- Dan Brown’s got a new potboiler coming out. I like Dan Brown. I wish I could boil the pot like he does. Critics disagree. One says so in a familiar voice. 🙂
- Almost a neighbor. Glad he’s not quite.
- Yet another judge fails to grasp the Fourth Amendment. (H/T JJ)
- Travis (TJIC) Corcoran’s upcoming novel sounds intriguing. I’d think so even if he didn’t take my name in vain in his trendy self-interview thingie.
- The Escherian stairwell 😉
- Okay, so we’ve all heard about how the IRS illegally targeted tea party and related groups around the 2012 election. And they are so very, very sorry. And we’ve heard how they were actually targeting them for much longer than they originally admitted. And it’s no big news because the IRS has been a political tool since it was only the irs and hadn’t earned its capital letters yet, so you have to wonder what everyone’s getting so flapped about. What’s really mindboggling is that any reporter or editor could quote this with a straight face: “…the practice was initiated by low-level workers in Cincinnati and was not motivated by political bias.” Wow. Orwell! Thou should’st be living at this hour.
Dan Brown’s critic sounds like a politician – talking out of both sides of his mouth at the same time.
I’d love to walk that Escherian stairwell, just for the sensation of it.
IMO, the most compelling things about Dan Brown’s books is his pacing and plotting. Characters and writing style – meh.
Haha about the IRS targeting not being politically motivated. Thanks for the laugh this morning.
I guess the question to ask about the IRS, is why does a low level employee in Cincinati have authority to initiate investigations on their own?
Staircase is cool. Better acting than 80% of the crap out of Hollywood these days. Too bad they didn’t get the money.
That Dan Brown piece had me laughing… hilarious!
And for your daily giggle: Pelosi says the IRS targeting conservative groups based on their politics is the Supreme Court’s fault.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/inside-politics/2013/may/13/pelosi-irs-problem-stems-court-ruling/
I’m not a fan of the blasted cross-dressers, but…
Are you serious, you senile hag?
(Note to those new to this: “Citizens United” also protects Democrat-supporting nonprofits, and the decision didn’t exist when the Clintonian IRS was doing the same thing.)
“failing to apprise the magistrate that it intended to use a stingray, what the device is, and how it works, it prevented the judge from exercising his constitutional function of ensuring that warrants are not overly intrusive and all aspects of the search are supported by probable cause.” — from the ACLU amicus brief.
No surprise – telling a magistrate he’s an ignerent wretch tends not to work out so well for parties or amici at counsel table….
Another staircase (I choose not to aggravate myself tonight by typing about the IRS or the 4th Amendment) that’s interesting is the one in the Loretta Chapel in Santa Fe. There’s definitely some question about whether or not it’s a miracle. It definitely is a moneymaker, though. The Chapel’s website: http://www.lorettochapel.com/staircase.html And a couple of critical articles: http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_mysterious_staircase15.htm and http://www.csicop.org/si/show/helix_to_heaven/
That’s a perfect capture of Dan Brown… however, his “style” (for lack of a better word) is infiltrating all kinds of fiction. It’s a matter of having a story, a place to go. I wish I was Mr. Brown. I’d hier someone to read this blog for me. 😉
“IRS targets conservatives” won’t get much MSM play, but this story will have legs.
“The Justice Department secretly collected two months of telephone records for reporters and editors at The Associated Press, the news service disclosed Monday in an outraged letter to Attorney General Eric Holder.”
http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/13/us/justice-ap-phones/index.html
Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.
It’s a good idea not to piss off a guy who owns a bulldozer:
http://www.freedomfeens.com/2011/04/14/two-killdozers-in-every-garage/
Lawhobbit, I think you misread the ACLU’s brief. They weren’t accusing the magistrate of being “an ignerent [sic] wretch”; they were accusing the prosecution of failing to give the magistrate sufficient information about what they were doing so he could properly exercise his constitutional function. In other words, they willfully concealed material information from him, so the fact that he issued the warrant was due to their dissembling, not to his error. Big difference.
The original bulldozer rampage, Marvin Heemeyer. The Tyranny Response Team made a miniature bulldozer trophy as a prize for the person who stood up to the government the most.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Heemeyer