Just FYI, since I’m down in Mexico City right now: Despite all the drug chaos in the north of Mexico–the state of Chihuahua has a homicide rate of 300 per 100,000 (compared to 36 in Baltimore City and 6.5 in New York City)–most of Mexico is much safer than most of America. Here’s an article…
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My wife and I were strolling through a deserted (and safe) Mexico City late last night when we stumbled across this doozy of an intersection.
He was as through-back to another time, a less politically correct time. I liked his moxie, even if I have mixed feelings about his urban vision. He was a one-man political institution, and certainly Baltimore would have been worse off without him. His obit in the Baltimore Sun and the New York Times.
Just what you’ve been waiting for, I’m sure! But seriously, the good people at Basic Books were kind enough to make me a website. Here it is, live and online. I’m sitting in Newark Airport, heading to Mexico City for a week’s vacation. Don’t expect much here till I’m back.
“Freeway Rick” talks about the trials and tribulations of being a big-time crack dealer. Specifically, this podcast from NPR: Planet Money tests various economic theories about crack dealing. But it’s a shame the economists have to “discover” this when better sociological and ethnographic work said this a long time ago. The drug stuff starts a…
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Talk about culture wars cognitive dissonance. No matter your political leanings, there’s something in this story to make your head explode. A man born a woman was fired for not being man from his $10/hour job at a drug treatment center watching people pee into cups for drug tests. He’s suing his former employer on…
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The first review of In Defense of Flogging is out today. It’s always a bit nerve racking when you click on that first review. But it’s favorable. Phew! Though I view descriptive/neutral-plus as favorable for a book like this. It’s hard to gush over a book called In Defense of Flogging, lest others start wondering…
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Speaking of issues I thought we had long since decided (like slavery, segregation, suffrage, medicinal bleeding, etc.), a poll found a plurality of Mississippi Republicans believe interracial marriage should be illegal. Forty-six percent oppose, 40 percent support, and 14% are “undecided” (as if they’ve weighed the pros and cons of this timely issue, but still…
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The United States has more more men & women in prison than any other nation including Russia and China…. The 95% conviction rate reached by threats of long sentences, intimidation, lies and prosecutorial abuse has got to be reckoned with now, not later. So says Duke Cunningham, an imprisoned conservative Republican, in Slate.
Washington, D.C., 1918. “District of Columbia parks — park policemen.” From Shorpy. Happy Opening Day!