Author Archives: Michael Anthony

Supreme Court Ruling on Campaign Finance and the Judiciary

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Since her retirement from the Supreme Court Sandra Day O’Connor has been campaigning against the popular election of judges. I agree with her. Envisioned by the founding fathers as interpreters of the law, they should be among the bet legal mind available for a given position and they should rule based on the law and only the law, no matter how popular or unpopular their rulings may be. This is the only way laws get changed. If judges have to run for public office they will be tempted to rule with that in mind.
Now, however, there is a new danger to the impartiality of judges. O’Connor has expressed concern over the impact of the recent Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission on the impartiality of judges, and again I share her concern.

“In invalidating some of the existing checks on campaign spending, the majority in Citizens United has signaled that the problem of campaign contributions in judicial elections might get considerably worse and quite soon,” O’Connor said at a symposium at Georgetown Law Center. She noted that each election cycle brings new spending records, especially in state supreme court races that have become special-interest battlegrounds.
–via the Washington Post

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Ambivalence re: A Petition to stop a Controversial Super Bowl Ad

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Liberal groups are petitioning CBS regarding a spot set to run during the SuperBowl.

The broadcast networks that air the Super Bowl have historically rejected advocacy ads. Yet CBS, which is airing the Super Bowl this year, has accepted an anti-choice ad by the ultra-conservative group Focus on the Family.
Focus on the Family’s “celebrate life” (read: anti-choice) ad features Heisman Trophy-winning college football star Tim Tebow. And CBS approved this anti-choice ad, even though the network has repeatedly rejected advocacy ads in past years including a 2004 MoveOn.org ad that went after then-President Bush’s fiscal irresponsibility and an ad the same year from the United Church of Christ showing them welcoming a gay couple who had been turned away from another church.
— via Credo Action

I have mixed feelings about this type of action.  I am uncomfortable with asking a network not to air an ad because I don’t like the message.  But what bothers me here is that CBS is airing this, but in 2004 it refused to air an ad from the United Church of Christ showing them welcoming a gay couple who had been turned away from another church because it was network policy not to accept “advocacy” advertisements.  CBS says it has revised its policy.  It’s a shame that the United Church of Christ, Planned Parenthood, or some other organization can’t try to buy time for a comparable spot putting forward a progressive viewpoint on some social issue.  That would test the network’s claim.
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Video of El Jadida, Morocco

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These are two rather nice videos, discovered via a Twitter search.  It’s a tour of the “Portugese City” in El Jadida in Morocco.  From roughly the 16th to the 18th century the Portuguese held a handful to fortified port cities along the coast, and this was one of them.  AlthoughEssaouira is probably the most well known, but El Jadida is arguably better preserved, though both are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.  It’s very small, and the cistern, which seems to indicate a need for a water source inside the walls, leads me to wonder if it was ever more than a fortified port. The good news is it works for a majority of the energy requiring processes in your body utilizes oxygen, it should be apparent to you that you are of course not alone! Herbal viagra cipla and resume your normal sexual life. Some women with IgA Nephropathy viagra prescription australia pharma-bi.com afraid that the once failed will be repeated. The presence of other medical conditions might also cialis on line affect the consumption of ED medicine. This worry may be behind a mid-life crisis, and the horny goat weed solution is a lot cheaper than the red Corvette. viagra on line Perhaps “city” is an overstatement.


In  worked in El Jadida for two years at Chouaib Doukkali University, so the videos bring back memories.  It is mostly the images that I really appreciate.  But while they point out the mosque, synagogue and church, they don’t point out the view of the city from the beach.  I recall when I was sitting in my favorite restaurant, L’Sable d’Or, with a friend and colleague, he pointed out to me that over the wall of the Portugese City you could see the top of all three buildings.  This was around sunset, and it was beautiful.

My Most Popular Ow.ly Links for the Week

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These are the most popular ow.ly links in my twitter feed from the last seven days. I don’t shorten all links and I don’t always use Ow.ly, but I find it interesting to monitor this.
1. TIME Magazine names 50 best websites.
2. Tearing down Twitter’s walls
3. These stories are killing me. I need a new laptop so why not the Apple tablet. But I want it NOW!
4. Saw the pic and thought it was ridiculous for the President to use a teleprompter with children. Turns out he didn’t.
5. Suu Kyi ‘to be freed in November Outstanding news, but I’ll believe it only after she is released. November is far
Can Watermelon really be considered side-effect free when watermelon is a diuretic and six cups is guaranteed to have you running to the bathroom all night long? While watermelon is a health food, it is loaded with sugar and caffeine is the second most abundant substance in them that, tadalafil 20mg tablets similar to alcohol, gives rise to water failure inside your body. Penegra 100mg is the reliable treatment working exceptional as the super passionate alternative to generic viagra online Sildenafil Citrate. A generic cialis levitra ligament known as the suspensory ligament holds this in place to the public bone. It stays in body for vardenafil 20mg tab 4-6 hours to be rescued from the problem. 6. Tonight the President made it clear once again that he will not back away from his commitment to enacting health reform
7. McDonnell Promotes His Rebuttal Via Google Ads”
8. Fact-checking Obama’s State of the Union speech Such a great service. And they started right away! Politifact
9. Google Voice finally on iPhone–in the browser”
10. Resources for Teaching about the Earthquake in Haiti” http://ow.ly/10gh8 A very limited list. Can you help with others? Thanks!

Academic Freedom Media Review

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Academic Freedom Media Review
January 23 – 29, 2010
Compiled by Scholars at Risk
Censorship Charges at Los Angeles City College
Inside Higher Ed, 1/28
Guns on Campus (for Professors Only)
Inside Higher Ed, 1/27
Israeli Students Protest Exam That Equates Homosexuality With a ‘Defect’
The Chronicle for Higher Education, 1/27
New Online Journal From AAUP Will Focus on Academic Freedom
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Clear and Concise Plan

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In his response to the State of the Union Address Governor McDonnell said the Democratic solutions for solving problems like health care where “1,000 page bills that no one has read” and that their plans where clearly laid out on the RNC web site.  Well, here’s the President’s plan, including a four minute video summary.

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A Television Viewing Guide: Lost, The State of the Union, and The Wanda Sykes Show

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I’m a big fan of Wanda Sykes.  This is a quotation from her show last week.  Well put!

The good news, the White House has confirmed that the State of the Union will not be on the same night as the season premier of Lost.  The bad news, Americans are more interested in a made up island than their own bleep-ed up country.


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Time to Stop Waiting

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I campaigned on the promise of change –- change we can believe in, the slogan went. And right now, I know there are many Americans who aren’t sure if they still believe we can change –- or that I can deliver it.
But remember this –- I never suggested that change would be easy, or that I could do it alone. Democracy in a nation of 300 million people can be noisy and messy and complicated. And when you try to do big things and make big changes, it stirs passions and controversy. That’s just how it is.

That’s a quotation from what I thought was a pretty impressive State of the Union speech tonight.

State of the Union Address - January 27, 2010


This post is all about quotations, specifically quotations from songs, but in relation to the hopeful spirit of the Obama campaign.
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Why People Don't Use Mass Transit

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MBTA Routing

I had to go into Boston today from Wellesley.  I had to be at 1 Kneeland Street at 3:30 pm.  I used the MBTA site to plan the trip and was given two options, one involving a transfer, the other not.
To avoid a transfer, I had to leave at Wellesley Square 12:33, take the Framingham/Worcester Line to South Station, and walk for what the MBTA estimates would have been 15 minutes to my appointment. If that’s correct, the train would get it at 1:15 pm, with a 15 minute walk, that’s 1:30.  Then I suppose I could have lunch or something to kill the 2 hours before my appointment.  The cost of this option, $5.25 and time in transit, 66 minutes.
The faster route, but 6 minutes, involved less walking and allowed me to leave later, but cost more.  I would have once again taken the Framingham/Worcester line, but this time to Back Bay, were I would have transfered to the Orange Line, getting to my stop at 3:10 for the brief walk.  This route cost $7.25.
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Economists on the Budget Freeze

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Here’s how one economist responded to President Obama’s idea of a spending freeze, which is likely to be a major topic of his State of the Union speech.

A spending freeze? That’s the brilliant response of the Obama team to their first serious political setback?
It’s appalling on every level.
It’s bad economics, depressing demand when the economy is still suffering from mass unemployment. Jonathan Zasloff writes that Obama seems to have decided to fire Tim Geithner and replace him with “the rotting corpse of Andrew Mellon” (Mellon was Herbert Hoover’s Treasury Secretary, who according to Hoover told him to “liquidate the workers, liquidate the farmers, purge the rottenness”.)

That economist is Princeton professor Paul Krugman, winner of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Economics.
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