7 Quick Takes, April 8, 2011

Here's the link to the main round-up of these Quick Takes.

1. It's been a fun week at work. We've been working on a case down in Mississippi where a judge, for no apparent reason and with no case pending, issued a court order on his own motion to 5 attendance officers, directing them to provide him with the names and addresses of all homeschoolers in the counties under his jurisdiction.

HSLDA filed an emergency stay with the Mississippi Supreme Court, and yesterday the stay was granted. The court ordered Judge Joe Dale Walker to respond by April 18, "specifically addressing the issue of under what authority the March 23, 2011 order was issued." Um, yeah, we're all interested in knowing that.

2. So is the US gearing up for actions in Yemen now too? The administration's rhetoric about evil government versus wonderful protestors is sounding a whole lot like our anti-Gaddafi statements a few weeks ago. Click here for an interesting discussion. At least Saleh doesn't sound as intransigent as Libya's leader.

3. An interesting case just got handed down in the Seventh Circuit. Jones v. Clark, 630 F.3d 677, for you legal types. Christina Jones, a meter-reader for ComEd (the power company in the Chicago area), was going around checking meter readings, using binoculars if the fence gates were locked or if there was a dog guarding the yard. She was black, the town is over 97% white. A "concerned citizen" called the police. When the police arrived, he found Christina dressed in ComEd gear - hat, shirt, pants, vest, all with the ComEd logo. She gave the policeman 2 photo IDs showing that she was with ComEd, and she showed him her binoculars and explained what she used them for.

Then she started to leave, and the officer said, "What's the rush?" He then asked for her date of birth and indicated that she was not yet free to go. Jones explained that she had a lot more work to do before the day's end, and then called her supervisor on her cell phone.

Another officer arrived, screamed at her that she hadn't given them enough information, knocked the cell phone out of her hand, handcuffed her, and threw her against the car. The two officers then arrested her for obstructing a police officer and took her down to the station for booking. In her later lawsuit against them, the officers claimed that there was no constitutional violation, because they had reasonable suspicion that Jones was involved in criminal activity and probable cause to arrest her.

Both the district court and now the Circuit Court ruled that, based on these facts, the officers had a "fatal flaw" in their argument - they could not point to a single circumstance that led them to believe that Jones was engaged in criminal activity. It's not a crime to read electrical meters with binoculars.

So now I guess we can add MRWB (meter reading while black) to DWB. And I'm thinking Ms. Jones is going to get a nice hefty settlement check from the Braidwood Police.

4. I subscribe to Worship Leader magazine and thoroughly enjoy it every month. One of my favorite features is Song Discovery - they send me a CD every month with 10-15 songs on it. Mostly new ones, or new covers of old songs. The last one had a wonderful update by Casting Crowns of an old classic. Click here for "Glorious Day." I really like what they've done with it.

5. We watched "How to Train Your Dragon" this last week. That is a thoroughly enjoyable movie! Now I wish I'd seen it in the theater - the flying scenes must have been stunning. After it finished, Addie and Stuart ran off to pretend (one of their favorite pastimes). Sara pointed out that they were far more interested in pretending to be the dragons rather than the Vikings. Well, yeah! I mean, who wouldn't want to pretend to be a dragon rather than a person? :)

6. I'm addicted to Tor's site. They post way too frequently for me to get as much work done as I should.

7. Brown marmorated stink bugs are evil. And disgusting. And ugly. And starting to show up in my office again.

And that's it! Have a wonderful weekend.