A Stitch in Haste

Kelo and the Flag Protection Amendment have left me a bit drained, so I'll put these out without much flare.

ITEM: Regarding "Zach," the 16-year gay blogger who was sent against his will to a religious compound to be "cured" of his homosexuality — the group, Love in Action that runs the compound, with the Orwellian name "Refuge," is being investigated by state child welfare authorities, putatively on the grounds that they are running a child care facility without a license. Let's hope this torture chamber is either shut down or at least defanged. (Hat tip yet again to Republic of T.)

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ITEM: I have been following the European antitrust harassment of Microsoft, including the software giant's recent capitulation in the form of a special version of Windows XP without Windows Media Player.

I blogged the following:

I predict that sales of this new forced-labor OS will be somewhere between "zero" and "only what the E.U. bureaucracy itself buys."

Ahem:

PC makers and distributors are holding back from buying the new alternative version of Windows XP that Europe's competition commissioner ordered Microsoft Corp. to offer as part of the punishment in the software maker's long antitrust battle with the European Union.
...
"We don't see any interest at all in the product for the consumer," said Lionel Jarlan, computer buyer at France's Fnac department store chain.

It's times like this that I almost want to be wrong.

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ITEM: Long-time readers of my blog know that I unswervingly oppose "free" (i.e., taxpayer-subsidized) municipal wi-fi, since it is not a public good. Most recent post here.

Well, the City of Orlando has recognized that "free" wi-fi, um, isn't free at all, and has scrapped their service:

[C]ity officials said that only about 27 people a day took advantage of the program — not enough to justify the $1,800 the city paid every month for the service.

Hopefully other cities will follow Orlando's lead and scrap this silly idea. (Hat tip to Out of Control.)

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ITEM: The California Bar Exam grader who had exam booklets stolen out of his vehicle was reportedly in a, um, bar at the time --

He had put all the answer books in a backpack, and put the backpack in his car. He reportedly parked the car, left the backpack, and went inside to imbibe. When he returned, the bar exam answers were gone.

En Passant has been the lead blogger on this incident.

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ITEM: The mother of the child mauled by the family's own dogs has been charged with child endangerment (recall: she left the child unsupervised and thought it wiser to put him in the basement rather than the dogs — the child found his way back into the house and to the lethal animals). I still say she should be charged with criminally negligent homicide.

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ITEM: Way back in November I blogged about a proposal to create a vast new government database on college students, complete with transcripts, financial aid history, Social Security numbers, etc.

Well guess who has that kind of data now --

The Defense Department and a private contractor have been building an extensive database of 30 million 16-to-25-year-olds, combining names with Social Security numbers, grade-point averages, e-mail addresses and phone numbers.

The department began building the database three years ago, but military officials filed a notice announcing plans for it only last month. That is apparently a violation of the federal Privacy Act, which requires that government agencies accept public comment before new records systems are created.

I remarked in a different context that young people, like gays, are an insular minority with little political power and who are therefore subject to political abuses such as this. Still, I suspect that this story may have legs, and you may see some low-ranking heads roll at the Department of Defense over this outrage.