Foxtrot on Sony DRM

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The justice system is a human system, and so it is inevitable that the justice system fails. The justice system punishes innocent people.

With respect to the death penalty, the execution of innocents may be very rare. However, it is inevitable. So we must understand that if we are to support the death penalty we must accept that innocent people will die as a result, even if only very rarely.

For me to allow the state to proceed with an imperfect system which creates permanent results, I would need to have compelling evidence that the cost was worth the reward in terms of the innocent lives saved. No such evidence exists. In fact there are substantive arguments that the death penalty contributes to the rate of violent crime rather then deterring it. It isn't clear that the death penalty works, and so how can you proceed...

One would hope you would proceed with extreme caution, but the attitude expressed by Alito that the Constitution only provides for reasonable defense and that substantive information about a capital case which was missed by that defense does not warrant retrial advocates a wanton attitude about such grave matters and is precisely likely to contribute to a situation in which innocent people are more likely to be executed.

This isn't acceptable. I'm growing less comfortable with Alito. But I have another problem.

The conservatives are not going to nominate a justice with an intelligent point of view on the death penalty. In light of that do I need to accept this and find other grounds upon which to consider his nomination (which is exactly what I advocated that abortion rights advocates do here)? Perhaps so.

Needless to say, on both counts, moderate Republican voters ought to really think about what they've purchased by re-electing Bush. I remain unconvinced that the impact that this election is having on the court is less important, long term, then the likely differences between a Republican and Democratic strategy on the war on terror going forward. I owe a hat tip for that observation to Rattle.

The 6th Amendment right to legal representation did not afford everyone "the most resourceful defense attorneys with bountiful investigative support."

"The 6th Amendment is satisfied when [defense] counsel's conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance, thereby ensuring that criminal defendants receive a fair trial," he said.

This case is interesting... Muddy... IMHO If the state is going to kill you it ought to consider all of the evidence. The idea that it need not seems ignorant of the finality of death.

Alito and the Death Penalty

El Segundo, CA – November 18, 2005 – On Friday, November 25 at 1 p.m. (PDT), the Falcon 1 countdown to launch is expected to reach T-Zero. At that point, the hold-down clamps will release and the Falcon 1 rocket will begin its journey to orbit, accelerating to 17,000 mph (twenty-five times the speed of sound) in less than ten minutes.

Designed from the ground up by SpaceX, Falcon 1 is a two stage rocket powered by liquid oxygen and purified, rocket grade kerosene. On launch day, Falcon 1 will make history for several reasons:

* It will be the first privately developed, liquid fueled rocket to reach orbit and the world's first all new orbital rocket in over a decade.
* The main engine of Falcon 1 (Merlin) will be the first all new American hydrocarbon booster engine to be flown in forty years and only the second new American booster engine of any kind in twenty-five years.
* The Falcon 1 is the only rocket flying 21 st century avionics, which require a small fraction of the power and mass of other systems.
* It will be the world's only semi-reusable orbital rocket apart from the Shuttle (all other launch vehicles are completely expendable).
* Most importantly, Falcon 1, priced at $6.7 million, will provide the lowest cost per flight to orbit of any launch vehicle in the world, despite receiving a design reliability rating equivalent to that of the best launch vehicles currently flying in the United States.

The maiden flight will take place from the Kwajalein Atoll of the Marshall Islands. The customer for this mission is DARPA and the Air Force and the payload will be FalconSat-2, part of the Air Force Academy’s satellite program that will measure space plasma phenomena, which can adversely affect space-based communications, including GPS and other civil and military communications. The target orbit is 400 km X 500 km (just above the International Space Station) at an inclination of 39 degrees.

SpaceX Announces Falcon 1 Launch Date

JS/UIX is an UN*X-like OS for standard web-browsers, written entirely in JavaScript (no plug-ins used). It comprises a virtual machine, shell, virtual file-system, process-management, and brings its own terminal with screen- and keyboard-mapping.

I have no idea what the point of this is, but its impressive anyway.

JS/UIX - Terminal

A tentative deal to extend the government's antiterrorism powers under the law known as the USA Patriot Act appeared in some jeopardy Thursday, as Senate Democrats threatened to mount a filibuster in an effort to block the legislation.

I'm glad they narrowed the National Security Letters but I'm not sure this bill really meets muster. This is one environment where the filibuster may be an honorable thing to do. On the other hand, it may just be a way of extending the existing law without the changes while creating the appearance of discourse.

Extension of Patriot Act Faces Threat of Filibuster

Tim Kehoe has stained the whites of his eyes deep blue. He's also stained his face, his car, several bathtubs and a few dozen children. He's had to evacuate his family because he filled the house with noxious fumes. He's ruined every kitchen he's ever had. Kehoe, a 35-year-old toy inventor from St. Paul, Minnesota, has done all this in an effort to make real an idea he had more than 10 years ago, one he's been told repeatedly cannot be realized: a colored bubble.

The 11-Year Quest to Create Disappearing Colored Bubbles - Popular Science

Digg gets up to 1,000 links submitted every day and 500,000 visitors each month, radiating traffic around the web. Its growth has been so pronounced that the site's own server melted down earlier this month.

But extra infrastructure and new staff will be added, thanks to a $2.8 million investment from a high-profile consortium of angel investors, including Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen.

Well, this is annoying news. Digg is very similar to MemeStreams. We do the technology better, but they have a much better look and feel, thanks, of course, to the fact that they have millions of dollars in funding to hire designers and pay people to sit and code.

We could beat the pants off of them for a fraction of this money.

Wired News: Digg has millions in funding

CMP Media, a marketing solutions company serving the technology, healthcare and entertainment markets, announced today that it has acquired Black Hat Inc., a producer of information security conferences and training that includes Black Hat Briefings and Conferences.

One fears the impact of this will be trouble... What is the association between CMP and Defcon?!

BlackHat sells out.

Paul is saying, "You guys used to do all kinds of crazy shit, but now that you have Jesus, you've got your act together."

God Hates Shrimp