Megan McArdle reports that she has had a fourth bicycle stolen since moving to DC, all of them locked, all of them at her home, the most recent inside a stockade fence.  In frustration, she observes, “I think I’m done with bike commuting. I’d rather just hand out $100 bills to random people on the street; at least I wouldn’t be rewarding theft.”

This is followed by a remarkably heated exchange in the comments section, numbering 60 as of this writing, wherein readers lambaste Megan for being a dingbat and each other for various transgressions.

Freddy Mercury and company offer some related thoughts:

The YahooNews headline “Openly gay teen voted prom queen at LA high school” did its intended task of enticing me to click to read the AP story:

An openly gay teen was voted prom queen at Los Angeles’ Fairfax High School in a campaign that began as a stunt but ended up spurring discussion on the campus about gender roles and teen popularity. Sergio Garcia, 18, was crowned queen Saturday night at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel.

“I feel invincible,” Garcia said in his tiara and charcoal-gray tuxedo.

A few days earlier, he gave a speech that won over some cynics and led to an ovation and his unlikely victory.  “At one time, prom may have been a big popularity contest where the best-looking guy or girl were crowned king and queen. Things have changed and it’s no longer just about who has the most friends or who wears the coolest clothes,” Garcia told a gymnasium full of seniors. “I’m not your typical prom queen candidate. There’s more to me than meets the eye.”

Garcia assured the crowd he wouldn’t wear a dress on prom night. “I will be wearing a suit,” he said. “But don’t be fooled, deep down I am a queen.”

I’m not sure what to think of this.  On the one hand, the kid wanted to be prom queen and the other students voted for him, whether out of solidarity, jest, or some combination of factors.   On the other, this just seems weird. Doesn’t the school have some bylaws specifying that prom queens should be chicks and prom kings dudes?

For that matter, while I recognize that different subcultures have variation within them, this wouldn’t seem to be helping convey the message that gay males are otherwise perfectly normal men who simply prefer having sex with other men rather than the customary opposite sex.

UPDATE: Commenter PD Shaw suggests the question should be “Why isn’t he the King?”  Quite.   The kid isn’t transgendered; he’s homosexual.

Photos: Cindy Casares

The Obamas are coming under criticism from around the blogosphere for their dealings with royals.  First, Barack Obama gave Queen Elizabeth II a video iPod filled with some rather add materials (along with an actually thoughtful gift).  Then, Michelle Obama got into trouble for getting too familiar with the the queen.  Now, Barack Obama is getting chastised for bowing to the Saudi king.

Now, frankly, I don’t give a hoot what the president gives the British figurehead.  I’m slightly concerned, as evidenced by his also giving PM Gordon Brown a boxed set of DVDs, that he seems not to understand that the UK is a First World country and that its leaders can probably afford anything available at Amazon for under $200.  But, really, it’s the thoughtlessness that counts.

Second, QE2 has been at the monarch thing for several decades, so one presumes that she gets a reasonable amount of obsequious treatment.  Being touched on the shoulder by the wife of the American president, presumably, is something from which her ego shall rebound.  As for Mrs. O, she is not a subject of the queen and thus not obligated to be anything other than cordial in dealing with her.

The bowing to the king thing annoys me.  It’s a proper enough show of respect for a monarch in his home and it would be rude for an ordinary American citizen not to follow this protocol.  But Obama isn’t a tourist being granted an audience with the king, he’s our de facto head of state.   Then again, a quick bow is less creepy than holding hands with him, as Obama’s predecessor was known to do.

At the end of the day, I just can’t muster the outrage of Michelle Malkin or even Mark Steyn on this one.  (I do find amusement, however, at Steyn’s description: “So let me see if I understand American protocol in the age of Obama: The First Lady hugs Queen Elizabeth as if she’s some granny at a seniors’ center photo-op, but the President of this republic prostrates himself before King Abdullah as if he’s a subject of the Saudi pseudo-Crown.”) Mostly, I share Pat Lang’s befuddlement that Americans care so much about monarchs and their little rituals.

Photo: Sydney Morning Herald

No further comment required:

UPDATE: Video replaced.

The Queen and I Edition OTB Caption Contest^TM is now over.

(Larry Downing/Reuters)

✰ THE WINNERS ✰

First: Maggie Mama – “I say, it seems like Russert still has a few questions for you, Georgie.”

Second: Suzanne Berton – It’s a bird; it’s a plane; no, it’s your father sky diving again.

Third: Wyatt Earp – “And one night when we were really tanked, Phillip and I made love while riding the chandelier.”

HONORABLE MENTION

Bithead – C’mon, Mr. Wallenda….

elliot – I think it was that smiling bird that got you.

William d’Inger – That stain is from the royal spitting contest of 1277.

Elmo – And watch out for Obama, he thinks he can fly.

yetanotherjohn – Man, 8 years has sure aged Laura.

John425 – Queen: “In a previous contest, Dill had that huge Egyptian statue standing dockside at the Thames.” (George: “I liked the yellow ducky better…” — Rodney)

Jim – “Made you look.”

ℛODNEY’S BOTTOM OF THE BARREL

“No George!…. NOT Pinata.”

George never figured out the Queens odd reaction to “Whassup?”

Oh, look, there’s Charlie, lets do yell “JUMP.”

Queen: “There’s one of the R.O.U.S now.” Dubya: “I don’ beleef dey exist,”

The Monday Contest smells a rat.

Time for the Thursday OTB Caption Contest^TM

(Larry Downing/Reuters)

Winners will be announced Monday PM

James Wimberly writes in favor of drastically limiting copyright terms.

[T]he 21-year limit of Queen Anne’s Act (footnote) provided adequate incentives for authors; the 95 years or life-plus-75 years of contemporary IP law is a giveaway to a clever lobby of wealthy engrossers of the commons. If you don’t believe me, check out Justice Breyer’s dissent in Eldred v. Ashcroft and the amici brief in the case of 17 eminent economists. The SCOTUS majority didn’t pretend that the Mickey Mouse extension law was defensible policy, it just held that Congress was constitutionally entitled to its mistake.

Without defending our current copyright terms, I think that this demonstrates a complete ignorance of the IP world today. This is not medieval England. It only takes a handful of real world examples to demonstrate that. If we were to re-adopt Queen Anne’s law (which would, frankly, be a legislative and policy nightmare, because that would put us in violation of several international treaties regarding copyright), then one of my favorite novels–Ender’s Game–would now be in the public domain. Which means that the author, Orson Scott Card, could go to a theatrical version of the book tomorrow and not see a penny from the proceeds. In other words, some movie studio would be making millions of dollars off of it, and not a dime would go to the original author. Pretty nice deal for the movie studios–not so much for the author.

Now, let me state for the record that I do think that our current copyright terms were untenable. And if we lived in Alex-Knapp-o-topia, my copyright terms would be as follows:

• For original authors, what I call the “Life and/or 50 Rule”–Authors keep the copyright in their works their entire life. Their heirs keep the rights for 50 years after the creation of the original work (as opposed to 70 years after the author’s death, which is the rule now).
• For all other entities, copyright is 50 years after creation of the original work, period.

Effectively, this make copyright about 50 years long (plus however many extra years an author lives), which I think is a fair number of years to protect a work. 21 years, though, is just a ridiculously short period of time.

Update: Megan McArdle makes a similar point:

It is obvious to me that current copyright terms are too long. 21 years may not be enough to get writers to invest their all in their craft, but 95 years seems excessive; I don’t think we will get more work out of 35 year old authors by promising to someday pay royalties to their as-yet-unborn grandchildren. And clearly, retroactivity is a gift to corporate interests that is actively contrary to the public good. But there is a lot of middle ground between those two extremes.

And, frankly, I think that life for authors, and 50 years from creation for everyone else is perfectly reasonable. But let me be clear–I do think that the current terms are too long. But I also think that authors do have rights in their creations that move beyond merely “what’s good for society.” I don’t really have the time or inclination to articulate beyond that, but for those who disagree, bear in mind that not caring about screwing authors vis a vis copyright incentives isn’t going to be in the best interests of society if folks who might have otherwise created great art decide to do something else instead, like advertising.

Today’s New York Times has a very long and detailed article regarding John McCain’s relationship with real estate developer Donald Diamond, a relationship that at least raises questions about whether Sen. McCain improperly used his influence as United States Senator to benefit a major donor.

For Mr. McCain, the Arizona Republican who has staked two presidential campaigns on pledges to avoid even the appearance of dispensing an official favor for a donor, Mr. Diamond is the kind of friend who can pose a test.

A longtime political patron, Mr. Diamond is one of the elite fund-raisers Mr. McCain’s current presidential campaign calls Innovators, having raised more than $250,000 so far. At home, Mr. Diamond is sometimes referred to as “The Donald,” Arizona’s answer to Donald Trump — an outsized personality who invites public officials aboard his flotilla of yachts (the Ace, King, Jack and Queen of Diamonds), specializes in deals with the government, and unabashedly solicits support for his business interests from the recipients of his campaign contributions.

Mr. McCain has occasionally rebuffed Mr. Diamond’s entreaties as inappropriate, but he has also taken steps that benefited his friend’s real estate empire. Their 26-year relationship illuminates how Mr. McCain weighs requests from a benefactor against his vows, adopted after a brush with scandal two decades ago, not to intercede with government authorities on behalf of a donor or take other official action that serves no clear public interest.

Read the whole thing. I don’t know if all the facts are in a row to state that McCain has been acting unethically with respect to Diamond, but the article definitely raises questions that are worth pursuing of the candidate. Especially for a man like John McCain, who has a history of such unethical conduct.

Some professors at Texas Tech are warning of dire consequences if the university goes forward with a massive increase in enrollment, especially if it is achieved by forcing teachers to teach more.

Some of Texas Tech’s most prestigious professors are concerned about their chancellor’s drive to increase the student body from 28,000 to 40,000 by 2020.

They especially are concerned about his assistant’s recent suggestion the university could save millions if officials cut back the number of hours faculty are excused from teaching to pursue scholarly activities and simultaneously enrolled more students in more classes. That would have disastrous consequences, a group of Paul Whitfield Horn professors, led by David Knaff, warned the chancellor last month in a letter.

The chancellor, Kent Hance, said their disapproval stems largely from misinformation.

Knaff is on sabbatical and could not be reached for comment.

That Knaff is leading the charge against increased teaching loads whilst on sabbatical — i.e., taking the semester off from teaching in order to concentrate on research — is quite amusing. But the professors in question are actually outstanding teachers.

The Horn title is considered the highest title a professor can earn at the university for outstanding teaching, research and service.

“While we generally support the concept of increasing the number of students, it is essential that such an increase involves the best undergraduate and especially graduate students. This implies raising admissions standards, creating competitive scholarships, investing in research and scholarship activities,” they wrote in the letter, which The Avalanche-Journal obtained on Monday. “Instead, you seem to be committed to dramatic growth by making our costs very much lower than those of other institutions, causing students to flock to TTU because we will provide education at a bargain basement cost.’ ” The push for thousands more students has already lowered the quality of the student body, according to the letter, which also raises questions about where officials will get the money to invest in resources for new students, like labs and dorm rooms.

So, it’s not just about teaching loads but about the type of students the university will enroll. And, indeed, the chancellor denies any plans to reduce research time. That Chancellor Hance does not have an earned doctorate and did not come up through the ranks of the faculty but is an attorney and politician likely reduces his credibility in making that claim.

Regardless, I suspect one’s views on the controversy will split almost exactly on a where-you-stand-is-where-you-sit basis, with professors on the side of low teaching loads and everyone else wondering what the fuss is about. After all, teaching is a university’s mission, right? Most faculty, especially a PhD-granting institutions, see themselves as scholars first and teachers second, however.

via Inside Higher Ed

The Wrong Day To Give Up Sniffing Glue Edition OTB Caption Contest^TM is now over.

(AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

✰ THE WINNERS ✰

First: Hodink – “Negative Ads? Moi???”

Second: William d’Inger – Listen up, Monica, no Lincoln bedroom sleepovers for you.

Third:(tie) Scott_T – Bill, you’re in luck! The giant behind me does like gladiator movies.

Third:(tie) bugalugs – BILL!!!! Put you pants back on! That’s not why it’s called the “cockpit”!

HONORABLE MENTION

physics geek – “I see dead people… oh wait, that’s just my campaign.”

Kenny – “An election? That’s where a whole bunch of people come together and vote for a person or thing, but that’s not important right now.”

John425 – Hey, Obama! I just kicked your ass in Ohio! How do you like them apples?

charles austin – Snake on a plane.

FormerHostage – Home Alone 4: The Day After The Election

Triumph – Just another damn liberal.

ℛODNEY’S BOTTOM OF THE BARREL

“No Hillary our pilot hasn’t flown a plane before, but she was married to an airline pilot for 35 years so we’re good to go.”

“SHUT UP EVERYONE, I”M LISTENING TO THE PEOPLE AND I WANT TO MAKE SURE THEY HEAR ME.”

…assume crash positions… stick your heads between your legs and kiss your ass goodbye, its going to be a bumpy ride to the Whitehouse.

President Bush just signed the executive order… Next stop… Gitmo…

“If the voters don’t understand that I’m to be the next Queen President I just need to speak louder and slower.”

The Monday Contest has already taken a stand on global warming.

British intelligence denies killing Princess Di.

The former head of MI6 denied Wednesday that the British intelligence agency was responsible for the car accident that killed Princess Diana and her boyfriend, Dodi al Fayed, in 1997.

Sir Richard Dearlove, who was the director of special operations for the agency at the time of Diana’s Paris accident, testified at the inquest into the pair’s death that he also believes an operation by rogue agents would have been impossible.

Fayed’s father, Mohamed Al Fayed, has accused MI6 of engineering the death of his son and the princess at the behest of Prince Philip, the queen’s husband.

During his time as director of special operations, Dearlove said it was his responsibility to sign off on any operation that would otherwise be illegal, such as breaking into an office or receiving a stolen document. The operation would then have to be approved by the foreign secretary, a senior member of the government.

Ian Burnett, a lawyer for the coroner’s inquest, asked Dearlove whether he could confirm that “no authorization was sought in respect of any activities concerning Princess Diana.” “I can absolutely confirm that,” Dearlove said.

Just in case you were wondering.

Good news for some of Michael Vick’s dogs. Ten of the dogs have been taken in by a dog rescue group in San Francisco called Bad Rap. All ten dogs on well on their way to transitioning from a short brutal lives as warriors under a brutal and sadistic man to lives as happy family dogs.

His back resting comfortably against her chest, Hector nestles his massive canine head into Leslie Nuccio’s shoulder, high-fiving pit bull paws against human hands.

The big dog — 52 pounds — is social, people-focused, happy now, it seems, wearing a rhinestone collar in his new home in sunny California.

But as Hector sits up, deep scars stand out on his chest, and his eyes are imploring.

Hector ought to be dead, Nuccio knows — killed in a staged fight, executed for not winning or euthanized by those who see pit bulls seized in busts as “kennel trash,” unsuited to any kind of normal life.

Instead, Hector is learning how to be a pet.[...]

The animals barrel around the house, with 4-year-old Hector leading the puppy-like antics — stealth underwear grabs from the laundry basket, dashes across the living room, food heists from the coffee table — until it’s “love time” and he decelerates and engulfs the women in a hug.

Here is a video of the dogs at Bad Rap,

Each dog was evaluated as an individual. Huss recalled the good-natured-but-quiet Rose, whose overbreeding had led to mammary tumors. In the end, needing surgery but unable to tolerate anesthesia, Rose was mercifully put down, just days after being transferred to a foster home.

[...]

Weekly “canine good citizen” classes are correcting his social ineptitude. And he’s taking cues on good manners from patient Pandora, a female pit bull mix who’s queen of the household’s dogs. Once Hector graduates, he’ll take classes to become a certified therapy dog, helping at nursing homes and the like.

From the sounds of it, these dogs would have all died rather quickly as none of them sound like ideal fighting material. An American Pit Bull Terrier that is dog friendly isn’t going to make a good fighter, and will either be put down during testing, after losing a fight or worst of all used as bait dogs, and we know how sadistic Vick’s methods of disposing of “undesirable” dogs were.

Alizee Poulicek, the new Miss Belgium, speaks three languages. Unfortunately, Dutch is not among them.

Belgium’s political tensions entered the glamour stakes after it was revealed that the new Miss Belgium does not speak Dutch.

Alizee Poulicek, who comes from the country’s French-speaking region, was booed by some of the 4,000 audience when she admitted that she could not understand a question put to her in Dutch at the contest on Saturday night in the main Flemish city of Antwerp. Poulicek, a 20-year-old language student, speaks French, Czech and English, but Flemish tabloid daily Het Laatste Niuews headlined its Monday edition with: “Miss Belgium does not speak Dutch”.

The paper underlined that the “community crisis in our country” — where there is no government six months after general elections amid bickering between leaders of the main French and Flemish parties — “has insinuated itself into even the lightest sector.” Poulicek’s victory “is not going down well,” the daily said.

She said she had been taking Dutch lessons before the contest and has pledged to improve her standard in one of Belgium’s three official languages, along with French and German.

The incident did not hurt her image with television viewers who voted for her, but Flemish journalists assailed her with questions at a press conference, highlighting her deficiencies in their tongue.

The Flemish community accounts for 60 percent of Belgium’s 10.5 million people. A further 3.5 million live in Wallonia and one million in the largely Francophone, but officially bilingual Brussels.

It’s rather odd that she speaks Czech* and not Dutch but one presumes that a significant number of 20-year-old Belgians don’t speak all three of the country’s official languages.

Obviously, the solution is for them to all speak English . . . .

UPDATE: It turns out that she’s the “daughter of a Czech father and a Belgian mother” and “spent half her life in the Czech Republic, returning to Belgium just six years ago.” She’s also a “Czech model.” Freddy, an intrepid staffer at Gone Hollywood, has found photos.

While I remain firmly in the camp that it’s almost inconceivable that Hillary Clinton won’t win the Democratic nomination, a growing number of people think they see the wheels coming off the bandwagon.

Obama supporter Mark Kleiman believes the planted question kerfuffle has “legs” and that “the moment she stops being inevitable, we have a whole new ballgame.”

Writing in Salon, feminist iconoclast Camille Paglia delivers a particularly harsh assessment of “Queen Hillary.”

Hillary’s stonewalling evasions and mercurial, soulless self-positionings have been going on since her first run for the U.S. Senate from New York, a state she had never lived in and knew virtually nothing about. The liberal Northeastern media were criminally complicit in enabling her queenlike, content-free “listening tour,” where she took no hard questions and where her staff and security people (including her government-supplied Secret Service detail) staged events stocked with vetted sympathizers, and where they ensured that no protesters would ever come within camera range.

That compulsive micromanagement, ultimately emanating from Hillary herself, has come back to haunt her in her dismaying inability to field complex unscripted questions in a public forum. The presidential sweepstakes are too harsh an arena for tenderfoot novices. Hillary’s much-vaunted “experience” has evidently not extended to the dynamic give-and-take of authentic debate. The mild challenges she has faced would be pitiful indeed by British standards, which favor a caustic style of witty put-downs that draw applause and gales of laughter in the House of Commons. Women had better toughen up if they aspire to be commander in chief.

Whether John Edwards or Barack Obama (toward whom I’m currently leaning) has conclusively demonstrated his superiority for the top of the ticket remains to be seen. They may unfortunately split the anti-Hillary vote (a majority of registered Democrats) so that she slips through. If Hillary is the Democratic nominee, I will certainly vote for her. But I continue to find it hard to believe that my party truly craves that long nightmare of déjà vu — with scandal after scandal disgorged and an endless train of abused women returning from Bill Clinton’s sordid, anti-feminist past.

Alex Knapp questioned her inevitability last night on OTB Radio, noting that recent events are highlighting her image as a robotic candidate. He believes, as do I, that in their heart of hearts most Democrats would prefer one of the other candidates to Clinton but are thus far sticking with her because they think she’s not only the inevitable nominee but will be assured of having all the resources she needs to compete in the general election.

The problem, it seems to me, is that for Clinton to lose, someone else needs to win. Obama is smart and charismatic but incredibly inexperienced on the national scene. Are Democrats really ready to turn the keys over to him? And Edwards, not particularly seasoned during his last run, seems to have actually lost gravitas since 2004. None of the second tier candidates seems to be catching fire.

So, if not Hillary, who?

Hillary Clinton has been amazingly effective in bringing home the pork to New York, Alexander Bolton reports for The Hill.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) has won tens of millions of dollars more in federal earmarks this year than her rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, even though two of them have significantly more Senate seniority.

A review of the first three appropriations conference reports finished by Senate and House negotiators shows that Clinton has successfully requested at least $530 million worth of projects.

Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.), Clinton’s chief rival for the nomination, has so far won $40.6 million in earmarked funds for his constituents, despite the fact that his home-state colleague and booster, Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), sits on the Appropriations Committee.

Clinton’s greater haul of federal funds may be due partly to her four more years of Senate seniority than Obama. But seniority is only part of it. Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.), who is also running for president and first won election to the Senate in 1972, garnered $67 million worth of projects. Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), who came to the Senate in 1981, helped place $100 million worth of earmarks in the three spending bills that have emerged from House-Senate negotiations.

Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the lone Republican presidential candidate in the Senate, did not win a single earmark in the spending bills. He has chosen instead to position himself on the hustings as a leading critic of excessive government spending. “He has never requested an earmark,” said McCain spokeswoman Melissa Shuffield.

Clinton has seized funds at an impressive rate by knowing what she wants and working methodically to reach her goal, which is the way she is reputed to work on almost everything.

[...]

“Her staff is very efficient,” Shakir said. “They’re on top of the legislative process a lot more than even the staffs of more senior members of the committee. “On top of that, they know what they want; they are knowledgeable about the process and get requests in early, and I think that has a lot to do with it.”

While I’m no fan of earmarks and think the process for allocating federal monies is badly broken, this is how the game is played and she’s playing it extraordinarily well. Despite being a relative novice in the Senate, she’s picked her committee assignments well, assembled an efficient staff, and figured out how to work with her colleagues. This while rather obviously spending much of her tenure running for the White House.