Quick Stop

Having served on a jury that hung because of one person after a two day trial in traffic court (I was ready to pinch the guy's head off and flick it down the hallway in disdain), I sympathize with the jurors in the Blagoviator's trial who were stymied by another lone holdout after months of trial and weeks of deliberation.

I'll bet you big bucks that that single juror lost the distinction between reasonable doubt and beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Some people will come up with the craziest arguments around guilt or lack thereof, and it's incredibly frustrating to be a party to those contortions in logic. It's doubly so when you know that a mistrial will result in a retrial with all the attendant costs of time, money and emotion.

Argh!

Drive-Bys

This should come as a surprise to no one...

You are 18% hippie.

You're not in the lowest bracket of non-hippie-hood, but you're close. I advise a field trip to a food co-op or a farmer's market. Do a few interviews and take notes, because there will be a quiz next week to see if you've learned anything.

Are you a hippie?
Take More Quizzes

... except, perhaps, the shade of The Princess Mom, who always expected I'd get married barefoot in a Gunne Sax dress with daisies in my hair on a hillside in the country with John Denver music playing softly in the background.
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Ear Worm of the Day:



Blame it on the quiz... and Ravenwood. At least one person I know won't hold it against me, anyhow.
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For once, a newspaper takes a sensible position:

This week, U.S. District Judge James Zagel settled the latest debate over jury privacy by deciding to withhold the names of jurors in the trial of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich and his brother Robert until the trial was over.

It is in the very marrow of the bones of a news organization to defend the free flow of public information, so it feels unnatural to say this, but we think Zagel got it right.

Huzzah, sirs!
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So a federal judge struck down parts of Arizona's new immigration law? The world as we know has surely landed on its head.

Professor Jacobson explains in detail why I am not wrong to think so.
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Giggle of the Day:



Just try getting that one out of your brain!

Drive-Bys

Ear Worm of the Day:



(Via europopped.) It's wedged firmly between my ears and won't go away!
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"The donkey screamed and children cried" is not a line from American Pie. Although it could have been...

Poor thing.
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Ghetto parenting at it's very best:

Two men who both have children with a young woman who was also on the scene began arguing, according to police Lt. Ted Roberts, who was assigned to the Gresham District the night of the incident.

The altercation was between the victim’s mother’s current and former boyfriends, according to the police release.

The argument started because both men were trying to visit with their children at separate times and during one of the visits, one man disciplined the child of the other man, sending that man into a rage, according to Roberts.

The angry man pulled out a gun and fired at the other man and didn’t hit him but accidentally struck the child in the cheek instead. The bullet also pierced her shoulder, the lieutenant said.

Even more confusing,

The wounded baby is the child of either a sister or an aunt of the mother who has children with the fighting fathers, according to the lieutenant.

Got all that straight? (I sure don't.) According to the beginning of the article, the wounded baby's mother is the woman with the battling exes. By the end of the story, it's unclear whose baby was shot.

But that a baby was shot at all, let alone for these reasons, is horrifying.
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Remember when I said that the Blagoviator likes to pick his own audience? He may not have testified in court, but he certainly couldn't wait to try his cause in the court of public opinion again!

I've got to admit that while most of his blathering was more of the same old same old, this little gem is priceless:

At his media conference, Blagojevich also admitted he had learned from the case.

“I’ve learned a lot of lessons from this whole experience and probably the biggest . . . is that I talk too much. Thank you.’’

I don't believe that lesson will stick.

And I do believe John Kass is correct:

Our former governor had a lot to say awhile ago, but now, apparently, he doesn't have the — what did he used to call it? — the testicular virility to take the stand in his own defense, as he promised about a gazillion times.

Weenie.