and Ours by Antonin Scalia is obviously an important Read. But the line that is most quotable from my perspective (and citeable in any future criminal prosecutions of me) is the one where a sitting justice of the United States Supreme Court recognizes (and recommends!) the right to revolution.

I pause here to emphasize the point that in my view the choice for the judge who believes the death penalty to be immoral is resignation, rather than simply ignoring duly enacted, constitutional laws and sabotaging death penalty cases. He has, after all, taken an oath to apply the laws and has been given no power to supplant them with rules of his own. Of course if he feels strongly enough he can go beyond mere resignation and lead a political campaign to abolish the death penalty—and if that fails, lead a revolution. But rewrite the laws he cannot do.

Revolution presents less of a moral problem than judicial activism. I like it.

Classics from the Past:

How You Can Transport Illegal Digital Content from One Place to Another Without Violating Laws Against Transporting Illegal Digital Content From One Place to Another:

From ???@??? Wed Mar 08 11:44:00 1995
Subject: Cute point from Risks

At the "risk" of passing on items already read, a short quote from the latest Risks Digest seems in order:

RISKS-LIST: RISKS-FORUM Digest Tuesday 7 March 1995 Volume 16 : Issue 87

- ------------------------------

Date: Sun, 5 Mar 95 18:50:01 PST
From: gat@aig.jpl.nasa.gov (Erann Gat)
Subject: The source of semantic content

"It's probably old news for RISKS readers, but a very difficult concept for lawmakers, that the semantic content of bit streams is in the eye of the beholder, and that the apparent correspondence between bits and semantics is the result of engineering convention and not an inherent property of the bits. Any attempt to legislate the content of digital communications is therefore doomed to fail because it is trivial to hide the source of semantic content. The following is a simple example of how this can be done:"

My summary:

1) Take porno image.

2) Encrypt it using One Time Pad (OTP).

3) Transmit encrypted file to A.

4) Transmit key file to B.

5) A & B send copy of file they each have to each other.

6) Porno has been transmitted *without* any person transmitting
any coherent information.

7) Now if A & B happen to be remailers with instructions to retransmit what they receive to C...

Too bad Law isn't Engineering or the above scenario would be ironclad.

DCF

"Daddy, daddy, I'm hungry"
"Call your Congressman. That's the only possible way of getting a bite to eat in this country of ours."

A Faraday Cage for your EZPass:

EZShield.com

EZPass is an Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) system used in the Northeast. A small white box is attached to your windshield and is queried by radios in passing toll booths. Your account is debited for the toll. Your account lists all the booths passed and when so it can be very useful for law enforcement and civil attorneys (including domestic relations lawyers). EZPass has already been featured on an episode of Law and Order. In addition since the system is protected by weak or no encryption, attackers with radios could extract some information by querying your EZPass. Perhaps duplicating it to steal tolls from you.

The EZShield is a little box with a drawer to hold your EZPass. According to the photo, it doesn't increase the EZPass form factor by much. What you are supposed to do in open the drawer to expose your EZPass only when you want to use it and keep it enclosed when you don't.

The interesting thing is that EZShield's sellers believe that there is enough interest in a technological privacy fix that they are willing to advertise it on mass media. I heard it just before the Rush Limbaugh show on WABC in NYC.

Ethics Committee Faults Torricelli on Gift Violations

The old joke has a new cast:

"The greatest miscarriage of justice since Senator Torricelli was acquitted of receiving a bribe that David Chang was convicted of paying."

A Q&A exchange between me and Eugene Volokh:
[Eugene's responses in italics.]

The topic was Gilmore v. Ashcroft -- FAA ID Challenge in which John Gilmore is suing the Feds to be allowed to fly domestically without ID.

So, does John have a chance?

No.

So it is your view that the Feds can ban anyone (except those wealthy enough to rent, buy, or build their own aircraft) from flying, for life, using secret orders, and without any
access to judicial process.

Seems a bit extreme to me.

Could they do the same thing for riding in a car or walking?

What about boats?

My view is only that they can insist that people show id.

So if there is a "Don't Fly" list, you would support people being able to sue to get off it?

Of course.

How can they force you to present something that they can't force you to have in the first place?

Same reason as for driver's licenses to drive. If you don't want an identification, that's fine -- but then you won't be allowed to do certain things where identification is necessary for security reasons.

I promised that I wouldn't send him any more mail for at least a week but now the time is up.

One doesn't need a driver's license to ride in a car. The government is now claiming that you need ID to ride in a commercial aircraft. Since the development of passports for international travel at the beginning of the 20th century, passports (or other travel documents) have been necessary to enter other nations. Commercial carriers began to check them on boarding not for security reasons but because if passengers were refused entry at their destination the carrier was responsible for their maintenance and return.

The problem with such ID requirements is not merely that ID is required. The problem is that the activity can be barred for reasons other than lack of ID. You will also be banned for your characteristics. After all, what's the point of requiring ID to fight terrorism if you can't ban terrorists from flights. Or people who fit a terrorist profile. Or people who owe child support (drivers licenses, fishing licenses, and passports are denied to those owing child support).

An ID requirement, when you combine it with online verification and authorization, creates a federal license requirement to engage in the particular activity. In the above case, a federal license to fly on a commercial aircraft. In other proposals, a federal license to take a job, open a bank account or rent an apartment.

A federal license that can be denied for any reason since it is issued via a computer analysis system driven by a secret algorithm.

It's a license because the federal government is required to affirmatively grant you permission before you can do something.

The right to fly is controlled by the Computer Assisted Passenger Profile System (CAPPS) -- soon to be replaced by the presumably wider-ranging CAPPS2. At the heart of CAPPS is a secret algorithm that determines whether you are or may be a terrorist. You can't know what facts or behaviors cause CAPPS to ban you from a flight since the algorithm is not for public consumption.

In fact, since the Feds have not set up an administrative procedure for you to challenge a denial of flight boarding (or any of the future activities that will be subject to CAPPS2 and similar systems) only those with the $25K to 100K needed to bring a federal civil suit will be able to challenge their denials. The Feds require private businesses that deny you credit to follow an appeals process but don't impose such a requirement on themselves in the much more significant denials that CAPPS2 will make. And even for the rich, these court challenges will be hard to win since the reasons for the denials will be a state secret.

So those who support such ID requirements and such federal licenses should be required to answer a basic question -- what activities should be subject to state and federal permission and which activities should not?

E-Books Not Exactly Flying Off The Shelves

E-Books Not Exactly Flying Off The Shelves
Most Readers Stick to Paper Despite Technology's Hype

By Linton Weeks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, July 6, 2002; Page C01

Whatever happened to e-books?

Not too long ago and not very far away, certain citizens of the digital world were oh so convinced that an e-book future -- in which the content of traditional books would be electronically zapped to home computers, laptops and specially designed devices -- was just around the corner.
...
There are those in the industry who continue to emote about the e-book and praise its capabilities, but the plain old reading public -- on the beaches, in the coffee shops, at the Metro stations -- just aren't buying into e-books. You don't see a horde of people devouring Huck Finn on a handheld or "Ulysses" on a laptop.
...
Palm Digital Media provides content for owners of personal digital assistants, a market of 25 million people. It offers some 5,500 e-titles in its catalogue at www.palm.com/ebooks.
...
But maybe e-books never really caught fire because there was never a deep desire for them in the first place. The 500-year-old book -- with white paper pages and night-black ink -- is a perfectly good technology for providing word-based information.

Electronic devices, on the other hand, can deliver words and more -- voices and video and music and interactivity. You can play Scrabble on a handheld. Or chess. Or rock-and-roll. You can chat. Or e-mail. Or you can call home or surf the Internet. Why use them to read vast chunks of printed matter?
...
Aileen McHugh, director of electronic publishing at Johns Hopkins University Press, is not so sure. "I think there's a future for books online," she says. "For searching. I think there might be a future for course materials, for students downloading them."

But "for books that people read," she says, "I don't think there's a huge future in e-books."

© 2002 The Washington Post Company

Usual folderol about e-books. I am in the heavy reader demographic "above 40 years of age". And I am a heavy reader. I used to read physical books while walking around and I still do but only in electronic form.

The article missed a few significant items like Baen Books' Webscriptions which has sold thousands of titles since they opened. I get a lot of books from them, myself, because they are a hard science fiction/military science fiction house and that's what I tend to read. Generally SF and Romance have done best in e-book format. Baen offers its books in all formats - online html, downloadable html, RTF, Microsoft Reader, a Palm OS reader, and Rocket Book. And they don't encrypt their e-book files. Perhaps that's why they are profitable and selling more than just about anyone else. Perhaps Digital Rights Management is neither necessary nor sufficient for success in vending digital media.

I read all my e-books on my Handspring Visor because its small form factor means it's always there and can hold plenty of books so I never run out. I also carry court cases that I want to read and other documents that I've converted. On downside -- I'm going through about 3 Visors a year because when you use them for reading while walking you inevitably drop them. At least they're cheap ($99 for rehabbed devices).

I don't know how readers put up with bulky books that can really only be used one at a time. My fear has always been running out of something to read. Plenty of backups in the Visor.

So I wonder. Is Latvia Offshore?

I am in receipt of a fun piece of spam:

Dear Customer,
Looking for a superior asset protection and tax management tool? Concerned about preserving your wealth in the heart of Europe without personal identity disclosure? We have a superior solution, which is able to meet the most demanding asset protection needs of our prospective customers. Please take your time to study this incredible and exclusive opportunity at www.offshore-cards.com
------------------------------------------------------------------
Offshore Cirrus ATM card
Complete anonymity when withdrawing cash
No ID requirements
Would cost you just $180
http://www.offshore-cards.com/anoncir.htm

So I wander over to NSI and discover where "the Heart of Europe" is (OFFSHORE-CARDS.COM) and discover that it is Latvia.

Now it is certainly possible that heroic Latvians could be offering fabulous anonymous bank accounts and credit and debit cards but how would one know this in advance. Then there's the fact that the record was created in May. A bit young. Give it a while to age.

Congressman Wants to Let Entertainment Industry Get Into Your Computer

Rep. Howard L. Berman, D-Calif., formally proposed legislation that would give the industry unprecedented new authority to secretly hack into consumers' computers or knock them off-line entirely if they are caught downloading copyrighted material.

I've been reading things like this for a while but I wonder how practical such an attack would be. They won't be able to hack into computers with reasonable firewalls and while they might try DOS attacks, upstream connectivity suppliers might object. Under current P2P software they may be able to do a little hacking but the opposition will rewrite the software to block. DOS attacks and phony file uploads can be defeated with digital signatures and reputation systems (including third party certification). Another problem -- Napster had 55 million customers. That's a lot of people to attack. I don't think Hollywood has the troops.

RE: Are the Feds Wimps or What? (fwd)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 22 Jul 2002 13:54:22 -0400 (EDT)
From: Duncan Frissell
To: "Trei, Peter"
Cc: cypherpunks@lne.com
Subject: RE: Are the Feds Wimps or What?

On Mon, 22 Jul 2002, Trei, Peter wrote:

> Well, the other possible interpretation is that the Feds are not
> black-at-heart, Big Brother, neo Stalinist fascist JBTs
> pouncing on any opportunity to make confetti of the Bill of Rights;
> but rather are actually trying to respond to 9/11 with a minimal
> impact on US Citizens.
>
> ...but of course, that would be an unpopular interpretation on
> this mailing list.


I agree. I assume that they have enough on their hands without adding
wholesale oppression. Takes time. Very expensive. That's one of the
advantages of an advanced market economy. Salaries and other operating
costs are high and the wealth of your adversaries is also so high that
unless you're making a profit on the transaction it's hard to "buy" too
much of something even if that something is oppression.

If the activity to be regulated doubles in size, the regulators had better
double in number too or they begin to fall behind. SEC? Markets can
adapt to demand changes because the actors are self-financing in the long
run so they scale well. Government actors aren't self-financed (only
a small number are in charge of theft) so scaling is difficult. Also
voluntary transactions are easier to complete than coerced transactions
(think prostitution vs. rape) since there is no resistance.

We'll see.

DCF
----
Governments do not become nicer or nastier because of their capabilities
and attitudes. They become nastier or nicer because of *our* capabilities
and attitudes.

So far the massive crackdown by the Feds that has stripped me of my civil liberties hasn't managed to do much. They have to work a bit harder.

I'm back to not showing ID to get into work just like before the war.

The states where I choose not to obtain a drivers license have upped their ID requirements for initial license applications but I already have one and don't patronize them in any case. They still let foreigners drive with foreign licenses so I will become a foreigner if they get too uppity.

Flight delays only slightly worse than usual (particularly since I mostly fly internationally and have always shown my passport). Domestic flight ID fascism is 6 years old this August so no change there.

As far as we know, only a little more than 1000 detained out of a pop of 270 megs. I was expecting that we would at least make WWII levels -- 200,000+ out of a population of 132 megs. I guess there could be a few more internees but they'd be tough to hide. Too many others would note their absence.

I thinks the Feds are just to wimpy to indulge in actual oppression these days. At least on a wholesale basis.

Maybe I'm wrong but I need more evidence first.

Gilmore v. Ashcroft -- FAA ID Challenge

AIR TRAVELER ID REQUIREMENT CHALLENGED
Secret rule demanding 'Your Papers Please' claimed unconstitutional

San Francisco - Civil libertarian John Gilmore today challenged as unconstitutional a secret federal rule that requires domestic US travelers to identify themselves.

Smooth move. Attempt to board a flight to DC on July 4th "to petition the government for redress of grievances". Even if not successful, it will be annoying and will be worthwhile if it manages to crack out copies of the secret security directives (like FAA SD 96-05)establishing the system.

Keep in mind that until the end of the first Clinton administration, it was perfectly legal to fly domestically without ID.

So I'm faithfully reading The Volokh Conspiracy
and faithfully following the link to a joint article on The Second Amendment as Teaching Tool in Constitutional Law Classes wherein I find:

The clash between constitutional rights and government interests is rarely presented more starkly than in the Second Amendment. The government interests (or, even more to the point, public interests) are profound, and are clearly implicated by the private conduct. And yet, whether we like it or not, the constitutional text protects at least some sorts of conduct that inherently jeopardizes these interests. (Even if one believes that the Second Amendment protects only a states' right, one still has to consider what would happen if a state in fact insists on arming its citizens and the federal government claims a countervailing interest in disarming them.

and I find myself desperately trying to come up with some "profound government interests" in disarming the citizenry. I guess that a governor would be worried about an armed citizenry if his intentions were less than honorable. I can't see a governor worrying about an armed citizenry unless he was going to do something nasty.

Can anyone come up with some valid government interests in a helpless population?

In fact, the Feds are probably missing a bet. Here's the DOJ publication United for a Stronger America: A Citizens' Preparedness Guide and it has nothing in it about arming yourselves to kill terrorists. On September 11th, our president could have gone on national TV and said, "I call upon all armed citizens to load their weapons, and go outside to secure their communities against terrorists. Under the emergency powers granted to me, I hereby suspend all federal state and local regulations against the possession and carrying of firearms." Large chunks of the US would have been safe from terrorists. Then the government could have concentrated on the disarmed bits like airliners and so forth. Make their job much easier.

NYPOST.COM National News: NO SHAME By BRIDGET HARRISON and STEVEN HIRSCH

in which the NY Post attacks former Tyco CEO Dennis Kozlowski for not hiding in shame.

July 12, 2002 -- Corporate disgrace hasn't cramped the high-rolling lifestyle of Tyco's ex-CEO, L. Dennis Kozlowski.

While the shamed fat cat awaits a Manhattan trial for tax evasion - and Tyco's stock remains stuck in the Dumpster - he's been living it up on his $25 million antique yacht and enjoying the Atlantic views from his $12 million Nantucket mansion.
...
"It's preposterous that this guy should walk the street," said a fellow businessman who was vacationing on the island. "He's a symbol of the whole culture of greed that has become embedded in our economy over the past five years."
...
One month ago, a Manhattan grand jury slapped Kozlowski with a 12-count indictment accusing him of evading sales tax when he bought $13 million worth of paintings for his Fifth Avenue apartment.
...
The criminal charges - coming at a time when corporate titans have been under scrutiny because of the Enron and WorldCom scandals - helped send the firm's stock diving from a 52-week high of $60 to $14.60 yesterday.
...
If found guilty of all his alleged 12 counts of tax evasion, conspiracy and fraud, Kozlowski, who's free on $3 million bail, could face a prison term of 44 years.

So there he is living it up after evading sales and use taxes on paintings. Meanwhile all New Yorkers blithely evade use taxes on their out-of-state purchases without even knowing they are violating the law. Have you filed a use tax form recently?

How to Dodge the National ID Card

 
Want to avoid the new, improved National ID card.

Simple. Don't pay your child support. In fact, if you don't have any children, get some. And then arrange to be ordered to pay child support. And then don't pay it.

The government won't issue you a National ID Card and you'll have gotten away clean.

No passport.
No Drivers License
No National ID?

Sept. 11 Hijackers Said to Fake Data on Bank Accounts

Sayeth the New York Times:

July 10, 2002
Sept. 11 Hijackers Said to Fake Data on Bank Accounts
By JAMES RISEN

WASHINGTON, July 9 — The Sept. 11 hijackers were able to open 35 American bank accounts without having legitimate Social Security numbers and opened some of the accounts with fabricated Social Security numbers that were never checked or questioned by bank officials, a senior F.B.I. official said today.
...
With no scrutiny from the financial institutions or government regulators, the hijackers were able to move hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Middle East into the United States through a maze of bank accounts beginning more than a year before their attacks.

A spokesman for SunTrust, which is based in Atlanta, said the bank had been cooperating with the F.B.I.'s investigation. The spokesman said it was possible for foreigners without Social Security numbers to open bank accounts in this country, but he could not provide details of what forms of identification the hijackers used to open the SunTrust accounts.
...
One of the first signs of a large infusion of cash coming into the United States for use by the hijackers appears in bank records dating from 2000, when $100,000 was deposited in bank accounts controlled by some of the leading hijackers, including Mr. Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi, Mr. Lormel said.
...

Note that it is as legal as church on a Sunday for non-residents to open financial accounts in the US or Switzerland or the UK etc. Many US banks don't accommodate foreigners but that is because of sloth not law. Certainly online brokers (who are quasi banks) do market to foreigners.

One reason that SS numbers were not verified is that the SSA has traditionally refused to verify for privacy reasons and the alternative method involves doing a credit check which takes time and money. And in the case of non-interest-paying current accounts there are no tax issues.

Banks located in the "red states" are not as bureaucratic as banks in the "blue states" and have been much slower to adopt the controls popular on the coasts. This is changing of course but there are still many social differences which make account transactions easier in the free states.

But let's assume for a moment that Homeland Security shuts the banks down and requires verified DNA samples and licenses from 10 separate agencies to open a financial account in the US. So the middle class Egyptians and Saudis with no criminal records who attacked us are faced with the ultimate challenge of getting the $500K they needed into the US.

By dint of heroic effort, the future highjackers manage to open bank accounts in Egypt and Saudi Arabia. They receive ATM, debit, or credit cards to draw on those accounts. Perhaps they encourage their French or British co-conspirators to open accounts in those countries. They arrive in the US and withdraw the $500 to $1000 per day maximum (per account) from ATM machines. Assume they have only managed to open 5 accounts. That's $2500 to $5000/day. Or 100 to 200 days to withdraw $500K. Not much of a trick particularly since they are not limited to 5 accounts and can get cash advances at any bank with any credit cards they have.

But then Homeland Security outlaws ATMs and credit cards (or at least the international connections of same). This is tantamount to imposing exchange controls which the US has never done. So the attackers have to fall back on Krugerrands. At $333 a pop, they have to get 1500 KRs into the country. Since bullion coins are not considered currency, they aren't covered by financial instrument import reporting laws. But you can just mail them one or two at a time. Most of them will get through. No big deal.

The truth is that it's a bit tricky to block the movement of small amounts of money like this.

Offshore-Based Firms' Officials Won't Have to Swear to Results

Yet another advantage of a "corporate inversion" -- you don't get on the SEC's hit list. Funny!

July 8, 2002

Offshore-Based Firms' Officials Won't Have to Swear to Results

By PAUL BECKETT and CHRISTOPHER OSTER
Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

NEW YORK -- The Securities and Exchange Commission's new order requiring chief executives and chief financial officers of the nation's biggest companies to swear to the accuracy of their financial results was intended to restore investors' battered confidence. But two of the companies that have prompted the biggest concerns don't have to comply.

Why? Because Tyco International Ltd. and Global Crossing Ltd. are based in Bermuda, even though they conduct many of their operations and have main offices in the U.S. and are listed on U.S. stock exchanges. Other companies with large U.S. operations but based offshore, including several big insurance firms, also aren't on the SEC's list of companies that have to send in the sworn statements at the same time as filing their next financial results with the agency.

The exemption for offshore companies is likely to add fuel to an already-vigorous debate over whether companies that have their main operations in the U.S. should be allowed to relocate their domicile to Bermuda and other offshore havens, a practice known as reincorporation. In those locales, the companies may avoid U.S. taxes and, critics say, can shield themselves more effectively from disgruntled shareholders.

Threat of Fraud Charges

The SEC's June 27 order requires CEOs and finance chiefs of U.S. companies with more than $1.2 billion in revenue last year to swear under oath that recent SEC filings are accurate. If they do so falsely, the executives could face civil charges of fraud or criminal charges of lying to the government or possibly perjury, lawyers say. The SEC's motivation, it said in its order, was to "provide greater assurance to the commission and to investors" that executives aren't violating the securities laws that govern accounting and financial reporting.

A SEC spokesman said large foreign-domiciled companies over which the SEC has jurisdiction, such as Global Crossing and Tyco, were excluded from the list because the agency wanted to issue the order "very quickly." Therefore it focused only on U.S. companies. The list of companies that must comply contains 947 names.

"We have no plans at this point to change or revise the list," the SEC spokesman added.

Fiber-optic company Global Crossing, which is in bankruptcy protection, is under investigation by the SEC and the Justice Department for accounting fraud. Tyco, the conglomerate, is under investigation by the SEC for its bookkeeping practices. And its former chief executive, L. Dennis Kozlowski, faces criminal charges brought by the Manhattan district attorney that stem from an alleged scheme to avoid paying New York state sales tax. Mr. Kozlowski has pleaded not guilty. Spokesmen for Tyco and Global Crossing declined to comment.

"Most people think of Bermuda-reincorporated companies as U.S. companies and would expect the same rules to apply," said Ann Yerger, spokeswoman for the Council of Institutional Investors, an association of major pension funds. "There is great concern among our members about the dilution of shareholder rights that reincorporation entails, and this is just another reason why shareholders need to be concerned."

The issue is a particular concern for property-casualty insurance companies. While 20 insurance companies, or insurers with corporate parents, are on the SEC's list, an additional five Bermuda-based insurers whose stocks trade primarily in the U.S. aren't, including Ace Ltd., which had revenue last year of more than $1.2 billion.

Full Compliance

A spokeswoman for Ace said that the company is in full compliance with SEC regulations and discloses a significant amount of information to insurance regulators. She said Ace doesn't believe "Bermuda insurance and reinsurance enterprises have an advantage" from a regulatory perspective.

While no insurer has been accused in the recent round of accounting controversies, insurance accounting has plenty of gray areas because of the way insurers estimate and set aside reserves for claims that may not be paid for 10 years or more. Such leeway makes it more difficult for a company to report results that won't need changing in future quarters, which could raise questions under the SEC's new regime.

William R. Berkley, chairman of W.R. Berkley Corp., a Greenwich, Conn., insurer on the SEC's list, said he expects the stock exchanges where Bermuda companies are listed to require SEC-type signatures from company executives. "It would be astonishing to me if companies that were domiciled in Bermuda and were effectively public through the U.S. capital-market system aren't going to be required to do the same thing," he said.

Write to Paul Beckett at paul.beckett@wsj.com7 and Christopher Oster at chris.oster@wsj.com8

URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1026081028785533040.djm,00.html


Hyperlinks in this Article:
(1) http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1025743359472561520,00.html
(3) http://online.wsj.com/documents/SECoath.htm
(4) http://online.wsj.com/documents/SECoath-list.htm
(5) http://online.wsj.com/documents/SECoath-statement.htm
(6) http://online.wsj.com/page/0,,2_0801,00.html
(7) mailto:paul.beckett@wsj.com
(8) mailto:chris.oster@wsj.com

Enron followed Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) in accounting for the activities of its Special Purpose Entities (SPEs) and concealed its true financial status.

Worldcom didn't follow (GAAP) in accounting for expenses and concealed its true financial status.

Federal and state governments and their Special Purpose Entities (like Social Security) have never followed (GAAP) and regularly conceal their true financial status.

If private execs should do time for their lies and concealment so should our political leaders for their much more significant lies and concealment.

Board of Ed., Pottawatomie Cty.v. Earls

Thinking further on the drug testing of government school students...

Has anyone considered the defense of consent?

If a parent turns his child's body, mind and soul over to a government bureaucracy for 12 to 17 years for "teaching" he could be held to have waived 4th Amendment rights.

Think about 17 years of interrogation, testing, examination, screening, record keeping, and indoctrination. More intimate than a single strip search or drug test. Parents of government school students have already consented to an extreme version of the search and seizure of their children. A few added urine tests seem insignificant.

Any who are concerned about this decision, should be even more concerned with the concept of government education.

The Hot New Field of Cyberlaw Is Just Hokum, Skeptics Argue

Lee Gomes writes in the WSJ:

Is there really a cyberspace full of "cybercitizens" who need only be accountable to their own "cyberlaws"? A loose-knit group of law professors is bucking one of the big fads in the legal field by calling that whole idea "cybersilly."
...
There is, though, a much less well-known but equally determined group of legal experts -- let's call them the "cyberskeptics" -- who are deeply troubled by just about everything about this trend. The skeptics start by questioning the very existence of cyberspace, which they say is no more real than a "phone space" involving all the people on the telephone at a given time. They go on to argue that something happening online shouldn't be treated any differently by the law than if it occurred on Main Street.
...
While the skeptics emphasize different points, they all have as a core principle a rejection of the notion of "Internet exceptionalism," or the idea that the Internet is a new, unique thing that requires its own special laws. "The steam engine ... probably transformed American law, but the 'law of the steam engine' never existed," writes Joseph H. Sommer, counsel at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, in a law review article called "Against Cyberlaw." He also fretted that the cyberbuffs are afflicted with "insufficient perspective, disdain for history, unnecessary futurology and technophilia."

Internet exceptionalism, if it exists, does not exist because governments will be nice to the Internet and leave it alone. Printing exceptionalism (which definitely did exist) did not exist because governments left printing alone and didn't try to control it. Printing was exceptional because those control attempts failed.

Internet exceptionalism can be understood if one considers the unique nature of infinity. If you have an infinite amount of anything, and you reduce it by half, you still have an infinite amount left. If you have an infinite quantity of: spam from Mrs. Mobuto Sese Seko, e-texts of Harry Potter, zoophilia .jpgs, Holocaust Denial .html pages, etc. and the justice system by dint of heroic effort cuts it in half, how much do you have left? An infinite quantity!

And unlike normal law enforcement vice suppression where the illegal activity pops up somewhere else. On the Internet, the suppressed activity pops up in the same place. While illicit activity in the real world may take place in secret and be hard to find, on the Internet it advertises its presence.

Only on the Internet, do most stories about a judge ordering some information suppressed come with pointers to mirror sites where the curious can find the suppressed information.

And as Even if the world's governments were to accomplish the fantasy goal of selling "the Internet" to Mr. Bill or imposing rigorous authentication controls on it at the root level, it is trivial to recreate an open network assuming sufficient demand as a new encrypted Virtual Private Network running over the tamed Internet.

Quite a strange legal entity indeed.

Note that the principalities and city states of the late middle ages were not replaced by nation states because people suddenly decided that it would be a good idea. They suddenly decided that it would be a good idea once those earlier organizational forms were rendered obsolete by the use of gunpowder.

If cheap ubiquitous communications together with the technologies of encryption and authentication render current organizational forms obsolete, it will be nothing new. Merely history repeating itself. The invention of the printing press broke the Europe-wide monopoly of the Roman Catholic Church and made Science and Capitalism possible merely because it allowed the cheap dissemination of knowledge. Modern communications lowers the cost of information transfer to near zero (including that information we label money and adds other features (as above) which make legal controls very difficult. Definitely a new legal regime.

Religious Objections to Drivers License Photos

Now these exemptions may be bad ideas, especially given the terrorist threats we now face. My tentative view would be to oppose them. But the practices of some of these states might suggest that the Florida woman's religious exemption claim isn't as silly as it might at first appear -- especially given that the Florida legislature, in enacting its Religious Freedom Restoration Act, has generally spoken out in favor of religious exemptions.

We got through the Civil War, WWI, WWII, and half the Cold War without any photo ID at all. We can probably survive the WOT.

Note that most photo objectors in the US are Christian rather than Muslim and Muslims (and anyone else) can drive in the US "temporarily" with drivers licenses from foreign countries which may not have any photo or may not have a useful photo.

SECULARIZING PRESSURE

Prof. Volokh discussing private and religious schools:

"Private schools may already be regulated in considerable measure by the government -- lower courts have generally rejected constitutional objections to their regulation, whether or not they get government funding."

Though many religious schools dodge regulation in practice by keeping a low profile and meeting in churches. Regulation of home schools is almost entirely voluntary because of the constitutional challenges involved in regulating in-home interactions among parents and children.

Unless a school markets itself to the general public or seeks some kind of certification, it will be hard to regulate because learning is merely an aspect of religious practice on the one hand and protected 1st amendment reading, writing, and speaking on the other.

The Attack Queers: Liberal Society and the Gay Right by Richard Goldstein

Interviewed by Brian Lehrer on WNYC on Tuesday 25 June. [Episodes can only be listened to for two weeks.]

"All the hot gay writers in the mainstream media are conservative." [Commie women, blacks, and Hispanics in the mainstream media but no commie gays.]

"We grew out of socialism."

In fact, Andrew Sullivan, Norah Vincent, et. al. can more properly be labeled libertarian. Also the usual blather about their success being attributed to being "acceptable" to the mainstream. Though no one hired Andrew to run his blog. He just started writing it (and has lost work because of it). He's not a mainstream writer. If socialist gay bloggers aren't as successful perhaps it's more attributable to socialism than gayness.

Isn't Rosie a successful mainstream gay writer?

On The Pledge...

I'm glad that the 9th Circuit decided that youthful atheists are too delicate to be exposed to the words "under God."

I've got a long list of things that me and my children are too delicate to be exposed to.

Left Wing Tactical Difficulties in the US

I've noted a particular tactical problem that Lefties in the US face that they have not generally faced in other countries.

I was reminded of this difficulty by an exchange which occurred on Wednesday night's The Buzz on WABC radio in NYC. Hosts Malzberg and Bey were arguing about The Pledge case when Bey attempted to pull a switch on right-wing "love it or leave it" rhetoric by suggesting that conservatives who can't accept separation of church and state should be shipped out . Malzberg said, "go ahead and try." [Quotes approximate from memory.]

I feel confident that Malzberg was commenting on the tactical problem faced by liberals who attempt to oppress conservatives in America -- the balance of arms.

The fact is that conservatives (and libertarians) are much more heavily armed than lefties (and even more heavily armed than left-wing radical groups) in the US. Though half the homes in America have firearms, 10% of the population owns over half of America's privately-owned firearms. And what do you suppose the ideology off that 10% is?

Anti-Semitism on Campus

Do you know that it has become a common stunt on campus to set up “checkpoints,” in imitation of Israeli checkpoints? (To be sure, no one is trying to get through with explosives — that would be realistic.) Michael Granoff, a lay official of the Hillel Foundation, says, “Can you imagine if Jewish students attempted to imitate what Palestinians do?”

Easy to do. Just approach the checkpoints with firecrackers and set them off. Certainly an attention getting activity. If concerned about using explosives during the War, substitute water balloons.

Supremes OK drug tests on those participating in extracurricular activities at school.

No big deal.

Anyone who entrusts their children's minds to government teachers has already decided that they don't value those children very much. Minor 4th Amendment losses are the least of their problems.

Supremes decide that mentally retarded are dangerous but that you can't execute them

Mentally retarded persons frequently know the difference between right and wrong and are competent to stand trial, but, by definition, they have diminished capacities to understand and process information, to communicate, to abstract from mistakes and learn from experience, to engage in logical reasoning, to control impulses, and to understand others' reactions. Their deficiencies do not warrant an exemption from criminal sanctions, but diminish their personal culpability.

I'm not sure that this is such a good argument on the part of the court. This implies that the mentally retarded are more dangerous to society than normal people. If so, they could be subject to incarceration under "danger to self or others" principles.

It would be better to "mainstream" the retarded by treating them like any other public school graduate. Make allowances for their limitations but allow them the honor of being treated as moral actors. If the State is into execution, then they should be allowed to participate fully in the process.

Instapundit suggests George is ready to pull the trigger.

Also, if you believe (as many bloggers do) that the Administration was using the Israeli-Palestinian confrontation as a distraction tool while the military buildup took place, this probably means that the buildup is more or less over and that more serious action is imminent.

Fire up Alex Garza's Moon on the old Handspring (a phases of the moon calculator). Note that the dark of the moon in August is the night of Thursday the 8th. In September the night of Friday the 6th. Hmmm.

So some time ago I answered the question Why do Libertarians Dominate Blogdom?

Wherein I used a G.K. Chesterton quote to illustrate why the ideologically organized can produce arguments on the fly -- an obvious survival skill in blogdom.

Here's a demonstration from my personal life. My wife and I are listening to Tuesday's Morning Edition on NPR when up pops a story on a Rock Fish ban on the Left Coast. Apparently Rock Fish stocks are down so 20% of Left Coast fisherfolk will have to shut down. So my wife asks, "How can we handle problems like that?"

Because of my reading and experience, I was able to reply with no perceptible pause, "Government fisheries management has been tried for 60 to 100 years and the stocks continue to decline so it is a demonstrable failure. Protecting fish stocks requires the development of property rights in fish populations or in aquaculture areas (whichever approach works best with different species). Currently, fishermen can only profit by harvesting fish. Property rights will give someone ownership of the capital value of fish stocks which is the best way to encourage their appropriate cultivation."

Now you may well disagree with my remarks but the point is that I was able to generate thoughts and arguments on point in an instant.

Just the capability one needs for blogging.

Now as to why libertarians rather than, say, communists dominate blogging? Later.

Good News About the Geneva Convention

Many have argued that the US Government is bound by the Geneva Convention in fighting the War On Terror (WOT). And they may well be right.

The good news is that you are not. Civilians defending their homes against attack are neither protected by nor subject to the Geneva Convention since they are not signatories and not part of any sort of an armed force.

This means that if some Al Quida member (in or out of uniform) attacks you, or if you just happen to encounter one on the street, you can kill them without having any Geneva Convention problems. You need neither accept surrenders nor take prisoners. You can still be subject to war crimes prosecution and ordinary criminal law but your potential liabilities are somewhat reduced by the elimination of Geneva Convention problems.

If you happen to be a US citizen in the US, the government probably won't extradite you for War Crimes prosecution and US juries are unlikely to convict you of anything for capping an Islamic terrorist (just make sure you've got a real one before pulling the trigger).

Also those unfortunate restrictions like no Dum-Dum ammo don't apply either. So go to town.

Regulatory Searches of Private Land

NPR's All Things Considered had a story about Florida's invasion of homeowner's backyards to kill citrus trees for citrus canker. Hear an 84-year-old woman describe her attempt to defend her 4th Amendment rights against peace officers and tree killers in Florida. A judge later ruled that warrants (or permission) were required to go on to people's land.

It's important to note that courts have generally upheld warrantless regulatory searches of businesses but have been reluctant to do so in the case of homes. Good argument in favor of home-based businesses.

NPR's Phillip Davis reports that Florida's battle to eradicate citrus canker has caught home owners in the middle. State officials have been destroying blighted trees on residential property without permission. Healthy trees within a certain radius have also been destroyed. A Florida judge ruled this was unconstitutional and that officials needed to have permission before entering private property. Citrus canker is a threat to the state's $2.3 billion citrus industry. (4:00)

Protecting Liberty in a Permanent War

A complaint about US citizen POWs from CATO

Note however that there is quite a bit of precedent for holding US citizens as POWs. Lincoln held about 215,000 US citizen POWs (who were wearing gray at the time). In an undeclared war no less.

Also as to duration, we had no idea how long the Cold War would last either -- Harry Elmer Barnes "Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace" -- and I recall that in 1984, I didn't think that it would end 5 years later. There was also the fear that we wouldn't know when the Cold War ended. In the end, we did. I also recall the Malaysian Insurgency which lasted from 1948 or so until the '90s when the last communist unit got too old and retired.

It can take a while.

The Napoleonic wars lasted around 26 years from '89 to '15.

At this point in WWII, FDR had interned more than 200,000 US citizens and enemy aliens (out of a much smaller population). The max that the US is holding right now is 2K. Not too many yet.

Saw two previews at the local Cineplex over the weekend. Both for slacker films: Blue Crush (a Surf Chick Flick) and 8 Mile (Eminem's debut as Detroit trailer trash living near 8 Mile Road).

The peculiarity of these films is that the making of them contradicts their subjects. The making a modern theatrical release takes the focussed effort of thousands of people over several years. If the film makers emulated their subjects, the film would never be made. So the existence of the film proves that the subjects of the film (in these cases) are pathetic losers who have nothing but themselves to blame.

The Neocons and the Nazis

Why is this easier to see than the same conundrum on the international stage? When a nation starts a war to effect a "regime change," it is engaging in murder on a massive scale. The morality, if anything, can only be worse than killing one's neighbor to prevent an alleged crime-to-be.

Am I afraid of people who mean the U.S. harm? Sure I am. Am I happy about living in a state of fear? Of course not. Do I therefore support blasting at every scary looking person in the world who gives Americans the evil eye? No. That policy is not only immoral, it will achieve the exact opposite of greater security for our children. Either reason on its own is enough for any sane person to reject such a course of action.

Though of course one could overcome libertarian objections by a few simple steps.

1)Privatize the 82nd Airborne.
2)Find an Iraqi property owner to invite the 82nd Airborne onto his land. Or find some unowned (government owned) land in Iraq and homestead it with the 82nd Airborne.
3)Wait for the government of Iraq to "initiate the illegitimate use of force".
4)Blow 'em away.

All perfectly legal in libertarian terms.

BTW, in Afghanistan we were invited in by (one of) the government(s) of the country -- the Northern Alliance. Maybe someone in Northern Alliance territory even invited us in in his private capacity.

The Revolution Will Be All Business, by John T Kennedy -- anti-state.com

I don't know why most of our "target demographic" don't see the obvious truth of your remarks. I've always said that rich, technologically equipped individuals are very hard to push around. Since liberty is merely people making their own choices and money plus electronics gives everyone greatly enhanced powers of choice, liberty is achieved outside of politics (which is the only way it can realistically be achieved).

Those with power are not going to give it up because someone convinces them that it is the right thing to do. Indeed, most significant historical changes were not planned.

See below:

http://technoptimist.blogspot.com/2002_06_16_technoptimist_archive.html#77995115

Thanks to New Zealand's Peter Gutmann for the pointer:

Why identity is useless as a predictor of future behavior.

"When a highway patrolman is sent to his duty, he has to be given the authority to cite traffic violators. This cannot be done explicitly for each violator because at the time that the patrolman is sent to his duty, the traffic violator does not exist, and the identity of the future violators is not known, so that it is impossible to construct individual access rights for the violators at that time. The point is that the patrolman's authority has to do with the behaviour of motorists, not their identity.

- Naftaly Minsky, "An Operation-Control Scheme for Authorisation in Computer Systems", International Journal of Computer and Information Sciences, Vol.2, No.2, June 1978, p.157.

Notice the case of the Palistinian suicide bombers. As soon as they blow themselves up, Israel IDs them, reports the name of the town they are from, and invades it. This doesn't prevent the bombing because the bombers have no characteristics that distinguish them from non-bombers in the same area.

Trads vs. NeoTrads -- The Differences

Most of today's traditionalists are, in fact, neotraditionalists. They differ in significant ways from the trads of past ages. Here are some of the differences:

Age of marriage - Trads <18, Neotrads >25


[More coming. I'm slow.]

Note to those trying to control events:

The replacement of feudal principalities and city-states by the nation state was not planned. It happened because of the introduction of gunpowder.

The Reformation, the Enlightenment, and the Industrial Revolution were not planned. They happened because of the printing press.

The mass migrations of the last 30 years were not planned. They happened because of the invention of jet-powered civil aviation.

The recent end of censorship was not planned. It happened because of the reduction in the cost of communications.

PROSECUTION FOR POSTING A STORY ON THE WEB

The same thing happened exactly a year ago in Chappaqua, NY:

"WHITE PLAINS, June 4 — Two male high school students in Chappaqua have been charged with harassment for posting a Web site that listed the names, phone numbers and alleged sexual exploits of dozens of their female classmates, law enforcement officials said today.

The two students were arrested on May 30 after Chappaqua school district officials learned of the Web site and notified the New Castle Police Department. Police officials said they would not release the names of the two students because it was department policy in cases involving youths."

*********

But the DA declined to prosecute for the absence of the "communication" element of harassment.

"Pirro said there was no crime because none of the girls were sent any of the Web pages, and the password meant the males kept the information among themselves."

*********

I'm not sure that the password restriction is relevent particularly since someone outside the group must have seen the pages and reported
them.

Ah for the good old days of Common Law when the tort of infliction of emotional distress required demonstration of physical damage or illness on the part of the victim.

Should Corporations Have Rights?

Great post from Eugene Volokh which raises so many tangential thoughts.

1. Rights of aliens. In the current war, we hear many people say, "aliens have no rights in the US". Which means I suppose that it's open season on them. If they have no rights, then any citizen is free to shoot them down at any time. Rough for the international tourist trade. If the speaker then admits that they have some rights, we are just arguing over how extensive those might be.

2. Non-corporate business forms. A few years ago in SF an apartment building subject to rent control with protected tenants and 24 apartments was bought by 24 buyers as tenants in common. The buyers occupied all 24 apartments and kicked the tenants out. The effect of rent control on property law.

In the case of corporations, lefties have long said that a limited liability corporation is a special creation of the state and thus should be under its control. But modern financial cryptography "using bearer settlement, anonymous voting, secret sharing, and so forth, [allows us to] create limited-liability business entities in software" (Robert Hettinga) and thus dodge this particular form of state control.

Strange but true:

Most Arab residents of the US are not Muslims.

Most Muslim residents of the US are not Arabs.

Have you ever been conscious of a tendancy to avoid certain words because "such things are simply not said these days"? Are you worried that you might have become accidently Politically Correct? There's hope.

Here's how to avoid the dangers of self-censorship in the modern era. Memorize the following list of highly controversial words and work them into your blog or conversation whenever appropriate. (Use an (old) dictionary to look up any that you don't understand.)

he & his (When used to speak of collective persons -- the male includes the female)
little lady
m'am
sodomy
sodomite
lascivious carriage
commie
bastard (When speaking of Madonna's first child, etc.)
leftie
pinko
fornication
traitor
lewd cohabitation
shacking up
nuke 'em
God (with a capital D and an o in the middle)

[Bookmark this post. I'll be adding more as they occur to me.]

Dog Bites Lesbian
In considering the dismissal of murder charges against Marjorie Knoller in the dog-bite death of Diane Whipple you have to keep in mind the concept of Depraved Indifference.

As some of us learned in law school, Common Law murder was, "The unlawful killing of a human being with malice." Malice was defined as, "Intent to kill, intent to do grievious bodily harm, intent to commit an inherently dangerous felony (the Felony Murder rule), or depraved indifference to human life."

The latter concept was usually illustrated by some miscreant shooting into the carriages of a passing train. The actor did not intend to kill but showed what the law chose to call "depraved indifference to human life."

So the question in this case is whether or not -- as a matter of law (since the judge took the final decision away from the jury)-- posession and control of a dangerous dog rises to the level of "shooting into a crowd." Even though fatal dog attacks are rare. And fatal dog attacks involving white supremicist prison gangs, bestiality, dogs named Bane and Hera, and Pacific Heights are even rarer.

DOG BITES BOX OFFICE

Astonishing box-office analysts, the mostly live-action theatrical version of Scooby-Doo took in an estimated $56.4 million to become the biggest attraction at the nation's movie theaters over the weekend, earning more than twice the amount of the No. 2 film, The Bourne Identity, starring Matt Damon, which bagged $27.5 million. Windtalkers, starring Nicolas Cage, was in third place with a disappointing $14.5 million. (The MGM film reportedly cost more than $100 million to produce.) All three films debuted on Friday. The Sum of All Fears, which had held the top spot over the previous two weekends, slipped to fourth place with $13.5 million, to bring its 17-day total to $84.5 million. The success of Scooby-Doo -- it was the biggest June opening in history -- was particularly surprising given the generally poor reviews the film received on Friday and the high failure rate of similar projects that have attempted to convert classic saturday-morning cartoons into live-action features. In reporting on the film's achievement, today's (Monday) Wall Street Journal commented: "Rival studio executives have been snickering for months about the box office prospects for the Warner Bros. movie Scooby-Doo, saying that a film with a B-level cast and based on a cornball 1970s cartoon character stood no chance in a summer of big-budget blockbusters. They aren't laughing now."

Proof (if proof were needed) that representative democracy is an inadequate system of social organization and should (quickly) be replaced with something else.

Dumb Volvo radio ad on WABC this morning.

Theme was "What would you do different if you travelled back in time (in your life). Illustrated by announcer's voice retrograding from maturity to infancy. Various car-related possibilities listed. One being something along the lines of "buy a Next Generation Volvo". This is in keeping with their current ad tag line.

One major problem. If you travel into the past, you can't possibly buy a Next Generation Volvo.

QUOTE OF THE DAY
=========================
"All the great media adventures of the 20th century have been visual. Television, movies, the Internet, they're all visual mediums and I don't think people have time to sit down and read."
-ED NEEDHAM, the new managing editor of Rolling Stone magazine.

Spoken like someone who's never spent all that much time on the Net.

Antiquities Dealer Is Sentenced to Prison

In a case that has been closely watched by the art world, a prominent Manhattan antiquities dealer was sentenced yesterday to 33 months in federal prison and fined $50,000 for his role in a conspiracy to sell antiquities stolen from Egypt.
...
In a stern statement, Judge Jed S. Rakoff of Federal District Court in Manhattan rejected the defense's arguments that Mr. Schultz was unaware of the legal risks and called him "an ordinary thief in every conventional sense of that word."

Yet another example of the modern tendancy to expand the definition of theft to cover a host of bureucratic offenses. Theft was called larceny
at Common Law.

Bouvier's (the Net's favorite legal dictionary) defines larceny as: The wrongful and fraudulent taking and carrying away, by one person, of the mere personal goods, of another, from any place, with a felonious intent to convert them to his, the taker's use, and make them his property, without the consent of the owner.

Well those who violate the antiquities laws of Egypt are not taking the personal property of another. These are administrative regulations which say no matter who owns an antiquity, they can't remove it from Egypt. No common law crime. A mere administrative violation. No moral turpitude attaches. You can't go to Hell. No 7th Commandment violation. No ordinary thief.

In an undeclared war, the US government imprisons a US citizen without trial "for the duration". Illegal? Probably not. Unprecedented? No.

The Union Army in the (undeclared) American Civil War imprisoned some 215,000 Confederate POWs "for the duration". Those prisoners were legally US citizens (that being the whole point of the war).

The Confederacy imprisoned some 193,000 Union POWs who were considered non-citizens of that nation.

So there is certainly loads of precedent for the practice.

[Thanks to the comment by a guy named Bruce (bpbatista@vssp.com) to the most recent Instapundit.com post on the detention of Al Muhajir for this thought]

DCF

Tyco CEO Resigns Amid Criticism

So New York State expects to try the CEO of Tyco for a sales tax violation.

How can they find a prosecutor, judge, or jury to try this case when every single person who is supposed to do those jobs has dodged New York State Use Taxes (the companion tax to the sales tax) and almost no one has ever filed a use tax form?

Is it just to prosecute someone for a crime that everyone in the state commits frequently and does not even consider a crime?

I'm not generally friendly with the FBI but I can't help but note how bad its PR work has been recently.

Those who do support the Bureau have been neglecting their best arguments.

"Why didn't the FBI catch the terrorists before September 11th?"

1) You can't catch terrorists without spying on them.

2) You can't spy on terrorists in America without spying on Americans

3) The FBI used to proudly spy on Americans but then left-wing politicos ordered us to stop.

4) Left-wing politicos now complain that we haven't been spying on Americans enough. They should have let us continue to spy on Americans like we used to.

5) Maybe we should investigate them for giving aid and comfort to the enemies of America. [Just kidding]

Don't Nuke Mecca

As tempting as it might seem to nuke Mecca if a weapon of mass destruction is used in the US by Islamic radicals, there are disadvantages.

Nukes are controversial as is the "terror bombing" of civilian populations. Bad publicity. Lots of innocent people get killed.

Try a spiritual response to a spiritual attack, instead.

Here's a better suggestion -- build a cathedral in Mecca.

You have to understand that it's a major no-no for infidels to even visit Mecca. Only the faithful who have submitted [Islam means submission] themselves to God can enter the holy cities of Al Madinah and Mecca. Islamics are free to build a mosque in Rome but Christians, Hindus, Buddists, etc. aren't free to visit Mecca.

Several precendents would allow us to invade Saudi Arabia, confiscate a small chunk of suburban desert outside Mecca and build a a fortress/cathedral there. First there's the left-wing precedent of the war in Kosovo in which Europeans established a new principle of international law which says that we can invade any country oppressing its citizens. SA is certainly oppressing its citizens. Quite a barbaric legal code and loads of religious oppression. The right-wing precendent is that the US can invade any country that's keeping us from freely doing business with them. [The Marines did it an avarage of more than once a year from 1802 to 1940.] The libertarian precedent is that most Saudi territory is unowned (government) land and anyone (say, the 82nd Airborne) is free to homestead it.

The benefit of this construction is that we can build it without harming any innocent people and all the world's Islamic radicals would be compelled to leave the rest of us alone while they attacked it. Their faith would hardly allow them to bother with building demolition in New York as long as the holiest sites of Islam were being profaned by the (hourly) celebration of the Eucharist. And nothing we could do (including torture and execution) would upset Osama bin Laden more. They would be irresistably drawn into a carefully prepared killing ground and eliminated.

To maximise the effectiveness of the attack, the church would have to be Catholic (English, Greek, or Roman). Those denomination's sacerdotal magic (featuring the actual presence of Christ) is much stronger than that of other Christian groups. Shouting Baptists just don't make it for this application.

So then our only remaining question is whether the cathedral should look like this or like this.

Can it ever be moral for a group to do that which is immoral for a member of the group to do?
--RAH

THE FDA MEETS THE FIRST AMENDMENT

Even more problematical than regulatory agencies crackdowns on advertizing are the many past cases of regulatory agencies cracking down on substantive writing and religious practice.

Specifically:

FDA burns the books of the Orgone Press claiming they were illegal labelling for Wilhelm Reich's banned Orgone Accumulator.

FDA bans Church of Scientolgy E-meters.

SEC demands that financial newsletters obtain a government license to publish.

CPSC bans a book (in 1984).

CFTC demands that commodity newsletters obtain a government license to publish.

Buffalo News - State considers strict law to track foreign students

ALBANY - State lawmakers are considering requiring New York colleges and universities to quickly report to police the names of foreign students who enroll to qualify for student visas but then fail to show up for class.

Other states have proposed similar requirements, but the New York bill, still at the committee stage, is believed to be the strictest, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

I trust that it's not the showing up for class that will be tracked but rather the students' academdic standing. I knew lots of people who rarely went to class and passed their courses (including me).

Is Emerson Dicta?

Yet another free law school lecture from Eugene Volokh. If you read these daily, you'll gain a free legal education.

See also:

Abortion Cams

Somebody should collect all of these. I'm waiting for the one on the Rule Against Perpetuities.

Why do Libertarians dominate Blogdom?

Easy. Because not all media are created equal.

As G. K. Chesterton says in Heretics:

The truth is, that it is quite an error to suppose that absence of definite convictions gives the mind freedom and agility. A man who believes something is ready and witty, because he has all his weapons about him. he can apply his test in an instant. The man engaged in conflict with a man like Mr. Bernard Shaw may fancy he has ten faces; similarly a man engaged against a brilliant duelist may fancy that the sword of his foe has turned to ten swords in his hand. But this is not really because the man is playing with ten swords, it is because he is aiming very straight with one. Moreover, a man with a definite belief always appears bizarre, because he does not change with the world; he has climbed into a fixed star, and the earth whizzes below him like a zoetrope. Millions of mild black-coated men call themselves sane and sensible merely because they always catch the fashionable insanity, because they are hurried into madness after madness by the maelstrom of the world.

So we've got prepared answers to lots of stuff and can therefore handle the posting loads imposed by Blogging. In a column of a number of years ago on the Libertarian Party, George Will thought it unusual that the LP had a plank on the Moon Treaty (surprise, surprise, they were against it).

Then there's the fact that we are People of the book. Blogging is a writing exercise and in order to be a good writer you have to read a lot.

Nelson's battle plan is revealed on scrap of paper

Vanessa Thorpe, Arts and Media Correspondent
Sunday May 26, 2002
The Observer

It may look like a random doodle, but a rough drawing found almost by chance on the back of a scrap of yellowing paper has proved to be our closest contact yet with the mind of Britain's greatest naval hero.

When Admiral Horatio Nelson defeated the French at Trafalgar in 1805, he changed the course of history. Today, following an extraordinary research coup for the historian Colin White, Nelson's lost battle plan is to go on display for the first time in the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich.

News of the discovery of the only hand-drawn tactical map of Trafalgar broke this weekend and has excited historians all over Britain.

Here's the real article from the Journal For Maritime Research:

Nelson’s 1805 Battle Plan

and, thanks to the power of deep linking, here's the plan itself.

Here is a detail.

WHY DON'T MORE FATHERS WANT THEIR DAUGHTERS TO BE LESBIANS?

Compared to that, lesbian sex seems much less repulsive, much less of an indignity ... pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases .. less likely to transmit STDs ...In terms of raw physical risk, you've got to prefer the girl.
...
Finally, I'll stress again that this question is in part facetious: I'm pretty sure fathers don't actually devoutly wish for their daughters to be lesbians, and I'm asking this mostly because it's amusing and a bit absurdist to wonder why it isn't this way. But it does have a serious component: Given fathers' notorious sexual protectiveness of their daughters, why don't we see more of the attitude I describe?

I guess that a Freudian could suggest a good motive.

Or a sociobiologist could point out that even though homosexuals can reproduce, a daughter's hetrosexuality maximises the chance that a father's genetic heritage will be passed on to grandchildren. Hetrosexual couples have a higher birthrate than homosexual couples and the female in a hetrosexual couple produces 100% of the couple's natural children. The odds of being the mother are lower if there are two women.

But seriously folks. The main reason is that a majority of (American) people don't think homosexuality is morally right 55% to 38% in the latest Gallup Poll. And I bet that a fair chunk of those 38% who are too chicken to use the term "morally wrong" don't think that homosexuality is a good idea.

Man out of jail after 4 1/2 years on civil contempt

BEAUMONT -- Odis Briggs hugged his attorneys after a Beaumont federal magistrate ordered his release Thursday on $50,000 bond from Liberty County Jail, where he had been held for four years and eight months for contempt of court.

"It's a joy to be released," said Briggs, 63, after making bail. "I'm going first to the altar and pray and then visit my wife's grave."

State District Judge Zeke Zbranek had refused to release Briggs to visit his ailing wife or attend her funeral after she died March 29, 1999.

Zbranek said Briggs "held the keys" to his freedom -- and state appellate courts agreed -- if he would turn over financial records to show what happened to the $120,000 he admits swindling from 18 black families in Chambers County.

Advice to those imprisoned for civil contempt:

They aren't supposed to keep you if you establish that you can't be coerced. So prove it.

Write daily letters to the judge holding you in prison expressing in the strongest possible language that you will never in a million years do what he says.

Include lengthy discussions of whatever personal, political, or religious philosophy motivates you to establish the depth of your convictions. On every letter note how many days you've been imprisoned and how many letters and petitions you've sent.

Attach copies of every one of those letters to Habeus Corpus petitions mailed daily to various state and federal courts around the country.

You've got nothing better to do, have you?

From a Slate piece on the abortion wanted poster decision:

"At issue were a series of Wild West "wanted" posters (a tiny replica can be seen here) and a Web site called the Nuremburg Files. Created in 1995 by anti-abortion activists, the posters featured images of abortion providers, their names and addresses, plus a "reward" of $500 for each doctor who was "persuaded" to stop performing abortions."

So I expect to see Osama wheel on in to federal court to sue George for making a threat against him "wanted dead or alive".

More and Yet More on Drivers Licenses for Illegal Aliens

A list of articles from northern New Jersey's Record newspaper about aliens, the DMV, and drivers licenses.

Almost no mention of the fact that aliens can drive anywhere in the US using drivers licenses issued by their home countries.

No mention of the fact that drivers licenses were not intended to be a general social control measure but just a safe driving measure.

I've read lots of genuine right wing nuts who used to be opposed to drivers licenses on religious or constitutional grounds complaining about drivers licenses for illegal ailiens. Inconsistant?

If animals are granted rights by humans, will humans have the same rights?

That is, if:

Animals should primarily be given the legal right to demonstrate their natural behavior (dependent on their natural disposition) even if they are found to be harmful and their movements have to be restricted.

Then aren't humans equally entitled to "demonstrate our natural behavior" including things like taking over the world, building nuclear power plants, and launching space vehicles? Not to mention killing and eating animals.

Got 11 Minutes -- Experience the Essence of Totalitarianism

Do you wonder what totalitarianism is actually like? You could certainly read Red Azalea by Anchee Min about growing up in Red China during the '50s and '60s. Or you could listen to the remarkable interview with her on NPRs Weekend Edition Saturday for 11 May 2002.

Warning -- Contains reenactment of a sex scene with dialog written by Mao Tse-tung.

Nominally an interview about the author's new novel Wild Ginger, it explores her life and past writings (ostracism because her parents were teachers, Red Guard member to overcome her social problems by becoming more socialist than anyone, Peasant to improve her purity, Actress portaying Madame Mao because she looked appropriate and they weren't making any other movies or plays, despised fellow traveller when Mao died and Madame Mao was arrested, refugee to America, citizen, patriot, and author).

And you think you've had a rough life!

VANDERBILT AGGRESSIVELY RECRUITING JEWS

I'm not praising, I'm not blaming, I'm just reporting the facts. But as to one item I can't help myself -- "'It dredges up stereotypes and issues we really don't want on the table,' said Jessica Keimowitz, director of college counseling at the New Jewish High School of Greater Boston." Really, Jessica? Is it really true that we don't like this particular stereotype? Tell that to our mothers . . . .

UPDATE: Reader Adam Bonin points out that the Wall Street Journal also wrote about this on April 29.

The WSJ article is accompanied by an interesting table ranking SAT scores by religious denomination. The fascinating factoid is that Jews are not at the top of the list. That honor belongs to Unitarians. Missing from the list are atheists, agnostics, and secular humanists. I wonder how those denominations would have done?

Fear of Speaking One's Mind

Great exchange among Eugene, Matt Welch, Eve Kayden, and others on fear of saying unpopular things.

Eve is right that one should focus on the topic of controversial remarks not on a controversial manner of speaking.

I agree with Matt who can't imagine why anyone would worry about saying something. I hang out with neo-traditionalists in NYC who actually say that they worry about such things. As both a neo-trad and a libertarian, I'm unlikely to worry about such things (libertarians never do).

SF author Robert Heinlein's leading character Jubal Harshaw from Stranger in a Strange Land said that he was twice as hard to push around since he was both a physician and a lawyer. That would certainly work. I'm in one of those catagories and certainly have the mouth. I note that the articulate are harder to shut up because others fear a tounge lashing.

Those of us lucky enought to reside in the US have a lot less than most (any?) to worry about in the realm of expression. Even ignoring the 1st, we have an advanced private economy where it is easy for anyone (no matter how deviate) to find a job.

The modern communications environment aids the deviate. While it's true that as primates we crave acceptance by members of our troop, we're not stuck with the small troop we're born into. Even if we don't move to the Big City to find others who share our own twisted vision, we can easily find them on the Nets and communicate with them. Thus social ostracism is much less powerful a control measure than it used to be.

Then since the 60's happened, the opposition can hardly argue that anything you say is violating sacred norms. Anyone who tries to make that argument can be dismissed with a chuckle.

"When I was born, smoking was a virtue and sodomy a vice." Since paganism, sodomy, bastardy, body piercing, and a whole list of behaviors, beliefs, and statuses which were once verbotten are now protected by law, anything goes.

I can easily list [next project] more than 50 things which would once have got one in serious trouble but are now perfectly OK.

Anyone attacked for their deviate behavior (calling for racist tax cuts, for example) can just say "Mine is merely an alternative life style. I understand they're even starting to teach it in the schools.

Car-impound law faces challenge: State court to review action when driver's license is suspended

Relates the sad tale of Washingtonians (the State of) who have their vehicles siezed when they are found to be driving without a valid license.

In the course of the story we find this bit of math:

Of the 178 fatality accidents the state patrol responded to last year, 15 involved suspended drivers. An estimated 340,000 of Washington's 4.2 million motorists are driving with suspended or revoked licenses.

As is usually the case in such matters, no one has done the math to see if these numbers establish that unlicensed drivers are significantly more dangerous than licensed ones:

_15__________340,000
178________4,200,000

8.43%_______8.10%

The power of spreadsheets. So it looks like unlicensed drivers are about 4% more likely to be involved in fatal accidents than licensed ones.