because i said so

Government

In a depressingly unsuprising move, the State of Florida successfully sued to “prevent a pregnant 13-year-old ward of the state from having an abortion”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4500245.stm on the grounds that she’s too immature to make the decision. The irony of this would be hilarious if it wasn’t so sickening. Fortunately “Fafblog can be witty”:http://fafblog.blogspot.com/2005/04/old-beyond-her-years-florida-has-no.html in ways that I can’t. For further discussion, see “Gibbon’s Decline & Fall”:http://mysteriousgalaxy.booksense.com/NASApp/store/IndexJsp?s=showproduct&isbn=0553573985, once thought to be science fiction.

opportunity is stuck

Space

Opportunity, one of the Mars Exploration Rovers, has gotten “stuck on a sand dune”:http://space.com/missionlaunches/050428_rover_update.html and it’s not certain that they’ll be able to free it. (All six wheels are pretty “deeply buried”:http://marsrovers.nasa.gov/gallery/all/1/f/447/1F167871674EFF55DIP1214R0M1.JPG.)

I’m sure they’ll think of something and the Little Rover That Could will be on its way. Still, send good vibes to Opportunity whenever you can.

wanted: mayor

Politics

Whew! That caught me by surprise. How was I to know that the “mayor of San Diego resigning”:http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/11485487.htm would be national news?

My favorite part:

_”Councilman Michael Zucchet, the city’s deputy mayor, will become acting mayor. Zucchet, who faces a federal trial next month for allegedly accepting bribes from the owner of a strip club, defended the mayor as an honorable man whose resignation took courage.”_

I’m relieved to know the city will be in good hands.