Chipotle

I find it funny that McDonald's ownership of Chipotle is news. I mean, this story is at least 3 years old. Also interesting is that Chipotle founder Steve Ells worked as a line cook at San Francisco restaurant Stars. Stars was the first really amazing meal I ever had. I must have been 14 or 15, with the fam on vacation. I just remember there being these magnificently big shrimp. To think the man-behind-Chipotle might have been toiling in the back. It all comes full circle really.

What about Killing Fields?

Score one for the public consensus that Michael Jackson really is an asexual alien...smoking gun and Drudge are pushing a report that the accuser originally told cops that he knew more about sex than MJ. Of course, as good law students, we know that lewd and lascivious conduct with a minor probably doesn't require lewd and lascivious intent.

God damn you Christian soldiers

This is real crap. Society is being run by Reverend Lovejoy's wife.

Pirates Notebook

Well, there's lots of interesting side stories going on in Bradenton, FL (spring training home of the Pittsburgh Pirates).

Ben Grieve got some time with the media to respond to the fact that Jose Canseco dedicated almost two pages of his book to explaining how Grieve was "exactly the type of player that should have used steroids."

Also, Matt Lawton is indeed a Pirate. He's their highest paid player at over $7 million for one year. He reported to spring training with a "chiseled, 5-foot-10, 190-pound frame." Lawton might be a good first half sleeper pick for your fantasy teams.

Why the Pope Shouldn't (can't??) Resign

I'm cribbing these ideas entirely from "nieuws over de kardinalen en het conclaaf. " Wim Wylin posts 4 good reasons why the pope shouldn't resign. Check his post for details on each:

1) a resigned Pope would cause division in the Church.

2) John Paul's current status is precious testimony on the inherent value of human life.

3) The theology of the papal office is ad personam, meaning that being pope is not just a role you play, it's who you are.

4) Catholic reformers have long called for a weaker pope, arguing that the papacy should be more a ministry of service rather than an authoritarian center of power. Now, John Paul's leadership is expressed largely through his suffering. Without declaring it as such, his continuing presence on the Throne of Peter is in effect an experiment in a new style of papal leadership .

5) HERE'S the LEGAL ANGLE. The resignation must be "freely made and properly manifested," according to church law, but it is not clear what could be done if the pope becomes incapacitated.

P.S. For all you new or forgetful readers: Here's my first posting upon news of JPII's recent dance with the grim reaper. It links to some helpful sites in case your cannon law isn't as polished as it used to be.

Late Night

Late night I like to watch PBS and listen to Pink Floyd.

Sometimes I take notes;

Me tv.......... me tv ....tv me.

First note: "when was the last time you felt safe at the top of a ladder?"

What! you don't watch infomercials? You don't understand me?

Maybe I don't understand you.

Second note: "Peter Gallagher = sideburns and hair."


We all live in Corey Haim's shadow.

My Super Sweet Disappointment of a Season Finale...and thoughts re: the youth.

Well...this week's sweet sixteen only cost $200,000. That's why it sucked (I have suspicions it barely topped 100k). Bow Wow didn't even show. Where did they hold it? The local firehall? really now. I mean, I feel bad for these people because it seemed like they only lead a middle-upper-class lifestyle and that therefore they might want to save the money for something else. Maybe a third house. And since when did it become OK for parents to toss around numbers like that with their kids? A pox on all your houses.

So, summing up the season, I'd say its a three way tie between Hart (the dude with the negligent father), Ava (the Persian princess), and the blond girl who moved from Roswell (also the second La Joya chica).

I found this site. The youth are out of control. Ourself, over at Blues Skies Forever compared it to Joyce. I said it reminded me of the clone species from Star Trek the Next Generation. There's a reason why Blue Skies Forever has constant fresh and exciting global content, while we are stuck linking to Bill Simmons and ruminating on MTV.

Also, in order to keep up my legal content...

...I wanted to share the best footnote I've ever written:

[14] 1 William Blackstone, Commentaries *130; see also G.W.F. Hegel, Texte Zur Philosophischen Propaedeutik (1840) (noting, “It is a violation of my natural external freedom, not to be able to go where I please… My personality is wounded by such experiences, because my most immediate identity rests in my body”).

Star edition cites, Rule 15.4(d), so hot right now. Sorry blogger has no "small caps" option. Just picture it in your mind. And for those of you looking for a pin cite to Hegel, suck it!

Hell has frozen over...

...I just thoroughly enjoyed an episode of Gilmore Girls. Never fear, I'm turning in my Y chromosome to the proper authorities.

RIP: Hunter S. Thompson

Its a dark day for a lot of people. Personally, Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail, Hell's Angles, and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas each changed my life...all in very different ways. The good Doctor was an icon of a free-spirited America that died a long, long time ago. Those of us born after the dark days of Nixon only got to experience that America through Thompson's books. Even after I grew up a bit and got off the ludes and amyls, I still continued to derive a great deal of hope and faith in our country from the fact that at least there were a few mountain valleys far enough away from the dark cloud of American Squaredom that were big enough to accommodate a man like Thomspon. ....sigh, that ship has sailed. Enjoy the ride from here, friend.

NASCAR lovers hate Jeff Gordon, so I love him. But not in a gay way. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Me and Simmons, Simmons and I

OK, there is nothing lamer than me just directing people to new Sports Guy bits. But, it is what it is. Sorry.

I thought since I just referenced Simmons this week, and I had a rather good post on The OC versus 90210 before, that I should alert people to Simmons assessment of the two. When I'm done with my Con Law brief (I have 4 hours left)...I plan to write my own assessment of the two show's relative strengths. Until then, familiarize yourself w/ Bill Simmon's approach.

Richard Kelly Project

Donnie Darko writer/director Richard Kelly is releasing a musical set during a heat wave in LA, staring Sarah Michelle Gellar. Music by Moby and Trent Reznor. I'm sure it will be awesome. Because...

The Revolution is Not a Dinner Party Movie Rule #1: Movies about Los Angeles are always good, or at least better than they would be if set in any other place.

This is long overdue. Huzzah! for Jimmy Carter.

Also, here's a sample of The Sports Guy at his most random. I was getting a bit bored, and then he comes up with the picture of Clint Eastwood and Hilary Swank with the caption "At this rate The Rock and Tara Reid should be sweeping the Oscars in 2014." Also, he notes "Ten years from now, I just want to be in the same room when a grown-up Hart watches the tape of his birthday party on "My Super Sweet 16" ... and tries to swallow his own tongue."

As a friend once said, "He's right about everything." Although I'm not sure why he didn't use his phrase 'throw up in his mouth' for Hart's reaction.

Since Bill Simmons can do his cheap ploy to write Steve Bartman's book...

I really just want to be at a big, rowdy sports bar with Bill Simmons and some overwhelmed friends and about 15 frat lawyers ignoring their babes and crowding Simmons in awe. The fun part would be when the usual-center-of-attention man-child gets too drunk and starts trying to heckle Simmons. He'd be non-threatening and making an ass out himself yelling "look everyone its the FUNNY GUY" "Hey FUNNY GUY."

....priceless. The best part is you know Simmons would handle it well.

Ligers, not so funny.

Napoleon Dynamite enjoys them, but should we laugh? Here's some general background. But, the reality is that transgenic organisms raise profound philosophical questions. Also, this man's account of his family trip to pet the liger at a state fair makes me sad. Wikipedia is, as usual, to-the-point and authoritative. But, I would have liked some more info on Ligers' subaltern and marginalised status in the animal world. I guess you could say that the Liger is like Napoleon himself. Built wrong and crying on the inside.

New Yorkers Love to Love Themselves

So I came up with this idea last night to start talking trash about the Christo Gates loudly in public. I was going to start the backlash early. I called the project, "contrived" and "pedantic." People got angry at me. Everyone loves these fucking orange gates. Truth be told, they are cool.

Central Park was a zoo this weekend. One of those strange and disconcerting New York lovefests. Disconcerting because everyone expects New Yorkers to be smug and above-the-fray. The reality is that they need stuff like the gates, or the blackout, or the occasional snow storm to keep life centered. These little communitarian moments make up for the hellishly small apartments, overpriced everything, and general grinding nature of living in the city. You get to feel like you accomplished something just by being where you are. So, New York, eat your orange little hearts out. Yell at your kids to stand still for photos because this is a "historic" moment; push other people out of the way so you can get a slightly better framed shot of the gates blowing in unison in the wind; buy your every-other-weekend children a pretzel; these are your gates. But, its still very lame to wear orange accessories to the spectacle. Very, very lame.

P.S. The photos are mine...I haven't put too many of my own photos up in the past, I'll try to do more in the future.

Reminds me of Holland...

Let the eagle soar, like he's never soared before

Walking North

72nd Street Entrance

Kim Kerry, Kim Chi

Would Kerry's bilateral talks have been better?...who the fuck knows these days...whopee, we're all gonna die!

Couldn't we have bought off Kim and had this swept under the rug? Those were the days. To be fair, Saddam would be swimming in the Tigris right now if he had nukes back then.

P.S. Here's some pre-9/11 information. It quotes the "Rumsfeld Report of 1999" and the section, "North Korea: Views from Three Continents," is illuminating. What bothers me is how little regard we have for Japan's need to deal with its public.

P.P.S. Actually, this worries the fuck out me. Is South Korea baiting the North to test? WTF?

Trouble on Korean Peninsula

I've been waiting to hear the Pyongyang take on Team America for a while. Personally, I kind of doubt Kim has been able to wake up from his cloud of Remmy-Martin and Russian hookers long enough to actually see the movie. If he does....look out!

In other news...I'm kind of shocked Camilla is settling for the title of Duchess of Cornwall...it sounds a little too close to the name of an S&M sex slave.

Re: Pets

NYU Law Internet Celebrity Law Lush directed me to www.savetoby.com , a site whose author (or is it auteur) threatens to kill and eat his cute pet bunny if he doesn't raise enough money for charity by June, 2005.

This reminded me of my hot new idea for a low-maintenance, high reward pet for the lonely Manhattanite. I was chowing down on Miami's chief delicacy, stone crabs, when I was informed that the tasty critters actually regrow their claws. So I was thinking, how neat would it be to have a little aquarium with a stone crab or two?Every 12-24 months you could rip off its claws, eat them, and then watch them grow back!

So, I thought it was finally time to post a picture of myself...I'm the second from the right.

Sick, Sad, World! Volume #1

This seems to be the most popular "alternative news" story of the new millennium. [from Drudge via irregular The Revolution is Not a Dinner Party heckler JTB]

Here's a story of a wine-enema gone wrong, which raises the interesting question of if there has ever been a wine-enema gone right. [From Tasseography, who is calling himself Wide World of Birds lately]

Finally, here's a story from Jordan of love gone wrong, then right, then wrong again. Its 1,001 nights for the cyber-era! [From Death in the Afternoon]

On an upbeat note, I'm expecting big things out of this resourceful little tyke.

UPDATE: This (probably the most upsetting of the bunch here) seems very un-punk to me.

Me, calling for Andy Reid’s head

I haven’t really read a lot of the coverage of the game or seen the post-game interviews, so I’m really not sure how the public reaction has gone down.

First, the Patriots are an amazing team that deserves all the accolades they are getting. They play really well together and are fun to watch. I was bitter about the Steelers loss to them, but even I find it really hard to root against these guys.

Moving on….

Here’s the thing(s) about football. The rules are too convoluted and contrived to match the flow of a sport like soccer. Also the vast majority of fans have never even played organized ball, which is much different from baseball or basketball. Finally, the players are generally unlikable freaks. Yet, it is definitively the most popular sport in the country.

Why? Because its designed to be a fan-centered TV experience. There’s so much going on that fans have millions of things to pick apart and comment upon and feel smart about. The strategy behind the game is more obvious (and important) than in any other sport. The breakout athletic performances are usually easy to perceive. More importantly, there are very few games and it’s a lot easier to plan your life around them so that you can feel like a “real” fan.

….that’s all a sort of apologia for what is my own, uninformed impressions of the game.

I’ve never before said that a coach should be fired for a single game. In fact, I hate it when commentators and owners blame things on coaches. First, it’s usually not truly their fault. Second, at least as important as any game is the overall program a coach is trying to build, which takes years to do. A classic example of “blame the coach” gone horribly wrong is the Redskin’s idiot owner Dan Snyder’s (the worst owner in sports) decision to fire Marty Schottenheimer (not the best, but certainly not the worst coach in the NFL) after only one year. You can’t do that. It’s not smart.

Nevertheless, Andy Reid should never coach in the NFL again.

Nobody thought the Eagles had a chance in this game. Yet, the Patriots made bone-head mistakes and the Eagles defense played twice as well as anyone could have expected. The reality is that, despite the fact that it felt like the Eagles were being dominated the entire 60 minutes, they easily could have won the game. They did not get a chance to really try to win because the coaching staff was not prepared enough to run a simple 2-minute hurry-up drill. Donovan was shaken and rattled in the last few minutes, but the rest of the team should have know what was going on (the coaches job) and known the plays well enough to get Donovan back on track (again the coaches job). Instead they wasted time and ran down the clock to a point where a win was impossible. Most shocking is that the chief advantage the Eagles had was a receiving squad playing better than usual against a 3rd string New England secondary. This means the Eagles were primed for a big, deep passing drive.

More inexplicable, to me, is Reid’s choice not to try for a field goal in the last minute of the first half. The explanation is that he was afraid McNabb was going to cough up the ball and give New England an easy touchdown. But, you can’t play conservative in the Super Bowl against a vastly superior squad. If you don’t have the nerve to double down on 11 after a shitty couple hands, you shouldn’t be playing blackjack. If you don’t have the nerve to try for 3 points with a minute on the clock and TWO TIMEOUTS and about 30 yards to field-goal range, you shouldn’t be coaching in the NFL.

The entire game was a gift to the Eagles, and the coaching staff blew it.
Obviously Donovan McNabb sucked horribly. There’s no doubt about that. But, quarterbacks often have shitty Super Bowls. He may get fired, he may not. What I find unacceptable and unprecedented is how Reid fielded a team that was not ready to play in the big game. My high school football coach would have had a 2-minute drill prepared in the WPIAL semi-finals. Reid is an NFL coach in the Super Bowl. Unacceptable. Teams have to demand more from a coaching staff than what Reid and company delivered last night.

Well, I'm off to Miami (enjoy the snow...suckers). I won't be back till Monday. I leave you with a parting question:

Is it is possible that "My Super Sweet Sixteen" could actually be socially progressive? Can showing girls who spend 70,000 dollars on a party feel good about themselves for raising a couple hundred bucks for charity actually ferment revolution? I doubt it, personally. I'm not even sure the youth know how to process TV in any other way that "I want that for myself"....I mean, the shows just fill time for the ads, right?

Bill Simmons Goes Primetime

Drudge linked to the Sports Guy today. I'm sure Simmons knew what he was doing when he decided to pan the super bowl city, but I doubt he thought his complaints were going to be a major news issue. I'm sort of worried the city officials and Paul Tagliabu are going to kidnap him and reprogram him a la Clockwork Orange. Plus, the reference to "And the Band Played On" in his column was just odd...apt, but odd.

Paging all Cardinals

Even though I'm a Jew, I've always been fascinated by the Pope, the Catholic Church, and its mysteries. We Jews are a faith based on tradition and ritual, so Catholicism always made more sense to me than those insane, uppity Protestants. I mean, what part of "one true church" don't you people understand.

Anyway, I know the Pope is profoundly important to a lot of people, and I've always though he seemed like a good guy. Here's a great travel article by a woman who retraces John Paul's years as an avid skier in the Tatra Mountains in Poland. So, what I'm trying to say is I have a lot of respect for people's faith and a lot of respect for the current Pope as a man. I'll try not to be too flippant here.

In case you haven't heard, he's not doing too well. Here's a review of what happens in the event of his death. I'm actually really fascinated about how this selection is going to go down in the internet/media age. I assume there will be live webcams at the Vatican checking for white smoke. I assume the media will make a mockery of the process. I hope there's no public backstabbing or gossip. There are very few secrets left in the world, why not keep one or two around just for irrationality's sake?

P.S. All you legal eagles can find the complete Universi Dominici Gregis (the current rules governing Pope selection) here. At least rhetorically, the preface strikes an interesting balance between the need for clear election rules and the dogma that the Pope is chosen by God.

P.P.S. Here's a blog from Belgium that seems to be "in the loop" Although my Walloon is not what it used to be.

P.P.P.S Here's a website by a US Lawyer with all sorts of information on the papal selection process.

Team America = form over function

Always reliable Wikipedia has an excellent summary of democracy in the abstract. Robert Dahl is a giant in the field. In Democracy and Its Critics (1989), he presents five basic criteria for democracy (Effective Participation, Voting Equality at Decision Stage, Enlightened Understanding, Control of the Agenda, and Inclusiveness). I'm not done looking through the footnotes, but I'm pretty sure he didn't include "the external manifestations of elections performed by an uninformed polity deciding between identical platforms."

Sham elections used to be the thing of despots, communists, and fascists. But, whether your personal proclivities tend towards The End of History or The End of Days, we all seem to agree that everything has changed now. The intellectuals who are supposed to be reminding us of all the "old" stuff are too busy scarffing down USAID grants to care.

Am I happy that Iraq managed to have elections with only slightly more bloodshed than the worst Haitian elections? Yes, of course. Is it a victory for peace-love people everywhere? Of course not. Democracy only leads to peace if it is real democracy. If anything, this sets a precedent of shame elections that will no doubt serve the Quadafis and Kuwati Royals of the world well. Who knew democracy could be so easy? You just declare the political opposition "criminals" and "outsiders" and then have free elections between "real citizens" chosen by "real citizens."

I understand that good-intentioned scholars may disagree with the proper order of steps towards getting to a functional democracy. It is easy enough to theorize that early, if totally inadequate, elections would go far toward creating an interested and engaged political society. I also understand the courage and resolve displayed by everyday Iraqi's who went out and braved bombs and walked through puddles of blood to vote.

But, the entire process has been cheapened by a Bush Administration that was hell-bent on holding the elections as early as possible. In order to cover up the fact that said "elections" had no possible chance of electing a candidate contrary to US interest, the administration made the election yet another battle in an interminable war against bad guys. The bad guys wanted to blow up the elections. They didn't. So we won. Huzzahs all around boys! Good work! Just don't ask questions.

Where is the fucking media these days? I watched British, US, and Iraqi news broadcasts today. All of them had the main story as "Not as much violence as we expected." Are there actual candidates? do they have positions? is it weird that I care?