Monday, December 16, 2002

Peering at the Jury [OpinionJournal.com] Here's something you don't see every day--a Wall Street Journal editorial written by a leftist. It's an attack on the system of trial by jury, a concept which Conservatives don't like much either. Specifically, the author wants to breach the privacy of jury deliberations. The point of it all is in this quote: Our entire criminal justice system is based on a fundamental trust in jurors. We trust jurors to be fair and impartial, that they will ignore inadmissible evidence, discount improper testimony, and listen to a judge's instructions. In short, we trust they will follow the law. Of course, the whole point of a jury is that they can ignore the law if even one of them believes it to be unjust or misapplied. Collectivists of both the left and the right recognize that as a threat to their ability to grind the people under their jackboots, and have been attacking the jury system for the past hundred years. The remaining obstacle they face is their inability to spy on jurors--you can't persecute someone for his or her vote if you don't know what it was. Allowing jurors to be videotaped would give the government a way to determine which jurors voted in a way not approved of by their lords and masters. comment () trackback ()  10:30:49 PM     Gore as Nixon?. In the wake of the 1964 debacle, Nixon rehabilitated himself as a moderate and won the presidency in 1968. My bet is that Gore figures that Bush will likely remain popular through the 2004 election cycle, especially if the Democrats immolate themselves in a frenzy of far leftwing extremism. Also, in the brutal 2004 Democratic primary campaign and presidential campaign, a number of Gore's potential rivals for the Democratic nomination will wear themselves out. Thus, calculates Gore, he will re-emerge as moderate, a la Nixon, and lead his party at long last to victory. It could happen. [Reason Online] A theory on Gore's decision not to run for President in 2004. comment () trackback ()  2:11:45 PM     According to the release notes for the just-released version 1.3a, "Mozilla" is dropping Mac support in favor of OS X. This isn't surprising, given the strong Unix bias of open-source projects, but it is disapppointing. I'd hoped that the existing bugs in the Mac version would be fixed first. Still, the version I'm using now works generally well enough for the present. The PC version works even better (I haven't encountered any bugs there), and they obviously aren't dropping that. comment () trackback ()  1:46:59 PM     I decided to experiment with the directions on How to create a directory in Radio's Outliner. The result is now available from the navigation bar on the left as "Ken's Directory". comment () trackback ()  12:19:25 PM     Slashdot | Will Your CD Player Tell on You? An anonymous reader writes "Ever feel like not being a marketing statistic? Well just by playing certain store-bought compact discs in your home or office computer, your new music disc may be transmitting your listening habits in real time to the respective record company...." --- Charming. Read on for more... [Privacy Digest] Of course there's no danger when listening to a CD on an actual CD player. And I'd be willing to bet that when the author writes "computer," he really means "PC." comment () trackback ()  5:59:38 AM

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