Amir Taheri says we’re not looking very hard for Saddam.

He just changed his mind!

Seriously, this is one of my pet peeves–the conflation of the concepts of lying (make a statement one knows to be false about a present or past circumstance) and the breaking of a promise, or changing a position. They really are different things. I remember being particularly irritated during the impeachment saga when people said something like “So what if Clinton lied? Bush lied, too. He said he wouldn’t raise taxes, and then he did.”

Even leaving aside the fact that Clinton’s lies were under oath, there is a distinction between making false statements, and taking a course of action different than that previously proposed, or even promised. Sometimes circumstances change, or new facts come to bear, in which case it’s not reasonable to hold to a course just for the sake of being consistent with past statements. That doesn’t mean that changes of position shouldn’t be criticized–just that they shouldn’t be considered “lies.”

In the case at hand, of course, it does appear that Schwarzenneger was being untruthful before the show, but there’s no way to know that for sure. It’s at least conceivable (though not likely) that once he got up on stage, he decided at the last minute to go for it, so the headline, to me, is too strong.

He just changed his mind!

Seriously, this is one of my pet peeves–the conflation of the concepts of lying (make a statement one knows to be false about a present or past circumstance) and the breaking of a promise, or changing a position. They really are different things. I remember being particularly irritated during the impeachment saga when people said something like “So what if Clinton lied? Bush lied, too. He said he wouldn’t raise taxes, and then he did.”

Even leaving aside the fact that Clinton’s lies were under oath, there is a distinction between making false statements, and taking a course of action different than that previously proposed, or even promised. Sometimes circumstances change, or new facts come to bear, in which case it’s not reasonable to hold to a course just for the sake of being consistent with past statements. That doesn’t mean that changes of position shouldn’t be criticized–just that they shouldn’t be considered “lies.”

In the case at hand, of course, it does appear that Schwarzenneger was being untruthful before the show, but there’s no way to know that for sure. It’s at least conceivable (though not likely) that once he got up on stage, he decided at the last minute to go for it, so the headline, to me, is too strong.

He just changed his mind!

Seriously, this is one of my pet peeves–the conflation of the concepts of lying (make a statement one knows to be false about a present or past circumstance) and the breaking of a promise, or changing a position. They really are different things. I remember being particularly irritated during the impeachment saga when people said something like “So what if Clinton lied? Bush lied, too. He said he wouldn’t raise taxes, and then he did.”

Even leaving aside the fact that Clinton’s lies were under oath, there is a distinction between making false statements, and taking a course of action different than that previously proposed, or even promised. Sometimes circumstances change, or new facts come to bear, in which case it’s not reasonable to hold to a course just for the sake of being consistent with past statements. That doesn’t mean that changes of position shouldn’t be criticized–just that they shouldn’t be considered “lies.”

In the case at hand, of course, it does appear that Schwarzenneger was being untruthful before the show, but there’s no way to know that for sure. It’s at least conceivable (though not likely) that once he got up on stage, he decided at the last minute to go for it, so the headline, to me, is too strong.

Ken Silber discusses some recent work (by an Oregon lawyer…) that may indicate that the universe is self replicating, and that we may even have created it ourselves.

This kind of stuff is always fascinating to me, because I have a (non-scientific, so far) belief in a teleology–that the purpose of life, and particularly intelligent life, is to help the universe come to know itself. I’ve been thinking about how one might derive an ethical system based on such a belief, but not hard enough, because I haven’t made much progress. This takes the idea one step further, in which the purpose of life and sapience is to not only give the universe consciousness, but to help it reproduce as well.

Interesting.

Here’s an infuriating article that just blew all the circuitry in my irony detector.

A Justice Department lawyer compared the enforcement of idiotic federal marijuana laws to ending Jim Crow in the South.

California and other states that want to make marijuana available to sick or dying patients are flouting federal drug laws in much the same way that Southern states defied national civil rights laws, a senior Bush administration lawyer said.

And here’s a wonder of understatement by his debating opponent:

When government agents shut down marijuana growers who serve sick people, it is “not acting with the same degree of moral propriety as it did to end civil rights abuses,” said Taylor Carey, a California special assistant attorney general who wrote a friend-of-the-court brief backing medical marijuana.

That’s putting it mildly. In fact, in this case, even ignoring the rights of patients to get the potentially most efficacious medicine, the federal government is enforcing civil rights abuses with this insanity. Recall that the point at issue was one of free speech and doctor-patient privilege–the right of a doctor to recommend a course of treatment for a sick client, which the federal law forbids.

It would almost be enough to make me vote Democrat, except for the war, and, of course, the fact that this was a policy initiated by the Clinton Administration…

The Federal Review has some advice for California Republicans.

The Federal Review has some advice for California Republicans.

The Federal Review has some advice for California Republicans.

Kevin McGehee points out the disturbing trend of increasing teen and even pre-teen prostitution in the U.S.

I think it should be legalized, but not for non-adults. Like drugs, the fact that it remains illegal, and thus outside of state control, makes it much more difficult to stop children from doing it. I’d be curious to know how much of this occurs in, say, Reno, relative to other cities of similar size and demography…