Each night when I get home from work I open my small mailbox outside my apartment and am greeted by an overflowing amount of mail that comes pouring out onto the floor. After scanning through the mail, I realize that unfortunately, the volume of mail has little to do with my popularity and more to do with a high credit score. I don't think a day has gone by in which I am not offered 0% balance transfer offers good until December 2008. And while I do enjoy getting compliments about my flawless credit rating from Visa, Mastercard, and Discover, the amount of paper wasted soliciting me to sign-up for another card is staggering.

It is not just credit card applications--100+ page catalogs have to be folded over to fit in my mailbox. I somehow ended up with a subscription to Lucky Magazine--a magazine devoted entirely to shopping--which apparently some people pay to receive. I can't say that I have been equally troubled by all of my unsolicited magazine subscriptions: I do look forward to issues of US Weekly that periodically find their way into my mailbox--a result of a subscription from a previous tenant at my apartment.

Aside from US Weekly though, there is little use for all of the unsolicited mail.  After about 6 trees worth of paper, multiple phone calls and unsubscribe requests to luckymag.com, I no longer receive Lucky magazine, however other catalogs still keep coming along with the continued environmental degradation associated with their production.

I am not a lawyer, but justifying torture on legal terms seems like it would be a pretty difficult task. Given the Constitution and all, it seems that cruel and unusual punishment shouldn't be something that legally permissible.

In a detailed and shocking piece in today's New York Times, we learn that torture wasn't easy to justify--but the Justice Dept. in consultation with the White House did it anyway. Because it wasn't easy to legally justify, the Justice Department--led by our old friend Alberto--kept the justifications secret.

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The word is apparently out, but only two blog entries just doesn't do justice to this rising progressive star.

Gillum, a Tallahassee City Commissioner,  and the founder and national director of Young Elected Officials (YEO), has been nominated by IMPACT to become their 2007 Emerging Leader of the Year!

I am not only calling on you to vote for Gillum (VOTE HERE!), I call on you to write your own blog entry, encouraging others to vote for and blog about Andrew Gillum!

Poor Alberto Gonzales. After approving the illegal wiretapping of US citizens without a warrant, claiming the Constitution does not provide the right of Habeas Corpus and allowing the FBI to use the Patriot Act to obtain citizen's private information, I can't blame AG for thinking that a few politically motivated attorney firings would rank relatively low on the totem poll of Constitutional abuses. Once you defend torture and get away with it, you probably consider yourself to have a reasonable amount of job security. But it appears that the attorney purge may be Gonzales' last abuse of power, as the calls for resignation have grown louder.

I wouldn't be surprised if Gonzales attempted one last Constitutional infringement before a forced resignation--he is currently tied with former AG's John Ashcroft and John Mitchell (Watergate burglar) for the all-time lead in Constitutional violations. I'm sure Gonzales would certainly love to be the sole record-holder of Constitutional desecration when considering his legacy.

Recently the NY Times ran a story on the development of a conservative alternative to wikipedia. Citing an anti-American, anti-Christian, liberal bias, the site is modeled on wikipedia but aptly called conservapedia.

The site prides itself upon using the "Christian-friendly" B.C. and A.D. rather than the pagan B.C.E. and C.E. abbreviations when referencing time (B.C.E. = before Common Era v. B.C. = before Christ). Jesus would be so proud.

I have to admit I found the whole concept hilariously stupid, so I decided to browse. First entry: Global Warming. Conservapedia writes: "It should be noted that these scientists are motivated by a need for grant money in their field of climatology. Therefore, their work can not be considered unbiased, though no more than any scientist in any other field. Also, these scientists are mostly liberal atheists, untroubled by the hubris that man can destroy the Earth which God gave him.[4].

Tony Blair recently announced that Great Britain would begin a pullout of 1600 troops from Iraq. Denmark and Lithuania announced they would likely pull out their forces as well (that's a loss of 53 Lithuanian soldiers). As the civil war in Iraq spins out of control, the Coalition of the Willing has become a bit less willing to engage in a failed and misguided war.

Surely this loss of support is a blow to the Bush administration's plan of escalation of US forces in Iraq...at least one would think. The White House, however, declared Britain's withdrawal a "sign of success."

Huh?

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There is a danger shelved within in our school libraries. Fortunately, a few brave librarians are willing to banish this danger to protect our children.

What is this danger? No--it's not the terrorists. It's not even the teacher's unions--though those unions are apparently more dangerous than Al Qaeda. The danger I speak of is more subtle and more popular and therefore even more perilous. Ready for the danger...drum roll...it's the word "scrotum."

The evil word appears in a children's book "The Higher Power of Lucky," by Susan Patron, this year's winner of the Newbery Medal, the most prestigious award in children's literature. Thankfully, as the NYT reports, the book has been banned from many school libraries across the country.

I know what you're thinking--how could I write this evil word on the YP4 Blog? Some of the Fellows are barely 18 years old--what if they are exposed to the word? One angry librarian outlined the dangers of the word: "This book included what I call a Howard Stern-type shock treatment just to see how far they could push the envelope, but they didn't have the children in mind." If the word scrotum is as far as the envelope can be pushed, then this librarian has a lot of books to burn.

The Vagina Monologues, a play by Eve Ensler, inspired a global movement to stop violence against women. Known as V-Day, this movement organizes local volunteers and college students to produce annual benefit performances around Valentines Day of The Vagina Monologues to raise awareness and funds for anti-violence groups within their own communities.

A campaign to end violence against women: seems like a noble cause that everyone can embrace. Who is going to be against that?

Unfortunately, empowering women and raising awareness of violence and rape is a more controversial topic than it should be. St. John's University recently banned a performance of the Vagina Monologues citing it goes against the values of the Catholic institution. Interesting...A movement to stop violence against women goes against the values of the institution.

It's not fair or balanced. The liberal media is obsessed with covering the death and destruction and failed policies in Iraq when they should be devoting even more time to important issues--like whether Speaker Pelosi should be permitted to use a plane that can make it from DC to San Francisco without having land and fill-up on gas. The media only devoted an entire two days to "AIR-OGANT NANCY" (to borrow an unbiased headline from the NY Post).  If the Pelosi story only gets two days, then the civil war in Iraq should only get two days: That's what fair and balanced is. Sarcasm stops after the tab.

So I haven't planned my Oscar Night Party yet and it's less than a month away. Actually I've never sat through an entire show or even attended an Oscars Party, much less hosted one. I like movies, but the Oscars always seem to be the same. Someone's dress causes all sorts of drama because it shows too much skin. Two celebrities tell a bad joke before announcing the nominations. The winner thanks their mother or Jesus in a predictable acceptance speech. Not even Jon Stewart could draw me in when he hosted.

This year could be different though. I'll admit--I am not happy about Dreamgirls getting snubbed in the best picture nominations, but I may be enticed to watch anyway. Al Gore's former campaign manager hinted that Al might have more to say than the typical acceptance speech should he win an Oscar for An Inconvenient Truth. Read here.