EXCERPTS FROM READER COMMENTS

THE GATES CASE: WHAT THE MEDIA DIDN'T NOTICE

According to this from Slate, Lindorf is incorrect when he says officer self identification is a nationally uniform requirement. It's up to the states or the individual depts:

"Yes. Massachusetts law requires police officers to carry identification cards and present them upon request. Officers are also required to wear a "badge, tag, or label" with their name and/or identifying number. The law is aimed at precisely the situation in question - suspects who feel their rights are being violated. Few other states impose this requirement on their officers as a matter of law, but many individual police departments, such as the New York Police Department, have adopted it as a matter of policy."

AND JESUS WAS BORN IN DALLAS

If the Republic of Texas has the legal right to succeed from the Union, does it follow that we have the legal option to kick them out? And build a wall? - -DaTheorist

BASEBALL BECOMES RESEGREGATED

My girls have participated in the RBI league mentioned in the article for two years. Our neighborhood is majority-minority, but the local league is 70-80% white. On the RBI league, the teams from the black parts of town are consistently the weakest in the league. I doubt they have a local league at all, and the RBI teams are the only place they can play ball. They will have a couple excellent players with no backup, and they get visibly discouraged by losing every game. Baseball takes time to learn, it takes a large group to play as there is not much small group activity, it takes a committed parent especially a father who is over-interested in sports. Our city economy does not serve the poor black marginal neighborhoods and baseball is one more example of that.

SWAT GONE MAD

The original basis of English law, from which much of our system was inherited, was that it was better for a a thousand guilty murderers to go free than for one innocent person to be convicted. This set the bar for police and judicial behavior very high.

In practice, our current system is the exact opposite. It's better to spy on, trash the homes of, murder the pets and relatives of, and/or convict a thousand innocent people than to have a single person get away with possessing a joint. - Fool of Eris

WONDERS OF OBAMA'S HEALTH PLAN UPDATE

I live in British Columbia and medical premiums for a family of three or more work out to just under $1300 a year (although I'm pretty sure I feel oppressed under the heel of this socialism).