Emerald City, Golden State, Orange Jumpsuit

::Arrogance and stupidity::

Stay after school, Mr Fernandez, and write 500 times: "I must not say 'there has been arrogance and stupidity' by the US in Iraq." Bad diplomat! Climb back into your Green Zone bubble and hush your mouth!

Just because the most talked-about book this week has been "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" by Rajiv Chandraskekaran, whose research vindicates exactly your words, don't go getting ideas above your State Department station. (See http://www.rajivc.com/book.htm for a synopsis of the book.)

::If Brazil can do it, so can California::

Hmmm. The guns are getting bigger week by week as we approach election day on November 7. Last week it was Al Gore touting Proposition 87; this week it was Bill Clinton urging Californians to become as oil-independent as Brazil is.

Will Governor Schwarzenegger be next week's Touter in Chief?

::Shipper in Chief::

Schwarzenegger likes to beat the Democrats at their own game by getting onto the hot topics first. A couple of weeks back, he had the blinding audacity to stand on an island in the very middle of the Bay Area--the most anti-Schwarzenegger part of California-- to whip the environmental Greater Spotted Shagpile out from under the Dems' feet.

And this week it was a sweeping new measure to deal with California's overcrowded prisons. I use the word "sweeping" advisedly. He is going to sweep a couple of thousand medium security prisoners off to other states. Golly! That'll get the prison numbers down in one fell swoop. And it's so brilliantly simple!

Only problem is, those other states will charge dearly for incarcerating California's miscreants thousands of miles from their homes and depriving them of visits from family and any rehabilitation programs the prisoners might have been participating in to get them fit to return to society.

::Looking for some summer work?::

I don't know if law students from Down Under will qualify for the task, but the New Orleans Public Defenders Office is anxious to get as many law students as possible working on tracking down the whereabouts of those prisoners you all saw forced to sit on an overpass after Hurricane Katrina.

For a bit of background, you should read "Abandoned and Abused", the ACLU's Prison Project's August 2006 report on what happened at the Orleans Parish Prison.
http://www.aclu.org/prison/conditions/26198res20060809.html

A recent Fox News story about the public defenders office is here: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,218457,00.html

And navigate to the Criminal Law Clinic program at Tulane University from http://www.law.tulane.edu/ via Programs of Study - Public Interest and Clinics.

rosalea.barker@gmail.com

--PEACE--

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