Our new Chief Justice

John Roberts has been confirmed as Chief Justice of the United States today by a margin of 78 votes to 22.

Let me say again that Roberts is clearly well qualified and I expect him to be an excellent justice. I realize that I'm just about alone among liberals, especially gay liberals, in this regard. But I refuse to be a prisoner of ideology.

Vlad the Impaler

My talented, erudite and always-informative partner Ron has been reading a book which has aroused his interest in Vlad the Impaler (generally taken to be the real-life inspiration for the fictional Dracula).

Today he found an entertaining but dubious family tree—apparently it comes from a different novel—which shows that Vlad was married to a Princess Cneajna the Unpronounceable of Transylvania, and that his son Mihnea was known as "the bad." (Considering what Daddy was like, it's a wonder that ordinary badness is even noted.)

There's lots of other colorful information on the wives and children of the family, an ill-fated lot, prone to suicide, early death and various congenital deficiencies.

Vote Against Prop 2

Good news: the generally conservative Houston Chronicle recommends that we Texans vote against Proposition 2, the odious Texas anti-same-sex-marriage constitutional amendment:

This November, Texans will vote on Proposition 2, a proposed constitutional amendment that would silence further reflection on these important issues. The referendum language defines marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Texas law already outlaws same-sex marriage. Should voters approve this amendment, it would change nothing in the law. It lacks any purpose other than to enshrine bigotry in the Texas Constitution.

But the amendment also bans the state, or any political subdivision, from creating or recognizing any legal status "identical or similar to marriage." Impeding protections for relationships that are even "identical or similar to marriage" is a crude assault on an existing truth. Throughout the state, same-sex couples are thriving, raising children, volunteering in the community and supporting each other financially. Withholding protections for these family units cruelly jeopardizes their ability to take care of themselves and their children.

(Via Charles Kuffner's excellent Off the Kuff.)

Soon to be a minor motion picture

Over the past few days several news items have appeared that sound like movie plots. This SFGate article on Pat Tillman's death brings to mind military cover-up movies like "A Few Good Men" or "Courage Under Fire":

The files [Tillman's] family received from the Army in March are heavily censored, with nearly every page containing blacked-out sections; most names have been deleted.… At least one volume was withheld altogether from the family, and even an Army press release given to the media has deletions.…

A Chronicle review of more than 2,000 pages of testimony, as well as interviews with Pat Tillman's family members and soldiers who served with him, found contradictions, inaccuracies and what appears to be the military's attempt at self-protection.

For example, the documents contain testimony of the first investigating officer alleging that Army officials allowed witnesses to change key details in their sworn statements so his finding that certain soldiers committed gross negligence could be softened.

If that's a little too real for you, you might prefer this article from the Observer:

It may be the oddest tale to emerge from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Armed dolphins, trained by the US military to shoot terrorists and pinpoint spies underwater, may be missing in the Gulf of Mexico.

Experts who have studied the US navy's cetacean training exercises claim the 36 mammals could be carrying 'toxic dart' guns. Divers and surfers risk attack, they claim, from a species considered to be among the planet's smartest. The US navy admits it has been training dolphins for military purposes, but has refused to confirm that any are missing.

After all that, it seems almost a shame to report that the purported "respected accident investigator" who appears to be the main source for the article is well-regarded among the crop-circles-and-UFOs crowd.

Finally, submarine movie fans can rejoice: there really are giant squid.

Stupid, stupid, stupid...

Andrew Sullivan takes note of an LATimes story:

BUSH VERSUS CONSERVATISM: In general, it's a good idea for the administration not to expand existing entitlements for Katrina victims and to rely on once-only measures. In so far as they are doing that, good for them. Once you create an entitlement, it lives for ever. But this strikes me as bizarre:

Instead of offering $10,000 [rental housing] vouchers, FEMA is paying an average of $16,000 for each trailer in the new parks it is contemplating. Even many Republicans wonder why the government would want to build trailer parks when many evacuees are now living in communities with plenty of vacant, privately owned apartments.

We have a unique chance to fight poverty by dispersing some of New Orleans' underclass across the country in places with empty rental markets. Instead, the Bush administration is creating trailer-ghettoes that cost more. Newt Gingrich is right to be livid. Isn't this a no-brainer?

For once I agree with Gingrich, who is quoted in the story saying "The idea that — in a community where we could place people in the private housing market to reintegrate them into society — we would put them in [trailer] ghettos with no jobs, no community, no future, strikes me as extraordinarily bad public policy, and violates every conservative principle that I'm aware of."

I also object to the obvious poison pill in this aid: the main thing offering subsidized trailer housing in New Orleans does is to provide these poor people a particularly efficient opportunity to lose everything all over again. It would be cynical and churlish of me to infer that FEMA intends to offer less aid for more money. As Napoleon reputedly said, "Never ascribe to malice what can adequately be explained by stupidity."