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February 12, 2008 | WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) today released the following statement on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Earlier today, Senator Obama voted in favor of the Dodd-Feingold amendment to repeal retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies (S. Amdt. 3907).

"I am proud to stand with Senator Dodd, Senator Feingold and a grassroots movement of Americans who are refusing to let President Bush put protections for special interests ahead of our security and our liberty. There is no reason why telephone companies should be given blanket immunity to cover violations of the rights of the American people - we must reaffirm that no one in this country is above the law.

July 9, 2008 | WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Senate Wednesday approved a bill to put new rules in place for intelligence agency eavesdropping on suspected terrorists.

The bill also effectively protects telephone companies from being sued for cooperating with a government surveillance program launched in the wake of the 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. The White House pushed hard for the provision, with a threat to veto the bill if it did not contain protection for phone companies.

The vote was 69-28, with Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois voting in favor.

Epic fail, Obama. Truly epic.

• This is Obama's explanation for his change of heart.


• This is a technical explanation of why FISA is bad. (It covers the entire bill, not just telecom immunity.)

  Specifically, the new legislation dramatically expands the government's ability to wiretap without meaningful judicial oversight, by redefining "oversight" so that the feds can drag their feet on getting authorization almost indefinitely. It also gives the feds unprecedented new latitude in selecting eavesdropping targets, latitude that could be used to collect information on non-terrorist-related activities like P2P copyright infringement and online gambling. In short, the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 opens up loopholes so large that the feds could drive a truck loaded down with purloined civil liberties through it.

  
  
• Here is some good commentary on Obama's bandwagon of "change," which followed this original post from February about Hillary's failure in regards to FISA.


• Here is a breakdown of the vote. For the record, Senator Shelby voted for passage, while Senator Sessions abstained.

Those of you who were championing the Democratic takeover of Congress in 2006: Are you happy yet? When again does the glorious reformation start?

This two party system is sinking the ship. Care to help right it?

Respect for the Constitution, the rule of law, individual liberty, sound money, and a noninterventionist foreign policy constitute the foundation of the Campaign for Liberty.

Original URL: http://bamatone.livejournal.com/203365.html

Anaheim Angels pitchers combined to throw a no-hitter against the LA Dodgers Saturday but still managed to lose the game. This has now happend only five times in 108 years.

[Angels pitcher Jered] Weaver actually began his undoing in the fifth when he failed to come up with Matt Kemp's chopper down the first-base line. He bobbled it for what was ruled an error. The first of two very costly errors. Kemp stole second and catcher Jeff Mathis' throw sailed into center for error No. 2, as Kemp easily took third. Rookie Blake DeWitt, with perhaps the biggest RBI of his young career, then drove a ball just deep enough to Vladimir Guerrero in right to get Kemp home from third on a sacrifice fly. And that was your offense for the night. Start the celebration.

Unreal.

Also, the Angels scored exactly one run in their three game series with the Dodgers and still managed to win one of those games. (1-0, obviously.)

The Angels have the third worst offense in the AL (in terms of runs scored), yet somehow lead the AL West by 4.5 games. Scrappy? That and a bad, bad division.

In semi-related news, Sonic Death Monkey lost for the first time this season - but barely. I was losing 1-9 on Friday, led 6-4 on Saturday, and ended up losing 4-5-1 for the week. Not too shabby, I say. Still 73-40-7 on the year and in 2nd place.

Original URL: http://bamatone.livejournal.com/202896.html

At the risk of bringing up old drama, I wanted to talk about hybrid cars again. I saw this in USA Today when it was first published and meant to write about it then, but just forgot.

One of the biggest reasons I couldn't get on board with hybrid cars was because it didn't make enough sense financially. The only way to justify the increased price of the hybrid was to own that car for more than 5 years. (It was 7-8 when I last checked). That was taking into account the price of gas, the price of the hybrid, and the relative trade-in value on the currently owned car. (In my case, I have no trade-in value since my car is leased.)

However, this just in (as of May 12, anyway):

Rising fuel prices and competition among a proliferation of gasoline-electric hybrids have sliced the payback period for hybrids to two or three years in some cases, instead of five years or more that made hybrids harder to justify at lower fuel prices.

That's good news, eh? One of the biggest contributers, of course, is rising gas prices. The "payback period" for hybrids will increase or decrease depending on the price of gas over the next few years. So if you think gas is only going to get more expensive, then it might be time to look into the hybrids.

That was, of course, only one issue I had. Another is the battery itself. I remember when Honda was first releasing their hybrid Civics, the battery had a 10 year warranty. That's great and all, but what happens after 10 years? This technology is still new enough that no one knows how these cars and batteries will react with time. Are they recyclable? I'd sure hate to think I'm saving barrels of oil but adding to landfills.

The other big question was resale value. All cars depreciate with time, but I'd venture to guess that hybrids depreciate a lot more quickly than normal cars. Why? Because of that battery issue. I admit I didn't have time to try very hard, but I couldn't find the trade-in value for a Honda Civic Hybrid on Kelley Blue Book or Edmunds. A quick search brought up this March 2007 column from CNN Money, though, that echoes my thoughts: "Conclusion: A genuine cause for concern."

What if you're the buyer? Are you really going to feel safe buying a used hybrid car that someone has been driving for 5 years? What happens if the battery dies 2 years after you bought it? Will the dealership take care of it? Can you get extended warranties on such a thing? How much will it cost to replace the battery? And does that justify the cost of buying a hybrid in the first place?

Way too many questions for me. I'm not saying I love my gas guzzling SUV and everyone should ignore this hybrid phase. I actually don't like my SUV for a number of reasons. But the bottom line is it's reliable, comfortable, and safe.

The last point I wanted to make is this: What if I don't want a compact car? They make hybrid SUVs, but they aren't really the solution.

Not all hybrids make sense. At current fuel prices, the Toyota Highlander hybrid takes 12.7 years to break even; the Saturn Aura, 24.3 years, Edmunds says.

And the $106,000 Lexus LS600h hybrid, compared with the gasoline LS460L — 102.6 years.

We're heading in the right direction, but I'm not sure I'm ready to jump into the world of hybrid cars yet.

Original URL: http://bamatone.livejournal.com/202272.html

Wilhagan's, Cheap Shots, Red Shed, Gallette's, Mugshots, Innisfree, Gallette's again, and outside Cheap Shots to collect everyone.

Taco Bell on the way home, of course.

I feel surprisingly good today. Grant does not.