perfidy

No, it's in the amendments (IV, IX, X), you sneaky semanticist you!

Nevertheless, I'm willing to bet that Ricky Santorum was not making a statement about the Bill of Rights when he made that speech, but was rather wringing his hands about how the preverts are going to drag civilization down. I dunno. That's just my sense.

[update] Santorum has a right to his opinion. I also have a right to know he's dead wrong.

[update] The big issue, in a legislative sense, isn't privacy at all, but whether the Feds have a right to regulate what consenting adults do with their own time. I'm inclined to think they don't.

Of course, he's right in saying that there isn't a right to privacy in the Constitution.

And to think, I have been invited to be in a wedding... Perhaps they should reconsider.

From Senator Rick Santorum:

"If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual (gay) sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything," the Pennsylvania lawmaker said in a recent interview, fuming over a landmark gay rights case before the high court that pits a Texas sodomy law against equality and privacy rights.
"All of those things are antithetical to a healthy, stable, traditional family," Santorum said. "And that's sort of where we are in today's world, unfortunately. It all comes from, I would argue, this right to privacy that doesn't exist, in my opinion, in the United States Constitution."

More information/insight/reaction/yammering at Instapundit, Light of Reason, and the Times-Leader, which is an actual news source.

Apparently,

I'm French! Why do think I have this outrageous accent, you silly king-a?!

What Monty Python Character are you, you English pig-dog?

(brought to you by Quizilla)

From Geek Lethal, via coded private communique, comes this January 2001 article from the Onion, covering Bush's Inaugural Address. Read it.

For you lazies, here's excerpts:

"During the 40-minute speech, Bush also promised to bring an end to the severe war drought that plagued the nation under Clinton, assuring citizens that the U.S. will engage in at least one Gulf War-level armed conflict in the next four years. You better believe we're going to mix it up with somebody at some point during my administration," said Bush, who plans a 250 percent boost in military spending. "Unlike my predecessor, I am fully committed to putting soldiers in battle situations. Otherwise, what is the point of even having a military?
On the economic side, Bush vowed to bring back economic stagnation by implementing substantial tax cuts, which would lead to a recession, which would necessitate a tax hike, which would lead to a drop in consumer spending, which would lead to layoffs, which would deepen the recession even further.

Bush had equally high praise for Attorney General nominee John Ashcroft, whom he praised as "a tireless champion in the battle to protect a woman's right to give birth."

Yeesh. It's like they had a time machine or something.

Tomorrow, when (hopefully) I am not exhausted and sore, I have on tap: genre killing; the French (again); and James Madison and Valery Giscard d'Estaing: a comparative view of constitution building in America and Europe.

In the meantime, I am going to go home and take a nap.

Put the founder of the Mars Society at the helm of NASA, and give him two weeks worth of the Social Security budget, and we'll be on Mars in a few years, tops. Very smart guy. He has developed plans for getting to Mars far cheaper than the typical NASA baseline mission profile. Not only cheaper, but smarter. 

Even better, put Charles Pellegrino in charge, give him a month's worth of the SS budget, and he and his Brookhaven Lab physicist compatriots will have us on our way to Alpha Centauri in anti-matter powered Valkyrie starships in a decade or two. If you're gonna think, think big. Screw Mars, I want the stars. 
 

While I know little about the two men mentioned (do feminists insist on being womyntioned?) in the Globe article, promoting from within is rarely a good sign at NASA. It will probably lead to more bureaucratic inertia, lack of creative solutions, and overspending. I could be wrong. On a more positive note, But Rutan and the aerodynamic geniuses at Scaled Composites have unveiled their new spaceship.

As the space.com article mentions, Rutan is going for the X-prize. This ten million dollar award goes to the first group that takes passengers into space, returns safely, and then does it again with the same vehicle inside a week. The prize is consciously modeled after the prizes offered in the early days of aviation, which played a significant role in the development of the industry. It gives me some hope that Rutan is pursueing this vision - unlike most of the pie-in-the-sky "competitors", Rutan has a proven record of not merely designing; but building, flying and selling experimental aircraft.

Rutan designed Voyager, the plane that made the first unrefueled, non-stop, round the world flight. If anyone can do it, Burt can. And if someone can get into space without metric tons of government funding, it will be a wonderful thing. (And if Rutan wins the X Prize, he can get serious venture capital.)

Goodwife Two-Cents is certainly right about Jack Kennedy's appeal to the American public: his charisma, cultural stuff, etc. But, that is precisely why he is overrated - people dig him, but his consumate fugbuckery on matters of policy go largely ignored because he was witty, cool, and had chicks.

Side note: I am so tired today, that this is how that passage above was originally typed:

Goodwife tweo cents is certainly right about Jacj Kenenfy;s appeeal to the Ameican public, his cahrisma cltural styuff, etc. But, thatis preciedlety whyy he was ovvertated - people dig him, but his consemmate fugbuckery on matters of policy go largeyl ignored because he was witty, cool and thad chicks.

That is not an exageration. Of course, you will note that no matter how tired I am, I can always type "fugbuckery" and "matters of policy" correctly.

I think "Humility" would be a burdensome monicker for any child carrying my genes. Increase... hmmn. No, I think I'll stick with John Christian. Baby ETA now only 20 days away. Sheesh. At least the new house now has all of our stuff in it, and the furniture in more or less the proper orientation.