RashyNullPlanet

From U2.com:

Early morning, April four
Shot rings out in the Memphis sky.
Free at last, they took your life
They could not take your pride.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated April 4th, 1968. He was a ferocious proponent of what is right:

?On some positions, Cowardice asks the question, “Is it safe?” Expediency asks the question, “Is it politic?” And Vanity comes along and asks the question, “Is it popular?” But Conscience asks the question “Is it right?” And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must do it because Conscience tells him it is right. I believe today that there is a need for all people of good willl to come together with a massive act of conscience and say in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “We ain’t goin’ study war no more.” This is the challenge facing modern man.

He is one of my greatest heroes. I will never forget him.

Karen De Coster excerpted this gem from a Marketwatch.com article:

Band continued: “We’re in a critical stage for stocks right now, what technical analysts call the ‘right shoulder’ of a head-and-shoulders bottom. The left shoulder formed on March 10, when the Standard & Poor’s 500 index touched its closing low for the year (so far) at 1273.37. The upside-down head came on March 17, when the index broke to a new low intraday but finished at 1276.60, slightly above the March 10 close. Now we’re sliding down again to complete the right shoulder of the pattern. If all goes well, the S&P should remain comfortably above the two previous closing lows. Then we can rocket higher in April.”

Predicting the future of stock markets this way strikes me as very similar to phrenology. You can dress up your prediction with fancy diagrams and laundry lists of terms, but in the end, the outcome will depend on the underlying principles. I have no doubt that the Dow will eventually hit 16k. It’s unavoidable given the fact that the unit by which it’s measured, i.e., the US dollar, is constantly shrinking.

To illustrate this, suppose I have a ruler I use to measure part of my anatomy every so often. The thing about this ruler, though, is that it’s slowly getting smaller, so every time I measure my part, I read a number that’s bigger than the last time. This makes me feel very good, even though my part hasn’t really changed since I quit growing about 20 years ago.

Yes, that analogy is a bit simplistic, since companies can and do produce and grow, however, the stick by which they’re measured is constantly shrinking. So, of course the Dow will hit 16k at some point. In fact, I’ll see Band’s 16k, and raise to 20k.

My wife and I made some sushi last week.

It’s a hell of a lot of work, but it’s fun and delicious, even if the rolls don’t turn out perfectly round and symmetrical. That’s about 2/3 of what we made that night. We didn’t make anything with raw meat because it won’t keep for more than a day. Making your own has some benefits, though, like varieties you can’t get at any sushi place, such as: bacon & egg, ham & cheese, or beef jerky. (We didn’t really make beef jerky sushi, but I may some day.)

Via Lifehacker, the Ten Legal Commandments of Photography are very timely, considering my recent encounter with a cop who objected to my photographing his? patrol car in a 7-Eleven parking lot. This portion is especially relevant:

VI. The following can almost always be photographed from public places, despite popular opinion:

• accident & fire scenes, criminal activities
• bridges & other infrastructure, transportation facilities (i.e. airports)
• industrial facilities, Superfund sites
• public utilities, residential & commercial buildings
• children, celebrities, law enforcement officers

The article at Photojojo references Oregon attorney Bert P. Krages, but I can’t imagine that laws governing photography in public places is much, or at all, different here in Michigan.

On my way to work most mornings I stop at a 7-Eleven to get some coffee. At least once a week, there is a Dearborn Heights cop there, reading the newspaper, and chatting with the employees. On most of my stops there, the cop is there when I arrive, and still there when I leave, usually three to five minutes later. On many occassions, I’ve taken calls in my car in the parking lot and noted that the cop remains there for quite some time. When it’s cold outside, the engine on his patrol car is usually running. Sometimes, there is more than one cop standing around reading the paper and the magazines.

This has been going on for at least several years, and several times over the past few years, I’ve emailed the chief of police and complained, and the cops’ lounging around stopped for a while, but always started again after a few months.

This morning, I used my cell phone to take a picture of the cop’s patrol car running, as usual, in the parking lot. He was leaving the store at the time and walking toward his car. When I drove out of the parking lot toward where I work, he followed me, driving so close to my car that I couldn’t see the front bumper of his car.

He stopped me and asked why I took a picture of him, and left me with instructions to ask permission before photographing police.

He was testy. He’ll probably be in a much worse mood after my letter to his chief, deputy chief, captain, the city’s mayor, and the entire city council filters down to him.

Radley Balko is absolutely correct: it?s essential that private citizens be permitted to photograph, videotape, or otherwise record on-duty officers. If I turn up as a corpse, this letter is probably why. I sent it to the cop’s top three bosses, the mayor of the city, the entire city council, and the city’s human resources department:

Dear Chief Gust, Deputy Chief Lazar, Captain Gavin, and Mayor Paletko,

This morning at approximately 8:30am I was wrongly stopped by one of your police officers.

I saw the officer at the 7-Eleven on the corner of Pelham and Van Born. He was standing behind the counter of the 7-Eleven when I went inside to buy a cup of coffee. As I was driving to the exit of the parking lot, I used my cell phone to take a picture of his running patrol vehicle, # 81, in the parking lot. I’ve attached the picture, which unfortunately, turned out quite blurry. The date & time stamp on the picture is 13-Mar-2008, 08:28am. I turned north onto Pelham from the 7-Eleven parking lot and a few seconds later, the officer followed me, tailgating my vehicle quite closely. He turned on his overhead lights near Pelham and Colgate. I signaled, turned right onto Colgate, and stopped on the right hand side of the road.

The officer stopped his patrol car behind my car, got out of his car, walked to my driver side window, and asked for my driver’s license, vehicle registration and proof of vehicle insurance. I gave him the documents and asked him why he stopped me. The officer said that I was driving 43mph in a 40mph zone. Then he asked why I had taken a picture of him. I answered that I like to take pictures. He ordered me to show him the photo on my cell phone, so I did. The officer returned to his vehicle for a few minutes, then came back to my car, returned my license and papers, and told me to ask permission before taking photographs of police officers in the future. He did not write any citations against me. He then returned to his patrol car and drove away.

I have complained several times via email in the past several years about Dearborn Heights police officers lounging around that 7-Eleven. I fear that this officer’s actions may have been retaliation for those complaints. The actions of the officer were inappropriate, intimidating, and harassing. I drive on Pelham every day to get to work, and I will probably never again feel comfortable driving on Pelham or stopping at that 7-Eleven because of the officer’s actions. Even worse, the officer has demonstrated that he may be a potential liability for the Dearborn Heights Police Department, and the city.

I would like the following actions taken to ensure that such an incident doesn’t happen again, to me or anyone else:

1. I would like a written apology from the officer. Via email is sufficient.

2. The officer should be disciplined.

3. Inform me what the officer’s name is, so I have it for my records.

4. Inform me what discipline the officer receives, also for my records.

5. Forward a copy of this note to the city attorney who should advise the police department what Michigan law says regarding photography of police officers and their vehicles.

6. Send me a copy of the city attorney’s advice to the police department. Via email is sufficient.

7. Send me a copy of the police department’s policy regarding photography of police. Via email is sufficient. If no such policy exists, the police department should develop one. The policy should also be posted on the police department’s web site.

8. Copies of disciplinary action records and all correspondence regarding this incident should be placed in the officer’s personnel file.

9. Provide me with copies of the audio and video from the officer’s patrol car video camera and any audio captured by any microphone the officer was wearing. Via email as MP3 and/or MPG files is sufficient.

10. Guarantee me, in writing, that neither the officer nor anyone from the Dearborn Heights police department or any other Dearborn Heights city department will attempt any retaliation, intimidation, or harassment of me or my family because of this incident, this complaint, or anything that results from it. Please send this last item via US Postal Service. My mailing address can be gotten from the officer who stopped me and checked my driving record.

Thank you very much for your prompt and thorough attention to this very serious matter.

Sincerely,

Matt xxxxx

xxxxxxx, MI

I thought college campuses were supposed to be havens of free thought, ideas, and intellectual pursuit. Stupid me.

Some spineless pantywaist went crying to mommy because he didn’t like the cover of the book Mr. Sampson was reading.

There is no such thing as the right to not be offended. The infant who whined to the campus Affirmative Action Office is clearly a gutless turd.

Via Billy Beck.

Charley Hardman’s post from a few weeks ago, that was nuremberg, this is now, gets at what I’ve been saying for a long time now, and what should be obvious to anyone with even the smallest shred of principle and integrity: your job does not free you from your obligation to determine right from wrong and to act accordingly.

The implications of that are immense, and apply to everyone, from Adolph Eichmann, to the local dog monitor girl.

A friend sent me this site this morning: youwalkaway dot com. They advocate walking away from your mortgage obligations:

If you QUALIFY
Your lender WILL NOT be able to call you in attempt to collect!
Your lender WILL NOT be able to collect any deficiency or loss they may receive by you walking away!
You WILL be able to stay in your home for up to 8 months or more without having to pay anything to your lender!
You CAN have the foreclosure REMOVED from your credit!

That site is clear evidence that many people have no idea what promises and obligations are, and even worse, that many people think they can get something for free. A mortgage is a contract, a promise. If a person breaks a promise, you can’t trust anything they say. When someone walks away from a mortgage, someone else is paying for it. Not the bank. Not “the man”. Your neighbors. And don’t ever forget: there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.