Blog: TAPPED

FUN WITH SCIENCE. In answer to Mike‘s motion sensor query, the reason the border has been largely bereft of such Flashdance-era technology is that motion sensors aren’t very smart. Separating a person from a squirrel, or a bird, or a tumbleweed is tricky. The number of false positives, which would force our already understaffed border […]

INTIMIDATION: IT WORKS. Ezra described today’s Richard Cohen joint as a break with recent precedent, but his previous column on Hillary Clinton was also good, solid liberal stuff. The two columns before that were the Stephen Colbert ones that got everyone upset. Cohen may not have enjoyed being attacked by the digital lynch mob, but […]

HOUSING SLOWS. For the third month in a row, housing starts — which is to say, the number of new residences under construction — dropped . Interestingly, analysts had expected a very slight slowdown this month, predicting a 0.5 percent decline. The real number? 7.4 percent. Meanwhile, builder’s confidence dropped from 51 in April to […]

WALLING THE BORDER. In response to Mike‘s query below, it’s worth recalling that when Goldfinger was released in 1964, there were no restrictions whatsoever on crossing the border from Mexico to the United States. People from all over Latin America were free to just wander north as they pleased and wander back again, just as […]

CREDIT WHERE IT’S DUE. In a sharp break from his recent wankery, Richard Cohen has an excellent column on John McCain today. It’s interesting, though, that Cohen thinks Jerry Falwell can codify McCain a true conservative. If that’s the case, and Falwell has become a gatekeeper for the ideology rather than just the Christianist voting […]

DO THEY HAVE FAX MACHINES? So, according to the speech last night, we�re just now installing motion sensors and infrared cameras on the Mexican border? Can this be true? Watching Goldfinger a little while ago, I actually wondered about this. You�ll recall the early scene in which Bond, joined by a revenge-seeking Tilly Masterson, whose […]

RUMBLINGS FROM INSIDE THE BUBBLE. In his speech on immigration tonight, President Bush will be calling, once again, for “a tamper-proof card” to “help us enforce the law � and leave employers with no excuse for violating it.” Whoever wrote this speech obviously hasn’t been reading The New York Times lately, or he’d have known […]

ROCK BOTTOM. Word on the street is that Larry Brown will be leaving as coach of the New York Knicks soon in order to be replaced by catastrophic general manager Isiah Thomas. Superficially, I think this move will lead to Thomas’ vindication — Brown’s squad played so poorly this season that they’re almost certain to […]

THE GREATEST AGE SINCE THE GILDED ONE. I’ve been debating whether to dig into John McIntyre‘s defense of tax cuts. It’s sort of standard stuff, but the first graf is such a perfectly concise statement of the GOP’s economic narrative that it deserves some real examination. The Washington Post’s Sebastian Mallaby is on a crusade […]

DAYS OF OLD. So of course everyone hates this Adam Nagourney Week in Review article quoting “leading Dems” who say the party would be better off not taking over either chamber of Congress in November. Actually, two arguments get made in the piece. The argument based on political gaming — that it’ll be better to […]