Kevin Drum writes:

The financial crisis of 2008 was a stupendous event, and it's frankly stunning to me how few people seem to have responded to it in any substantive way. Occasional throat clearing aside, it's been business as usual for a huge chunk of the political, business, and pundit class, especially on the right.

I just don't get that. The Great Collapse was a big enough, and unexpected enough, event that it should have changed your mind at least a little bit about something. If it didn't, you either have godlike powers of prognostication or else you've simply decided not to let real world events ever affect your worldview. I'm willing to put money on the latter.

What always amazes me about progressive bloggers writng things like this is how little they connect President Obama and Treasury Secretary Geithner to this. I have 4 letters for Kevin - H-A-M-P. Obama and Geithner claim it was a success. The latest NYTimes poll says that "Americans are more pessimistic about the nation’s economic outlook and overall direction than they have been at any time since President Obama’s first two months in office." Geithner tells Obama "all is well." It isn't.

Speaking for me only

Ballots have gone out for the Denver Mayoral election. Today, at the 40th annual NORML 2011 conference in Denver. Montel Williams moderated a debate panel among several of the candidates: James Mejia, Jeff Peckham, Doug Linkart, Thomas Wolf, Theresa Spawn and Chris Roemer.

Factoids: In Denver. there are 270 medical marijuana centers, 470 grow facilities and 170 infused product manufacturers. There are between 14,000 and 20,000 in Denver who have medical marijuana cards. It provides 4,000 jobs in Denver.

Candidate Chris Roemer got justly booed when he referred to marijuana as "addictive." It was during the q and a session at 55:00 into the video. [More...]

Another busy day at work for me. Here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

The Short Fingered Vulgarian seems to be overplaying his buffoonish hand. The latest - Jerry Seinfeld does not want to be seen standing next to him:

Comedian Jerry Seinfeld canceled an appearance at one of Donald Trump’s charity events, saying that he is disturbed by Trump’s rhetoric about President Obama. Seinfeld will however still make a monetary contribution to the charity, St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital.

Trump, in typical fashion, crudely lashes back:

We don't care that you broke your commitment," [Trump] wrote, [. . .] "What I do feel badly about is that I agreed to do, and did, your failed show, 'The Marriage Ref,' even though I thought it was absolutely terrible . . .

Trump seems on the verge of a Torpedo of Truth tour.

Speaking for me only

Nate Silver writes a nice article on the online poker issue. As a sports investor, two parts were particularly interesting to me:

Some of the potential replacements for Full Tilt Poker and Poker Stars, such as Bodog.com, flout the law much more flagrantly by offering sports betting.

Many states have taken the ludicrous position that poker is not a game of chance, but sports betting is only a game of chancre. Ridiculous. The other part that is interesting to me is this:

The Oklahoma Senate yesterday passed a bill increasing the maximum penalty for converting marijuana to hashish to life in prison. A spokesman for the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs said "the goal of the bill is to "send a message" that illegal drugs won't be tolerated in Oklahoma." The bill previously passed the OK House, then went to the Senate where a non-pertinent amendment was made. It now goes back to the House for enrollment.

Conviction of a first offense of cooking hashish would result in a prison sentence from two years to life in prison. Sentences would be doubled under a second offense, and those convicted would not be eligible for a suspended sentence or probation.

The bill passed the Senate by a vote of 44 to 2. The earlier version, substantially identical, passed the House by a vote of 75 to 18.

NYTimes editorial:

[NJ Governor] Chris Christie canceled [a Hudson River tunnel project] last year, costing his state $3 billion in federal funds. After making that terrible mistake, Mr. Christie now says he wants $570 million in funds to replace another choke point for the Acela — the 100-year-old Portal Bridge across the Hackensack River. He is even willing to put up $150 million of state money, since the bridge is also used by New Jersey commuter trains. In his letter asking for federal funds, he lamented that the bridge, which swings open for river traffic, is “beyond its useful life” and delays trains. That’s rich coming from the man who canceled a project that was vital to ending train delays in the future.

There are many requests, even one from Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, a Republican who earlier rejected $810 million of these funds. Now he wants $150 million for a modest rail project between Milwaukee and Chicago.

Is the Tea Party ok with this?

This is pretty disconcerting: Since June, 2010, your iPhone has been keeping track of everywhere you've been and storing it on your phone. Why? No one knows.

The data isn't transmitted, but stored in a program. So theoretically, without a court order, only Apple and someone in possession of your phone can access it.

This makes it even more important for courts to rule that police cannot access your cell phone data without a warrant. If you're arrested and police take your phone when you're booked, they have no business looking at your recent calls and texts, let alone accessing the stored file to find every place you've been and when.

While courts disagree on whether you have a reasonable expectation of privacy in your vehicle, surely they would agree, as did the Colorado Supreme Court, that a phone is different. Or would they? Who knows anymore -- which is why Apple needs to discontinue this. [More...]

The wrongfully convicted youths, now men, from the Central Park Jogger case are suing New York for $50 million. NYC says it won't settle.

Jury questioning begins tomorrow in the retrial of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. The Chicago Sun Times has re-started its Blago Blog.

Two of the three shut-down online poker companies have agreed with the Government on a refund plan for players.

Big TV night: New episodes of Survivor, American Idol, America's Next Top Model and Justified. And reruns of Breaking Bad from the first three seasons. Most unwatchable show to hit the airwaves in a long time: Mob Wives on VH-1.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

Matt Yglesias:

[Y]ou have conservative politicians refusing to make a serious effort to reach an agreement out of some blend of taxophobia and fear of giving the President a win. The result, again, whether the right realizes it or not, is a gift to the wing of the Democratic Party that disagrees with Obama about the desirability of enacting spending cuts.

I doubt this very much. But here's hoping! The problem is tax policy. Will Obama let the Bush tax cuts expire? I hope so.

Now that possession of marijuana for personal use is no longer a crime in Massachusetts, the Supreme Court has ruled police cannot order occupants of a vehicle to exit the car just because they smelled marijuana. From today's ruling:

"Without at least some other additional fact to bolster a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity, the odor of burnt marijuana alone cannot reasonably provide suspicion of criminal activity to justify an exit order...."Ferreting out decriminalized conduct with the same fervor associated with the pursuit of serious criminal conduct is neither desired by the public nor in accord with the plain language of the statute,

The ACLU, which participated in the case, says:

“Today’s ruling is a strong statement that police cannot treat decriminalized conduct as if it were a serious crime. Heavy-handed police enforcement in the face of minor drug infractions not only wastes public resources but disproportionately affects communities of color.”

What happened, according to the opinion (link is only temporary, the case is Commonwwealth vs. Benjamin CRUZ. SJC-10738. April 19, 2011):

The Defense Department announced today that Pvt. Bradley Manning will be moved from Quantico to the Joint Regional Correctional Facility at Fort Leavenworth.

The Kansas prison opened in 2010 as part of the Military Correctional Complex.

From their Flickr page, here's a photo of a cell.

Some recent cases challenging military pre-trial detention conditions are here.