Assorted states

Ok, ok, I'll post about the damn state of the union already.

Yes I watched it, yes I was appalled, yes I think I might actually know what the hell he meant by "human/animal hybrids," but only because I'm a big geek. Mostly I just drank wine while listening to him shovel shit for 50 minutes. Between my roommate and myself, we counted about 20 instances of "freedom" and 22 of "terror" or "terrorist" which is actually lower than I expected. I'll give him props for his education initiatives if he actually follows through and comes up with a way to teach kids science and math... I'll give him even more props if he can show me that he can do long division without a calculator.

But here's the really cool part about the speech. You heard that Cindy Sheehan got an invite to the speech, but got arrested in the House chamber? She was wearing a t-shirt that said "2245 dead, how many more?" or something to that effect, and the cops hauled her away when she refused to cover it up because there is a very old law that forbids protest within the Capitol building. Without even going into the irony of this prohibition of free speech in the very center of our democracy, her arrest was total crap. T-shirts with suggestive slogans are not a form of protest that is restricted by any law (remember the kid in Detroit who wore the "Bush = terrorist" shirt that won in court?) and it's very suspicious that DC police, who probably deal with more protesters than any other police department in the country, would not know that distinction.

Ah well. That's not the best part. The reason this story merits a post (like I really need a reason) is because after she got arrested, Sheehan could not get ahold of her lawyer. This in itself isn't that interesting, except that the person she called after giving up on her lawyer turned out to be my constitutional law prof! In his non-law professor life he specializes in first amendment law and apparently has enough notoriety that someone gave Sheehan his number as "the guy" to call when she was in trouble. My prof made a few calls and got her out of jail, and now I get to claim that I'm one degree of separation from Cindy Sheehan... or is it two? I forget, is it zero degrees if you know the person, or if you ARE the person?

This is why I love living in Washington.

Oh, and as another fine example of why I love living in Washington, guess who I got to talk to last night. Bob Woodward. You know, the Woodward of "Woodward and Bernstein" who broke Watergate? Yeah. Not that we had an in-depth exchange or anything, I just got to stand at a mic and ask him a question after he gave a lecture on national security and the Iraq war, but he did tell me that my question was "very well articulated" so I get to brag that I met Bob Woodward and he thinks I'm articulate. Yeah, it's all about spin baby. Maybe I should put that on my resume.

Ok, gotta crash. Sooo much to do this weekend. Apparently there are these "job" thingys that we're supposed to get for the summer and Washington is something of a popular place for law students for some unfathomable reason. Personally I think it's probably the ducks in the reflecting pool.

Right, so where the hell am I now? *looks around* Hmm, I seem to have just gone through some sort of hedge and am now surrounded by trees. Hey! I'm out of the Shire! Which means that I'm... err... in the Old Forest. Aw crap, where the hell did the path go? Damn you entwives and your machinations! Total to date: 75 miles.