Gerbil's Giant Gumball Gumbo

In Weighing Death Penalty, A Flaw in Fact

A military law blog pointed out over the weekend that Congress, in fact, revised the sex crimes section of the Uniform Code of Military Justice in 2006 to add child rape to the military death penalty. The revisions were in the National Defense Authorization Act that year. President Bush signed that bill into law and then, last September, carried the changes forward by issuing Executive Order 13447, which put the provisions into the 2008 edition of the Manual for Courts-Martial.

Anyone in the federal government — or anywhere else, for that matter — who knew about these developments did not tell the court. Not one of the 10 briefs filed in the case, Kennedy v. Louisiana, mentioned it. The Office of the Solicitor General, which represents the federal government in the Supreme Court, did not even file a brief, evidently having concluded that the federal government had no stake in whether Louisiana’s death penalty for child rape was constitutional.

RHAPSODY PLAYLIST FOR JUNE 30, 2008
---
Someone Great - LCD Soundsystem
Memphis - Benevento/Russo Duo
Puttin' People on the Moon - Drive-By Truckers
Driving Backwards With You - The Slip
Nellie Jean - The Slip
Ronnie and Neil - Drive-By Truckers
The First Single - The Format
Feelin' Alright - Traffic
It Takes Time - The Stills
The Needle and The Damage Done - Neil Young
Doin' The Cockroach - Modest Mouse
Stella Was A Drive and She Was Always Down - Interpol
Deck Shoes - Greyboy Allstars
The Day John Henry Died - Drive By Truckers
One Big Holiday - My Morning Jacket
Put Your Records On - Corinne Bailey Rae
Susanne - Weezer
Car Carrier Blues - Leo Kottke/Mike Gordon
Step Right Up - Tom Waits
City Calm Down - Architecture in Helsinki
505 - Arctic Monkeys
Seven Story Mountain - Railroad Earth
Operator - Grateful Dead
Summer of My Fall - Surprise Me Mr Davis
Caring is Creepy - The Shins
It's About Twilight Now - My Morning Jacket
Well You Needn't - Thelonious Monk
Pacific Theme - Broken Social Scene
The House We Live In - The Stills
Waiting for Jaden - Animal Liberation Orchestra
The Last Song - Foo Fighters
Patato's Mission - New Monsoon
Tonight's The Night - Neil Young
Cinnamon Girl - Neil Young
Golden - My Morning Jacket
Louisiana 1927 - Marcia Ball
Magician - Golden Smog

Pig Brains Causing Neuro Disorder

By Julie Steenhuysen

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Eighteen pork plant workers in Minnesota, at least five in Indiana and one in Nebraska have come down with a mysterious neurological condition they appear to have contracted while removing brains from slaughtered pigs, U.S. researchers and health officials said on Wednesday.

State Farm Sponsors Hispanic Voting Drive
http://www.truthout.org/article/state-farm-sponsors-hispanic-voting-drive
Miriam Jordan reports for The Wall Street Journal, "With an eye on the fast-growing Hispanic market, State Farm Insurance Companies will announce Thursday that it will be the lead sponsor of the largest national campaign thus far to encourage Latinos to become US citizens and register to vote. That will make it the first mainstream US corporation to put money behind the massive mobilization effort ahead of the November presidential vote."

Jacques Brel's "Amsterdam"

i kind of lost interest in this when my formatting got all screwed up. i'm going to post more as the days come and go.