Drones and Democracy

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Germany's Der Spiegel reports, "Obama's Leaked Drones a Reminder of the Bush Years."

Yeah, a reminder alright. And one the left's hypocrites would rather do without. Glenn Reynolds has more, "THOUGHTS ON ORIGINALISM AND DRONE STRIKES." Plus, Rich Lowry on the left's kill list hypocrisy, at that link.

Also, "IF HE WERE A REPUBLICAN, HE’D BE A WAR CRIMINAL," and "ILYA SOMIN: The Drone Targeting Dilemma."

Blame Righty AWOL in Christopher Dorner Manhunt

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I meant to post this earlier, but better late than never.

Don't miss Michelle Malkin's devastating piece, "The Blame Righty mob falls silent."

RELATED: At Pundit Press, "Liberals Rush to Defend Murderer Christopher Dorner; 'A True Patriot Hero'." And CBS News 13 — Sacramento, "Support Growing For Former L.A. Officer Accused Of Killing Spree" (at Memeorandum).

It's pretty shocking, really. More at Twitchy, "Jesse Jackson tweets plea to Chris Dorner: ‘I understand your feelings of hurt and pain’."

History of Leftist Hypocrisy

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A follow up to my earlier post, "Blame Righty AWOL in Christopher Dorner Manhunt."


Meanwhile, at the Los Angeles Times, "Trail of fugitive ex-cop turns very cold in Big Bear," and "LAPD will reopen investigation into 2009 firing of Dorner."

Also at Instapundit, "REMEMBER, ONLY POLICE CAN BE TRUSTED WITH GUNS: Police seeking Dorner opened fire in a second case of mistaken identity." Also, "3 bystanders reportedly shot by police during hunt for murder suspect," and "LAPD Had “No Idea” Who They Were Shooting at In Dorner Pursuit, Says Victims’ Attorney."

Obama's Drone Attack On Your Due Process

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From Noah Feldman, at Bloomberg:

The biggest problem with the recently disclosed Obama administration white paper defending the drone killing of radical clerk Anwar al-Awlaki isn’t its secrecy or its creative redefinition of the words “imminent threat.” It is the revolutionary and shocking transformation of the meaning of due process.

Fortunately, as seen during John Brennan’s confirmation hearing for Central Intelligence Agency director, Congress is starting to notice.

Due process is the oldest and most essential component of the rule of law. It goes back to the Magna Carta, when the barons insisted that King John agree not to kill anyone or take property without following legal procedures.

What they meant -- and what has been considered the essence of due process since -- is that the accused must be notified of the charges against him and have the opportunity to have his case heard by an impartial decision maker. If you get due process, you can’t complain about the punishment that follows. If you don’t get that opportunity, you’ve been the victim of arbitrary power.

Continue reading.

And tune into Glenn Greenwald on Twitter for leftist hypocrisy updates:

In the NYT, @jengranholm becomes the latest Dem to admit: of course we object much less because Obama is presidentis.gd/wnPmUl
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) February 10, 2013

Young, Big Government Progressives

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It remains to be seen, but whether this is an ephemeral trend that coincides with the current Obama-led Democrat-socialists or a longer, secular political realignment is an important question. Either way, conservatives have their work cut out for in them.

At the New York Times, "Young, Liberal and Open to Big Government":

MISSOULA, Mont. — This funky college town, nestled along two rivers where five mountain ranges converge, has long been a liberal pocket, an isolated speck of blue in a deeply red state. Now Montana is electing more politicians who lean that way, thanks to a different-minded generation of young voters animated by the recession and social issues.

Sam Thompson, a 22-year-old environmental studies major at the University of Montana here, considers himself “fiscally conservative” but opposes cuts to Medicare; he expects to need health coverage when he grows old. Aaron Curtis, 27, a graduate student, admired Jon Huntsman, a moderate Republican, but could not stomach Mitt Romney’s opposition to same-sex marriage.

Billie Loewen and Heather Jurva, editors at the student newspaper, speak of a Depression-era mentality that is pushing their generation to back Democrats. Saddled with student debt, they worry about health care and are terrified that they will not find good jobs. “You might be just one accident away from losing everything,” said Ms. Jurva, who has worked 40 hours a week waiting on tables to put herself through school.

It is no secret that young voters tilt left on social issues like immigration and gay rights. But these students, and dozens of other young people interviewed here last week, give voice to a trend that is surprising pollsters and jangling the nerves of Republicans. On a central philosophical question of the day — the size and scope of the federal government — a clear majority of young people embraces President Obama’s notion that it can be a constructive force, a point he intends to make in his State of the Union address on Tuesday.

“Young people absolutely believe that there’s a role for government,” said Matt Singer, a founder of Forward Montana, a left-leaning though officially nonpartisan group that seeks to engage young people in politics. “At the same time, this is not a generation of socialists. They are highly entrepreneurial, and know that some of what it takes to create an environment where they can do their own exciting, creative things is having basic systems that work.”

Well, if they're not "a generation of socialists," young people ought to be gravitating toward folks like Sen. Rand Paul instead of the brain-addled, entrepreneurial-crushing Democrats like President Obama and the idiot Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.

We'll see. More at that top link in any case.

Cartoon Credit: William Warren.

Google's Really Advanced Search

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You've know doubt heard of Advanced Search. How about Really Advanced Search?

I spotted this at the bottom of a Google Search Results page today and had to take a look.

Among the search features, including the usual ones, are:

• words almost, but not quite entirely unlike:
• rhyming slang for:
• this exact word or phrase, whose sum of unicode code points is a mersenne prime:
• subtext or innuendo for:

and this:

• the words , but not , unless they contain either the intersection of phrases , , and or a gerund in which case the disjunction of and will also be taken into account (on Tuesdays). 

At the bottom of the page are also several links:

You can also... Tickle a unicorn Download our ranking code so you can run Google at home Search by odor Some of the features of really advanced search might make a good coding project. They might also be a challenge to explain. But they really make a better April Fools Joke.

Tips from Google: What's Missing?

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One of my colleague's recent bookmarks caught my eye:  How to solve impossible problems.  
The link is to a story by John Tedesco of the San Antonio Times about Google search guru Daniel Russell who posed a daunting challenge to a room full of investigative journalists:

What’s the phone number of the office where this picture was snapped?

Here's the photo:
What makes this challenge difficult is that there is no direct information about the office from which the picture was snapped.
According to the article, "(Russell) wasn’t asking for a phone number for the skyscraper in the picture, which sounds hard enough. He wanted the phone number of the precise office where the photographer was standing when the picture was taken.  Nothing in that office was even in the photo. Yet in a few minutes, Russell, a research scientist at Google, revealed the answer by paying attention to small details and walking us through a series of smart Google searches."

Yes, most of us don't put Google's full power to use. Advanced features can make searching more surgical.  The article goes on to illustrate Boolean modifiers (what works and doesn't) as well as operators many people haven't tried lately, if ever. It's a good summary; take a look.
But Google is all about finding. Nothing about how good a result may be. This is typical of most students. We laugh when we hear "If it's on the Internet, it must be true," but that's how students actually behave. We're getting better at finding. We've made little progress at evaluating.
It's really not Google's business to tell us what to believe. And we resist attempts at interference when it comes to second-guessing what we want to see--although search engines are paying attention to what we click and are influenced by our choices.  Which is why it becomes all the more important that we develop good investigative habits.
Spoiler Alert
I managed to find an answer I'm pretty sure is right, but there is still some conjecture involved. If you'd like to solve Russell's challenge, go ahead. Answers are easy to find, thanks to Google.  Here's Russell's blog, and some answers.  Did I/they get it right?