Read the story here...

I'll probably post some analysis tonight or tomorrow. What's clear is that the court ruled under the California constitution, not the federal constitution.

Along with some hilarious Colbert commentary:

Well, I went to the polls at about 10 a.m. and did the deed. As is usual for my polling place, especially in non-peak hours, there was basically nobody there except for me. I asked one of the poll workers about turnout, though, and he did say it seemed a bit higher than normal.

However, the story appears to be different in Indianapolis, where according to officials turnout is extremely heavy--comparable to general election participation.

Also of note is that in certain areas of Indianapolis, Republican crossovers seem to be very very heavy. In one precinct that went Republican in the last election, only a small fraction of the ballots requested today were GOP. I'm not sure which candidate that bodes best for overall, but at least in one of the neighborhoods mentioned, based on the demographic there, I see the votes going for Obama.

This is the feared toll from Cyclone Nargis, which struck the nation on Saturday. Many of the casualties are a result from the massive storm surge which flooded the delta region that was directly hit.

This is a sober reminder of the great tragedy that can befall humanity. Puts high gas prices, home foreclosures, and the latest political scandals in perspective, wouldn't you say?

Back on April 16 I discussed the role Indiana would play in the Democratic Party's nomination process, and I explained why I thought the Hoosier State would not be a slam dunk for Hillary.

Now nearly 3 weeks have passed since that post, and the attention has been firmly on the state. My family has been called twice by pollsters, twice by the campaigns, and a few times by PACs. We've also received multiple pieces of primary-related mail.

Obama's campaign seems more organized and energetic. His operatives have been on the streets passing out literature and schmoozing. His momentum has taken a hit here, though, as the polls have shown, most likely because of the continued flap over his ex-pastor.

So what's the outlook for tomorrow? My guess is that Hillary takes it, but by a margin less than 5%. Here's a few interesting notes that might impact the outcome:

- Obama appeared for the full hour on "Meet the Press" on Sunday. The show, done live from Indianapolis, trumped Hillary's appearance on "This Week" by many fold.

- Many churches in Indianapolis organized an early voting drive, tallying over 1600 votes. Despite the supposedly non-partisan nature of the voting drive, speculation is that Obama will benefit the most.

- Lots of Republicans in Hamilton County (northern suburbs of Indianapolis) are asking for early ballots. This trend undoubtedly will repeat itself on election day and in other suburbs of Indy. What is unclear is what this means for the results. Could it be that this area, which is composed of numerous affluent whites, will contribute to the national trend of Republicans switching to vote for Obama in surprising numbers? Or is it a result of Rush Limbaugh's "Operation Chaos"?

The interesting thing about Indiana is that nobody seems to be that confident in predicting how the different areas of the state will vote. When we look at how Clinton and Obama have split the demographics, Indiana provides an example of diversity that makes prediction difficult. I'll have more on this following the primary.

A good analogy to politics... (hat-tip In the Agora)

The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld Indiana's law requiring voters to show photo identification. In short, the court held that the law did not impose an unreasonable burden on potential voters and that the state's interest in limiting voter fraud is legitimate.

Interestingly, the court did not speak through a clear majority opinion. Rather, the 6 justices voting to uphold the law split into two groups of 3 writing separate opinions. One opinion was written by Justice Stevens and joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy. The other was written by Justice Scalia and joined by Justices Thomas and Alito. The court's liberals (minus Stevens) voted in dissent.

Maybe if I'm motivated, I'll read the opinions and type up a post on the legal reasoning.

The National Review has now added their opinion against the use of corn-based ethanol for fuel, joining a growing chorus.

Their main argument against corn-based ethanol is its impact on the price of food.

The writing is on the wall. This alternative fuel's days are numbered. It's not a question of if it will be abandoned, but how long it takes our government to move beyond the influence of the corn farmers lobbying efforts. Having Iowa so early in the primary season doesn't help matters.

You may be surprised to learn that it's the founder of Greenpeace.

His reason is based on combatting global warming. Also interesting is his conclusion that there is insufficient proof that humans are causing global warming. He, however, does feel there is a large enough probability that we are the cause that we should take steps to avoid the gamble.

I will tell you it does not get more fun than these debates. They are inspiring debates. I think last night we set a new record because it took us 45 minutes before we even started talking about a single issue that matters to the American people...

Now, I don’t blame Washington for this because that’s just how Washington is. They like stirring up controversies and getting us to play gotcha games and getting us to attack each other. And I’ve got to say Sen. Clinton looked in her element.

[Emphasis mine. Read the article here]

So let's get get this straight, shall we Barack? In the same sentence you both criticize negative "Washington"-style politics, and then practice those very politics against Hillary Clinton. The hypocrisy seems blatant.

Local city councils in England have cancelled their celebration of St. George's Day, stating fear of Muslim riots as the reason. According to the article, local officials feared a repeat of the riots that struck in 2001 that left 300 people injured.

In this story we see a perfect microcosm of the challenge that faces the civilized world.

St. George is the patron saint of England (as well as many other nations and peoples), and now many there will not be able to celebrate his feast day because of a gutless surrender to the tyranny of radical Islam.

As is characteristic of radical Islam, the opposition to St. George is based on ignorance. As this article points out, St. George is not a crusader as some people believe. They are mistaking him with another George. Finally, St. George actually is celebrated by numerous Muslims in Lebanon, where he grew up.

But since when did truth and reason influence the radicals and their apologists?

The future of domestic ethanol production is cellulose not corn. Unfortunately, Indiana and many other states will continue to push corn-based ethanol until the bottom of it falls out.

See the full text of his address before the UN today...

In today's address, Pope Benedict analogizes the community of nations--embodied in the UN--to a family. He says that the Church follows with interest and believes the UN's mission reflects humanity's propensity towards good. Yet again the Pope brings us back to his vision of freedom:

In the context of international relations, it is necessary to recognize the higher role played by rules and structures that are intrinsically ordered to promote the common good, and therefore to safeguard human freedom. These regulations do not limit freedom. On the contrary, they promote it when they prohibit behaviour and actions which work against the common good, curb its effective exercise and hence compromise the dignity of every human person.

In the name of freedom, there has to be a correlation between rights and duties, by which every person is called to assume responsibility for his or her choices, made as a consequence of entering into relations with others.

The Pope focused on 3 roles the UN plays: emphasizing the responsibility of nations to protect their citizens, creating rules and guidelines to protect the environment, and finally creating guidelines to protect human dignity. He expands on the matter of human dignity:

Now, as then, this principle has to invoke the idea of the person as image of the Creator, the desire for the absolute and the essence of freedom. The founding of the United Nations, as we know, coincided with the profound upheavals that humanity experienced when reference to the meaning of transcendence and natural reason was abandoned, and in consequence, freedom and human dignity were grossly violated.

Generally Benedict spoke favorably of the UN's actions in regards to human dignity, but he also presented a challenge that faces the UN (could be interpreted as a criticism in a different light):

[Human rights] are based on the natural law inscribed on human hearts and present in different cultures and civilizations. Removing human rights from this context would mean restricting their range and yielding to a relativistic conception, according to which the meaning and interpretation of rights could vary and their universality would be denied in the name of different cultural, political, social and even religious outlooks. This great variety of viewpoints must not be allowed to obscure the fact that not only rights are universal, but so too is the human person, the subject of those rights....

Experience shows that legality often prevails over justice when the insistence upon rights makes them appear as the exclusive result of legislative enactments or normative decisions taken by the various agencies of those in power. When presented purely in terms of legality, rights risk becoming weak propositions divorced from the ethical and rational dimension which is their foundation and their goal.

Thus Pope Benedict affirms that rights spring from natural law and not from the mere enactment of men. This, I believe, he says is to be considered as a cautionary principle to individual nations and to the United Nations itself.

A 5.2 magnitude earthquake, with epicenter in southeastern Illinois, struck this morning. It was the first earthquake I've ever felt. Not a big deal, but it was disorienting to be awoken by it. While 5.2 isn't a big magnitude, quake energy travels more efficiently through midwestern soil, so it can be felt more intensely over a much larger distance. This quake, small by California standards, was felt in 7 states and even caused structural damage to a building in Louisville.



So now for a little bit of midwestern earthquake trivia... The midwest does not include any plate boundaries like the west coast, so seismic zones here are a result from older buried faults (in a sense, this is how I've seen it explained). This earthquake was in a region called the Wabash Valley Seismic Zone, which is related to but not part of the more famous New Madrid Fault. The New Madrid Fault lies at the borders of Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Illinois, and it southeast of the Wabash zone.

Earthquakes have occurred several times before in the Wabash zone, with 5.4 being the biggest recorded. The New Madrid, on the other hand, was responsible for some of the nation's most famous and destructive earthquakes. Click here for more information on the geology and history of the New Madrid Fault and associated earthquakes.