I join those who applaud the President’s decision to loosen (albeit inadequately and pathetically, but it’s still something)… er, loosen travel restrictions to Cuba. The move allows some minor increase in remittances and increased access for direct travel to Cuba for church groups and students and so forth… and the move goes in the direction of letting any American who wants to travel to Cuba do so (you probably can now, though you have to do so “unofficially” without a passport stamp and through an entry point other than the United States, such as Mexico or another Caribbean country). I...

In an otherwise grim world, where we ponder the aftermath of the Arizona shooting and the fact that today marks nine years since the Guantanamo Bay prison-beyond-law was opened [a commemmorative protest will take place starting at 11 am across the street from the White House for those in the D.C. area]… at least one thing can bring a smile to our faces– when a bad man gets his, in this case, former House Majority Leader Tom “The Hammer” DeLay receiving his just recompense, a three year prison term for his role in money laundering and attempted laundering associated with...

I obviously have my own conclusions about [what is being reported now] as the shooting of Congressman Gabrielle Giffords (DEMOCRAT, Arizona) in Tucson, at a constituent meeting in a grocery store there; a total of twelve people were shot during a shooting spree, and apparently six are dead as well. The L.A. Times reports that the gunman is in custody. I suppose at the moment, until more information is available, I should restrain myself from making conclusions, other than to note that “civility” in our society has been breaking down for a long time, and, along with a failing economy...

The only thing I can say about Justice Dept. efforts to subpoena Twitter account private messages of a member of the Icelandic parliament (and more importantly, former Wikileaks volunteer) is… at least they’re doing it in a way that can be talked about, to wit, a subpoena, rather than a “national security letter.” The reason is somewhat obvious: the use of a subpoena means that anything obtained by subpoena can eventually be used in a hypotehtical court prosecution of Emmanuel Goldstein Julian Assange, whereas anything obtained by a national security letter might have a slight Fourth Amendment problem. For whatever...

“Wow!” is the only available reaction to this movie review of “Yogi Bear” that Dean rightly suggested just might be “the greatest movie review ever.” Once in a while I go into a meta-level discussion about talking dogs, which, of course, are not something one sees that could be described as “normal” and hence are something that one would find “disturbing”… [as an aside now, let’s talk about just why the name of this here blog is “the talking dog” which is, of course, based on the joke way down at the bottom of the home-page (go look if you...

I’ll get right to it for this 2011, and today’s amusingly one-tensive day (1/1/11): oil prices are going up, and hence, gasoline prices are going up. The Global Recession [TM] kept a lid on things for a while, but China ain’t getting any less industrial, and it needs to buy oil, and it is. So some time during this calendar year, many if not most Americans can expect to pay over $4 per gallon for gasoline… which is only the beginning, as virtually all relevant commodities– from heating fuel and electricity, to food, to all goods that have to be...

It’s nice to see our Lord Mayor “take responsibility” for a series of acts bordering on criminal indifference on his part associated with the City of New York’s utter inability to clear most of its streets following this weekend’s mega-blizzard (interestingly, the 20 or so inches that were recorded in Central Park were the sixth highest total ever recorded, but the second-highest this year, after February’s 26 inch fall). Still… the Lord Mayor’s sudden humility on this seems… disingenuous. To be fair, in my dozen years in Brooklyn, this was the hardest I’ve ever had to work in terms of...

Having blown his “close Guantanamo within a year” promise (and well before then, of course, sacking White House counsel Larry Greg Craig for having the audacity to make him publicly state the promise in the first place)… the Obama Administration proposes an “executive order for permanent detention”… which… is kind of exactly where we are now… isn’t it? Some four dozen men would still be too-dangerous-to-release-but-too-tortured-to-prosecute, trials would have to be by military commission… oh, but there would be some kind of meaningless “review process”… perhaps even every year! As with the terms “enemy combatant” and “war on terror”… the...

Attorney David Coombs, counsel to one [ex-?]-PFC Bradley Manning justs wants to give you “a day in the life” of Private Manning. I won’t go into much more detail (Mr. Coombs does that himself… read the link if you want it), but Private Manning is required to sit in his rather small cell (and sit it is… he will be stopped from any form of exercise) for 23 hours a day or so, then allowed for a figure-8 walk in a concrete room for up to an hour a day, with limited opportunity to read, watch television, write to approved...

The Grey Lady treats us to the comedy stylings of Tom “the billionaire” Friedman. The title is a reference to the former President of Costa Rica imploring the world (that would be, of course, the United States) to “do something” about climate change, because there is no “Plan B” for the planet; Friedman conflates this to note there is no “America B” (forgetting that, of course there is an America A and B: the America A of the uber-privileged people sitting on mega-millions, such as… Tom Friedman himself.,. and the America B of the rest of us, where even the...