Motley Moose – Archive

Thursday June 6th President Obama came to Palo Alto, CA for a fundraiser. 350 Silicon Valley was determined to make sure he heard our opposition to the KXL pipeline.

Thursday was also my nephew’s high school graduation. Our family is very proud of him; school has not been easy for him because of ADHD, he had to work harder than most to achieve this goal. My sister with her famous stubborn determination kept him focused and busy. He has exceeded expectations by excelling at school, dance and sports. After receiving his diploma the crowd chanted for him to do a flip, which he did to cheers. I have complete faith he will continue to impress people with his innocent charm and determination as he heads to college and beyond.

Afterwards I drove with my wife and our 9 year-old to join 350 Silicon Valley. In the back of my mind were the 282 recent graduates, wide-eyed and hopeful, but what is their future? A crappy job market, overbearing student loan debts and severe weather are already stacked up against our new graduates. As a father, uncle and human being I feel the need to work towards improving these conditions. None are more urgent than Climate Change.

  Make sure you let your peeps

  know where to find you!  

     

                                            Oregon Coast from Cape Perpetua

A recent trip to meet up with old friends from graduate school gave us an opportunity to reacquaint ourselves with them and with the Central Oregon Coast as it had been many years ago when we interned in Portland. The coast line and beaches have changed little but the growth of previously small burgs is unavoidable.  Being there in mid May afforded us minimal traffic but also iffy weather. As it worked out, it was fine. It rained on the afternoon we arrived and when we left five days later. Intermittent sun brought out the best the coast has to offer and contributed to the wonderful visit with old friends.

By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

I recently had the pleasure of watching my first Bollywood movie, a title called Lagaan: Once upon a time in India. The movie’s plot was fairly conventional yet unconventional at the same time. India is straining under the rule of the evil British Empire. A rebellious young man with striking green eyes attempts to defy the British. How? By beating them in a cricket match! The local village quickly forms a cricket team, the British team is defeated, and the local village’s crushing tax burden is reduced for the next several years.

There were some fairly interesting things about this movie (with respect to politics).

More below.

It’s no secret there’s been a big influx of new members in the last few months. I’ve read some introductory material, diaries as well as posting guidelines. A few of them are here

Posting Guidelines

FAQ

Welcome Mat: Q&A Continued

Welcome Mat: Q&A Edition

Insider’s Guide to Motley Moose

And still I have questions. Maybe you have answers. Or maybe you have more questions.  

From the White House – Weekly Address

In this week’s address, President Obama says that the United States Senate will soon take action to fix our broken immigration system with a commonsense bill, and urges lawmakers to act quickly to pass this bill so that we can continue to live up to our traditions as a nation of laws, and also a nation of immigrants.

  Make sure you let your peeps

  know where to find you!  

There are times for finesse and then there are times for blunt force. Determining which is which is often the defining characteristic of success in any endeavor. The ongoing efforts to address cybersecurity risks and threats to industrial systems have for many years been a period where finesse and patience rule as we slowly accrete the requisite components from which a solution can be constructed. The time has come, however, to swing some hammers.

Crosposted from the ICS-ISAC Blog

Let us put aside for the moment that not only did most of you not have any qualms about such surveillance during the Bush Administration.  Let us also put aside that during those years you not only lacked any qualms, but also supported it and questioned anyone that disagreed with you over it.  Let us assume, for purposes of argument, that this is genuine concern rooted in privacy issues and not rooted in politics.

President Obama has made clear that members of Congress have been briefed on this issue.  Therefore, if you are truly concerned, and you truly believe that the public had a right to know what was happening, there is a simple solution that was available to you the moment you found out.  What is that solution?

Read everything you know about the surveillance programs into the Congressional Record.

This could be done through an actual speech on the floor of the House or the Senate.  This could be done through a speech in committee.  This could be done by moving to insert the full text of what you have into the Congressional Record.  There are all sorts of ways to do this and with its insertion it would enter the public domain.

Now you’re probably thinking that you could get in serious amounts of trouble, and go to prison for a long time, for what is effectively leaking highly classified information.  You couldn’t be more wrong.  See, that Constitution you claim to hold so dear, and you claim you know pretty much inside and out, protects you pretty much absolutely if you had chosen to go this route.  I direct your attention to Article I, Section 6, Clause 1:

Senators and Representatives…  for any speech or debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other place.

This is a grant of congressional immunity for your speeches in Congress and your insertions into the Congressional Record.  In fact, this is how Sen. Mike Gravel (D-Alaska) helped ensure that the Pentagon Papers would enter the public domain.  A subsequent case held that this protection also extends to congressional aides for conduct for which a representative or senator would be immune from prosecution.

So, there you have it Republicans.  If you were so concerned about this matter, and you truly believed that the public had the right to know, rather than just as part of an attempt to create a scandal, there was a way open for you to raise your concerns and inform the public.  This way was created in the Constitution and is now nearly 226 years old.  Furthermore, it has been used before.  With all the constitutional scholars you claim to have, I’m surprised you never thought of this before.

On June 7, 1965 The US Supreme Court issued a ruling overturned an 1879 Connecticut law that provided:

any person who uses any drug, medicinal article or instrument for the purposes of preventing conception shall be fined not less than forty dollars or imprisoned not less than sixty days.  

snip

any person who assists, abets, counsels, causes, hires or commands another to commit any offense may be prosecuted and punished as if he were the principle offender

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/suprem…

48 years ago ~ in my lifetime (I was about three weeks old when the ruling came down) it was a criminal offense for married couples in Connecticut to practice birth control.  It was a criminal offense to provide married couples with birth control.

I so glad we’ve come a long way.