The Yin Blog

Go away, winter, it's almost May!

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"?

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 started to repudiate some of his past views on taxes, for example.

However . . . this is focusing purely on political issues.  Now, I'm not downplaying the importance of issues, since for many people, such things as Supreme Court appointments, tax policy, Iraq, and so on are key points.  But I can't escape feeling that on a procedural level, the candidate who would represent 4 more years of the Bush Administration is . . .  Hillary Clinton.

How can I say that?  Let me explain.

Obviously, I don't mean that Clinton, if President, would duplicate Bush's policies.  Rather, what I mean is that she strikes me as most likely to replicate the Bush Administration's approach to dealing with the opposition and the public: a malleable understanding of truth and reality; and questionable judgment about and excessive devotion to blindly loyal subordinates.

Malleable understanding of truth and reality

As far as I can tell, nothing ever matters except what the Clinton campaign says at this very moment; certainly, not anything that was said in the past by any member of the Clinton campaign.  The best example of this is the "3 am ad" that Clinton ran against Obama in the days leading up to the primaries in Texas and Ohio.  The ad asked voters to consider whether the person in White House would be up to answering the phone at 3 am to deal with a national security crisis. 

The suggestion here is that Obama is not ready, and the country would suffer if he were the President.  Yet, in 2004, Bill Clinton, when campaigning on behalf of John Kerry, told a crowd that if one candidate was selling fear (i.e., Bush) and one was selling hope (i.e., Kerry), you better vote for the one selling hope(!). 

Is this at all consistent?  Of course not, because all that matters is the present, and in the present, Clinton needed to sell fear.

There are so many other examples of this kind of malleable, "reality is what we say it is" attitude, including:

She admits here that she said some things she knew not to be true.  Why?  If she's willing to lie about something this trivial, what else would she lie about that matters to her?  What is especially galling about the Bosnia sniper lie is that it was so brazen -- as if to say that the public is a bunch of dupes who wouldn't possibly find out the truth.

Another example of Clinton's reality: Florida and Michigan.  As we know all too well, the DNC voted to strip Florida and Michigan of its delegates as punishment for those states' decisions to violate party rules "by moving up their contest dates before Feb. 5."  Clinton pledged with the other candidates not to campaign in those states.  Yet, after she "won" those states, she started calling for the results to be counted and the delegates to be included.

What rational person would conclude that the results would be meaningful?  (To be fair, she later called for some sort of re-vote, and it may be that the Obama campaign obstructed any effort to come up with an acceptable re-vote, but that is a different issue.)  This is especially true in Michigan, where Obama's name wasn't even on the ballot!

Questionable judgment about and excessive devotion to blindly loyal subordinates

One of the key complaints that I've heard about the Bush Administration is that it made mistakes in appointing people like former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, former Attorney General John Ashcroft, and of course, Vice President Dick Cheney.  It compounded those mistakes by not listening to "good" appointments, like former Secretary of State Colin Powell and the generals who advised the President not to invade Iraq, at least not without committing 500,000 troops.

Let's look at what we know of Clinton.  I've already blogged before about Clinton and former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack, so I won't repeat what I said except to say that I think so little of the association that it was a major motivating factor in leading me to change my support initially from Clinton to Obama.

Then there's her former campaign director, Mark Penn, who was able to keep his day job as the CEO of his lobbying firm, Burston-Marsteller.  Of course, he was fired when it became known that, while Clinton was opposing a free trade deal with Colombia, Penn was representing Colombia in that same deal.  Why didn't Clinton think that it was a problem to have Penn continuing to work as a lobbyist while running her campaign?  Heck, even Dick Cheney resigned as the CEO of Halliburton!

Is this an example of what her "35 years of experience" has led her to conclude is an acceptable arrangement without a conflict of interest?!?

Of course, she didn't even fire Penn -- he remains on her campaign as an advisor!

Speaking of questionable judgment about subordinates, I have to end with this observation.  We have a mess in Iraq in part because Bush did not listen to the generals who warned him about invading.  Lesson: military commanders might know what they are talking about.

Redux:

Hillary Clinton declared Thursday she will begin withdrawing troops from Iraq within 60 days of becoming president, regardless of what her military advisers say about the situation on the ground at the time.

True, invading and withdrawing are different.  But the bald-faced willingness to dismiss what military commanders have to say evinces a similar attitude of disrespect toward the professionals and a ruthless desire to advance one's own agenda regardless of the facts.

***

Again, I realize that political policies matter to people, and there would obviously be differences between Hillary Clinton and John McCain on a range of issues.  But that is focusing on what the President does, and ignoring how the President will do it.  Both are important, and when it comes to replicating how the Bush Administration is perceived to do things, I see the danger as coming from Hillary Clinton more than John McCain.

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

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 "Victory Committee." Its goal is to raise $120 million -- which they're sure to spend trying to destroy our candidates.

We've seen this before -- we know they're already launching attacks on Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

Hmm, you mean, Senator McCain might use the money to launch an attack:

- "in which several unidentified people described as [] supporters talk about how insulted they felt by what Obama said" about rural voters being bitter and clinging to guns and religion?

- criticizing Clinton as a flip-flopping on NAFTA: "Here's what you can't do. You can't spend the better part of two decades campaigning for NAFTA and PNTR for China, and then come here to Pennsylvania, and tell the steelworkers you've been with them all along.  You can't say you are opposed to the Colombia Trade deal, while your key strategist is working for the Colombian government to get the deal passed"?

- criticizing Obama as having "condescending views of Americans living in small towns"?

- mocking Clinton as pretending to be "Annie Oakley," "running around talking about how this is an insult to sportsmen, how she values the Second Amendment"?

- calling Obama "out of touch" with mainstream Americans and an "elitist"?

Heck, if I were a Republican (which I'm not), I don't think I'd contribute a penny to the GOP right now.  Why would I, when Clinton and Obama are the ones making these attacks on each other?

Neal Stephenson & Iowa City

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 out to have an Iowa City connection!  After graduating from Boston University, Stephenson moved to Iowa City (he'd grown up partly in Ames, Iowa) in 1981, where he worked on his first novel "The Big U."

Yea for Iowa City!

Yes, men are *that* shallow, apparently

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 positive and supportive than other match-ups.

The reason, researchers suspect, is that men place great value on beauty, whereas women are more interested in having a supportive husband.

Experience to be President

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 all, Bill Clinton had only been governor of a small state, while his opponent:

(1) was the sitting President of the United States -- itself no doubt the best experience for being President of the United States;

(2) had been a United States Ambassador to the United Nations;

(3) had headed the Central Intelligence Agency; and

(4) had served two terms as the Vice President of the United States -- a position at least comparable to Senator Clinton's eight years as the First Lady.

If you want to talk about experience, George H.W. Bush's record dwarfed Bill Clinton's . . . .

Why Eliot Spitzer's conduct matters

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 think so.  One thing that defenders of Bill Clinton never seemed to acknowledge was that his impeachment wasn't based merely on the fact of an illicit sexual relationship with an intern, but rather, lies under oath about that relationship.  Here, Spitzer's conduct is even worse. . . .

Had the story been that Spitzer had gone to Nevada (where prostitution is legal everywhere except in the cities of Las Vegas and Reno) and hired a prostitute, there might have been some moral outrage, but it would otherwise be a non-story.  This would be true even if, as is the case, Spitzer -- as AG -- brought cases against prostitution rings, for it is entirely consistent to say that as AG, he was merely enforcing New York law, whether he agreed with it or not.

That argument, however, is not available to him.  It's not a private matter, as he asserted in his "apology."  (If it were truly private, why would he feel the need to call a press conference about it?)  The fact that he, as AG, prosecuted prostitution rings and yet engages one himself, means that he is putting himself above the law.  Had he disagreed with the ban on prostitution, he -- as AG -- could have declined to prosecute such cases.  He did not.  He obviously felt those laws were worth enforcing.  So why is it "private" when he allegedly engages in it?

I don't see how Spitzer has any choice but to resign.  His political career has to be in shambles.  How could he ever win another campaign?

The Democratic Party's cheap shot at McCain

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 first-name basis with me -- from someone claiming to be the DNC's General Counsel.  The point of the e-mail was that "John McCain is breaking the law."  It continued:

I don't know if you saw the news, but the press covered the complaint all day. John McCain himself directly responded to Governor Dean at a press conference, saying "We're doing exactly what Howard Dean did in a previous election and what the FEC ruled in the case of Congressman Gephardt."

But that's a lie -- John McCain isn't doing what Governor Dean and Congressman Gephardt did at all.

Governor Dean and Congressman Gephardt followed the law and were granted written permission by the FEC to withdraw from the federal matching funds program.

To prove it, we have a copy of the letter Governor Dean received from the FEC in 2003 granting him permission to drop out. If McCain is doing "exactly what Howard Dean did," he'll have no trouble producing a letter of his own.

But you and I know McCain's lying -- he doesn't have a letter like that from the FEC. Not only has he refused to get permission, he's been warned by FEC Chairman David Mason that he can't unilaterally drop out of the program.

Of course, what the e-mail failed to state is that the reason McCain doesn't have the letter from the FEC is that the FEC currently lacks a quorum.  And part of the reason that it lacks a quorum is that Senator Barack Obama, among others, has put a hold on one of President Bush's nominees.

I don't know whether Obama's grounds for blocking the nominee are meritorious; I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt and think that Obama truly believes that the nominee deserves to be blocked from the seat on the FEC.  But it doesn't look very good if he's basically hamstringing his likely Presidential opponent from getting a needed ruling by the FEC.  It has the appearance of the same kind of politics that Obama is constantly decrying.  Furthermore, I don't know whether McCain's effort to withdraw from the restrictions of public financing are legitimate; they may well be bogus.

But it seems misleading for the DNC to be crowing that McCain "can't" produce his FEC letter when it's the Democrats who are keeping the FEC from being able to do anything.

Jack Bauer and me

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 based on my contribution to the AALS Law and Humanities Section symposium.  Sadly, the online link doesn't include the photo of Jack Bauer that ran in the hardcopy of the paper.  Go read it, because you're not going to get a new episode of "24" until early next year.

Re-enacting the Pentagon Papers argument

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. v. United States.  This was all the brainchild of my colleague Randy Bezanson.  Dean Emeritus Bill Hines played Solicitor General Griswold, former UI General Counsel Mark Schantz played Alexander Bickel, and eight of my colleagues and I played the Supreme Court justices.  I was fortunate enough to play Justice Harlan -- my ideal justice.

What was especially interesting was the presence in the audience of Daniel Ellsberg, the RAND analyst who copied the Pentagon Papers and leaked them to the New York Times and the Washington Post.  Ellsberg was definitely a . . . character, and I was delighted to get to meet someone once accused by Pat Buchanan of having cost the United States the Vietnam War.

Here's a Daily Iowan story about the event, which also contains a Quicktime video.

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

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 the VP slot on her Presidential ticket to Illinois Governor Tancredi.  In exchange, Tancredi is supposed to offer no resistance to the execution of Lincoln Burrows.  During the second season episode "Sweet Caroline," however, now-President Reynolds gives a speech in Chicago in which she says that she wouldn't be where she is today without the support of her home state of Illinois.

But wait, under the Twelfth Amendment, the President and the Vice-President cannot come from the same state.  Thus, Reynolds and Tancredi couldn't have been on the same ticket . . . .

An important lesson from election 2000

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 2000, of course, Ralph Nader ran as a third-party candidate who ended up siphoning enough votes from those who otherwise would have voted for Al Gore that Gore lost the general election to George Bush.  (Yes, I realize some voters cling to the belief that Gore still won the election, but at least under the recount methods proposed by Gore, it looks as if Bush would still have prevailed.)

My sense is that Al Gore inspired far more unity among Democrats and independents than Hillary Clinton does, and indeed, Gore had less political baggage.  At the same time, my sense is that John McCain inspires less distrust and dislike among Democrats and independents than George Bush did in 2000.  Thus, if some Democrats and independents were willing to throw their votes away and vote for Nader rather than Al Gore, there has to be a risk that they'd do the same when presented with a less politically attractive Democrat and a less feared/reviled Republican.

True, after eight years of President Bush, such Democrats and independents might be less willing to risk another Republican victory.  But it's got to be a risk that one should think about.

How Hillary Clinton has lost my vote

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 university professors -- hardly a representative subset of the general voting population.  I was also a bit disappointed at his performance in the YouTube debate, although that was primarily a function of inflated expectations, I think.  In any event, the point is that I did not suffer from any instinctive, visceral "anyone but Hillary" pathology.  I saw her (and still do) as very smart and competent, ruthlessly so.

But by the time the Iowa caucuses rolled around, my support had shifted to Obama.  The big reason was that Clinton really courted former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack, naming him co-chair of her national campaign and promising to pay off his nearly half a million campaign debt.  More ominously, in the days leading up to the caucuses, a colleague of mine heard from a top local Democrat that Vilsack was the leading candidate to be named Secretary of Education in a Hillary Clinton Administration.

The fact that Hillary Clinton would seriously judge Vilsack to be an asset to her campaign raised grave doubts in my mind about her judgment of people.  I've come to the view that the policy issues that a candidate favors matter less than the candidate's judgment about people -- who does the candidate listen to, who would the candidate appoint to cabinet positions and judgeships, and so on.  On that score, Vilsack is just terrible.

Let's review briefly the disaster that was the first round of the University of Iowa search to replace David Skorton, who was driven off by the Board of Regents.  The Regents were led by Michael Gartner, a Vilsack appointee.  Unlike past presidential searches, in which the Regents had no involvement until a slate of four (or so) finalists were presented to them, this time, the Gartner-led Regents inserted themselves into the search process itself, with Gartner and three other Vilsack-appointees on the search committee itself.  That search concluded with four finalists, all of whom were rejected by the full Regents.  Why?  Supposedly, none of the finalists had any experience in health sciences management -- a necessary requirement, according to the Regents, given the immense presence of the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics.

Of course, one would think that this absence of relevant experience would reflect a failure on the part of the search committee to have included that requirement in its job description -- and hence, the four Regents on the search committee themselves were responsible for wasting the entire process.  Not surprisingly, the Faculty Senate issued a vote of no confidence in the Regents.

What was Governor Vilsack's response during this fiasco?  He merely asked the Regents to see if they could work something out with the faculty.  Hardly decisive leadership, particularly when the Regents decided only to offer the presidency to one of the four -- no doubt someone who had already decided that he/she would never work for this Board of Regents, and not surprisingly turned down the offer.

Back to square one.  Minus more than $100,000 in expenses incurred by the search firm retained to help in the process.  Minus a good deal of reputation.  Minus a year of effort by various faculty, staff, and students.  (For more detail about this, you have to go to my colleague Nick Johnson's blog and search for the voluminous blog posts he had on the presidential search.)

Anyway, judgment about people matters, and Vilsack demonstrated extremely poor judgment with his Regents nominees, and Hillary Clinton demonstrated poor judgment by chasing Vilsack's endorsement.  (Of course, all in my humble opinion.)

So that's why I decided to support Obama instead of Clinton.  But what if Hillary Clinton were to get the Democratic nomination?

I might have been willing to hold my nose and vote for her, as I did in 2004 for John Kerry.  But after the disgusting and dishonest attacks that the Clinton war machine -- particularly, those by former President Bill Clinton -- I just can't stomach the thought of rewarding this sort of reprehensible behavior.  There's something somewhat George W. Bush-esque about the Clintons, in that their personal power is more important than principles, their political party, or even the nation.  Just as Bush has (as far as I can tell) left the Republican Party in disarray, the Clintons' attacks on Obama threaten to rend the Democratic Party.

If the election were tomorrow, and Obama were the Democratic nominee, he would get my vote.  If Obama were not the Democratic nominee, but John McCain were the Republican nominee, he would get my vote.  If neither Obama nor McCain were nominees, then I'd probably just write in Michael Bloomberg.  What is clear is that Hillary Clinton is not getting my vote, not after this last week.

UPDATE: Wow, I forgot to mention this:

Sen. Hillary Clinton, in an about-face, said on Friday she wants the Democratic Party delegates in two states that were barred by the national party to be reinstated and counted in the race to determine the party's U.S. presidential nominee.

Hmm, could it be that, unlike Obama and John Edwards, Clinton kept her name on the Michigan ballot and hence "won" that state's primary?

This is so transparently ridiculous -- since neither Edwards nor Obama contested the state, in what way could it be said that the delegates there represent any sort of preference for Clinton over the other two?  Yet, Clinton is able to argue with a straight face that she is entitled to have those delegates counted.

Disgusting.

This can't possibly be right

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 "same-sex marriage" question.

Anyway, I think it's safe to say that this test fails rather spectacularly to predict my actual preferences.

Is Senator Obama a "Bob the Builder" fan?

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 Builder, can we build it?  Bob the Builder, yes, we can!"

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

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 break scheme cooked up by Michael Scofield.  There were likable prison convicts (Scofield, Sucre, C-Note) and loathsome but watchable ones (T-Bag) and some decent prison officials (Warden Pope, and a few other minor characters) and some loathsome but watchable ones (Bellick, Geary).  Throw in a juicy conspiracy plotline going as far as the Vice President's office, and it's not hard to see why "Prison Break" was a hit.

At the end of season 1, Scofield and his crew broke out but had the law literally chasing at their heels.  Season 2 was much sunnier in atmosphere -- downright hot at times, as you might expect in places like Arizona, Nevada, and Utah (in the summer, anyway).  Some of the escaped cons were killed off, and at the end, Scofield was once again in prison.  This time, though, he was in a hellish Panamanian prison that looked something like the maximum security facility in "Escape From New York."

Season 3 picked up with another Byzantine plot by the mysterious Company to use Scofield's engineering talents to break out a fellow prisoner known only as Whistler.  As incentive?  The Company captured Scofield's nephew LJ and Scofield's girlfriend Dr. Sara Tancredi.  When Scofield and his brother Lincoln Burrows (LJ's dad) resisted, with Burrows narrowly failing to rescue LJ and Sara, the Company representative called Burrows and told him that it was understandable that he would try to rescue his loved ones, but he had better not do it again or LJ would suffer.  And she directed him to a box in an alley.

A box big enough to hold a human head.

Which is where the episode ended.

Was it really going to be a human head in there?  Following conventional Hollywood wisdom, you'd think not.  The use of a human head sized box could only be meant to mislead the audience into expecting that, only to be "surprised" when it turned out to be something else, like a hand in a block of ice.

Only, the next episode revealed that . . . it *was* Sara's head in the box!!!!

* * *

I have to say, this was so utterly mean-spirited and violative of Hollywood conventions that, even as I mourned the character's death -- and I really thought that Scofield and Sara had really good chemistry together -- I applauded the writers' gutsiness in doing so.

As far as I can tell, one of the rules of Hollywood is that it is okay to kill off the female lover of a male protagonist, but only in a few circumstances:

(1) The relationship between the protagonist and the woman pre-existed the events depicted in the movie or TV series, and generally, the woman's death motivates the protagonist to do something (like kill a lot of bad guys).  We might think of the woman as a motivational sacrificial lamb.  Some examples of this situation include action flicks like Steven Seagal's "Hard to Kill" (his wife is killed in the same shootout that puts him in a 7 year coma, freeing him later to romance Kelly le Brock) and Arnold Schwarzeneggar's "Collateral Damage," as well as the movie you were probably thinking of once I told you what was in the box, "Se7en."

(2) The male character is basically a jetsetting globetrotter who, for narrative reasons relating to sequels, can't be tied down to one woman, and if he foolishly marries one, she must be killed off.  *The* archetype for this, of course, is James Bond, and we see this exact scenario in "On Her Majesty's Secret Service," when Bond gets married, only to lose his bride at the end of the movie.

I've tried to think of other examples/situations, and I haven't come up with any.  Scofield's relationship with Sara Tancredi did not pre-date the events in the series; it arose during the show.  And Scofield, while handsome, is not at all James Bond.  (He's more like MacGyver, if anything.)  I really don't expect him to meet and romance another female character during the rest of the show, though I suppose if it lasts for several more seasons (he breaks out of the Panamanian prison, gets captured elsewhere, breaks out again?), it could happen.  So, Sara will end up being a motivational sacrificial lamb, except not one that pre-dated the events in the show. . . .  And at the end of the series, Scofield will -- one expects -- bring down the conspiracy and the Company, and then he'll be alone.

Even if it plays out as you'd expect, it's already broken the rules, and I applaud that.

Sneak preview of "24" season 7

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 preview about cast members for season 7. I'll also just note that it looks like cyberterrorism will be the threat this day. Yea for getting away from WMDs!

Jack Bauer . . . criminal?

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.  At least he made the proper sort of abject apology and said that he'd do more time in custody if necessary to ensure that production on "24" not be interrupted. . . .

So I was on TV yesterday . . . .

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 was the Supreme Court's recent decision in the Seattle and Louisville school district cases.

I've gotten two comments so far.  The first was, "Wow, talk about the camera adding 10 pounds!"  The second was from a student who "was kind of disappointed that [I wasn't] pointlessly aggressive and argumentative like so many talking heads on round table discussions."  The student also "mused at [my] continued skill to dodge questions about where [I] personally stood on such controversial issues as affirmative action."  I wrote back, "As for being pointlessly aggressive and argumentative, that's what class is for, no?"

Speaking of TV, I've been vastly disappointed at how bad this new fall season has been.  I had tagged only three shows to try out: "Reaper," "Bionic Woman," and "Moonlight."  After watching the first episodes of each, I deleted my season pass to "Reaper" and kept the other two, but only after feeling underwhelmed.

"Reaper" is probably the best show of the three, but just not my taste.  It's about a slacker who learns on his 21st birthday that his parents sold his soul to Satan, and now Satan is collecting.  Instead of taking him to Hell, though, Satan wants him to track down escaped damned souls, using a  . . . Dirt Devil vaccuum.  (ha ha)  I liked the concept better when Fox ran it as "Brimstone" with Peter Horton; the difference is that "Reaper" is a mixture of action, horror, and comedy, with Sam and his slacker buddies taking on powerful baddies, while Satan (Ray Wise) takes on a fatherly role.  Kevin Smith of "Clerks" fame is involved, and it shows.  The program is witty, but I guess twentysomething slackers just don't interest me all that much now.

"Bionic Woman" was okay in the premeire.  I liked the much darker tone that it exhibited compared to the cheesy Lindsay Wagner version.  But it's curiously unexciting so far, and the characters have not been consistent to themselves thus far.  This is on life support in my view.

"Moonlight" is basically a ripoff of the mid-1990s late night "Forever Knight" about a vampire detective who wants to do good and who loves a human woman.  The problem with "Moonlight" is that the vampire, Mick St. John, is too stupid to care about.  I mean, if you became a vampire 50 years ago when you were 30, I think you'd take care to move around the country periodically so that people don't notice that you never age.  And if you didn't do that, I think you'd at least "backstop" your story about being the son, not *that* Mick St. John, with your former police partner, so that he wouldn't blow your cover to that peskily intrusive female that you have the hots for.  This one is on life support too . . . .

Dan Rather's quixotic quest?

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 on "60 Minutes Wednesday," in which Rather reported that documents from the Texas Air National Guard demonstrated that George W. Bush had received preferential treatment while serving there during the Vietnam War; however, bloggers raised serious questions about the authenticity of the documents, and subsequent "60 Minutes" segments failed to address those concerns.  An independent commission concluded that "60 Minutes" had rushed to air the initial segment and was unable to validate (or disprove) the authenticity of the documents.

Apart from the fact that Rather still seems unable to accept that there is a difference between the story that he believes he reported (Bush received special treatment) versus the story that he actually reported (documents established that Bush received special treatment).  If the story were merely that Bush had received special treatment based on people's recollection, well, I don't know that too many people would've been surprised.  What made the original "60 Minutes" segment compelling was its assertion that documents proved this fact.

Anyway, without rehashing all of the debate over the documents (you can follow the above link for more if you really want to relive the whole gory details), what I found especially sad about Rather's lawsuit is that he asserts that he was paid $6 million a year just to read the teleprompter.  It was CBS' fault, not his, that the story was not properly sourced, as it turns out, even though you'd think that the questions being raised in the blogosphere and then in other mainstream media outlets would've led a thinking reporter to question what he was spouting on air.