A friend of a friend exults at Boston’s narrow escape from cartoon peril:

“Take this as a warning, enemies of America. All of your nefarious plans to harm us — provided said plans are placed in in plain view on busy public streets and covered with flashing, colored lights — shall be discovered and neutralized in LESS THAN THREE WEEKS!”

By the way, what are the keywords to find a picture of the pseudinfernal device?

the view from Saturn’s shadow

My latest finding of “dictionary translation”, at a pet store:

ONE-STORY CAT CAVE
UNE CAVERNE À CHATS D’HISTOIRE

I’d make it caverne à chats à une étage.

Funny that I missed this three years ago — Joseph Hertzlinger has a provocative idea about drugs:

I don’t think a suggestibility drug such as marijuana should be encouraged. . . . I suspect that marijuana might be particularly dangerous from the point of view of inducing groupthink. I have not had any direct personal experience but I have noticed that it is defended as reinforcing the approved habits in the social group of the user. [examples elided] If we put that together we can see that marijuana is a conformist drug – probably because of its ability to make people suggestible. (That might explain the thoroughness of the collapse of trendy drug use in the ’80s. Once its use declined, the remaining users would start conforming to the new trend and stop.) . . . Declare that any drug whose use declines will be legalized. That will encourage drug users to keep their friends off the drug and will eliminate the “everybody does it” defense.

I’ve seen it a hundred times: the TV detective says “I think we’d better continue this conversation at the police station,” and the interrogee meekly gets into the car. Just once (and I thought I’d already said this) I’d like to hear the suspect say “No thanks, I’m comfortable here,” or “Suit yourself; do you have my phone number?”

I’m currently absorbed in Veronica Mars, which early in the second season came close to fulfilling my dream:

DEPUTY SACHS: The sheriff would like to have a word with you.

LOGAN ECHOLLS: And I’d like to be the cream filling of an Olsen Twins sandwich, but — [shrugs]

DEPUTY: Will you come with me please?

LOGAN: If I’m under arrest, then do me the courtesy of making it all official-like.

Kaiser Permanente has a radio spot with this bit of dialogue:

So what did your doctor say?

Oh, she prescribed the same medication she always does.

And it worked?

M-hm! My doctor is awesome.

What’s wrong with this picture?

Bastards.

Fake identifying documents save lives in Iraq:

At any time, the relevant authorities in Iraq could have decreed that all people get (as near as possible) forgery-proof biometric ID cards and carry them at all times – a great way to batten down a country, right?

Doing so would have fed directly into the strategy being used by the enemies of peace and security in Iraq today: setting up fake checkpoints and killing people who arrive there members of the wrong sect. Identity cards had a role in the Rwandan genocide just over 10 years ago, as well.

(Cited by Bruce Schneier.)

Radley Balko has finished and published his report, Overkill: The Rise of Paramilitary Police Raids in America.