JK refused today to cross the police union picket line planned to protest the upcoming US Conference of Mayors. 

That's cool.  It shows some backbone for a principle.

"I don't cross picket lines. I never have," Kerry said.

Ugh.  The Tigers have now lost 5 in a row to fall 8 games under .500.  Last night, they fell apart again in the later innings, falling to Kansas City 7-3.

Gary Knotts pitched well after allowing 4 runs in the first.  Pudge blasted his 10th dinger of the year.  Still, the offense isn't getting anything done recently.  They've got to turn it around or they risk falling back into the "We can't win anything" ways of last year.

Still, Pudge leads the All-Star vote.  And Carlos Guillen is closing fast.  Help them out by voting online with mlb.com.

Additionally, the NBA Draft is tonight, but the Pistons don't pick till the 54th selection.  There could be some interesting trades at the top of the board.  Remember, Shaq and T-Mac are still available.  But for the Pistons fan, this is just a handy diversion until Sheed signs a multiyear deal.

OK, that was a cheap shot.  This is really a post about how he's letting the assault weapons ban lapse.  Which is really a much bigger deal when it comes to urban crime and isolated wackos (read: domestic terrorists).

Still, we're so worked up about terrorism that we can't let immigrants get licenses to operate automobiles, yet we can actually loosen our regulations on buying AK-47's, Uzi's and TEC-9's?

Arianna Huffington spells out just why The Smug Asshole would want this to happen:

The reason is as simple as it is craven: It's all about placating the NRA, which has promised to withhold its presidential endorsement until after the assault weapons ban has expired.

What a profound failure of leadership.

By playing politics with our safety, the president has shown where he really stands on his signature issue of national security. If keeping Americans out of harm's way were truly his top priority, he'd stand up to the gun lobby and demand that Congress do everything in its power to keep assault weapons out of the hands of criminals, drug dealers and terrorists.

Remember, no toenail clippers allowed at the airport, but your AK-47 is A-OK.

JK premieres a new ad called "Paperwork" today highlighting his plan to reduce health care costs for every American.  It's a great spot of the "I'm a serious guy who's trying to solve serious problems" variety, hence I love it.

One of the things I like most about the spot is that it tells voters to go to johnkerry.com to read his whole plan for making health care more affordable.  The website doesn't do a fantastic job of highlighting the plan, but you can download it here.

On the whole, it's full of pretty good ideas.  We can nitpick specific points, but JK gets huge props just for having a plan and telling voters to read it.  That's called running on ideas, boys and girls.  We could use a lot more of that around here.

Kerry's plan has three key points.

1. Make Health Insurance Cheaper
   
   Everyone likes to talk about healthy kids and the uninsured (see points 2 and 3), but the truth is that virtually everyone is affected by the skyrocketing costs of health care and health insurance.  All those folks who pay out the nose for prescription drugs vote and Kerry is smart to address their concerns first.
   
   The plan is simple:
   
   
   • Provide federal assistance for the most expensive 0.04% of cases that make up 20% of medical expenses for private insurers.
   
   
   • Lower the costs of perscription drugs by allowing the feds to negotiate bulk discounts.
   
   
   • Invest in technology that will cut costs and reduce medical errors.
   
   
   • Limit malpractice insurance costs by implementing new controls on lawsuits, but not by enacting damage caps which only affect those cases where malpractice is actually proven.
   
   
2. Cover Every Kid
   
   This part of the plan is pretty similar to whan Dean did in Vermont and formed the centerpiece of his health care plan.  It's been proven to work in the states and can work on the federal level.  The Kerry plan would provide federal assistance to cover every child whose family earns less than 300% of the poverty level.
   
   
3. Cover the Uninsured
   
   Kerry would allow every business to buy into the federal health plan in order to provide more affordable choices to their employees.  Remember, expanding the size of the federal insurance program would, under Kerry, allow it to negotiate ever bigger bulk discounts.
   
   Workers between jobs and others without health insurance would qualify for big tax credits to make health care affordable even in tough times.
   

That, my friends, is a damn good plan.  It probably wouldn't solve every problem when it comes to health care, but it tries to address the basic tension that exists in our system.  No one should get something for nothing in our free market society, but no one deserves to die just because they can't afford adequate health care in the richest nation on Earth.  This JK character looks less and less like a douchebag every day.

The Mozilla Foundation released Firefox 0.9 last week.

What is Firefox, you ask?  Is the new-from-the-ground-up web browser descendant from Netscape.  Features include automatic popup blocking, tabbed browsing ^*, integrated Google Search, and lots of customizable themes and extensions to enhance the browser's funcationality. 

Firefox can't really beat Safari or even Mozilla's competing Camino for OS X, but it's sick for Windows.  Substaintial improvements over IE.  Definitely worth the download, even to just experiement.

I also recommend Deepest Sender, the built-into-Firefox LiveJournal client I'm using to post this entry.

*Tabbed browsing is a cool new feature of modern web browsers that allows you to open more than one page in a single window.  It's a lot slicker than having tons of buttons in your taskbar.

While you bask in the sweet, sweet glow of victory, check out nba.com for MP3's of Palace PA announcer John Mason's trademark "Dee-troit Basketball!!".

Impeach Bush now.

Molly Ivins shows us point by point how The Smug Asshole and his cronies have simply ignored US and International law that outlaws torture. As the Wall Street Journal reports: "Bush administration lawyers contended last year that the president wasn't bound by laws prohibiting torture and that government agents who might torture prisoners at his direction couldn't be prosecuted by the Justice Department."

Congress has tried to exercise oversight, but Ashcroft refuses to cooperate. Remember, we are a nation of laws, not of men. If Bush doesn't like it, then he can be impeached.

Can't forget last year's Shock title.

Big Ben goes for 18 and 22 as the Pistons cruise to their third World Championship 100-87. It wouldn't have been that close either if Darko had hit is foul shots at the end of the game. Chauncy was named MVP, but I still think Drew Sharp had it right. They're all valuable.

Also - the Tigers beat the Philles 9-3, too. Bonderman pitched 7 innings of one hit ball.

All in all, a great night. If you need me, I'll be outside flipping over some cars.

Drew Sharp finally writes something nice. And he correctly identifies the Finals MVP as the whole damn team. Game 5 in 30 minutes. Let's go win one tonight.

Apple's new Airport Express.

What they say it is: A way to easily and wirelessly stream your MP3 collection to your hi-fi.

What it really is: A high performance wireless base station at a reasonable price with two great new features: audio out and portability.

That it is an all-in-one solution that's inexpensive is so key. You just need to buy one box. Well done, Apple. Well done. Now, hurry up and ship me one.

Hitchens speculates that it's about to get a whole lot worse.

Notice that he provides a positive alternative to torture:

Skill, in these matters, depends on taking pains and not on inflicting them. You make the chap go through his story several times, preferably on video, and then you ask his friends a huge number of tedious questions, and then you go through it all again to check for discrepancies, and then you watch the first (very boring and sexless) video all over once more, and then you make him answer all the same questions and perhaps a couple of new and clever ones. If you have got the wrong guy and it does happen you let him go and offer him a ride home and an apology. And you know what? It often works. Only a lazy and incompetent dirtbag looks for brutal shortcuts so that he can get off his shift early.

I'd really like to have some brilliant analysis, but I don't have anything to say. Torture is wrong and morally reprehensible. Plus, it doesn't work. We haven't received actionable intelligence and everyone just hates us more. I am ashamed that my country would condone it. I'm ashamed that no one is willing to come clean about how and why it was authorized. I'm just ashamed.

Ralph Wiley died today of heart failure. He was 52.

I was just learning to love this longtime sportswriter. I think it was his May 27 column for ESPN's Page 2 that did it:

You think Ben Wallace cares? You think Ben Wallace will shrink in front of Shaquille O'Neal and say, "Please, sir, may I have another?" Ben Wallace is one of 10 children of poor sharecroppers from a little spot on the map called Benton, Alabama. Ben Wallace has gone up against cotton gins and giant threshing machines and nine brothers and sisters for food. Do you really think Shaquille O'Neal is going to intimidate him? You better play on.

Thanks for the memories, Ralph. I, for one, will miss you.

The Tigers lost 9-2 against Dontrelle Willis and the Marlins yesterday, ending a four-game winning streak. On the bright side of things, we actually had a four-game winning streak to end. And that streak was not compiled against creampuffs, but rather Atlanta and the defending World Series champs. That's not too shabby.

Still, they still haven't had a five game winning streak in two years. And they're still four games under .500. This week has been pretty good, but there's a lot of work left to do.

Pistons win 88-80 behind the strong play of Sheed and Billups. One more win Tuesday night and the Palace will have a new address - Three Championship Drive.

I think it's a bit of a mistake that everyone is talking about how huge Shaq has been. First, he's not dominating the glass like he has in the past. Big Ben, Sheed, and the boys have a lot to do with that, but he's averaging 4 rebounds fewer a game than he did against the Timberwolves. Second, he's not scoring. Certainly, he's been the Lakers best player and their leading scorer, but remember that when Jordan went off in the playoffs he dropped 60. When Shaq goes off, he's lucky to get to 35. At that rate, he cannot win without the help he has not been getting. I'm not saying he hasn't been playing fantastic. I'm not saying that he's actually made me a believer in his skills rather than the ultimate skeptic. I'm just saying he isn't the one man wrecking crew you've been lead to believe. He's played outstanding, but the Pistons have contained him. Nothing less. Nothing more.

Drew Sharp, god bless him, blames The Rapist.

We'll see you Tuesday. With a little luck, we'll have just gotten back from flipping over a few cars and setting them on fire. Go Pistons.

When you have them on the floor, don't let them back up. Rest assured we won't make the same mistake again.

Lakers win after a desperation heave by the rapist sends the game to overtime.

Make no mistake, that is precisely what the New York Times reported today.

And I quote:

A team of administration lawyers concluded in a March 2003 legal memorandum that President Bush was not bound by either an international treaty prohibiting torture or by a federal antitorture law because he had the authority as commander in chief to approve any technique needed to protect the nation's security.

Remember, we impeached President Clinton for not breaking the law. So what do we do to Bush when he gets some smarmy lawyers to say it's OK for him to actually break the law.

Ronal Reagan died over the weekend (as if you could have possibly missed it). A few thoughts:

1. Bummer. I didn't agree with Reagan politically, but he never did anything but serve his country the best he knew how. I'll tip my hat to that.
2. Also - Alzheimer's sucks. If you really want to support his legacy, don't watch 17 hours of CNN. Cut a check to the Alzheimer's Association.
3. I'm ready to move on. This is my one "blame the media" rant. I do not need 7 straight days of Reagan tributes. I've absorbed that he died. I've thought about it enough to make a couple of informed opinions (see above). There's a funeral in a couple of days. Let's move on.

Pistons win 87-75.

A sample exchange between me and my Laker fan roommate Joan:

Joan: Yap yap yap.
Todd: Right. So the Pistons won, right?
Joan: Yap yap yap.
Todd: Right. So the Lakers lost, right?
Joan: Yap yap yap.
Todd: Right. Pistons in 5.

Expect a full report tomorrow.

I'm tired as all get out, but we won!

Enjoy this Herseth ad while I recover.

Let's go win one.