At first I thought this was satirical news, but I was wrong. In Italy, six seismologists and a public official are being tried for manslaughter over a public statement by the official that an earthquake was unlikely–a week before an earthquake hit the town and killed 308 people. If convicted, they could spend up to 12 years in prison.

In the days before the destructive earthquake, there were precursor quakes, and the defendants were called upon to analyze the potential threat. After the meeting, the public official, working for the Civil Protection agency, made the statement, “The scientific community tells me there is no danger, because there is an ongoing discharge of energy. The situation looks favorable.” As a result, people in the town did not prepare for the quake, leading to many of the deaths.

The problem here is, the public statement is almost certainly not representative of what the seismologists said. That’s their claim, and it is most likely true: no self-respecting seismologist would say in such a situation that minor quakes release tension. That’s something a non-seismologist might think. The meeting minutes revealed no such assurances, instead revealing that they said something more reasonable: there’s no reliable way to predict earthquakes.

What’s most likely is the classic case of the public official wanting to calm fears and protect business interests, and so releasing the most favorable statement he could think of. But even that is not a criminal offense. On the other hand, government officials apparently do not require building codes to be strict enough to prevent people from being killed when quakes hit; no one is being prosecuted for that, however.

Instead, the seismologists are being blamed. Scapegoat, anyone?

As the June 6 WWDC nears, rumors are starting to quietly spread. One mentioned that international journalists are being “quietly” invited to the Keynote, and that this indicates that “something big” may be announced. Many believe that it’s Apple’s new cloud-based music subscription service. This doesn’t make sense to me, however. After all, the service would likely not be world-wide; instead–like most Apple media deals–it would probably start in the U.S. and then spread from there. So, if I may go for a long shot here, I have a feeling that the “something big” may be something else. Something that I have not heard rumored for this keynote.

One significant point about OS X Lion is how much it borrows from the iOS. The swiping-grid app screen, the new and understated scrolling, the full-screen “windowless” apps. All of these elements, built for a multi-touch OS, make a fair amount of sense on a laptop, which is equipped with a trackpad–but what about the desktop Macs? Sure, Apple might start bundling the “Magic Trackpad” with desktop Macs. However, they might also be planning to go one step further.

About nine months ago, an Apple patent application was uncovered, one which addressed a very significant drawback concerning multitouch and desktop computers. The patent idea was a special “flex base” design, which would allow the user to draw the screen from a standing position to something close to the top of the user’s desk, angling upward:

At the time, it wasn’t considered a likely thing to be released anytime soon; nobody knew about Lion, and Lion’s iOS underpinnings weren’t revealed until a few months later, when most people had forgotten about the patent. (After a targeted Google search, it appears a few people had not–though many seemed to look down on the idea.) I hadn’t thought about it myself–until I read the “something big” rumors a few days ago.

I find this idea more likely now for a few reasons. First, the mouse-controlled GUI is clearly on its way out; multi-touch is the next evolution in this regard. We’ve seen it slowly build on laptops with Apple’s increasingly larger and gesture-based trackpads, then with the Magic Trackpad, and in parallel with the iPhone and iPad.

Now, save for the oversized trackpad, Desktop computers don’t lend themselves to multi-touch. The screens are too far away from the user, and too high up. Just try holding your hands up to your screen for more than a few seconds and imagine doing that for hours. Clearly it wouldn’t work.

But bring the screen down so it’s closer to being a surface, and the game changes significantly. Look at this video from 2006 (YouTube version here), when Jeff Han gave a demo of multitouch at TED. Note the position of his screen, the angle relative to the user. Looks a lot like the flex-base Mac show in the upper-left corner of the patent image above, doesn’t it?

Now think about Mac OS X Lion, with its iOS features, and think about how awkward it might be on desktops–until you think of it being part of a flex-based 27-inch multitouch screen. Now, that would be something.

Add in the fact that Apple, in Lion, is adding small touches like the ability to re-size windows from any edge–before now, it has only been from the lower-right corner, and has been since the Mac OS came out in the 80’s. Why add that in Lion? It’s not a part of the iOS. But in the context of a multitouch desktop OS, it makes perfect sense. That’s something a person would probably feel is more natural when using their fingers. Even the Mission Control feature in Lion would be a lot more meaningful in multitouch than the current window-switching paradigm.

This could even eventually be a lead-in to completely re-designed laptops which could be like a larger version of an iPad–maybe a dual-screen laptop without a physical keyboard, or perhaps something completely new that makes more sense with a touch screen. Keep in mind that Jobs has never been shy about making big changes which redefine how we think about computers in general use. It would also be a body blow to Windows, which still does not have a multi-touch friendly OS, and might take years to develop its mobile platform into something that integrates well into the mainstream OS. Apple going multitouch across the board would set it ahead of the crowd just when Windows 7 is beginning to make that platform respectable again.

Like I said, this is a long-shot. However, it would qualify as “something big,” and would fit perfectly with Lion’s new orientation. I won’t be surprised if it doesn’t come, but having thought of it, I wouldn’t be too surprised if it does come, either.

In any case, I was relatively uninspired by Lion before this, and didn’t expect much from the WWDC. Maybe now I am expecting way too much. But I am eager to find out.

Right-wingers are showing their colors again in this:

Republicans are working on multiple fronts to stop President Barack Obama from making companies bidding on federal contracts disclose their donations to third-party political groups.

Gee, I wonder why? But here’s a quote I found interesting:

Issa said the legislation “preempts an executive order designed to silence and intimidate job creators….”

“Job creators”? But we’re talking about companies that use money spent by the federal government. And Republicans have made it eminently clear that such money never, ever, ever creates any jobs. Ever. Remember when Obama was pushing the stimulus? That’s what they insisted. But suddenly, federal money is feeding “job creators.” Interesting.

That’s not all they’re being dishonest about, though. You have to question assumptions: exactly why would it “intimidate” federal contractors if they are required to disclose their contributions to third-party political groups? Note, however, that Issa did not just say “intimidate,” he also said “silence.” Silence them how? What exactly are they saying, and why would they feel it necessary to stop saying these things if they were exposed? Apparently, these are corporations spending millions of dollars to attack politicians who don’t steer as much federal spending their way. So if letting the public know what they are doing will silence and intimidate them, why is that? Because the public would become upset if they knew how the political system was being bought? Why, of course not!

In fact, the Center for Competitive Politics, a right-wing organization which vehemently opposes campaign finance regulation and reform, claims that the Republican bills to stop the requirement of such disclosures constitute a

strong rebuke to the executive branch’s effort to bring politics into the federal contracting process and enable the creation of a Nixon-style Enemies List.

Wow. Federal contractors secretly spending millions of dollars to influence elections and support the campaigns of politicians who will give them billion-dollar contracts is not “bringing politics into the process,” but allowing the public to know what they are doing is “bringing politics into the process”? That’s fascinating.

Also, we all know that Obama is so corrupt that he wants nothing more than to compile enemies lists all day long and then make evil plots to attack groups which support his political opponents. Because we all know there is a long list of right-wing organizations which have been attacked or even killed off by Obama and other liberals in acts of purely political retribution. Organizations like ACORN, SEIU, unions in general, Planned Parenthood, the TIDES–oh, wait, those are liberal groups attacked by right-wingers with enemies lists.

Come to think of it, I can’t really come up with any right-wing groups which have faced such concerted efforts to bring them down. The “enemies list” thing is yet another case of right-wing projection–accusing the other side of your own worst practices. If you recall, the “Obama’s enemies list” canard is nothing new; right-wingers have applied that conspiracy theory to all kinds of things, including the decennial census.

Of course, the disclosure would do nothing than to show the American people exactly who is buying influence in their government. Which is what the right-wingers really don’t want you to see.

On his radio show recently, Ed Schultz used a term to describe right-wing radio host Laura Ingraham which was completely unacceptable. He has been rightly suspended without pay.

Here is his on-air apology:

While I may not like him for what he said recently and his behavior at other times in the past, I have to respect him for this public statement.

He did not use excuses, he did not equivocate, he did not try to say that he did not really say what he said, and he did not turn the apology into a lead-in for further attack. I don’t think I have seen a single “apology” by a right-wing pundit or politician in similar situations who did not try to slip in at least one (though more often all) of these prevarications.

Instead, Schultz took full responsibility–another concept unrecognized on the right, where people seem to think “taking responsibility” means just saying that you do and getting credit for being a stand-up guy while not actually paying any penalty for it. Schultz is taking the suspension without pay, and says he deserves it.

While there is much just cause to be gravely concerned about radiation hazards in Japan these days, one must also use a certain amount of critical thinking so as not to be caught up in hysteria that easily arises. People all too easily panic; in the U.S., many people consumed iodine pills despite having no reason to. The pills posed a greater health threat than the minuscule amounts of radiation that they may have been exposed to. People took them anyway, because they were caught up in the hysteria.

Now, sometimes concern is warranted. For example, the Japanese government raised the “safe” level of radiation exposure for children from 1 millisievert to 20 millisieverts per year, so as to allow them to be exposed to playgrounds with previously unacceptable levels of radiation. Parents were not amused.

I would certainly agree that parents should be upset. While the jury is still out on exactly what is safe or not, upping the safe limit to the point where German nuclear workers would balk is probably less a matter of following safety and more a matter of moving goalposts and risking children’s health so as to save expense. Where children are concerned and replacement of playground topsoil can remove 90% of the radiation hazard, changing the government standard like this is a weasel’s way out.

However, in some cases, a little critical thinking is called for before getting upset. A video has appeared on YouTube of an earless rabbit in Fukushima:

This is causing some alarm, though fortunately it has not been picked up by the media aside from the IB Times–yet. And while this story could show the harmful effects of radiation in Fukushima, it would be foolish to take it seriously without verification and analysis. If you watch the video, you may notice that there is nothing showing where the video was taken nor when it was taken. No one even speaks in the video. For all we know, this video could have been taken a year ago in South Dakota. While the poster is listed as being in Fukushima, that also could be claimed by anyone, anywhere in the world; YouTube does not verify locations claimed by users, that I know of.

Next, even if it is from Fukushima, that tells us next to nothing. The IB Times report says the person who posted the video claims, “This is the first anomaly/deformation ever born.” Either that was mistranslated, or was a typo, or the person is simply wrong. A quick Google search will reveal quite a few earless rabbits born around the world, like a rabbit named Vincent in England in 2008. It is not an unheard-of deformity. Nor can we be sure if it was even caused by radiation; it could have been caused by exposure to pollution, as we see happening with amphibians.

And even if it is caused by radiation, how unusual is that? One rabbit is hardly a scientifically relevant sampling. And even if it does show a rise in damage, then how does this compare with what we already expected? Some might say this has value as a canary in a coal mine, but frankly, I think that people are already on heightened alert to health hazards posed by radiation. If they weren’t tipped off by the three nuclear reactors exploding on TV, and only caught on when they saw a YouTube video of a bunny, then I think they should be paying a bit more attention.

Now, if a study came out showing a significant number of animal mutations due to radiation from a large enough sampling in a certain region nearby the reactor, and this could act as evidence that hazards are in excess of what was expected from the radiation exposures thought to exist, therefore indicating some risk we were previously unaware of–then I would be concerned.

Until then, this is random data.

As I recently mentioned, the GOP seems to be painting itself into a corner with the Medicare bill. In a bizarre play of ideological purity, it seems that anyone who does not want to be a pariah in the GOP ranks must embrace a third-rail issue which could devastate their standing with the voters. Gingrich, until now a formidable candidate who spent years building himself up, is now seen as having self-destructed simply by disagreeing on that one issue–an issue which stands to lose the Republicans a safe seat in New York in a few days, one which their constituents are screaming at them in anger about.

In order to get the party’s nomination, there are certain things one has always had to do. Sometimes these things are a bit far out, but recently, it seems that the new GOP line which candidates must toe is so extreme that any candidate must essentially alienate themselves from the country at large before they can become viable in the primary race.

I guess this is what comes from the almost pathological abhorrence to anything connected with Obama, causing Republicans to denounce as evil the very things they themselves proposed as wise and right only years, months, or even just days before. Since Obama is in fact a centrist and embraces a fair number of ideas in the moderate Republican realm, all that is moderate becomes toxic to them, leaving only the more and more extreme positions, the extremist vitriol which candidates must now embrace and celebrate or else be excoriated by their own.

It has come to the point where there is now talk that Paul Ryan, the author of the “Kill Medicare” plan himself, is being seriously considered as a possible presidential candidate. The man who led the party into its lockstep vote which could lose them their only remaining island of political power, the House, which could take away from them even their dwindling chances of winning the White House.

They find themselves now bereft of a safe Republican seat, a seat that the GOP candidate should have won by several touchdowns; losing it to a Democrat, voted down by a predominantly right-wing constituency who have expressed particular dislike for the GOP Medicare plan.

The GOP finds itself more and more facing the wrath of Americans in general, and even more and more of their own voters–not the core, not the base, but those important moderates who don’t want Medicare to be scrapped and replaced with vouchers, and who aren’t all that wild about continuing massive tax cuts for rich people when it is clear that it only helps balloon the deficit and increase the debt. But they have to stand by these issues. It is become an increasingly more difficult balancing act for them, to be able to somehow avoid becoming hated by their base or hated by the electorate at large, or by both by trying to waffle somewhere in a center that no longer exists.

Not that I am not enjoying this, or that it is a richly deserved comeuppance. But it is also morbidly fascinating to witness. I am cautiously aware that I thought the same thing would happen due to the Republican obstructionism back in 2009, and was terribly wrong. Somehow I don’t think I am quite so wrong on this one, though.

It’s not much of a garden, even by Japanese standards, but it’s what we’ve got and it’s there. It’s a patch of dirt which measures 22 feet by 6 feet along the south side of the house, and despite there being a house just inches beyond it, it still gets a respectable amount of sunlight–quite a bit in the summer, in fact. So we wanted to do something with it, make it much more presentable.

When we got the house, it was loose dirt, but after a few rains, became somewhat more caked, and moss and weeds started growing. It would likely soon become a wild mini-weed-field soon enough. Our plan was to add planters and stepping bricks, and then fill the rest with garden stones. The stones are often used in Japan as a security feature–someone prowling around outside will make themselves known by the crunching sounds.

In any case, after scouting a few materials, Sachi sketched out an idea and I took it to InDesign and made a basic layout:

We went to a “Home Center,” the type of store in japan that specializes in this kind of stuff (like a “Home Depot,” I suppose), and found the exact stuff we wanted. We got some Goldcrest conifer shrubs and flower bushes, some low, curved brick enclosures, bricks to use as stepping stones, and a truckload of 10kg bags of the landscaping stones. We needed at least 50 bags of the stones; they were a bit less than ¥300 each. The materials arrived in the middle of the week, and have been sitting there waiting for us since then.

We set aside Saturday to do the work, and fortunately, it was nice weather, if a bit hot. First, we placed the faux-brick enclosures. Since the ground had dried unevenly, I had to dig up the dirt (which smelled uncomfortably like fish parts) and level it out before we could place them.

Next, we placed the stepping bricks as we wanted them to be, but they also sat unevenly, so it was back to churning up and the flattening out the dirt beneath them as well.

Then we were ready to lay out the stones; Sachi opened the bags, and I took them in and spread them out over the area.

We had just about enough for the minimum, but could probably use more–maybe another 20 bags to make the stones deeper where we’d like, and a few more bags to fill in the narrow dirt area on the other side, at least near the front.

When we finished, it looked pretty nice.

Later, I got a view from overhead (after it started to rain and the stones took on more color), and stitched together a few photos to see how close we came to the plan I made at the beginning:

Eventually Sachi wants to get a wire arch for the entryway (at left in the above diagram/image) which will have rosebushes growing over it. Should look nice! Now all we have to do is keep the plants alive…

When Republicans first started talking about their Medicare plan back in April, I could hardly believe they were serious–and I predicted that it would cost them dearly if they were really going to try it out. That was before we knew the public’s reaction.

Now we know.

Case in point: New York’s 26th congressional district, recently vacated by Chris Lee after his now-infamous shirtless photo on Craigslist.

The 26th district is heavily Republican. Though held by a Democrat for most of the 90’s, it was redistricted after the 2000 census, and since then, Republicans have won by varying margins. The closest Democrats came to reclaiming the seat was in 2006, when Republicans were incredibly unpopular and the House fell to the Democrats; even then, the 26th was won by a Republican by 4% of the vote. In other elections in the last decade, Republicans have won by margins of 11.3%, 14.5%, and 51.2%, with Lee winning the seat handily by a margin of 47.2%, with 73.6% of the vote over the Democrat Philip Fedele’s 26.4%.

Now that Medicare is a big issue, Republicans are finding themselves in trouble. 21% of respondents to a poll in the 26th said that Medicare was the single most important issue in deciding their vote, followed by jobs (20%), the budget deficit (19%), and then by taxes and health care (12% each).

And with the special election just three days away, the Democrat, Kathy Hochul, has jumped ahead in the polls and now leads the conservative candidate by 4 points. Hochul carries the largest block, 42%, followed by Republican Jane Corwin, with 38%, with 12% going to the Tea Party candidate. True, the vote is being split on the right, but considering that the Democrat got only 26% of the vote just a year ago, this is pretty significant.

Furthermore, 66% of voters say their minds are made up, with another 27% saying that it’s unlikely they will change their minds by election day, with Democrats being the most firm in their decision. With only 7% to work with, that’s not much hope for the Republican–especially since most of the undecideds are independents and Tea Party people. You might think that was good for the Republican, but almost all of the people who defected from the Tea Party candidate so far have gone for Hochul, the Democrat. Which means that if anyone stands to gain from the uncertains, it’s Hochul.

If Hochul wins, it will be interesting to see the reaction of the GOP regarding their Medicare plan. Already they have tried to walk back from it, but walked right back into it shortly after that, even going so far as to vote for it nearly unanimously and shooting down one of their most popular presidential candidates because he dared speak out against it.

Will they continue to walk into the buzz saw, claiming the 26th was only an aberration? One can only hope so. Unless they are stupid, they will not only shelve the Medicare plan, but also do a 180 and disown it, with nothing less than a new bill that bolsters Medicare in its present form. Yes, they’ll look like pandering hypocrites, but they already look like that anyway. At least they won’t be firmly gripping a third-rail issue any more.

Amazingly, I get the sense they will not do this, but will instead, like lemmings were once thought to do, swarm in lockstep over the precipice on this one.

Like I said, one can only hope.

It’s past 6:00, and it doesn’t seem like the Rapture yet. But then, this is Japan. Not so many Christians around, so it’s not as easy to spot them rising into the clouds. And since it’s sunny here, the people rising up probably angle off pretty quickly to where there are clouds, making their ascent more difficult to spot. Also, the dead are all cremated, so when they rise from their graves, it could look kind of like a dust devil or something.

No earthquakes so far.

Here are some quotes from Republican senators from the last decade. See if you can guess, while reading them, what all of these senators did this week:

You should, of course, be able to guess that all of these senators have just filibustered a judicial nominee.

Recall that, when Democrats filibustered only the most extremist judicial nominees under Bush, after having confirmed a higher percentage of his nominees for high courts than most presidents even dream of, Republicans excoriated the Democrats and threatened the “nuclear option” of doing away with the filibuster altogether. Since then, of course, Republicans have enacted the filibuster far, far more than any Congress in history, using it as an almost daily tool to obstruct anything they don’t like and even some of what they do like.

Back when it was the Democrats, though, a deal was struck to get past the impasse. Republicans grudgingly, under the deal made, allowed Democrats to use the filibuster under “extraordinary circumstances.”

What are the “extraordinary circumstances” for all of these Republican senators to do something they reviled when it was Democrats doing it?

The nominee, Goodwin Liu, had criticized Samuel Alito in a way they didn’t like. Goodwin, universally hailed as being an excellent judge as well as decent, open-minded, intelligent, and moderate, is being denied a judicial appointment because Republicans want to be pettily vindictive. Liu criticized Alito–criticism which he has since retracted and apologized for–and now Republican senators are willing to do something they only recently held as unconstitutional because they are so offended and unwilling to accept even an express apology and retraction.

So, what did Liu say that has Republican senators willing to violate the constitution over? Here’s the statement cited:

Judge Alito’s record envisions an America where police may shoot and kill an unarmed boy to stop him from running away with a stolen purse; where federal agents may point guns at ordinary citizens during a raid, even after no sign of resistance; where the FBI may install a camera where you sleep on the promise that they won’t turn it on unless an informant is in the room; where a black man may be sentenced to death by an all-white jury for killing a white man, absent a multiple regression analysis showing discrimination; and where police may search what a warrant permits, and then some. Mr. Chairman, I humbly submit that this is not the America we know. Nor is it the America we aspire to be.

Was this criticism unwarranted? David Alan Sklansky, law professor at UC Berkeley School of Law and a former federal prosecutor, disagrees:

Here are the facts. At the Justice Department, Alito did argue that a lower court had erred in finding a Fourth Amendment violation when a police officer fatally shot an unarmed eighth-grader fleeing from a residential burglary with $10 and a purse; he suggested that the police should be allowed to use deadly force against anyone they reasonably suspect is a fleeing felon. On the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Alito did in fact uphold a decision by federal marshals carrying out an eviction to point shotguns and semi-automatic rifles at residents who were apparently offering no resistance; he explained that the force was reasonable because the family had resisted an earlier eviction effort, was reported to own firearms, and had threatened to shoot any agents that came onto their property.

Alito also upheld the FBI’s warrantless installation of a hidden camera and microphone in a suspect’s hotel room, on the ground that the agents turned on the equipment only when a confidential informant, who consented to the surveillance, was in the room. And Alito did in fact dissent when the 3rd Circuit overturned the death sentence imposed on a black defendant by an all-white jury in Kent County, Del. He took that position in part because he thought that, at least without expert statistical analysis, it wasn’t determinative that Kent County prosecutors struck all the black jurors not only in the defendant’s trial, but also in the three other capital trials held within a year of the defendant’s. Finally, in two separate cases, Alito did dissent from the invalidation of searches that seemed to exceed the literal scope of the underlying warrants; in each case, he argued that the warrant should be read more expansively.

As for Liu’s comments being inappropriate, Sklansky points out that Scalia has been immeasurably more scathing in his attacks against other jurists than Goodwin’s statement could ever be characterized as being. Apparently, that’s OK.

What this comes down to is Republican senators being vastly hypocritical over what is, in the end, an expression of concern over the integrity of the constitution by a widely respected moderate judge who wished nothing more than to respect the legal rights of Americans.

The Roman Catholic Church has a new whipping boy in the ongoing child molestation scandal: loose American mores.

First, the church tried to cover up the sexual abuse, hiding and protecting the priests, and sometimes even threatening the victims.

Next, they tried to blame homosexuality, despite the fact that pedophiles generally do not have any adult sexual orientation and comprise a group distinct from homosexuals or heterosexuals.

Now, with the excuse of “it’s the gays” wearing thin, they have released a new “study” which blames the sexual revolution of the 60’s and 70’s.

Riiiighhht. This is kind of like parents trying to figure out why their kids aren’t the angels they tried to make them to be. It has to be TV, or music, or the teachers, or society–anyone but themselves. We naturally, almost instinctively look outward for blame. However, what the church is doing goes beyond that; it has to be crystal-clear to them that a number of factors played a role, but that they themselves are ultimately responsible, not just for the internal factors contributing to the problem, and not just for failing to quickly identify the problem and deal with it, but especially for their shameful behavior in covering it up and allowing it to continue. And yet they cannot seem to bring themselves to admit to any of that; instead, they seek scapegoats upon which to shed the blame.

I have to say, this more than anything else makes me disrespect the church, and reinforces my general criticism of organized religion: any religious authority large enough, considering its own public image to be equivalent to the legitimacy of the beliefs they represent, will inevitably hold its own well-being as being more important than that of its adherents, and thus whenever there is a conflict, will act against the interests of its own members.

On Sunday, Newt Gingrich criticized Paul Ryan’s Medicare plan, calling it “right-wing social engineering” and “radical.”

Later, when castigated by his own party, he tried to retract what he said, calling it a “mistake.”

Now he is attempting to claim that if liberals making hay of his statements, quote what he said in any way, then they are dirty rotten liars:

Let me say on the record, any ad which quotes what I said Sunday is a falsehood. I have said publicly, those words were inaccurate and unfortunate. And I’m prepared to stand up, when I make a mistake – and I’m going to on occasion – I want to share with the American people that was a mistake. Because that way we can have an honest conversation.

Now, if you accidentally said something you didn’t really mean, then it might be fair game to try to take it back–not that Republicans would ever allow a liberal to walk back such a thing. Conservatives don’t even let liberals walk back from things they didn’t say. But if he said something intentionally, and meant what he said, then later decided it was a bad idea and decided to reverse himself, then, no–you cannot claim people who quote you are lying, so long as they don’t contradict the fact that you have reversed yourself.

And in this case, Gingrich hasn’t even reversed himself–he just played a damage-control PR game which made it seem like he retracted what he said–and then called anyone who quoted his un-retracted statement a liar.

In any case, let’s take a look at this. On Sunday, this is what he said:

MR. GREGORY: What about entitlements? The Medicare trust fund, in stories that have come out over the weekend, is now going to be depleted by 2024, five years earlier than predicted. Do you think that Republicans ought to buck the public opposition and really move forward to completely change Medicare, turn it into a voucher program where you give seniors…

REP. GINGRICH: Right.

MR. GREGORY: …some premium support and–so that they can go out and buy private insurance?

REP. GINGRICH: I don’t think right-wing social engineering is any more desirable than left-wing social engineering. I don’t think imposing radical change from the right or the left is a very good way for a free society to operate. I think we need a national conversation to get to a better Medicare system with more choices for seniors. But there are specific things you can do. At the Center for Health Transformation, which I helped found, we published a book called “Stop Paying the Crooks.” We thought that was a clear enough, simple enough idea, even for Washington. We–between Medicare and Medicaid, we pay between $70 billion and $120 billion a year to crooks. And IBM has agreed to help solve it, American Express has agreed to help solve it, Visa’s agreed to help solve it. You can’t get anybody in this town to look at it. That’s, that’s almost $1 trillion over a decade. So there are things you can do to improve Medicare.

MR. GREGORY: But not what Paul Ryan is suggesting, which is completely changing Medicare.

REP. GINGRICH: I, I think that, I think, I think that that is too big a jump. I think what you want to have is a system where people voluntarily migrate to better outcomes, better solutions, better options, not one where you suddenly impose upon the–I don’t want to–I’m against Obamacare, which is imposing radical change, and I would be against a conservative imposing radical change.

That sounds pretty darn specific and considered for an outburst which can be excused because he accidentally misspoke. I don’t think he can claim “slip of the tongue” on this one. So how exactly does he walk it back?

In a conference call with conservative bloggers, Gingrich said he “used language that was too strong” on NBC’s “Meet The Press,” and that he was reaching out to Ryan.

“My hope is to find a way to work with the House Republicans,” Gingrich said, according to Matt Lewis of the Daily Caller.

He also appeared on Republican commentator Bill Bennett’s radio show, where he was on the defensive from the outset. At first, he blamed adversarial questioning from the “Washington establishment,” and said he should have responded differently.

“I’m totally for what Paul Ryan is trying to do in general terms,” he said.

The “narrow question” he was asked, he said, was whether Republicans should adopt a plan that the public seems to oppose, not whether he agreed with it.

“I just said I am for the process of improving it. I didn’t say I was for the plan as it currently exists. I think that is an important distinction,” he said.

In short, he says that his language was “too strong,” he supports Ryan “generally,” is for “improving” the plan, and the question he was asked was too “narrow.”

Here’s the thing: that doesn’t contradict what he said Sunday. It only sounds like it contradicts it. Gregory wasn’t asking about the whole budget, he was talking only about the Medicare aspect, which Gingrich completely trashed, calling it just as radical and wrong as “Obamacare.”

In this response, Gingrich uses a straw man, and acts like he has been accused only of opposing the entire budget, and denies that is true. But that’s not what Gingrich got into trouble for–it was his specific criticism of the Medicare plan.

And Gingrich did not, as far as I can find, say that he now approves of Ryan’s Medicare plan–only of the total budget, which one can approve of overall while still disagreeing with certain parts of it.

As for blaming the question for being too narrow, or the questioner for asking a question he didn’t like or wasn’t prepared for, that is meaningless in the context of reality. He was asked a reasonable question, and gave a thoughtful, detailed response. That’s not an error, nor was he tricked into anything.

Gingrich also said:

“I made a mistake,” Gingrich told Fox News host Greta Van Susteren, recounting his apology call to Ryan earlier in the day. “The fact is that I have supported what Ryan’s trying to do on the budget,” he said. “The budget vote is one that I am happy to say I would have voted for.”

Attempting to preempt the inevitable attack on his description Sunday of Ryan’s plan as “right-wing social engineering,” Gingrich insisted: “Let me say on the record, any ad which quotes what I said Sunday is a falsehood. I have said publicly, those words were inaccurate and unfortunate. And I’m prepared to stand up, when I make a mistake – and I’m going to on occasion – I want to share with the American people that was a mistake. Because that way we can have an honest conversation.”

Again, he is claiming here that he would be happy to vote for the budget plan as a whole–the weasel being that he doesn’t have to like everything in the bill to vote for the whole thing.

However, as far as I can tell, he still has not contradicted or disowned his specific statements on the Ryan plan for Medicare. As far as I can tell, he is more for transitioning, making it voluntary to use classical Medicare or opting to use vouchers instead. That does not erase his statements that Ryan’s plan–to go whole hog into vouchers–is too “radical,” or is “social engineering” as “bad” as we see on the left.

Essentially, what Gingrich is doing is misdirecting (the straw man about the budget instead of specifically about Medicare), giving general approval of Republican policies (he approves of Ryan’s plan if forced to take it or leave it whole), and blaming his interviewer for ambushing him with a question that, in reality, was completely reasonable, and which Gingrich, had he wanted to, could easily have answered exactly as he is answering now.

As far as I can tell, if Democrats come out and run ads quoting Gingrich as saying the Ryan plan is “radical” and “social engineering,” or even that Gingrich opposes the specific plan for Medicare, those claims would be 100% true and not in the least misleading.

Gingrich, in short, is lying. He never retracted his remarks, and quoting him is completely legit.

Oh, and Republicans are still trying to kill off Medicare.

There seems no end to the stories in the tech media spouting the endless meme “Macs Are No Longer Safe.” In a story titled “Say goodbye to era of Mac malware immunity,” MSNBC’s tech reporter jumps on the bandwagon–with just as flimsy support as any of the other hacks who bought into the meme. The article begins:

Such is the predicament that Apple’s success has brought: Sophisticated malware has started to appear that’s directed specifically at Apple machines.

For years, security experts predicted that as Apple gained market share, cybercriminals would turn their attention from Windows machines toward Mac attacks. Now it appears to really be happening.

No, for years, security salesmen have been saying that hackers “really are” targeting the Mac, the firewall has broken, and Macs are no longer safe. Not “predicting,” but proclaiming. Here’s a sample from seven years ago, in October 2004:

The Apple community has, since its inception, been largely immune to nefarious hackers bent on spreading harm. If you are a Windows user, as I am, you know the routine. You complain about the latest spyware or virus attack, and Apple devotees respond with good-natured teasing–they don’t have worry about such nonsense. Well, now they do.

John Gruber from Daring Fireball listed samples of such stories ranging from that 2004 story to the present day–continuous stories about Mac security “finally” crumbling. And yet, here we find ourselves, barely changed from the days of the first false alarms. Today is little different; the MSNBC story is a jumble of tired scare tactics from people trying to sell anti-virus software, either bamboozling or bringing in on the scam a tech reporter who writes the story to make the issue seem a lot more serious than it actually is.

The story is based upon the most current threat from another trojan–maybe the third or the fourth ever made for the Mac–which doesn’t even really infect your computer. It’s more like an elaborate scam, except instead of emailing you about your eBay account expiring or your bank requiring a change in your status, it tries to trick users to install software which tries to get them to do the same thing by mimicking anti-virus software.

The thing is, this is malware only by the merit that it is software and wants to do something bad to you. But it is not what most would consider “malware,” in that it does not actually “infect” your computer. Instead, it completely bypasses security, using social engineering instead. It’s not a virus, it’s a scam.

This article, however, is even more misleading than most, as it then tries to imply that actual viruses are out there for the Mac, or at least iOS devices, and by extension, Mac OS X. Read this and tell me the author isn’t trying to imply that:

While Apple advocates have argued for years that Macs were inherently more secure, most experts say that the hackers simply follow the market.

So now there are viruses aimed at smartphones, for example, because tens of millions of them–tiny, powerful computers–are in use around the world.

Smartphones are also more attractive because they are constantly connected to the Internet. By the time an infection is discovered, the attackers have made their money with fraudulent charges and moved on.

Furthermore, because the computing world is no longer singularly dominated by Microsoft Windows, “we’re seeing more Web-based attacks that are platform agnostic,” said Zscaler’s Sutton.

That means fraudulent websites are designed to infect any computer that inadvertently visits the site, whether it be a Windows or Mac OS X computer running any of a half-dozen Web browsers.

The popularity of Apple’s iPhone and iPad has had a “halo effect” that attracts both consumers and criminals to the platform, so Mac owners should keep their browsers up to date and be more cautious.

After reading that badly-written garbage, the average reader will probably come away thinking that not only are iOS devices falling to viruses, but that your Mac can be infected merely by visiting a web site. If you follow the link, however, you find that the story is about Android viruses; in my own search, I was not able to find any legitimate reports of viruses for iOS. As for infection from visiting web sites, that is certainly not true. The web site danger comes from web sites which will initiate a download of a trojan–but not an infection.

While the threat may get as far as downloading and decompressing a trojan when you visit a malicious site, it still requires a user to be dumb enough to then approve the installation of the software and intentionally type in the administrative password. Even then, the trojan doesn’t exactly “infect” the Mac, but installs software which will make fake virus alerts pop up and then try to get the user to visit a malicious web site to buy fake software to get rid of the fake viruses. As far as I can tell, however, the trojan is just a standard app and can be gotten rid of simply by deleting the program file.

Ironically, these badly-written articles which are not much more than ads for Mac “security” software firms will only make more people susceptible. Believing that such virus attacks are possible, gullible users will be more prone to fall for the scam.

Ironically, the writer also uses dubious numbers to inflate the Mac’s market share–the opposite of what similar writers do when reporting only about market share–so as to make it appear that Macs have crossed the threshold that makes them attractive to hackers. The implied message is that the Mac OS is no more secure than Windows, and the only difference is the number of units in use–another longstanding canard. Just like the false impression that Macs are falling to “malware” in general, which in fact it is, so far, only trojans–which instead of defeating OS security, simply bypass it by tricking the user. If you buy an expensive home security system and then open the door for a criminal, it’s not a failure of the security system.

The only fact coming close to being actually relevant in this whole sham of a report lies in the fact that a Make-Your-Own-Trojan kit is being sold to scammers so they can use this method themselves. However, this is not an actual spread of malware, but just an indication that we might, at some future time, start seeing more trojans. But as far as I can tell, that’s it. Still no viruses, still no worms, still no threat other than the occasional social engineering scam that no OS could ever really protect against. And at that, these scams are very few in number.

Once again: the Mac in not invulnerable. It has no magical immunity. Someday, there undoubtedly will be viruses and worms for the Mac. However, we’re still not there yet.

In the meantime, the greatest threat is from stupid, alarmist articles like these.

Update: I have noted that many are reporting on the fact that the “MacDefender” trojan is becoming “widespread,” making this more of a game-changer. From what I can tell, that is true to a degree–this does seem to be more common a trojan than we have seen before–but still not a cause for general alarm. A calmly reasonable article on Wired says it very well:

Bott’s discovery renews this debate: A new piece of malware seems to be fooling more Mac customers than past examples. So does this change the scenario? Should Mac customers install anti-virus software by default like most Windows customers do?

Charlie Miller, a security researcher who has repeatedly won the annual Pwn2Own hacking contest by hacking Macs and iPhones, told Wired.com he doesn’t think so.

Miller noted that Microsoft recently pointed out that 1 in 14 downloads on Windows are malicious. And the fact that there is just one piece of Mac malware being widely discussed illustrates how rare malware still is on the Mac platform, he said.

And while 200 posts complaining about Mac Defender in Apple’s support forums may seem like a lot, that’s still a small fraction of the millions of Mac customers in the world.

While Mac Defender does show that the problem is getting worse and people should be more wary about malware, it doesn’t necessarily mean that every Mac user today should rush to buy anti-virus software, Miller said.

Ultimately, it’s up to the customer because there’s a trade-off involved. Anti-virus software will help protect your system from being infected, but it’s expensive, uses system memory and reduces battery life.

The best thing to do is to set aside ego and ask yourself honestly: do you ever download and install software from untrustworthy sources? Do you not monitor reports of Mac malware on a regular basis so you may recognize these threats before they reach you? Are you tech-savvy enough to recognize the signs of a scam?

Allow these to guide you to make the right decision.

Republicans are seriously threatening to let the debt ceiling expire, something which would have dire consequences for the U.S. and world economies. In response, Obama should give them nothing. Nada. Not a penny. Not even a kind word.

Frankly, the whole GOP romance with Hostage politics is getting more than just a little too unnerving. They were obnoxious over taxes, threatening to deny everyone a tax cut unless the rich got one too–and Obama caved. The GOP won the battle, and discovered that they could take hostages and Obama would fold. So then they threatened a government shutdown, and, predictably, Obama played footsie with them; even though he wound up giving them very little in the end, the impression was that he played ball, and that the GOP either got something, or came close.

Almost immediately after that, the GOP, emboldened from the apparent success of their hostage-taking so far, announced they had two more hostages: Medicare and the Debt Ceiling.

This is why you don’t deal with hostage-takers: if you give them a cookie, they’ll want a glass of milk. It’s too easy to take hostages, and there’s no end to their supply. Obama dealt with the GOP when it demanded ransom, and lo, just days later, they produced brand-new hostages.

Medicare, so far, has come back to bite them in the ass. They continue to vacillate between saying that they’re not going to do it, and threatening to go all the way. You get the feeling that (1) they want to do it, (2) they know that it would be politically damaging, but (3) they believe they can use it as a huge bargaining chip to get other things they want. The Democrats actually are on pretty strong ground here, and know that they can use the Medicare plan to hurt Republicans in next year’s election. As a hostage, it’s kind of a loser because it would be harder for Republicans to harm it.

The Debt Ceiling, however, is something else. It is more like the government shutdown, in that Republicans actually have the power to make it happen by withholding a vote. But the debt ceiling is like the government shutdown on steroids. Steroids from hell. Seriously, this could wreck the economy–but the Republicans are holding it back like it’s a dessert they want to withhold to punish a recalcitrant child.

Obama has got to stand firm on the debt ceiling thing. He has to call the Republican’s bluff. Dealing with the Republicans when they threatened to shut down the government was bad enough; it brought about the current crises, and if Obama continues to deal with them, the GOP will keep on doing this, and every few months we’ll have another situation where the GOP is threatening to destroy some aspect of America in order to get what they want.

Another reason Obama should not give an inch is that the debt ceiling, unlike the government shutdown, is not something the GOP can pin on Obama. The GOP can’t let the debt ceiling go unchanged and then tell Americans that the president wrecked the economy. And if they do let this go, it won’t be like the government shutdown, which is bad–it would be completely disastrous. Republicans would have to be a hundred times more stupid and crazy than they could possibly be to make this happen. The GOP would be literally committing suicide if they ran the economy into the ground over political game-playing.

Obama will be pressured, though; he may think or people may tell him that he has to do something. And that is true, in that he has to appear before the American people and tell them that the GOP is out of bounds on this one. That the debt ceiling is not a bargaining chip, it is not something you hold hostage, and that in all good conscience, there is no way on earth that he will budge on this one, and that if the Republicans have decided to wreck the economy, there’s nothing he can do about it.

That Obama seems to be unwilling to do is stupid. This is not a choice for him, unless he wants to face this situation every other week. If Obama really wants to keep playing the “I’m reasonable, I’m not partisan, so I’ll talk to them regardless of what they’re doing” game, then he’s an idiot. He has to draw the line in the sand.

Otherwise, a week or two after he makes some sort of deal with the GOP, yet another hostage–or three–will materialize, and we’ll be back at square one. Because when the GOP sees that destructive behavior wins them something, they make it a standard practice, like they did with obstructionism and blazingly hypocritical partisan attacks.

Obama has to make clear to the GOP that they cannot simply print free currency like this, like a child demanding a toy or else he’ll use his baseball bat to destroy something else in the house. It was bad enough when the brat threatened to bash in the TV set, but now he’s saying he’s going to take it to grandma’s head.

Time to take the baseball bat out of his hand and teach the little snot a lesson he’ll never forget.

You know something is off-kilter with GOP politics when more than one candidate is forced to decide whether they will run based on the schedule of television renewals, and you could tell how likely any one person was to run based on whether their show would continue for another season.

You may have heard, Judgment Day is coming. No terminators, apparently, but your Christian friends will be flying up into the air at 6:00 pm on May 21. Which time zone, you ask? All of them, apparently.

On May 21, “starting in the Pacific Rim at around the 6 p.m. local time hour, in each time zone, there will be a great earthquake, such as has never been in the history of the Earth,” he says. The true Christian believers–he hopes he’s one of them–will be “raptured”: They’ll fly upward to heaven.

Apparently, God will respect local authorities in their designation of time zones, even the ones set hours before and after others in the same longitude.

One has to wonder if the people publicly predicting this truly believe the rapture is coming or not. Some people are just that nutty. But it is easy to suspect people like this of manipulation; they may correctly believe that predicting the rapture, despite being eventually proved wrong, will draw adherents to their cause. The media loves goofy stories like these, so it’s great publicity for the people making the predictions.

Now, you might think that once May 21 passes and there’s no rapture, these people will get a huge black eye. However, you would be wrong. You might be thinking of scientists, who lose credibility when they predict something and it doesn’t happen. In the world of faith, things work differently. Remember, religious zealots disrespect scientists exactly because they change their beliefs depending upon prevailing facts. To the faithful, a wrong prediction is easily–in fact, automatically explained off as a “test” or in some other way. The yahoos predicting the end of the world–who have done this many, many times before–risk nothing in being wrong. They only have to worry about how much they gain.

Atheists are having fun with this, of course. Many post-Rapture parties are being planned for the hour after the predicted end of days. One enterprising atheist even started a business where, for a fee, he promised to take care of people’s pets after they ascend–presumably without their furry friends–to heaven. He’s dealt with this intelligently, in that he will not take the pets before the Rapture, but has promised that he or his agents across the U.S. will drive to the homes of those raptured within 24 hours after the event to collect the pets. He claims to already have 250 takers, which, frankly, is sad.

As tempting as it is to laugh at these people, there will be damage. Followers, made to believe that any doubt may win them an express ticket to hell, have interrupted life plans. One woman dropped out of medical school. A couple who apparently are not working as a result of this and are running out of money have no backup plan. It has caused rifts between families and friends. Doubtlessly many more people are going to be hurt by this in some way or another. But the people causing all of this will not pay the price–and the people hurt will probably find a way to keep believing in and respecting the ones who caused them harm.

Newt Gingrich Tweeted his candidacy for president:

Today I am announcing my candidacy for President of the United States. You can watch my announcement here. http://bit.ly/kEbh7d

Note the “bit.ly” URL shortener. One has to wonder if Newt is aware that he announced his candidacy via the usage of a Libyan top-level domain.

Not that this establishes any kind of improper behavior, it’s just kind of funny. Bit.ly is a widely-used resource and, outside of the domain suffix, has nothing to do with Libya. But imagine if Obama used a similarly innocent Iranian top-level domain link to announce that he is running for re-election, and what the right wing would make of that.

Rand Paul:

With regard to the idea of whether you have a right to health care, you have realize what that implies. It’s not an abstraction. I’m a physician. That means you have a right to come to my house and conscript me. It means you believe in slavery. It means that you’re going to enslave not only me, but the janitor at my hospital, the person who cleans my office, the assistants who work in my office, the nurses.

Basically, once you imply a belief in a right to someone’s services — do you have a right to plumbing? Do you have a right to water? Do you have right to food? — you’re basically saying you believe in slavery.

I’m a physician in your community and you say you have a right to health care. You have a right to beat down my door with the police, escort me away and force me to take care of you? That’s ultimately what the right to free health care would be.

By this logic, one’s right to religious belief enslaves clergy; the right to keep and bear arms enslaves gun dealers; the right to legal representation enslaves attorneys; and, I suppose, the right to free speech enslaves, well, anyone who you want to have listen. While we’re at it, don’t we all have a right to life? That makes slaves out of everyone who does anything that keeps people alive.

Apparently Paul does not quite understand the meaning of the word “rights.”

Here’s an expressive chart showing the reasons the deficit is too high:

From the source:

The events and policies that pushed deficits to these high levels in the near term were, for the most part, not of President Obama’s making. If not for the Bush tax cuts, the deficit-financed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the effects of the worst recession since the Great Depression (including the cost of policymakers’ actions to combat it), we would not be facing these huge deficits in the near term.

In short, take away Bush’s two wars, his tax cuts mostly for the wealthy, the bad economy he generated, and therefore the need for stimulus to keep it from becoming a depression, and we’d practically have a balanced budget.

In the meantime, Republicans are adamant that we continue with the Bush tax cuts–the one element which, over time, will balloon the deficit more than anything else. And when the deficit falls somewhat over the next several years, Republicans will inevitably claim all the credit, and demand they get everything they want in the name of cutting the deficit more–which would in turn explode the deficit again, which they would then blame on Obama and/or the Democrats. And so on and so forth.

Wow. Even for D.C., this is corrupt:

Meredith Attwell Baker, one of the two Republican Commissioners at the Federal Communications Commission, plans to step down—and right into a top lobbying job at Comcast-NBC.

The news, reported this afternoon by the Wall Street Journal, The Hill, and Politico, comes after the hugely controversial merger of Comcast and NBC earlier this year. At the time, Baker objected to FCC attempts to impose conditions on the deal and argued that the “complex and significant transaction” could “bring exciting benefits to consumers that outweigh potential harms.”

Four months after approving the massive transaction, Attwell Baker will take a top DC lobbying job for the new Comcast-NBC entity, according to reports.

Exactly how blatant does bribery and influence peddling have to become before somebody gets arrested for it? Ka-ching! Sorry, Americans–another Republican sold you out, big-time.

Yes, it’s on both sides–but the Baker case was about as barefaced as it gets. Democrat Christopher Dodd stepping into an executive role at the MPAA was used as an example of what one would call “equivalence,” but Dodd did not shove through a controversial jackpot for the movie industry and then step into the MPAA job a few months later. As far as I can tell, Dodd did not really do anything in particular for the entertainment industry. His hiring was more about connections, skills, and clout.

Baker, on the other hand, is a very different case. She went to work for an organization she very recently ruled over. Not only that, she ruled very much in their favor, to their great profit. Even more, she fought especially hard to make the deal even sweeter for them than was supposed to be, arguing on behalf of the corporate giant against the interests of the American people. And then almost immediately, she quits the government job she used to enrich them and gets enriched herself.

Similarly, another FCC Republican, Michael Powell, now earns millions of dollars a year for the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, which he was supposed to be in charge of regulating when he “served” in his government position as head of the FCC.

Next to these two, Dodd’s sell-out comes across as the very model of propriety. False equivalency strikes again.