Hyper inked.

Arizona has placed a proposition on its ballot that could make a random voter a millionaire. Prop 200 proposes a million dollar lottery every two years for a lucky Arizona voter.

This would certainly increase voter turnout. A local Arizona newspaper has decried the idea, saying it doesn’t want uninformed voters. But maybe the winner will be a reader of your fine publication.

Honestly, the odds of winning a voter lottery are far better than the normal state lotteries.In 2004, about 2 million Arizonans voted so the odds of winning are 1 in 2 million. The odds of winning PowerBall are 1 in 146 million.

It makes voting seem like a good deal. (I believe they could speed up the state’s ballot counting by just looking at my ballot, and announcing the winners to be those for whom I didn’t vote. The last President for whom I voted was Roosevelt. Theodore Roosevelt.)

Now if they could just cut down on ballot propositions. This year, Arizona topped the nation with nineteen — including two each on land conservation and banning smoking in various places.

See this New York Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/17/us/17voter.html

Yes, it’s true: after reports surfaced about the vice-president accidentally shooting his friend Harry Whittington, a 78-year old attorney, while quail hunting, another long-time friend and hunting pal of Dick Cheney’s, Alan Simpson, the former Republican Senator from Wyoming, arose out of the tall grass to say this:

“But when this man, the victim, the poor guy, it‘s a sad thing what happened to him, but it has less to do with Dick Cheney and much more to do with him. He apparently went for another bird, picked it up, came back and got behind the two other hunters and didn‘t say I‘m back, I‘m behind you, I‘m here. And if you don‘t do that, let me tell you, anything can happen.”

Simpson’s went on to praise Cheney’s extraordinary marksmanship, as if he were Wyatt Earp.

I heard this on MSNBC.

Forget all your hunting safety courses if you are the vice president of the United States: the guy you shoot is at fault. Not you, who pulled the trigger.

Imagine if the same accident had happened with the roles reversed. Would the US government be considering serious federal charges. Yes, they would.

Do you think that then it would be the victim’s fault? No, it wouldn’t. (Maybe it’s the Secret Service’s fault?)

(Then too how close and involved is the Secret Service? Do they just prevent the vice president from being shot? But if their boss is about to shoot someone, it’s look-the-other-way? )

Hello? It is always the responsibility of the hunter to know what they shooting, not the people walking with the hunter. (If you are the vice president’s situation, see how long the police wait to question you. And see how far “it was the other guy’s fault” gets you.)

Should future hunting partners of Mr. Cheney be issued body armor? That would seem prudent.

This newspaper of record has come out on the issue of whether Judge Alito should be confirmed by the US Senate as a Supreme Court Justice.

Surprise! They are against him. In a piece entiltled Judge Alito’s Radical Views, they attack his “radically broad view of the president’s power” as well as “a radically narrow view of Congress’s power.” Sounds like the kind of Supreme Court justice any White House incumbent would want.

The previous court — with the retiring Justice O’Connor — stood up against the presidential push to violate the principle of habeas corpus, espousing the view that suspected terrorists could be held “indefinitely and without trial.”

This executive priviledge has been named the “unitary executive” theory. Where was Judge Alito when President Nixon needed him?

The Times also thinks that the judge “would quickly vote to overturn Roe v. Wade.” The new Chief Justice Roberts made that point of strongly favoring judicial precedent over the Court’s power to legislate these diffficult matters from the bench — something Alito in his uninformative testimony has failed to do.

The Times says his paper trail is filled with cases favoring those in power at the expense of the little guy — whether they be racial minorities, the aging, workers or women. Or even, incredibly, car customers who think it should be illegal to turn back car odometers, insisting “Congress did not have the power” to protect them.

In summary, the newspaper feels that senators voting for this appointment will rue the day and wish they appointed someone more like Sanda Day O’Connor, with “her cautious, centrist approach to the law.”

The administration views Alito’s confirmation as an unevitable slam dunk. Time will tell.

See another blog’s take on the Times’ piece.

As mentioned yesterday in this blog, Times reporter Judith Miller has been given space to explain herself in the wake of her long-negotiated resignation from the paper.

In the Op Ed piece, she explains her decision to leave the Times after a distingushed 28-year career there.

She states her 85 days in jail for contempt for refusing to reveal her sources is more than twice as long a any other US journalist.

She agreed to testify only on the Valerie Plame Wilson matter , and only after Scooter Libby released her from her pledge of confidentiality. Once that was done, she did testify.

Some on Times felt she never should have testified, even if it meant she would be obstructing a serious investigation and therefore, would have been charged with obstruction of justice, a serious crime in itself.

The paper in response to the impasse between the court and Ms. Miller has advocated a Federal shield law to allow reporters to protect their sources without facing this level of legal coercion.

She has website, further discussing these matters, JudithMiller.org

The New York Times and their famous reporter Judith Miller have reached an agreement regarding her leaving the paper. This ends her 28-year career at the distinguished newspaper.

She has been a center of the storm over the CIA leak story, the case in which Scooter Libby, Vice President Cheney’s right-hand man, is under indictment for perjury.

She served 85 days in jail for contempt of court for refusing to reveal her sources . The Times stoutly defended her, but in the end she did reveal her source to a grand jury.

The NY Times became divided over Ms. Miller’s behavior. Apparently, those that think she was wrong have won out over the others. Her reports that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction were part of the reason the Bush administration decided to invade Iraq. These reports were lately found to be untrue.

Tomorrow, theTimes will print her letter explaining her position on the entire matter. The tradition at the paper is not to print internal arguments in the paper, but the Miller story has become too big for her employer or former employer to ignore.

According to an MSNBC news program, one blog predicted Judge Alito would be the next nominee for the nation’s highest court.

The blog is scotusblog.com

While that was impressive, the blog, composed mainly by people from the law firm of Goldstein & Howe, also foretold that John Roberts would be nominated. One of them wrote “More likely, I think, is Judge John Roberts of the D.C. Circuit, who was only confirmed to that court last year.” This was written on November 7th, 2004. Justice Roberts was actually nominated on July 19th, 2005.

Another of the bloggers, Marty Lederman, said last Friday — before his latest prediction came true — “permit me to sheepishly add that I, too, predicted a Roberts nomination back in November (in a comment to Tom’s post, which apparently no longer exists online), and again in May.”

This particular blogger then goes on to say that his predictions seldom are correct.

Last Friday, one of the bloggers, Tom Goldstein, picked Alito as the next nominee and one “likely to energize the President’s conservative supporters.” He was right on both counts.

If you want to learn about the U.S. Supreme Court on the internet, this blog would be a good place to start.

Somehow, I don’t think he will like this kind of publicity.

Hell, it seems, is a New Zealand pizza chain. It’s new wave pizza, often served blanco with toppings like avocado, chicken, and cashews.

The billboard features a generic smiling President Bush photo with the headline, “Hell. Too good for some evil bastards.”

I thought they were on our side. Imagine the uproar if this ran in America.

A push poll is a negative campaign trick to besmirch your political opponent by tying them to something negative and conducting a bogus poll to spread the misinformation. For example, “I’m calling to take a poll on my opponent’s eating children for breakfast.” Assumes a fact not in evidence.

Tonight I received a seemingly innocent phone call. It was a political poll conducted by Citzens United.

United for or against what or whom, they didn’t reveal.

It was a poll about the ACLU and NAMBLA. I refused to answer the poll “questions,” but I did ask a few questions of my own. Like who the heck are you.

Citizens United is a right-wing group that seems to feel America would be better if it were more to the right. I don’t agree with that as I am a moderate, but in today’s climate this makes me somehow a Commie whacko.

From reading the ACLU site, it seems that the ACLU did defend the right of NAMBLA to have a website advocating its repellent sexual beliefs. (NAMBLA is the North American Man Boy Love Association. I do understand why no one would advocate these practices in South America or other parts of the world.)

But here’s the thing. Is this a news story right from today’s headlines? No, it is a five-year story dug up solely to attack the ACLU.

I am not a member of the ACLU, but I don’t favor attacking it in this way with a push poll, or as I call it, an attack poll.

This push poll is a scurrilous method used by Citizens United. It pushed me all right: away from Citizens United and towards the ACLU.

There’s a terrific OpEd piece in The New York Times today, timed to coincide with 1) our celebration of our freedoms and 2) the impending replacement of Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court.

She argued in one of her last decisions that the concept of eminent domain as outlined in the constitution mut be taken too far.

Eminent domain is the idea that private property can sometimes be taken by the government if it creates a larger public good, for example, public roads.

But she decried extending this idea too far. D evelopers might take land willy nilly for the greater economic good of the area. This argument could be used to take anyone’s home whenever someone with deep pockets thinks they have a better use for the property.

Unfortunately, Justice O’Connor was on the losing side of the argument, so now eminent domain abuses “for the common good” can flourish.

The OpEd author, John Tierney, is a Pittsburg native. He has watched eminent domain’s abuses ruin a once vibrant downtown. Over five decades in the quest for the modern renewed city, the heart of Pittsburgh — with its homes, families, small businesses, even jazz clubs — has been replaced by cold corporate towers and empty plazas. The people living there and the life of the community have been drained away.

Voila, the Pittsburg Renaissance.

So, as we ponder a replacement for Justice O’Connor, let’s think about Pittsbugh, where its urban renewal policy has been turned into urban destruction.

The Brooke Shields / Tom Cruise battle is heating up. Brooke has posted an Op-Ed piece in The NewYork Times.

Apparently, Mr. Cruise had quite a run-in with Matt Lauer in an interview. He said Ms. Shields and her new memoir about her depression are way off base: postpartum depression is not a real problem. Moreover, said the star, psychiatry and anti-depressive drugs are worthless.

Instead, he suggested vitamins and exercise as cures.

It’s fine to have these opinions Tom, but keep them to yourself, not on national TV. And do not jump up and down on couches while talking like this, as you did the other day.

You know, you may need some meds yourself.

P.S. I believe Mr. Cruise — as some other celebrities (not Brooke Shields though) — is a Scientologist. Years ago, Scientologists actually picketed against anti-depressive drugs. So there is an unpleasant “party line” stink to Tom’s protest.

I’m afraid I have even less faith in Scientology and L. Ron Hubbard,* its sci-fi writing founder, than Tom has in modern psychiatry.

*True Story: Many years ago, Lyle Stuart, the book publisher and L. Ron Hubbard were in a creative writing class together.

As they pondered their future writing careers, L. Ron said that best way to make a lot of money, much more than writing, would be to start a religion. Of course, that’s just what he did, and it worked. He did become very rich.