Only fifteen minutes into my vacation, but I can hardly resist posting this.

Saddam learned the names of the GIs guarding him, was interested in the details of their lives, which they were not supposed to discuss, and sometimes offered fatherly advice. They conversed in English.

O’Shea said when he told him he was not married, Saddam “started telling me what to do.” “He was like, `you gotta find a good woman. Not too smart, not too dumb. Not too old, not too young. One that can cook and clean.'”

Then he smiled, made what O’Shea interpreted as a “spanking” gesture, laughed and went back to washing his clothes in the sink.

(Mark my words, there will soon be a recognized psychiatric diagnosis for the syndrome which forces people to think “blog this” whenever the read something interesting.)

Much as it pains me, I’m going to go on what bloggers typically call an “hiatus,” although I prefer the term “vacation.” From blogging, anyway. Not that I’m going on any sort of real vacation, but I’ll be traveling like crazy for the next month or two, and between that and the rest of my life I don’t want to feel like a bad person if I don’t blog every day.

I’ll likely still post some stuff, albeit very rarely, for the next few weeks. After that, storm back re-invigorated and saucier than ever.

It’s tough sometimes, being a middle-class straight white American male. I mean, we rule the world, and it’s really hard to get anyone to feel sorry for us. We have feelings too, you know.

So it’s good to know that, as an atheist, I’m a member of an honest-to-God persecuted minority. The latest example comes from Brooklyn College, where Timothy Shortell was forced to decline the position of chair of the Sociology Department after the tabloids discovered that he was an atheist. (Don’t they realize how hard it is to get good department chairs?) Read the story at Majikthise and Feministe. The real source of trouble was an essay on anti-naturals.org, in which Shortell had not-so-nice things to say about religious morality. As Lindsay says,

The essay argues that religious faith undermines an agent’s capacity for true morality. The author makes the rather commonplace observation that people who use a code of “revealed truths” to guide their behavior are shirking the hard work of moral deliberation. The author calls these people “moral retards.” Unfortunately, the author conflates blind followers of religious dogma with thoughtful believers who reason independently within a religiously-informed framework. Make no mistake, the former really are moral retards. They may conduct themselves well if they seize on a sound set of rules, but “just following orders” isn’t a moral position, even if you think you’re just following orders from God.

I’ll be blunt, anyone who claims to be shocked by this line of reasoning in 21st century is either ignorant or disingenuous.* Would the tabloids have prevented Freud or Nietzche from chairing a department at CUNY? They disparaged religion in much harsher terms than poor Tim Shortell, and they did so in the scholarly works that made them famous. Heck, Plato more or less demolished the divine command theory of morality 2400 years ago with the Euthyphro Dilemma.

Jokes aside, this is a completely inexusable violation of academic freedom, not to mention religious freedom. The administrators at CUNY (of which Brooklyn College is a part) should be ashamed of themselves.

It was just in April that I posted about Oscar Brown Jr, the soulful singer and songwriter who was also something of a social activist. Somehow I missed the news that he just passed away on May 31st. On the day I wrote about him, he was giving a show here in Chicago, his hometown; now I’ll never have then chance to see him perform live. A service will be held on June 24.

Friday Random Ten with a twist: use your iPod to divine the future, by using the first ten songs to appear in a random playlist as Tarot cards in the Celtic Cross spread. Full explanation, including a key to the positions, here.

This week, let’s ask a specific question: “Will the Democrats recapture the White House in 2008?” The songs say:

1. The Covering: Aretha Franklin, Precious Lord, Take My Hand
   
2. The Crossing: Charles Mingus, Better Git It In Your Soul
   
3. The Crown: Patricia Barber, Regular Pleasures
4. The Root: Ray Charles, Hit The Road, Jack
   
5. The Past: Euphonic, Precognition
6. The Future: McCoy Tyner, Good Morning Heartache
   
7. The Questioner: Buckshot LeFonque, Jungle Grove
   
8. The House: Chick Corea & Bobby McFerrin, Autumn Leaves
   
9. The Inside: Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, I’m Just a Lucky So-And-So
   
10. The Outcome: Sex Mob, Baby Let Me Hold Your Hand

Well, isn’t that special. The Covering and Crossing make sense, as they refer to current influences and obstacles; clearly, the oracle is reminding us of the gradual takeover of our formerly secular country by Jesusland. But there’s good news in the Root, which refers to past influences: perhaps they will be hitting the road soon? The appearance of Precognition in the Past is an obvious reference to the Downing Street Memo and the Bush Administration’s ability to see the need to invade Iraq long before intelligence could actually make the case.

But the auguries for the future are more ambiguous. The Future speaks of heartache. The Inside, referring to our hopes, fears, and expectations, seems to think we’ll get lucky. And the Outcome, wrapping up the whole story, is a Sex Mob tune.

Is it possible that Rep. Sensenbrenner will succeed at repealing the 22nd Amendment, and (to his horror) our next President will be — Bill Clinton?

David Appell links to a powerpoint presentation by Joel Parriott, a self-described “worker bee” (really, Science Program Examiner) at the Office of Management and the Budget. Parriott, who received a PhD in astrophysics from Michigan, is trying to explain to scientists how they are viewed by the OMB when they come to ask for money. The interesting slides are where he explains the “Ethos and Mythos” of each community, and how scientists can most effectively make their case (edited slightly for clarity).

Ethos & Mythos: Science/Technology Community
• Basic research is critical to the long-term interests of the U.S.
• More research money is always good, less is always bad
• Producing the next generation of scientists is of paramount importance
• The Administration must not understand (or perhaps be hostile to) our compelling arguments, or else they would follow our recommendations
• We’re smart, so you should listen and send us more $ and we’ll do good things … trust us

Ethos & Mythos: OMB Staff
• Large, sustained budget deficits should be avoided if possible
• Basic research is a good thing and support is typically a clear Federal role, but it’s difficult/impossible to know when investment is sub-critical and generational timescales add to the complexity of the analysis
• Appetite of community for more $$ is boundless; everyone claims to be doing compelling, ripe-for-great-advance work
• It’s difficult to impossible for the most of the S&T community to set priorities
• Universities are good; national labs are unique but uncontrollable entities
• Federal gov’t needs to more wisely & efficiently spend $$

Making a better case
• Work to put yourselves in our shoes
  • How would you realistically implement your own recommendations within a fixed budget envelope?
  • Use the framework of the R&D Investment Criteria to drive arguments
• Improve your consensus reports
  • Apply the same level of logical rigor as you do for peer-reviewed journals (expose assumptions & context; admit limitations; data, not anecdotes, should drive arguments)
  • Spend more time on executive summary and navigation
  • Workforce arguments are typically weak ones…let the science drive the case
  • Well grounded constructive criticism adds to your credibility (we know things are not perfect, so alternative for us is to assume less than full honesty on your part)
  • Strong outsiders add to your credibility (e.g., EPP2010)
• Many decisions are political at their core, so community needs to be more politically astute, but partisanship should be avoided

The idea that science should drive the case is interesting. It’s obvious in some sense, but earlier in the document we read about the priorities driving the President’s 2006 budget, and they are mostly about the war on terror and spreading freedom. But one thing that is clear is that the government likes to hear the same thing from disparate groups of advisors — maybe all those NASA and HEP panels do serve some purpose after all.

Update: Well, that was fast. Before I even got the post published, word is out that Mukhtaran Bibi may have been released! Who knows exactly what prompted the decision, but perhaps a well-timed blog campaign actually had some effect. On the other hand, it may just be a sham, as Kristof suggests (via Majikthise) — so it’s worth keeping the pressure on.

Update again (6/16): Apparently, she is still not free to travel. Perhaps unsurprising to see the US State Department joining in the “soothing” but misleading public statements.

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Ezra Klein points to a post by Tom Watson about the arrest of Mukhtaran Bibi. Nicholas Kristof tells the backstory:

Last fall I wrote about Mukhtaran Bibi, a woman who was sentenced by a tribal council in Pakistan to be gang-raped because of an infraction supposedly committed by her brother. Four men raped Ms. Mukhtaran, then village leaders forced her to walk home nearly naked in front of a jeering crowd of 300.

Ms. Mukhtaran was supposed to have committed suicide. Instead, with the backing of a local Islamic leader, she fought back and testified against her persecutors. Six were convicted.

Then Ms. Mukhtaran, who believed that the best way to overcome such abuses was through better education, used her compensation money to start two schools in her village, one for boys and the other for girls. She went out of her way to enroll the children of her attackers in the schools, showing that she bore no grudges.

But then, Mukhtaran made plans to visit the U.S. Presumably she would tell people about some of the less pleasant aspects of the current situation in Pakistan. As Ezra explains:

Pervez Musharraf, our erstwhile ally in the War on Terror, couldn’t have that. Mukhtaran Bibi was put under house arrest last Thursday. When she tried to walk out, police pointed guns at her. When she tried to make calls, they snipped the landline. When she moved to the cell, they took her to Islamabad and put her in prison. Then, for good measure, they released her rapists — a warning shot.

As good a reason as I’ve ever seen to bring political pressure to bear on a repressive government. Tom Watson suggests that everyone write to Pakistani officials to express their outrage, and has collected the relevant email addresses:

His Excellency Mr. Jehangir Karamat ambassador@embassyofpakistan.org

Mr Mohammad Sadiq is Deputy Chief of Mission and assists the Ambassador in the overall functioning of the Embassy. He deals with both political and administrative issues. dcmsadiq@embassyofpakistan.org

Mr Aslam Khan is Minister (Political) and deals with political issues minpol@embassyofpakistan.org

Mr Shahid Ahmed is Counsellor Community Affairs and deals with the Pakistani community in the United States. shahidahmed@embassyofpakistan.org

Brig Shafqaat Ahmed is the Defence & Military Attache of the Pakistan Embassy. da@embassyofpakistan.org

Mr Ashraf Hayat is the Minister (Trade) and deals with Pakistan-US trade issues. commercialsection@embassyofpakistan.org & compk@rcn.com

Mrs Talat Waseem is the Press Minister and Media Spokesperson of the Embassy pressinfodiv@embassyofpakistan.org

Don’t delay.

The 30th edition of Tangled Bank, the carnival of science-oriented blog posts, is now up at The Geomblog. I didn’t submit anything, but Suresh has noticed that the squishy sciences tend to be over-represented in these carnivals, so he decided to take the initiative and include pointers to some interesting physics and math posts. So my entry on the arrow of time was included, as well as a nice older post by John Baez on topology and a newer one by Cosma Shalizi on Gödel’s theorem.

The US Senate passed a resolution, sponsored by Mary Landrieu and George Allen, that officially apologized to lynching victims for the Senate’s failure to condemn lynching several times in the 19th and 20th centuries. Not a difficult position to get behind, really. Except that it was passed by voice vote, rather than by a roll call, because several Senators would not support the resolution.

So, who are the Senators who bravely hold the pro-lynching position? Unfortunately it will probably be impossible to ever know for sure, unless the Senators themselves tell us. Not only was their a voice vote, but it’s possible to add your name as a co-sponsor of a Senate resolution even after it’s already been passed. From Kos, here’s the list of non-sponsors:

Lamar Alexander (R-TN)
Robert Bennett (R-UT)
Christopher Bond (R-MO)
Jim Bunning (R-KY)
Conrad Burns (R-MT)
Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)
Thad Cochran (R-MS)
Kent Conrad (D-ND)
John Cornyn (R-TX)
Michael Crapo (R-ID)
Michael Enzi (R-WY)
Chuck Grassley (R-IA)
Judd Gregg (R-NH)
Orrin Hatch (R-UT)
Kay Hutchison (R-TX)
Jon Kyl (R-AZ)
Trent Lott (R-MS)
Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)
Richard Shelby (R-AL)
John Sununu (R-NH)
Craig Thomas (R-WY)
George Voinovich (R-OH)

Via Atrios, Chris Geidner and Americablog are trying to figure out which of these non-sponsors were actively against the resolution. Any Senator who ends up not being a sponsor of a resolution like this should be ashamed of themselves.

Update 6/15: Several more Senators have now co-sponsored: Bond, Bunning, Burns, Chambliss, Conrad, Murkowski, and Voinovich.. Their names have been stricken out above. However, Chris Geidner has called all of the Senators’ offices, and has been told by the offices of Sens. Alexander, Bennett, Cornyn, Grassley, Gregg, and Shelby that they support the resolution.

Update 6/17: Crapo, Grassley, and Hatch have now co-sponsored.

Via Deepen the Mystery, a photo essay from Time magazine about a Muslim high school right here in Illinois. Once they pass sixth grade, boys and girls play separately, and must wear the school uniform.

Talk about your throwback jerseys. I wonder what would happen if one of the students showed up at school with ERVING 32 on the back of their uniform, sporting a giant Afro.