Archive for May 6th, 2010

Heroes for more than one day.

Thursday, May 6th, 2010

(I originally had this as an “Edited to add” to the previous post, but decided that it deserved to be broken out into a stand-alone entry.)

Here’s something to get the taste of the last link out of your mouth, and restore your faith in humanity. The Los Angeles County District Attorney gave Courageous Citizen Awards to Quoleshna Elbert and Larry Harnisch yesterday. Ms. Elbert and Mr. Harnisch intervened in a brutal domestic violence incident at considerable personal risk; the victim lived, but sustained serious and permanent injuries.

This is noteworthy to me because Mr. Harnisch works for the LAT as a copy editor. He also runs the paper’s indispensable “Daily Mirror” blog, which highlights L.A. history using excerpts from the local papers. I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Harnisch (though I hope to someday) but I’ve admired his work ever since reading his extensively researched takedown of the horrible Donald Wolfe book about the Black Dahlia murder.

Well done, sir, and thank you.

(Hattip: L.A. Observed.)

Posted in California Über Alles, Law, Media, Thanks | Comments Closed

Random notes: May 6, 2010.

Thursday, May 6th, 2010

OMG! Faisal Shahzad had a Kel-Tec Sub Rifle 2000 in his car!

…all along he possessed a weapon that could have easily done extreme damage, one rapidly fired round at a time.

Later:

It is, in effect, a low-powered rifle. Unlike those of some rifles, its bullets probably would not penetrate a police officer’s bullet-resistant vest, a law enforcement official said.

And:

Unlike the Tec-9, it is not frequently used by criminals, the official said.

Meanwhile, Dana Milbank in the WP asks the musical question:

Is the NRA a terrorist organization?

What prompts this? The NRA’s opposition to barring people on the notoriously unreliable terrorist watch list from purchasing guns.

In other news: Houston rapper that nobody’s ever heard of files lawsuit against local radio station for not playing his “music”.

Trae is suing for general damages to his reputation, character, standing in the community, mental suffering, loss of professional opportunities, performance revenue and record royalties.

I’m looking forward to seeing what legal precedent his lawyer sites that requires a radio station to play someone’s music. Could I sue KGSR for not playing Jonathan Coulton? Even better, could I sue KGSR for playing Kasey Chambers?

Edited to add: “Washington Post puts Newsweek up for sale. Do I hear $1? Anyone?”

Provider 1 bids 300 quatloos on the newcomers.

Edited to add 2: I have been in the practice of noting Roger Ebert’s better negative reviews, especially the one-star and zero-star reviews. A zero-star review from Ebert is pretty rare; he’s stated in the past that for a film to get no stars, it not only has to be bad, but morally reprehensible in some way.

Accordingly, I am going to link to this zero-star Ebert review. I am not going to name the film. I do not encourage you to click on the link. I had heard about this film previously on FARK, and wish I had not.

Posted in Clippings, Guns, Hysteria, Law, Media, Movies, Music, Stupid, Thanks | 4 Comments »