The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Claude Muncey:

Hmm . . . theoretical knitting?

I have spent entirely too much time waiting for heart tests this year. My thoughts and prayers are with Teresa.

People have knocked around the idea of political cycles for a long time. Arthur Schlesinger Sr. was the proponent of a roughly 30 year cycle. One possible causal mechanism is the formation of political opinions and alignments in late teens/early adulthood. The length of the cycle would be driven by the time gap between a cohort forming political alignments and having maximum political influence.

I have also read of 12 year and other cycles. Generally, when some professor or other publishes their theory, the next election smashes it neatly.

After learning of McCain's actions, and watching the Palin interview, I could almost hear someone saying, "Look over here -- shiny, shiny!"

Anything to get that interview off the evening news, and stop the Vice-Presidential debate.

pedantic peasant @70:

This was a favorite trick question of my constitutional law professor.

I assume you mean if the candidate dies after the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December. After the Certificates of Vote are signed by the electors on that day, then the Vice President-elect would automatically become the President-elect. (Whether that happens legally when the President-elect dies, or when they simply don't show up at the inauguration, is beyond me.) But if the winning candidate for President dies before that day, things get really interesting.

That is because twenty or so states still do not require electors to pledge a faithful vote for the candidate in whose name they were chosen. Every election or so, someone (sometimes by mistake) does not vote as expected, becoming thereby a faithless elector. This has happened 158 times, the last time in 2004, but has not yet affected the outcome of an election.

The most interesting case in relation to this discussion occurred in 1872 when 63 electors for Horace Greely changed their vote, as Greely had died before the Electoral College met. (Three voted for him anyway. Either way, Grant won.)

This leads to a number of interesting, if not frightening, scenarios. Just for argument, let's say that McCain-Palin ekes out a narrow win, a margin of just a few electoral votes. However, John McCain dies suddenly a few days later. Here is a non-exhaustive list of what could happen:

• Everybody could vote for who they were elected to vote for, and Sarah Palin becomes President.
• A few electors vote for Obama, and he becomes President.
• McCain is elected president, but a couple of electors choose not to vote for Sarah Palin, voting for say, Ron Paul instead. This would prevent a majority, probably throwing the election into the Senate.
• The same thing could happen in the presidential tally, and the election would be thrown into the House. (That is where the writers of the Constitution thought most Presidents would be elected -- I mean, who would have thought the Electoral College would somehow work most of the time?)
• The Republican Party might try to take a Mulligan on the election and somehow pick a new candidate to sell to the electors.
• The electors could contact each other and elect someone else entirely, probably sending the election to the House.
• And so forth.

All of this would be accompanied by lots of lawsuits, and perhaps a riot or two. Jeff Greenfield wrote a comic novel a few years ago to highlight this problem in constitutional law, but nothing has changed.

Now that you have your parole notice, I will withold my escape advice, save that hacksaw blades in cakes will set off the magnetometer. However, smuggling street clothes and fake ID in has been known to work.

Great news!

Patrick and Teresa, you will both remain in my prayers -- for healing, strength, patience and humor.

Sorry -- the previous post is from this set of answers to an Alaska Eagle Forum questionaire. The relevant question is #11.

There really isn't any reason to bring Gov. Palin's children into this fight, not when she has made statements like this for the record:

Q: Are you offended by the phrase “Under God†in the Pledge of Allegiance? Why or why not?

A: Not on your life. If it was good enough for the founding fathers, its good enough for me and I’ll fight in defense of our Pledge of Allegiance.

For readers from outside the U.S., the pledge was not written until 1892, while the phrase "under God" was not added until 1954.

The best restaurant name relevant here, in my opinion, is King Dong in Berkeley. Even better, two storefronts down is a massage parlor.

(The address is 2429 Shattuck Ave -- Street View tells the story.)

John Houghton @59

Why did I follow that link? Somebody pass me a can of extra strength crystal BrÄno®.

Remember, once a week, BrÄno® in every brain . . .

Well, if this bunch wants to try something, odds are it won't involve nukes.

One of those interesting little details of nuclear command and control is the two man rule. which covers everything up to and including presidential decisions. Unless there is sufficient urgency to require an emergency war order, President Bush needs SecDef Gates' explicit concurrence for the use of nuclear weapons or JCS will not accept the order, period. It's not a matter of refusing the order of a superior, it is strictly following the standing orders that have been in place since the early 1960's.

Currently Gates and the JCS Chairman appear to be some of the principal opponents to attacking Iran at this time. Also, Gates tends to be a real stickler on command and control issues. The last time somebody significantly violated nuclear custody rules was the B-52 flight from Minot to Barksdale last year. After that everybody from the team that handled the weapons at Minot up the chain to the AF Chief of Staff and Secretary of the Air Force either had their careers ruined or were fired outright. (It makes one wish for that kind of enforcement of the law of land warfare, but that is a different topic. Maybe.) That tends to send a very clear message in the military.

Now conventional weapons are a different question. News releases like this one help feed the rumors that a small number of prototype Big BLUs are ready to go.

Paul @ 42 &m Lance @ 43:

Quite right, both of you.

Lance @ 35

Changing the rules in this case would imply amending the Constitution.

If I understand correctly, you seem to believe that changing the size of the Supreme Court would require amending the Constitution. As it turns out it would not. Article III does not set the size of the court, that is left to legislation.

As referred to earlier, FDR wanted some sleight of hand enacted that would allow him to immediately appoint six additional justices to go with the existing nine. It did not go over well.

Camaldolese monk Thomas Matus blogs at gaia.com, and reports that most of the hermits have relocated sucessfully to the Franciscan community in Soquel near Santa Cruz. Four monks will remain at the Hermitage on fire duty, as long as they are allowed to.

This seems to be a pattern throughout much of the fire area -- evacuate everybody but a few able people at some key sites, such as Nepenthe and Post Ranch Inn.

For anyone else wanting to keep up on the Big Sur fires (Basin Complex and Indians) there is a community site up handling notices, messages, as well as requests and offers for housing and assistance.

Too true Marilee, too true.

As many of you know, things have not gotten better in the Santa Lucias near Big Sur. The Basin Complex fire had been listed as only 3% contained for more than a week, but has now jumped the lines. Evacuation orders cover the coast from Big Sur Village to Limekiln State Park -- roughly 25 miles along Highway 1.

The personal connection for me is New Camaldoli Hermitage, adjacent to Limekiln. This is a Benedictine community of hermit monks that I have been associated with for several years. Fires are not unusual in this area; the Hermitage was destroyed by fire in 1958 and threatened by the big fires in 1999. The Hermitage is at 1,800 feet above the Pacific, more than two miles up a steep winding single lane road from Highway 1. While there is a fire road leading from the back of the Hermitage up over the ridge behind them, the only real evacuation route for them or any other residents is Highway 1, and the fire looks close to the road both near Big Sur Village and Esalen. I hear that it's bad up Palo Colorado canyon near Tassajara Zen Center and Lost Valley.

But Nepenthe is still there.

My guess is the monks will evacuate to San Luis Obispo, where there is a large oblate community. It would be nice to know for sure if they are safe.

Saturday my wife and I were home, staying inside in hopes of avoiding the 108 (F) forecast high temperature. Around noon we both noticed that it was starting to look a bit overcast, which is rather unusual for a very hot San Joaquin Valley day. (It looked more like a hot day in Lousiana where I grew up.) By 3 that afternoon we had to start turning on lights in the house, and we started to get some light but rather cold rain. We could also hear a lot of thunder toward the Sierra, and wondered how bad the fire situation was going to be.

We already have the worst air pollution in the country. The air has been brown and visibility low for the past couple of days. There are two fires about an half hour or so up the hill from us, and we seem to be getting a bit of the smoke from the north as well.

So far there is only one fire in Big Sur, well north of some friends -- the King City fire is closer in air miles but less likely to be a problem. It will probably get worse for them before it gets better as the Santa Lucias tend to have a big hard burn about every decade, and they are due now.

Teresa @ 3

Still to come: The Adoration of the Credentials, ...

Would that be with a monstrance?

Excuse me, please read "upper left" for "upper right" on my previous post. Thanks.

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