The House just rejected the bailout--watched it live on C-SPAN and CNN. Hold the line, honorable Representatives. A vote for the bailout is a vote against re-election. When this comes up again later today or later this week, stand firm. You can do this, and if you do, you can keep your congressional seat. I still don't understand why McCain or Obama haven't come out strong against the bailout. It would be a great way to win votes.

I don't talk much about Jack Thompson. He's a bit of a kook, a classic example of excessive zeal in a questionable cause. I mentioned him once, to discuss the civility of his filings, but despite his grotesque obsession with censorship, making fun of him often feels like the moral equivalent of beating up an infant or mocking someone with a severe mental handicap. The man is a walking caricature who seems incapable of recognizing how ridiculous he is. He's finally been disbarred for his antics, though, and I just have to share the jokes...

I don't think I'll fly Delta anymore. I'm not under any illusion that they'll miss me, or that without my business they'll go bankrupt again, or that my impotent whining will somehow result in a change of Delta's policies. I realize that, given the situation I'm about to relate here, most every other airline in the world would have behaved in similar fashion. And yet, the fact remains: Delta airlines took over $500 of my money and gave me nothing of value in return. So you can understand my reluctance to ever give them another dime, ever.

I don't mind the gaffes--Senator Biden misspeaks, Palin is clueless on foreign policy, hey, nobody's perfect, right? These are just the veeps, after all.

But when the technologically impaired senate judiciary committee, of which Biden is a member, votes to create a publicly funded police force with gestapo-like powers of search-and-seizure with the sole mission of safeguarding corporate intellectual property profits, it really undermines Obama's position as a pro-technology candidate. *sighs* Maybe it's a third-party candidate year?

What a day! As a general rule, I try to stick with commentary and avoid running yet another news-aggregator, but if you're paying attention to the election at all, I have a whole bunch of stuff you've just got to see. There's a video clip after the jump...

Law school is the one thing I've ever said I'd never do. While I (obviously) got over that particular commitment, I have never felt entirely at home in the law school environment. Most of my peers want more practicality; I'd like more theory. My peers think law is the best, most effective way to structure human relationships; I am frequently suspicious of the law and its tendency to serve as an instrument for imposing one's will on others. Most of my peers are bright and interesting and socially adept; I'm bright and interesting and, let's face it, awkward beyond belief.

What the frak.

So it turns out I'm partial to "freak" and "freaking" (pronounced "frick" and "frickin'"). My wife was somewhat more tickled by "feck," as borrowed from the TV comedy Father Ted. With George Carlin's recent death, it seems like everyone has swearing on the brain... so I wasn't entirely surprised to see that CNN finally picked up on how Battlestar Galactica's "frak" has infiltrated the language as a "pseudo-swear."