Sidewalk Chalk, legal or illegal?

Not guilty was the verdict for Mr. Olson, a San Diego man accused of violating California's vandalism statute by writing anti-bank messages on the sidewalk in front of a North Park Bank of America.

I was called to jury duty recently, and during jury selection someone on the hot seat said he believed that juries have the ability to decide questions of law, but agreed to not do so for a simple DUI case.  Predictably, he was excused.  I immediately thought this guy was a joker, but maybe he had a point.

In the case against Mr. Olson, the City argued that sidewalk chalk, although washable, was still a violation of the state vandalism statute. “The People do not fear that this reading of section 594(a) will make criminals of every child using chalk," said Deputy San Diego City Attorney Hazard in justifying the prosecution.  The statute makes it illegal to "maliciously . . . deface[] with graffiti or other inscribed material," someone else's property.  The legislature added the terms "graffiti or other inscribed material" after a federal court decision held that Berkeley, CA man did not "damage" property, nor did he use liquid paint on the property when he wrote on a sidewalk with chalk.  Interestingly, other city attorneys rely upon the view that the statue does not require permanence, citing a case (In re Nicholas Y., 85 Cal. App. 4th 941 (2000)) in which writing on a window with a permanent marker was held to be vandalism even though it was easily cleaned.  Tenuously then, writing in chalk must constitute "inscribing" under state law and that kids get away with it by not inscribing with malice, however incompatible with the dictionary definition of inscription being a "lasting record."  Although I could make an argument that the Nicholas Y. case is distinguishable because it absolutely required human effort to remove the ink from the window, whereas sidewalk chalk does not require any human labor to remove it from the ground, it appears the San Diego trial judge agreed with the City Attorney's construction of the law by sticking to the vandalism allegations. It seems to me that someone who writes to encourage people to close their accounts at bank is unquestionably writing with great malice toward the bank by encouraging others to threaten its very existence (or at least bottom line).  Thus my understanding of the jury's verdict was that it is ridiculous that the law should say that sidewalk chalk can constitute vandalism, even if under the guise that Mr. Olson did not draw with malice.

What does this say about our jury system?  Jury nullification is probably alive and well. Maybe Juror number 8 was right, when the people feel like the law is wrongly applied in a particular instance, they have the duty to acquit.  What is more troubling is if this view is applied in the opposite situation; the jury feels like the law should apply in a particular circumstance and convicts.

Much Hubbabaloo about nothing, obscuring the real issue.

Noted conspiracy theorist and U.S. Senator Rand Paul posted a letter from Attorney General Holder responding to his request about if the President could order drone strikes in the U.S. against U.S. citizens.  Holder responded that it was conceivable that under "extraordinary" circumstances it would be permissible, listing Pearl Harbor and 9/11 as examples. Paul, I'm sure giddy from this admission, proclaimed "refusal to rule out the possibility of drone strikes on American citizens and on American soil is more than frightening. It is an affront to the constitutional due process rights of all Americans," in an attempt to highlight the Tea Party talking point that Obama is systematically consolidating power.  However, Holder's response does not change anything; drones are military weapons, and can be used in a similar way to a sniper when there is sufficient threat of military threat.  The situations Holder described in his letter can be considered military attacks on the United States, and I would assume that a President would have some authority over military responses to these attacks.  It would be wise to determine the scope of "extraordinary" but to think that you could unequivocally rule out the use of military force inside the country would be impossible in a world in which the possibility of attack still exists.  However to appease the posturing of Ryan by saying the President in no hypothetical circumstance would have this power is unreasonable, and probably a violation of the constitution which grants powers to the President as Commander in Chief of the military.  While congress has meekly sat on its hands instead of trying to define when the president can use military force throughout the last 60 years, I guess it is refreshing that he Holder did not lie about the scope of the power granted to the president to hopefully provide impetus to congress to finally act.

Pretending that this isn't just a crass attack on the President for political brownie points, it does raise some important questions.  Why do we allow the president to broadly define the scope of when his own military powers are valid?  We can start with the Patriot Act which gives broad discretion for the President to play judge, jury and executioner. If the President determines, in his own judgement, that the suspect is an imminent threat to U.S. security, that is sufficient to order a drone strike.  The Act as applied is used to preemptively incapacitate people deemed to be terrorists.  In a war zone, killing a U.S. citizen behind enemy lines can probably serve as due process because you have notice that people near enemy combatants have the potential to be killed as an unfortunate consequence of war.  The problem is that here, the geographic war zone is indeterminate and thus the limitation granted by the requirement of "being an imminent threat," hardly can constitute due process.  Nonetheless, congress has said these are authorized military strikes and the courts appear to be in no mood to answer the hard questions. We see actions of the President implementing the act according to its provision.

Ryan can scold the president for saying things we already know have been delegated to the president, or he can do his job, and convince congress to delineate the extent of where wars and military action occur more clearly to reign in the president.

Forced Abortion and Media

A Texas court granted a Texas teenager the right to have a child against the wishes of her parents.  In two articles, one by Fox News and one by CNN,  we see a divergent view of what actually happened.  While one news source refers to the teenager's lawyer as Carey and the other as Casey (as of my 10:47 am viewing of the web pages), they cherry-pick quotes that gives the appearance that these are in fact two different people.  The Fox News article has Carey triumphantly proclaiming that this is a "victory for life" whereas the CNN story has Casey arguing that Roe v. Wade guarantees the right for women to choose the fate of their pregnancies.  We end up with a feel good story for both sides of the abortion debate at the best, and conscious disregard for the underlying philosophical debates at the worst.

What is also notable is that the lawyer works for an anti-abortion group specializing in pro-life litigation.  However, I question these tactics.  The winning argument, well maybe not for a Texas court, is that is is insane for someone to force any woman to abort a child against their will, regardless of the risk to the person or baby.  Otherwise, parents can undermine the autonomy of a woman in child bearing decisions simply because she is a minor.

There could be a further underlying strategic goal here.  In a case in which a teenager wishes to get an abortion over her parents wishes, she still must overcome the general state interest in preserving life, which courts have been using to justify various hurdles for teenagers to over come to procure abortions.  In contrast, here the state interest doubles down on the teenagers interest in having a child and protects the child from overbearing parents.

We can also look at this the other way.  If the state is so willing to protect a child whose parents are trying to coerce her into having an abortion, why is the state so unwilling to protect a child from coercion from parents forcing the teenager into having the child.  It seems inconsistent to me to say that a parent has no say over child bearing decisions in one case, and in the other case can use anything short of abuse in the other situation to coerce a child.

The pro-choice lobby would be wise to take on more of these easy to win cases to prevent the pollution of workable jurisprudence uphold the reproductive rights of women.  The right to autonomy over ones self requires that there be no overbearing influence forcing action in one direction or another. The pro-choice lobby should see that the Roe v. Wade doctrine is not interpreted to say that coercion is only bad if only done in one direction.

NFL and back in America

Today I'll just give a few thoughts on Sundays Chargers game. The game began with a little deja vu, a kick return for a touchdown on the very first play of the season. It's hard to think that this could be an aberration. As a result, Kaeding is out for the season. It is really hard to pinpoint what is wrong here, but hopefully its a one time thing as most NFL teams manage their special teams with bench players without issue. However, the tone set by this play was apparent in the poor play by the Chargers in the first half. The half was punctuated by Rivers being upset on a 4th and 20 play that Turner was afraid to give the go ahead to Scifres to kick the field goal. The second half proved different, the defense looked better, and despite a pedestrian game for Rivers usual standard, they pulled of the W. The turning point may as well have been Scifres kicking and ugly looking, but good field goal from about 40 yards out. Hopefully this is a sign that the Chargers will be able to handle adversity this season as opposed to fading when it counts. Coach Turner is on the hot seat, and should be on his team to keep their heads in the game. My heart says yes he can, but my brain says no. Lets hope the Chargers show some heart., AND play with their brains this season.

We don't need no education

Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall" came up in my iTunes today. I lead me to think about how rebelling against the constrictions of education, in the era that song was written, was an expression of free thought. Today in contemporary America, I feel the tables have turned. Now the people railing against education are typically conservative Christians and libertarians. Pink Floyd sings "we don't need no thought control," indicating that in school, kids are forced to think a certain way, and as a result become little automatons to serve whatever overlord reigns supreme over the education system. The anti-public education right seems imply on the other hand that we don't need no critical thinking. We have everything figured out; there is no need to analyze society, science, or superstition. The claims are based mostly on the creationism vs. big bang/evolutionary theory conflict for conservative Christians, and based on some sort of socialist career decisions by the libertarians.
I bring this up because, when I reminisce, my personal experience was that the public school system 'opened my mind.' If I was to be educated by the cultural institutions of where I grew up, for example, I would not know that condoms existed. It was a select few teachers that, while running school in the draconian manner teens despise, implanted feeling of critical thought over the decisions that were being impressed upon you. Can we blame the free thinking anti-educations movement from the past for bringing us to where we are today, where there is a contempt for the education system, even by those who don't subscribe to right wing ideology?

Colbert's De-mock-cracy

I found the entire Steven Colbert SuperPAC transgression of events highly amusing, and impressively, politically relevant. The opinion of (presumably liberal) commentators is that the decision in Citizens United v. FEC, regardless on the constitutionality of the actual campaign finance law, will allow unimpeded growth of the influence of corporations on the political process. This can be done through unlimited spending from Super Political Action Committees, (SuperPACs). I have not read the decision, but I agree with this sentiment. However, a bunch of whining about the results of the decision will have effect. Colbert, TV's out sized mock political pundit, has found a far more effective way of combating this growth. After clarifying his relationship with his employer, Viacom, he was able to start his own superPAC.
What can the conceivable point of this be? He is collecting money from fans of the show, and in return, the donors get their name scrolled on the bottom of the screen. This can be seen as a nice publicity stunt. However, when looking at the write in Rick Parry, with an 'A', commercial campaign, we can establish that Mr. Colbert has done more to shine light on the critical part of this issue. By using the superPAC funds to confuse the democratic process, he is successful in showing us what no one else has been able to; these superPACs have the ability to make a complete mockery of our political process. Those with the most money can subvert, mislead, or simply 'out shout' the other side. While Colbert's mockery makes for good comedy, other mockery can have a much more sinister purpose.

Bike to School Day

Today is the first day I rode my bicycle to school. Initially, I have been nervous about riding in San Francisco because of the hills. The Bike Coalition provides a great resource to map out ideal routes to take while cycling.  Unfortunately, it requires you to remember a lot of of left and right turns to stay on a less steep path. The way to school was great, mostly downhill, and only about 30 minutes. That is a full 15 minutes faster than my bus trip.  The way back home was more difficult. I chose to follow this route known as "The Wiggle."  The Wiggle zig zags it's way up the hills from near the Castro up toward the Panhandle. The path was amazingly flat feeling.  I made a wrong turn up a steep hill, a turn I hope I don't repeat.

Another enjoyable aspect of the day, was watching cyclists interactions with the car driving public. There are enough cyclists, that they feel empowered to yell at people for texting, or running red lights. I observed both of these events today. I saved $4, and probably burned off half of lunch. I think I'll strive to ride 2-3 days a week, but with the time to get to school, it may have to be at least TO school, everyday.