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Homicide: Toronto vs. Chicago

I’ve written about this before, but it’s worth a second telling. Besides, how many of you read footnote #14 to the Epilogue of Cop in the Hood? Chicago and Toronto are similar sized cities. Chicago is having a record low number of murders; Toronto is having a record high number of murders. Chicago is patting itself on the back; Toronto…

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Maybe it’s not such a crazy idea…

Here’s me defending flogging for my favorite TV news show, the NewsHour. It’s very interesting that the option of flogging over prison currently registers over 70% support in their online poll. This mirrors the earlier newser survey in which 63% percent thought is was “brilliant” and another 13% found it “intriguing” (20% clicked in one of the negative categories).

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Live Free

Presidential hopeful and former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson calls (once again) for

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What is wrong the C.J. system

There’s very little that strikes me as more absurd than offering or accepting a guilty plea for time served. It represents so much about what’s wrong with the criminal justice system. And that’s a lot. If you’re guilty, then it’s a travesty of justice because you get to go home. If you’re innocent, it’s an even worse travesty. But you…

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Twin Cities?

The current and first issue of the new food magazine Lucky Peach has an article about yakamee in New Orleans. This further supports my belief that Baltimore and New Orleans were siblings separated at birth. Yakamee is a crappy Chinese take-out noodle dish. I ordered it once, to the amazement of the woman behind the plexiglas and pretty much every…

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“I’m expressin’ with my full capabilities…”

The Timesand a grim read about a boy with mental problems, gone bad. It’s interesting but in all-too-many ways nothing new. But what struck me was this great example of doublespeak: Mr. Clergeau was discharged … with the expectation that he would be imprisoned. Hospital authorities told the state police that he was “not a psych patient,” which appears to…

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“Outraging the Modesty”

From the Singapore Straits Times: A Briton on a visit here was charged on Friday with outraging the modesty of a 30-year-old woman in a Clarke Quay club. Austin Charles Arnold Cowburn, 34, is alleged to have grabbed her buttock in the China One pub at 4am on April 3 2011. AOL Travel adds: The maximum sentence for the crime…

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In Defense of Tenure

Three cheers for actor Matt Damon! You know, Matt and I have a lot in common. Both our mothers are retired school teachers. Both of us went to school in Cambridge, Mass. And both of us are devilishly good looking! But seriously, both of us know that the answer to bad teaching is not job insecurity. You go, Matt! While…

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