Update: Dr. Robert Atkins died today, April 17, 2003. R.I.P.

Very Off-topic for us:

We received the following report on the condition of Dr. Robert Atkins, founder of the very popular Atkins Diet. We know his diet is controversial, but no one can doubt that Dr. Atkins dedicated his career and much of his life to it. This senseless accident saddens us and reminds us of how fragile life can be.

It is with deep sadness that we must advise you that as of today Dr. Atkins remains gravely ill, in a coma and on life support. As most of you know, on his way to work Tuesday morning following the late-season snowstorm, Dr. Atkins fell on the slippery sidewalk in front of The Atkins Center. He suffered a major blow to his head and has not recovered from surgery to remove a blood clot from his brain. His physician reports that Dr. Atkins' chances of a meaningful recovery are slim. Nonetheless, we are hoping for a miracle and every measure possible is being considered to save his life.

Here is his final column on the evils of sugar, which he put the finishing touches on the night before his accident. As a substitute, Dr. Atkins recommends drinking tea. Tea is healthy for your heart.

Tea and Your Heart The impressive cardiovascular benefits of tea have been shown by a number of recent scientific studies. The well-known Zutphen Elderly Study, for instance, which followed a large group of older men in the Netherlands from 1985 through 1995 showed that the men who drank the most tea also had the fewest incidents of heart disease and stroke. Similar results have been reported from a number of other studies. In a 1999 study of men and women in the Boston area, for instance, the participants who drank at least one cup of tea a day had a 44-percent lower risk of a heart attack than those who drank no tea.

We're going to have a cup now and hope for a miracle for Dr. Atkins.

The owner of the internet domain name "Felons.Com" is auctioning it off on Ebay. Details here. We hope it's bought by someone with a progressive agenda who wants to use it for something like helping former inmates get jobs or regain the right to vote, rather than by some right-wing group that wants to make money off it by using it as some kind of offender registry. If you know of someone who might be interested, please forward them the ebay link.

Denver International Airport Remains Closed

Denver International Airport (DEN) was officially closed at 1:30 a.m. on Wednesday, March 19, 2003, and remains closed at this time. Weather conditions are evolving. Airport personnel, concessionaires, airline personnel and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) are working together to ensure the safety of all stranded passengers and to provide adequate customer comfort.

Due to a tear in the outer layer of the tent roof, all passengers have been relocated from the center of the Terminal, or what is commonly referred to as the Great Hall, into the outer edges of the Terminal. Because of potential safety issues with the tear in the outer layer of the tent roof, all concessions in the Terminal have been closed. Passengers needing concessions and food may go to Concourse B where several concessions have reopened.
The TSA has worked diligently to process security checks with minimum personnel to allow passenger access to Concourse B where concessions are open. The TSA has rapidly responded to changing needs and is working with airport officials to provide customer service.

DEN would like to thank all stranded passengers who have remained calm and very understanding during this major spring storm which has essentially shut down the entire city.

Via A Moveable Beast , check out the Age Gauge--we had no idea we were too old for.....or we were so young when.....

Here's another more political one, one for tv lovers and this last one for movie buffs.

Chelsea Clinton has accepted a job with pay in the six figure range. She'll be working in the New York office of London-based McKinsey & Company as a consultant, researching topics ranging from health care to corporate finance.

We never saw or heard Mr. Rogers on television. But after reading Jeanne D'Arc of Body and Soul today, we're sorry we didn't. She's written a beautiful and heartfelt tribute.

Terry Jones, founding member of Monty Python, writes that like President Bush, he's losing patience. [link via criminal defense attorney Dennis Roberts, Oakland, CA)

We just saw our last perfect beachside sunset for a while, and are on our way out for a last Mexican feast--we have to say, Cancun has been great, perfect weather, incredibly coral blue waters, a hotel out of a story book, and lots of comraderie among the criminal defense folks who traveled down. Yes it was a long way, the timing could have been better (it felt a little weird going off to an idyllic setting while as a nation we sit poised to go to war at any moment), but four days of sand, sunsets guacamole and friends were a great tension reliever.

Many think the criminal defense bar are all of one view. As to crime, we are. But not as to war. Several of the staunchest defenders in the country think we ought to take out Hussein as soon as possible--a greater number are hesitant, but inclined one way or the other. At the other extreme, are the pacifists, and they are not all holdovers of the 60's.

One item of interest was the pharmacies. Non-psychotropic drugs that are prescription in the US are over- the- counter here, and according to the pharmacies, legal to take back to the U.S. It was suggested to us that we buy cipro and amoxicillian while we were here. We asked why we would do that, couldn't we just call our doctor when we got home if we needed it? The answer was, "What if your Doctor's dead?" A pretty extreme but sobering thought. We wrestled with that for a few hours, and a group of us went over to the pharmacy to check it out. So, better to be "Chicken Little" and be "safe than sorry?" Or to say, forget it, if it happens it happens, you can't guard against all the possibilities. Some of the group bought the pills, some didn't. We didn't. But we definitely had a moment's pause there.

We'll be back posting at our regular pace Monday night.

Law Prof Eric Muller of IsThatLegal?, who has been following the Howard Coble/Japanese internment camp controversy, has an oped today in the News and Oberserver-- Coble gets real history really wrong:

This is not some petty academic dispute about a historical footnote. Since Sept. 11, 2001, we have been struggling to preserve our safety while also preserving our freedoms and protecting the rights of the millions of good Americans of Arab ancestry and Muslim faith. Coble's dismissive comments about the largest-scale American human rights violation of the 20th century bear directly on his commitment -- and his ability -- to avoid another one in the 21st.

Good riddance to the celebrity recordings in New York City taxis. They were almost as awful as the Dell commericials.

Law Professor Glenn Reynolds has some thoughts on what direction the space debate should take us in his new Tech News Column. One of the courses he teaches is Space Law, so we give him extra credibility on the issue. He says,

the public debate should be on how to move ahead with an ambitious space program without committing ourselves to another big, bureaucratic program like the Space Shuttle, which never really took us where we wanted to go. Instead, we need to find ways to unleash the energies of the private sector, and to allow industries like space tourism to play a bigger role. It's capitalism that lowers costs, not government programs.....

A twenty-first century NASA should focus on new space launch technologies (including such "breakthrough" technologies as laser launch and scramjets), on interplanetary exploration (which won't have a commercial market for a while) and on other things that the private sector can't do. Those things that the private sector can do, like launching things to low-earth orbit, should be left to the private sector.....

I say that the debate will be over how to move ahead, rather than whether to move ahead, because I think that's how most Americans feel. As of Sunday afternoon, the email for my MSNBC site was running hundreds-to-one in favor of going on with an ambitious space program (and I mean literally "one" - I got only one email saying that we should just give up on space and stay home, and it was from a Canadian).

Count us in as one of the hundreds-to-one who want to see an ambitious space program.

We're bumping Activism Job Openings up from Friday -- and note, it pays real money:

"From time to time, we read blogs whose authors mention they are looking for work. This was in our inbox today, and we thought we'd share it. But for the fact that we already have a quite demanding day job, we'd be tempted.

Currently, there are two full-time job openings at the Marijuana Policy Project in Washington, D.C.:

* Director of State Policies, who will develop and manage all of MPP's state-based campaigns, including overseeing all lobbying activities, hiring and managing campaign managers for state ballot initiatives, coordinating public education campaigns, including press strategies, and managing MPP's State Policies Department staff and interns.

* Legislative Analyst, who will monitor marijuana-related legislation in the states, maintain MPP's state Web pages, write and e-mail legislative alerts to MPP members, and assist the Director of State Policies with research and analysis.

Please do not reply to this message with questions, and no phone calls, please. Instead, please go here for complete job descriptions and application guidelines. We are accepting resumes until February 7, and we will interview selected applicants from February 3 to 14. Positions will begin on approximately March 3 (but this is flexible).

Both positions are in our Capitol Hill office in Washington, D.C., which is conveniently located near the Union Station Metro stop on the Red Line. Both positions require exceptional written and oral communication skills, professional appearance, and political/policy experience.

Sincerely,

Rob Kampia
Executive Director
Marijuana Policy Project
Washington, D.C.

We (TalkLeft) have no further information, so no need to email us rather than going directly to the MPP's website. We can say that we have known and worked on issues with Mr. Kampia for many years and we are very impressed with his dedication and talent."