John Yoo publicly argued there is no law that could prevent the President from ordering the torture of a child of a suspect in custody - including by crushing that child's testicles.John Yoo is one of the primary legal advisors to George W. Bush, responsible for legal reasoning to justify torture, warrantless wiretapping, and virtually anything else the president feels is necessary. Here's the exchange with Yoo, from a December 1, 2005 debate in Chicago with Notre Dame professor Doug Cassel: Cassel: If the President deems that he's got to torture somebody, including by crushing the testicles of the person's child, there is no law that can stop him? Yoo: No treaty. Cassel: Also no law by Congress. That is what you wrote in the August 2002 memo. Yoo: I think it depends on why the President thinks he needs to do that.More description and a link to an audio clip here.

George W. Bush continues his pattern of appointing unqualified people and bypassing rules and regulations that get in his way by appointing Ellen Sauerbrey to the post of assistant secretary of state for population, refugees, and migration, a post that is responsible for a $700 million budget to address global refugee crises. Sauerbrey began confirmation hearings in October 2005, but Sen. Barbara Boxer put off the vote until after the winter break. Bush took the opportunity to appoint her and about a dozen other candidates as “recess appointments” while Congress was out of session. There’s more on Sauerbrey’s lack of qualifications and her conservative views at Salon.

In 2003, the Bush administration said that the $200 billion estimate of the cost of the war in Iraq from Larry Lindsey, Bush’s economic advisor, was too high. Paul Wolfowitz suggested that the cost of reconstruction would be financed entirely by Iraq. Congress has so far appropriated $251 billion for military operations, and the Congressional Budget Office has indicated that we should expect another $230 billion in costs over the next ten years. Now a paper by Nobel prizewinning economist Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard budget expert Linda Bilmes argues that the CBO’s estimate leaves out some significant costs, like healthcare for injured soldiers–lifetime care for brain injuries alone may cost $35 billion. Their paper argues that $1 trillion is a conservative estimate of the total costs. (Story at The Guardian.) ...

In a Washington Post article about conservative Christian support for the confirmation of Samuel Alito, Rev. Herbert H. Lusk II, a recipient of over $1 million in federal grants from the Bush administration’s Faith Based Initiative, says: “My friends, don’t fool with the church because the church has buried a million critics. And those the church has not buried, the church has made funeral arrangement for."As Pharyngula points out, this sounds a little threatening…

From the BBC, how not to dispose of live rodents: A US man who threw a mouse onto a pile of burning leaves could only watch in horror as it ran into his house and set the building ablaze. Luciano Mares, 81, of Fort Sumner, New Mexico, found the mouse in his home and wanted to get rid of it. “I had some leaves burning outside, so I threw it in the fire, and the mouse was on fire and ran back at the house,” he was quoted as saying by AP. Though no-one was injured, the house and everything in it was destroyed. UPDATE: This is not true–the mouse was dead when thrown into the fire, which was blown into the house by wind. UPDATE January 12: Now Mares is sticking with the original story.

KTVU in San Francisco used this background image when discussing the NSA warrantless wiretap issue. (John Hazelton on the SKEPTIC list spotted this and got the screen capture.) Historical Comments Danny Boy, FCD (2006-12-09): LOL, I would never have suspected NASA to be involved in this domestic spying ring! No wonder they have Hubble up there, the men in gray suits are peeping on us with it! Down with NASA!(I wonder if the Bad Astronomer, Phil Plait, is in on all this cloak and dagger operation too.) ...

America’s Blog has brought up a story that was published in the mainstream media last year (in the Washington Post) and a few days ago (in the Chicago Sun-Times) but which for some reason hasn’t resulted in an uproar. The story is that there are sites on the Internet from which you can purchase copies of calling records for cell phones and land lines, such as Locatecell.com. John in DC, who runs America’s Blog, purchased his own cell phone records, and indeed got a list of all the numbers he had called. Cingular thinks this is an “infinitesimally small problem” for them. How are sites such as Locatecell getting their information? They could be purchasing it from insiders, they are no doubt using “pretexting” (social engineering) to persuade customer support representatives to give them the information, or gaining access to customer account information via the web (Verizon Wireless had another major security hole in their online billing system last year, similar to one in 2001 which they took two weeks to act upon). Whichever mechanisms are used, it is clear that privacy is being violated and likely that laws are being broken, yet there seems to be little visible interest on the part of the telephone companies in going after the criminals–perhaps because doing so might expose how poorly they are securing the information. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has a good collection of material on this issue here. (Updated January 9: They filed a case against Bestpeoplesearch.com, which admits to using “pretexting” as their method to obtain the information.) (Thanks to cowmix for bringing this to my attention.) ...

The latest issue of Reports of the National Center for Science Education includes an article (“The Taboo Standard”) by Marni Landry of Paradise Valley High School, who reports that she proposed a study to survey life science teachers in the Phoenix Union High School District on the subject of evolution. The survey, intended to support her M.A. thesis work at the University of Phoenix, asked the recipients whether they agreed or disagreed slightly or completely with the following statements: I have helped to write the district or state science standards. I would like to contribute in the writing of the district or state science standards. I know specifically what the district standards are concerning the theory of evolution. I have avoided details about the origin of life in order to avoid conflict in my classroom. The theory of evolution goes against my religious beliefs. If I were to get into a confrontation with a student or parent concerning the theory of evolution, I feel that [the] administration would support my actions. I feel that creationism (creation science) should be taught parallel to evolution in the classroom. I am concerned over the fact that many states have removed evolution from their science standards. Students must understand the theory of evolution in order to understand the study of biology. I have experienced conflict with a student, parent, or administrator concerning my teaching of evolution.This survey and edited versions were rejected by school district administrators as “too controversial.” The irony of being unable to conduct a survey of science teachers about a subject that they are required by state science standards to teach is explicitly noted. The author was able to complete a pilot study, and her article reports the percentages for the above statements (16.5% say that evolution conflicts with their religious beliefs and that creationism should be taught). The same issue of Reports has stories from Texas and Arkansas about high school teachers being unable to teach about evolution or (in Arkansas) even mention the ages of rocks in millions of years. This, to me, is far more frightening than attempts to force the teaching of intelligent design or creation science–that teaching about evolution has already been removed from or watered down in many of the classrooms of the United States. It’s no wonder that the average American is completely ignorant on the subject. ...

Jeff Lowder, one of the founders and former president of the Internet Infidels, now has a blog, Naturalistic Atheism. Historical Comments Danny Boy, FCD (2006-12-09): Wow, sounds good. I've asked II before if they would be interested in doing a group blog. J. Lowder said he was interested about blogging, somewhat. I'm glad to see that he has indeed taken the plunge into the blogosphere. ...

I read (and completed) the following books in 2005. I’ve reviewed most of them at Amazon.com (where the links point): Richard Abanes, One Nation Under Gods: A History of the Mormon Church Pascal Boyer, Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious ThoughtRachel DeWoskin, Foreign Babes in Beijing: Behind the Scenes of a New China Cory Doctorow, Eastern Standard TribeMark Haddon, the curious incident of the dog in the night-timeMichael A. Hiltzik, Dealers of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age Peter W. Huber and Mark P. Mills, The Bottomless Well: The Twilight of Fuel, the Virtue of Waste, and Why We Will Never Run Out of Energy Penn Jillette, Sock David Cay Johnston, Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich–and Cheat Everybody Else Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything Joel Levy, The Scam Handbook: The Secrets of the Con Artist Richard Marcus, American Roulette: How I Turned the Odds Upside-Down–My Wild Twenty-Five-Year Ride Ripping Off the World’s Casinos John Markoff, What the Dormouse Said: How the 60s Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer Industry Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind, The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron Ben Mezrich, Ugly Americans: The True Story of the Ivy League Cowboys Who Raided the Asian Markets for Millions Kevin D. Mitnick and William L. Simon, The Art of Intrusion: The Real Stories Behind the Exploits of Hackers, Intruders & Deceivers Matthew Modine, Full Metal Jacket Diary John Allen Paulos, A Mathematician Plays the Stock Market V.S. Ramachandran, A Brief Tour of Human Consciousness Jon Ronson, The Men Who Stare At Goats Paul Scharbach and John H. Akers, Phoenix: Then and Now Thomas J. Stanley and William D. Danko, The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America’s Wealthy Jim Steinmeyer, Hiding the Elephant: How Magicians Invented the Impossible and Learned to Disappear Anthony Storr, Feet of Clay: Saints, Sinners, and Madmen: A Study of Gurus Teller, “When I’m Dead, All This Will Be Yours!”–Joe Teller, a portrait by his kid, Teller Vicki Lewis Thompson, Nerd Gone WildIra Winkler, Spies Among Us: How to Stop the Spies, Terrorists, Hackers, and Criminals You Don’t Even Know You Encounter Every Day Richard Yancey, Confessions of a Tax Collector: One Man’s Tour of Duty Inside the IRS I began, but haven’t yet finished: James Bovard, The Bush BetrayalAntonio Damasio, Looking for Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling BrainDiego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia: The Business of Private Protection Jennifer Michael Hecht, Doubt: A History Olivia Judson, Dr. Tatiana’s Sex Advice to All CreationV.S. Ramachandran and Sandra Blakeslee, Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind Spammer-X, Inside the Spam Cartel: Trade Secrets from the Dark SideThomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire MindRobert H. Tillman and Michael L. Indergaard, Pump & Dump: The Rancid Rules of the New EconomyJohn Viega and Gary McGraw, Building Secure Software: How to Avoid Security Problems the Right WayAndrew Vladimirov, Konstantin V. Gavrilenko, Andrei A. Mikhailovsky, WI-FOO: The Secrets of Wireless Hacking ...