Reason articles from January 2004

Reason archives from January 2004

The myth of media monopoly.(Editor's Note)(Editorial)
January 1, 2004... LET ME APOLOGIZE in advance for any nightmares induced by this month's cover image. And let me apologize to dominatrices, too, for linking them to as controversial and (in some circles) disreputable a figure as Rupert Murdoch. Yet the...

Liberty Belle.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
January 1, 2004... Libertarian means different things to different people, but Sabine Herold, the young self-proclaimed Franco-libertarian profiled by Matt Welch ("Liberty Belle," October) seems a bit confused on one of the most basic tenets of libertarianism: a...

Bipartisan Coulterism.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
January 1, 2004... It is unusual for me to find fault with the logic of Cathy Young ("Bipartisan Coulterism," October), but for her to use the much criticized (by conservatives) Ann Coulter as a representative of conservatism while underplaying the influence of...

Denial of Service.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
January 1, 2004... Julian Sanchez's characterization of AmeriCorps ("Denial of Service," October) rang true. As a member of AmeriCorps' Teach for America program, I received a $40,000 per year living stipend in addition to the $4,000 in tuition reimbursement....

St. Martha.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
January 1, 2004... Michael McMenamin's article, "St. Martha" (October), displayed a level of bias and a lack of perspective rare for this magazine. While I don't relish Martha Stewart's trials and tribulations, it's a stretch to paint her as a saint martyred at...

Snow job: anti-cokehead discrimination.(Citings)(case argues that addicts qualify as disabled)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... JOEL HERNANDEZ WANTS his old job back, and employers and addicts across the country may have a stake in whether he gets it. Fired from Hughes Missile Systems (now Raytheon) in 1991 when he tested positive for cocaine, Hernandez, who also...

WiFoes: radio signals make waves.(Citings)
January 1, 2004... THE BOARD OF School District 97 in Oak Park, Illinois, thought installing wireless computer networks in elementary school classrooms was progressive and cutting edge. But in an action that may soon be emulated elsewhere, three sets of parents...

30 years ago in reason.(Citings)
January 1, 2004... "For government officials... there should be no right to privacy or confidentiality whatever. And so: no bugging and no compulsory testimony for private citizens; but strip our rulers bare." --Murray N. Rothbard, "Privacy, or the 'Right...

Shots in the dark: gun control's shaky foundation.(Citings)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... YOU MIGHT THINK it's big news when a panel of experts appointed by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), usually a gun control booster, concludes there's no good evidence that legal restrictions on firearms do what they're...

Chipped beef: outsourcers against outsourcing.(Citings)(computer industry)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... THE CHAIRMAN OF computer chip maker Intel has a problem with high-tech companies sending jobs overseas. Andy Grove thinks the problem is so big that the federal government should get involved with a proto--industrial policy for technology. But...

Quotes.
January 1, 2004... "Bush told his senior aides Tuesday that he 'didn't want to see any stories' quoting unnamed administration officials in the media anymore... said a senior administration official who asked that his name not be used." --The Philadelphia...

Source.(American approval rating)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... American ideals are popular around the world--America itself, not so much. That's the broad portrait painted by the Views of a Changing World 2003 survey conducted by the Pew Research Center for People and the Press, which measured the opinions...

Mile Novakovic was convicted in absentia by Croatia for war crimes in 1995.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... Mile Novakovic was convicted in absentia by Croatia for war crimes in 1995. He was finally apprehended this year. That's when authorities figured out they'd tried and convicted the wrong man. They meant to convict a higher-ranking soldier with...

Paris High School's marching band had an ambitious idea for a half-time show.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... Paris High School's marching band had an ambitious idea for a half-time show. "Visions of World War Two" presented flags and music from each of the warring nations. For Germany, the Texas school's band played "Deutschland uber Alles" while the...

When Chilean authorities found white powder in Fernando Vasquez's luggage, he told them it was talcum for his feet.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... When Chilean authorities found white powder in Fernando Vasquez's luggage, he told them it was talcum for his feet. A field test for drugs came back negative, but they jailed him anyway. He spent two months there before they got around to doing...

Brandon Kivi and his girlfriend, Andra Ferguson, have a lot in common, including using the same type of asthma inhaler.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... Brandon Kivi and his girlfriend, Andra Ferguson, have a lot in common, including using the same type of asthma inhaler. So when Ferguson began having breathing problems and found she'd forgotten her inhaler, Kivi let her use his. Her mother...

Limo fleet owner Daniel Steiner may lose his taxi license.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... Limo fleet owner Daniel Steiner may lose his taxi license. Did he overcharge customers? Drive an unsafe rig? No. Tampa, Florida, authorities say he wasn't making enough money. The law requires a minimum $40 fare, and Steiner allegedly was...

Rap-rock band Linkin Park will play Malaysia ... on a few conditions.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... Rap-rock band Linkin Park will play Malaysia... on a few conditions. "Male artists must cover their bodies from the chest to knee level," the Ministry of Culture and Arts said. "The artist must not display rough, raunchy actions that conflict...

The Mexican government, which owns the name brand Tequila, is considering requiring that all tequila be bottled in Mexico.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... The Mexican government, which owns the name brand Tequila, is considering requiring that all tequila be bottled in Mexico. Not surprisingly, American bottlers see this as an attempt to take their business away and give it to Mexican firms.

Britain's Department of Health has decided to postpone the introduction of a new treatment for macular degeneration, which causes blindness in the elderly.(Brickbats)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... Britain's Department of Health has decided to postpone the introduction of a new treatment for macular degeneration, which causes blindness in the elderly. Advocates for the blind say the delay is a cynical attempt to ration the new treatment,...

The blurry blue line: cops and crooks in cahoots.(Citings)
January 1, 2004... RETIRED G-MAN H. Paul Rico made headlines in October when he was arrested for his alleged role in the 1981 murder of businessman Roger Wheeler. Before leaving the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 1975, Rico had been one of the driving forces...

Barbarians inside the gates: 'essential' literature goes nobrow.(Citings)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... WHAT DOES A list of the "100 greatest novels of all time" look like in the post-middlebrow age? Britain's Observer assembled such a list in October, mixing exemplars of the traditional great-lit canon (Cervantes, Kafka, Proust, Joyce, Tolstoy,...

Balance sheet.
January 1, 2004... Base Motivation Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld wants to close about one-quarter of the nation's 425 military bases. Army bases without quick-deployment forces are almost certain to be shut down. J-Lo Blow When Jennifer Lopez...

Rose-colored calculators.(Data)
January 1, 2004... Advocates of Medicare and Social Security reform have long complained that fuzzy accounting makes the programs appear to be more fiscally sound than they are. The trustees of both programs focus on the average actuarial balance over time,...

Fund transfer protocol: states eye Internet sales.(Citings)(Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Act)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... THE PRINCIPLES OF federalism embodied in the Constitution are more than a vital check on overweening power; they're a great source of online discounts. Because Congress has power over interstate commerce, the courts have thus far ruled...

The no-Kobe zone: competitive negligence.(Citings)
January 1, 2004... IN OCTOBER, THE Aspen Daily News announced with great haughtiness that it was no longer going to participate in the journalistic frenzy of the nearby Kobe Bryant trial. The Colorado paper sniffed that "there are stories out there that need to...

Seed case: hemp food ban.(Citings)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... FIRST THE DRUG Enforcement Administration tried to ban hemp foods by claiming they've been illegal for three decades; it's just that no one (including the DEA) noticed until recently. In June the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit...

Raw deal.(Soundbite)(Interview)
January 1, 2004... Franklin Delano Roosevelt is widely credited with saving America from economic ruin. But Jim Powell's new book, FDR'S Folly: How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression (Crown Forum), promises to send FDR's inflated reputation...

If you build it, they will leave: sports teams fleece the taxpayer, again.(Columns)
January 1, 2004... ON THE SAME day the Florida Marlins paraded through Miami to celebrate their second World Series championship in six years, politicians from Miami-Dade County swallowed the young baseball team's corporate welfare bait. County Mayor Alex...

Kobe's rights: rape, justice, and double standards.(Columns)
January 1, 2004... KOBE BRYANT'S ALLEGED sexual assault has generated the usual media circus that follows criminal charges against professional athletes, especially for sex crimes. But even with all its tawdry details, the case raises some serious issues about...

The impossible stream: the war on DVD users.(Rant)
January 1, 2004... WADING THROUGH A dozen ads before I even reach the menu screen of the new Lion King DVD, preschoolers screaming all the way, I vowed to throttle Disney capo Michael Eisner. Foolish me. Little did I know that the guy I really want is James...

"... Or don't you care?" Logical proposals for taxing away all of society's ills.
January 1, 2004... IF PEOPLE ARE WILLING TO PAY $3 FOR A LATTE, THEY OUGHT TO BE WILLING TO PAY AN ADDITIONAL 10 CENTS TAX FOR PRESCHOOL EDUCATION... JUST AS ANYONE WHO'LL PAY $100 FOR A PAIR OF RUNNING SHOES SHOULD ALSO PAY FOR RESEARCH INTO GLOBAL WARMING...

Domination fantasies: does Rupert Murdoch control the media? Does anyone?
January 1, 2004... A COLLEGE PRESIDENT once told me, "I've never seen a pancake so thin it didn't have two sides." The hype and noise surrounding the Federal Communications Commission's proposed relaxation of broadcast outlet ownership rules have made the...

Marihuana: just say no again: the old failures of new and improved anti-drug education.
January 1, 2004... I'M AT THE February 2001 Teens at the Table conference, a feel-good event sponsored by a coalition of Los Angeles youth organizations and high schools. It's designed to boost self-esteem and teach teenagers how to make smart decisions. In one...

Cybergreen: Bruce Sterling on media, design, fiction, and the future.
January 1, 2004... IN THE 1980s, Bruce Sterling became a leader of the "cyberpunk" revolution--a literary movement that combined the artistic ambition of science fiction's 1960s New Wave with the hard-core speculation associated with Verne, Wells, Heinlein, and...

Found objects: what archaeologists can gain from markets, or lose by ignoring them.(Culture and Reviews)
January 1, 2004... THE INITIAL REPORTS from Iraq last spring confirmed the worst fears of archaeologists around the world. Warnings and pleas about safeguarding important cultural sites had gone unheeded. With coalition forces still struggling to accomplish key...

Uncritical masses: was the public too stupid to oppose the war in Iraq?(Book Review)
January 1, 2004... Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq, by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber, New York: J.P. Tarcher, 176 pages, $11.95 WAS THE PUBLIC "deceived" into supporting the war in Iraq? Did President George W. Bush...

Welcome back, Napster: all power to the audience.
January 1, 2004... Here's a special reason to be happy that Napster, the notorious outlaw file-sharing system that took a long, court-ordered hiatus, has returned as a major-label-backed enterprise offering single-track downloads for 99 cents. The new--some might...

Self delusions: does morality require a soul?(Book Review)
January 1, 2004... The Problem of the Soul: Two Visions of Mind and How to Reconcile Them, by Owen Flanagan, New York: Basic Books, 364 pages, $27.50 HUMANISTS HAVE ALWAYS eyed science a bit warily. Just over a century after the 1687 publication of Newton's...

Postal pranksters: counterfeit stamps as art.
January 1, 2004... A FEW YEARS ago in Turkey, the Chicago artist Michael Thompson and a friend were arrested for venturing too close to the Armenian border. The authorities weren't sure why anyone would go so far into the Kurdish zone, let alone some Americans...

Webcam in the round.(Artifact)(Brief Article)
January 1, 2004... BEHOLD THE THOLOS, where the webcam meets the circular, painted panorama of the 19th century. The device, which features a 23-foot wraparound screen some 10 feet high, works in pairs: People gathered at one Tholos can see real-time, life-size...

Economic growth--the essence of sustainable development.
January 1, 2004... Thirty years ago, a group of academics known as the Club of Rome put forth the "limits to growth" theory, predicting disaster for humankind unless natural resource--depleting economic and technological progress were abandoned. This...