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Last Word on Limbo

Monday, May 21, 2007

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Flower blogging

Sunday, May 20, 2007

Mainly to add a little color, a picture of one of my wife’s orchids, which she’s brought outside for the summer.

(Click for a larger view)

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The Day exposes a lending scam

Sunday, May 20, 2007

The headline story in this morning’s Day (Predatory Lending Shatters Dreams Of Dozens Of First-Time Home Buyers) about a local lending scam is a good piece of journalism. Not only did the Day expose an egregious swindle, but it got the AG’s office to investigate, and hopefully, put an end the careers of some of these folks.

I’ve heard rumblings about this for some time, and I was peripherally involved, both as a minor source and as an in attorney, in that I’ve sued all but two of the individuals named in the article for lending related CUTPA violations. Of the two exceptions, one was the lawyer for someone I did sue.

The last case I had involved almost the whole cast of characters, but I never tumbled to the scam being pulled on the buyers, since my clients were sellers. My clients were cheated too, but in a different way than the buyers, and their losses were far less than those suffered by the buyers. I had another case involving buyers years ago, involving exactly the same modus operandi, but only one of the persons named in the article.

I’ve sued one of these people three times, and I’ve come to conclude, partly as a result of those experiences, that there are some people who literally can’t tell right from wrong. Such people are more common than you might think. If you tell them something is wrong, and they shouldn’t do it, they may listen and do as they’re told. But without someone else to act as a surrogate conscience, they are adrift without a moral compass. Those who suffer from this problem, as is the case here, may engage in behaviors in which the potential rewards don’t justify the risk.

The Day’s reporter deserves an award for this one. I know she’s been working on it for months. Here’s hoping she gets one, and that the AG goes after these folks aggressively.

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Russert shows respect

Saturday, May 19, 2007

Thursday I wrote about my fear that I could not reliably recognize irony. Today I learn that I can’t recognize satire, or, even worse, that I confuse sincerity for satire. When I read this post at Hullabaloo I figured that the letter allegedly written by Tim Russert must be satire. Could anyone seriously write a paragraph like this:

I have not honked my car horn since September 11 as a gesture of respect to all of [the 9/11 responders]. 9/11 also gave me a whole new insight into my Dad and why he left school in the 10th grade to enlist after Pearl Harbor. I wrote a book affirming his life. It changed my life and my relationship with my father—and my son—forever. We now share openly the love and respect and pride we have in each other. A day doesn’t go by when other sons and daughters want to share stories of their dad with me. Now that’s a journey I never expected, but one which is so meaningful—perhaps even more important than my “career.”

No doubt you’ve guessed that this was, in fact, really written by Tim Russert. The man who rules the Sunday talk shows thinks that he is somehow honoring the 9/11 dead by not honking his horn. That’s his car horn of course – he never tires of honking his own. The rest of the inspiring column is just as weirdly maudlin.

I don’t think I can be blamed for thinking Digby made this letter up. Had Russert not written it, it would have been an inspired piece of satire.

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Getting ready for 2008

Saturday, May 19, 2007

My wife attended a meeting with the Joe Courtney campaign today. It’s an unfortunate fact of life that the next campaign starts the day after election day. Here’s Joe with John Hollay, who works in his Norwich office.

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John doesn’t know how lucky he is. My wife and I have known him since he was three, when he went to nursery school with our son. We looked in vain for a picture from back then, but we couldn’t find one. Had we done so I would have figured out some way to work it in.

Here’s another pic of John, Liz Duarte, and John Murphy.

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Update: Edited to correct misidentification.

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More Republican hypocrisy

Saturday, May 19, 2007

A few days ago I wrote about Republican hypocrisy, that if you wanted to know what a Republican was doing, just listen to what he condemns.

Here’s more proof of a particularly slimy variety. I should add, by the way, that I have stolen all of this from the linked stories, but I think it’s important to spread it around.

Ted Klaudt, 49, a Republican rancher from Walker, faces a long list of charges: eight counts of rape, two counts of sexual exploitation of a minor, two counts of witness tampering, sexual contact with a person under 16, and stalking.

Court documents mention five possible victims. Three were foster children between the ages of 15 and 19 who lived with Klaudt’s family. One is a cousin of one of those girls, and the fifth is a friend of Klaudt’s daughter.

In the most disturbing accusation, the girls say Klaudt had them convinced they could earn up to $20,000 by donating their eggs to a fertility clinic. And even though he has no medical training, the girls say Klaudt did all the supposed “exams” and “procedures” himself.

Do I even have to tell you about the nature of his legislative passions:

establish certain legislative findings pertaining to the health and rights of women, to revise the physician disclosure requirements to be made to a woman contemplating submitting to an abortion, and to provide for certain causes of action for professional negligence if an abortion is performed without informed consent.

clarify the application of certain provisions pertaining to the sale of pistols.

provide for recognition of certain valid nonresident permits to carry a concealed pistol.

provide for limited confidentiality of certain firearms information.

establish a task force to study abortion and to provide for its composition, scope, and administration.

prohibit the performance of abortions, except to save the life of the mother, and to provide a penalty therefor and to provide for a delayed effective date.

In support of free religious expression in public schools.

Proposing and submitting to the electors at the next general election an amendment to Article XXI of the Constitution of the State of South Dakota, relating to the definition of marriage. [The proposed amendment:: “Only marriage between a man and a woman shall be valid or recognized in South Dakota. The uniting of two or more persons in a civil union, domestic partnership, or other quasi-marital relationship shall not be valid or recognized in South Dakota.”]

revise certain provisions regarding the performance of abortions on unemancipated minors and those found to be incompetent. [The bill required a 48 hour delay after notification of a parent befor an abortion could be performed, with certain exceptions noted.]

prohibit the performance of abortions, except to save the life of the mother, and to provide a penalty therefor and to provide for a delayed effective date.

Truly disgusting. Truly Republican.

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The outlook isn’t brilliant in Norwich

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Like most people, I can point to very few concrete ways in which I’ve made a big difference, but by dint of my political activities I can claim a few. I’ve often joked that my gravestone will identify me as the man who kept baseball out of Groton, because I was instrumental, both in public and behind the scene, in preserving the Copp property as open space after Glenn Carberry fixed on it as a possible location for a minor league team. Besides being vocal in public, I provided a private legal opinion to one of the Copp Board members to counter the bogus opinion the town got saying it would be legal to use that property, which was restricted by deed for certain purposes, for a profit making enterprise such as a baseball team.

The team went to Norwich, which City today is struggling with the inevitable headaches associated with the constant demands from athletic teams for more and more state and municipal subsidies. When the Navigators (remember them?) promised to come, in doing so they were giving the back of their hand to Albany. Turnabout being fair play, they abandoned us for greener fields as soon as it suited their purposes, and we had to trade our Yankees farm team for one affiliated with the – sorry, I can’t remember. No one goes to the games anymore, the stadium is deteriorating, there’s no money to fix it because the team isn’t paying rent and Glenn Carberry (remember Glenn?) is making excuses for them. All of this was perfectly predictable, and it’s a credit to Groton that so many of its citizens (although not its politicians) wanted to have nothing to do with the team. Because of citizen support, the Copp Board resisted the politician’s pressure to hand over the property, which some of those politicians still resent, the lessons of the past few years notwithstanding.

The way these teams operate reminds me of something else I actually helped accomplish-heading off a tax break Mark Wolman wanted for a proposed office building, in which he intended to rent space to a tenant he intended to entice away from from a tax-paying Groton landlord. When he appeared before us (during my brief town council stint) with his hand out, he told us he wanted to build this great new office building, and he was asking us to “share the risk” with him by cutting his taxes. Now, in the world of private enterprise when you share the risk you also share the profits, but not so when a municipality shares the risk. If there are profits made they go unshared. Losses like those in Norwich? Those get shared, or transferred in bulk to the town.

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Deja vu in Iran

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Something to file away in case Bush is crazy enough to start pumping up a war with Iran.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Friday said Iran has not hampered the IAEA’s inspection of Iran’s nuclear facility.

“The information… is untrue,” IAEA spokesman Marc Vidricaire told a press conference when asked about recent reports that last month Tehran refused to give IAEA inspectors access to its Natanz uranium enrichment base.

“We have not been denied access at any time, including in the past few weeks,” he said.

If and when the pre-war propaganda blitz starts, they’re sure to trot out this charge. After all, it worked last time. This story will likely go almost unnoticed here now, and will certainly be safe in the memory hole then.

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Due Process on Gitmo

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Yesterday I linked to a couple of youtube videos, the creators of which were unable to appreciate the irony in Randy Newman’s songs. I now find myself having to admit that I’m not sure whether I can recognize irony when I see it. In this morning’s Times we read about the “trial” or “military hearing” of Majid Khan, an alleged something or other ( “Mr. Khan has not been charged with those offenses or any others”). Is the reporter trying to be even handed, is he tilting toward the government, or is he being ironic in a way that flies beneath my radar? Gentle reader, you be the judge.

First we learn that Mr. Khan is a highly suspicious person because, as a former long term resident of the United States, he was proficient in English, a skill that enhanced his value to Al Qaeda. Sure enough, he practically admitted that he could speak English:

His language skills were on full display in the transcript of the military hearing, held to determine whether he is being properly held as an enemy combatant.

Mr. Khan repeatedly demanded a lawyer. He complained about the conditions at Guantánamo — at one point deriding the detention camp for its flat basketballs and scolding officials for their “cheap branded, unscented deodorant soap.”

Then we learn that Mr. Khan complained about the, shall we say, kangaroo nature of the court.

But his own actions are revealed to undermine his argument:

Mr. Khan also took advantage of procedures to have written statements introduced from witnesses, several of whom denied some important details of the government’s accusations.

Yes, that’s right. Mr. Khan took advantage of the procedures. Now who’s not playing fair? Who is he to complain?

And his allegations that he was tortured? Well, so far as the hearing is concerned they appear to be irrelevant, but in any case they were batted away by the very credible Pentagon spokesman who said that the United States does not “conduct or condone torture”, which we all know is true because 1) we are the good guys, and 2) we have defined the term torture to automatically exclude anything that we do while we are doing it.

Despite the fact that he wasn’t tortured (for, by definition, he couldn’t have been), and despite the fact that he took advantage of the court in so may ways:

Mr. Khan often returned to his view that he was facing unfair legal odds.

This is where my irony detector blew it’s fuse. Was the reporter pulling our collective legs or engaging in some subtle form of irony? Is Mr. Khan’s “view” truly just one way to look at a process which may, in fact, be eminently fair? Or, as I would submit, is there no other “view” a rational person could hold? In which case, why attribute the “view” to Mr. Khan, instead of just saying that the court is of the kangaroo variety. At some point the evidence is too overwhelming to play the on the one hand-on the other hand game, isn’t it?

Khan is not allowed a lawyer (except the one he has never met “because of government regulations”), he’s not actually charged with anything except, apparently, being a bad person, he’s not allowed to see the evidence, he’s not allowed to present witnesses, and if, after all that, he manages to eke out a result that the Pentagon doesn’t like (which apparently happens, though it’s hard to believe), the Pentagon can try again and again, as many times as it wants, until it gets a result that it likes.

So help me out here. Is this irony, or is it the usual media dodge of giving equal treatment to opposing viewpoints, even when one is obviously false?

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No hell below us

Tuesday, May 15, 2007

There are times when being a non-believer has its down side.

Jerry Falwell’s death has brought on one of those times.

When I was back there in pre-seminary school, I believed that when you died you were judged by God (or his duly appointed deputy) and sent to a proper place. I took some satisfaction in knowing that people like Falwell would experience a terrible moment when they learned with horrible certainty that they were in fact, evil, and deserved to burn forever and ever in hell. Crude as the system might be, for some folks it does produce some rough justice.

There’s absolutely no satisfaction in knowing that dead Jerry will never experience that moment-that he will never know how wrong he was. Like dead Jesus and dead Hitler he is simply no more. No justice here, and no justice hereafter. When folks like Jerry die, that’s a depressing thought.

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