world cup quarter finals 2

SSV Cudllefish 1964 

England 1:3 Portugal (on penalty kicks) *barf* they should have just flipped a coin

Brazil 0:1 France

world cup - quarter finals

SSV Cuddlefish 1964 

Germany 4:2 Argentina (penalty shootout)

Italy 3:0 Ukraine

War Crimes

SCOTUSblog

More importantly, the Court held that Common Article 3 of Geneva aplies as a matter of treaty obligation to the conflict against Al Qaeda. That is the HUGE part of today's ruling. The commissions are the least of it. This basically resolves the debate about interrogation techniques, because Common Article 3 provides that detained persons "shall in all circumstances be treated humanely," and that "[t]o this end," certain specified acts "are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever"—including "cruel treatment and torture," and "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment." This standard, not limited to the restrictions of the due process clause, is much more restrictive than even the McCain Amendment. See my further discussion here.

This almost certainly means that the CIA's interrogation regime is unlawful, and indeed, that many techniques the Administation has been using, such as waterboarding and hypothermia (and others) violate the War Crimes Act (because violations of Common Article 3 are deemed war crimes).

Ghana Joins the Axis of Evil

Tony Seybert 

dust art

When the dust gets thick on the back window of his Mini Cooper, Scott Wade uses it as a canvas to create temporary works of art. 

Pirate

a skater for Sin City Roller Girls, was jumped and brutally beaten, on June 23rd, at approximately 3am. She and two co-workers had just left the Aristocrat bar, When a fight broke out between several male subjects, and Pirate was struck in the face with a blunt object, wrapped in a sweatshirt. The left side of her face was crushed. While she was on the ground, one white male adult, and two black male adults, proceeded to stomp on and kick her in the head. They fled, like the cowards that they are, when confronted by patrons.

Pirate was in surgery today, to reconstruct the left side of her face, from 10 am until approximately 2:15 pm. The doctor relayed that the surgery went very well, but her recovery will take quite some time. Pirate does not have insurance, and any donations can be made to the Sin City Roller Girls, to help with her expenses, as she will not be able to work for some time. Every little bit helps.

This incident occured at the Smith's grocery store parking lot, located at 850 S. Rancho, North of Charleston Blvd.

If anyone has any information, please contact: Crime Stoppers 702-385-5555 or 702-229-3347 Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, Assault & Battery Division

Help us get Pirate some booty. She was badly injured in an random attack on Friday, June 23rd and is still in the hospital recovering. She's staying at the Spring Valley Hospital in Las Vegas, Nevada, room 324. By now we're guessing the nurses know her by her skate name! Please send her your love and donate a few bucks towards her medical bills. We sure
appreciate it.

Yes, American TV Sportscasting Sucks

The Sins of American Sportscasting

It’s easy to see why O’Brien and Balboa announce this way. They are simply calling soccer games the same way all American sports are called. And yet the fact that there is such dissatisfaction with a very traditional, mainstream announcing team speaks volumes not just about the way soccer is presented on American TV, but about the state of American television sportscasting in general.

American TV sportscasting is full of factoids, full of graphics, full of breakaways from the midst of play for prerecorded human-interest backgrounders, full of color analysts overexplaining what happened a couple of minutes ago even as new, more urgent things are happening in front of our eyes, full of overpacked broadcast booths with three-man teams, sideline reporters, spotters, graphics people and telestrators, all breathlessly jostling for air time. Goals are scored in hockey games, and instead of showing the players celebrating, hyperactive producers cut away to show coaches, random crowd shots, the empty net, the goalie whose expression is hidden behind his mask. A single football play cannot pass without two instant replays; lineups cannot be given without film clips of the players saying their own names. At any given moment in a baseball game, what you’ll hear is the studied casualness of the down-home, nothing-really-exciting-going-on-here play-calling tradition that O’Brien personifies.

All these strands together add up to the crisis in American sportscasting that is made evident at every World Cup, when English-speaking fans flee in enormous numbers to listen to commentary in a language they don’t even understand. It’s not just soccer, of course — for many U.S. sports fans, it has long been impossible to listen to the type of football telecasts epitomized by Al Michaels, John Madden and the overproduced Monday Night Football franchise. John Davidson’s interruptions wherever there is an American hockey telecast has driven those few fans who care about them to the Internet for local radio connections. And so on down the line. The common denominator in the way American TV covers any sport is the absence of the simple, urgent description of what is happening on the field, the court or the ice — the single most visceral thing for any fan watching any sport he or she cares about.

second round - day four

SSV Cuddlefish 1964 

Brazil 3:0 Ghana

Spain 1:3 France

Rally for Tamara Hoover

RALLY FOR TAMARA HOOVER
Monday, June 26, at 7PM
AISD headquarters: 1111 W. 6th St.

Parents, students, teachers and community supporters will join Tamara Hoover and any other AISD employees that feel unjustly targeted by subjective, moralistic standards Monday evening outside of the AISD Board of Trustees meeting.

The FIRST AMENDMENT applies to TEACHERS TOO...Even if they are supposed to be “held to a higher standard.” (unfortunately, without the salary to match)

Austinites will come speak at, and rally outside of, the AISD Board of Trustees meeting to call for a school district that judges teachers by their TEACHING, by their skills and by their dedication to their job, and to bring the warning to ALL TEACHERS: YOUR JOB COULD BE ON THE LINE if someone finds something on the internet about you that they don’t like.

Tamara Hoover, an Austin High School art teacher, is currently being threatened with termination due to some nude photos of her found on an art photographer’s website. The District is apparently pursuing criminal charges and claiming that she was an ineffective teacher. SHE HAS DONE NOTHING CRIMINAL! And with the outpouring of support she is receiving from fellow teachers, students and parents alike, it is hardly likely she is an “ineffective” teacher…in fact, the Board itself had recently recognized her as an “outstanding teacher.”

Her termination is based on these photos subjectively being assigned as "inappropriate material" posted on a website. The policy such an act is said to violate is also HIGHLY subjective: the “moral turpitude clause” that prohibits "base, vile, or depraved acts that are intended to arouse or gratify the sexual desire of the actor." Whateever your interpretation of this clause, since Ms. Hoover wasn’t the one that pointed her students to the photos, she has violated NO policy. IN FACT: it is a fellow teacher, Gayle Andrews, who had a student bring up the photos on the internet for her whole class to view and who is NOT facing any discipline.

The final decision to terminate Ms. Hoover will come in August— she is appealing and asking for a hearing prior to that. They have yet to get her input or her side of the story. Monday night, supporters will ask them to set a date for her hearing so she can have her day in court!

"The First Amendment serves not only the needs of the polity but also those of the human spirit — a spirit that demands self-expression." - Tamara Hoover

austinist
austin chronicle

UPDATE: Jazz artist Harold Smith is auctioning off one of his paintings on e-Bay with the proceeds of the sale going to Tamera. Bid here

UPDATE 2: eBay cancels the auction.

round two - day three

SSV Cuddlefish 1964 

Italian Diving Team 1:0 Socceroos

Switzerland 0:0 Ukraine (Ukraine advances on penelty kicks 3:0)

second round - day two

SSV Cuddlefish 1964 

England 1:0 Ecuador

Portugal 1:0 Netherlands