Another Democratic Senate seat threatens to turn Republican.

Senator Frank Lautenberg is 86 years old and diagnosed with stomach cancer:

"We expect a full and complete recovery for Senator Lautenberg. The senator will be treated with chemotherapy administered approximately every three weeks. We anticipate that he will receive between six and eight treatments, and in between treatments, the senator is expected to be back at work in the Senate."...

If Lautenberg's health forces him to resign, it could hurt the Democratic Party. Under New Jersey law, Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, would be able to appoint a replacement if a senator left office.

"The government in the Indian state of Meghalaya has confiscated textbooks showing pictures of Jesus Christ holding a cigarette and a can of beer."

"Jesus Christ is central to Christian faith and Christian life. The attempt to tarnish his image is highly objectionable and goes against the spirit of religious tolerance in India."

Because disrespecting religion is the main problem here. As opposed to: How the hell does such insane nonsense get into a school textbook?

What was the subject to be taught from the book? Cursive writing. Oh, do we even need cursive writing anymore? Come on. Get with it. We don't need cursive writing. We need cigarettes and beer:

Or wine. Jesus was more of a wine advocate.

For Tiger Woods, why is the religion substitute — therapy — preferable to Buddhism?

I'm looking at the transcript of Tiger Woods's remarks:

My behaviour has caused considerable worry to my business partners, to every one involved in my foundation, including my staff, board of directors, sponsors -- and most importantly, the young students we've reached....

"Worry" = financial loss.

... I have made you question who I am and how I have done the things I did. I am embarrassed that I have put you in this position. For all that I have done, I am so sorry.

Yes! How?

... but there is one issue I really want to discuss. Some people have speculated that Elin either hurt or attacked me on Thanksgiving night. It angers me that people would fabricate a story like that. Elin never hit me that night or any other night. There has never been an episode of domestic violence in our marriage. Ever....

People weren't fabricating. They were looking at the evidence, which you brought out into the public sphere with that car wreck, and trying to figure out what it mean. That's not nasty prying. It's ordinary speculation about a mystery that's right in front of our faces.

The issue here was my repeated irresponsible behaviour. I was unfaithful. I had affairs. I cheated. What I did was not acceptable, and I am the only person to blame. I stopped living by the core values that I was taught to believe in.

I knew my actions were wrong, but I convinced myself that normal rules didn't apply. I never thought about who I was hurting; instead, I thought only about myself. I ran straight through the boundaries that married people should live by. I thought I could get away with whatever I wanted to. I felt that I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me. I felt I was entitled. Thanks to money and fame, I didn't have to go far to find them.

Okay. That's how. He thought he was special. (He was!) And he thought he could avoid the rules that applied to ordinary people.

I was wrong. I was foolish. I don't get to play by different rules. The same boundaries that apply to everyone apply to me. I brought this shame on myself. I hurt my wife, my kids, my mother, my wife's family, my friends, my foundation, and kids all around the world who admired me.

I've had a lot of time to think about what I've done. My failures have made me look at myself in a way I never wanted to before. It's now up to me to make amends, and that starts by never repeating the mistakes I've made. It's up to me to start living a life of integrity.....

I owe it to my family to become a better person. I owe it to those closest to me to become a better man. That's where my focus will be. I have a lot of work to do, and I intend to dedicate myself to doing it.

Part of following this path for me is Buddhism, which my mother taught me at a young age. People probably don't realize it, but I was raised a Buddhist and I actively practised my faith from childhood until I drifted away from it in recent years.

Buddhism teaches that a craving for things outside ourselves causes and unhappy and pointless search for security. It teaches me to stop following every impulse and to learn restraint. Obviously I lost track of what I was taught.

As I move forward, I will continue to receive help, because I've learned that's how people really do change.

Starting tomorrow, I will leave for more treatment and more therapy.

So then, not Buddhism, but therapy. The problems will not be understood in terms of his traditional religion, but modern American addiction treatment. Why, exactly? Why is the religion substitute — therapy — preferable to Buddhism?

I would like to thank my friends at Accenture and the players in the field this week....

Did he just win an Oscar?

In therapy, I've learned the importance of looking at my spiritual life and keeping it in balance with my professional life. I need to regain my balance and be centered so I can save the things that are most important to me — my marriage and my children. 

Spiritual life, balance, centering... therapy displaces and partakes of religion.

I do plan to return to gold one day....

An amusing typo.

Finally, there are many people in this room and there are many people at home who believed in me. Today, I want to ask for your help. I ask you to find room in your heart to one day believe in me again.

Believe in him... The echoes of religion are everywhere.

At the Cute Conversation Café...

... the talk is highly animated.

The photo is a detail of a painting called "Personages with Star," by Joan Miró (1933):


(Enlarge.)

"[I]nvasion of the home has been approved based on no showing whatsoever. Nada. Gar nichts. Rien du tout. Bupkes."

"No other circuit allows entry into the home on less than reasonable suspicion," writes 9th Circuit Chief Judge Alex Kozinski, in United States v. Lemus (PDF)

Plain view is killing the Fourth Amendment. Because our plain-view case law is so favorable to the police, they have a strong incentive to maneuver into a position where they can find things in plain view, or close enough to lie about it.

... There was absolutely no reason for the detectives to enter [Lemus's house] except to try to find contraband in "plain view." So, the detectives went in and, while there, Diaz thought he saw "something sticking out from the couch" that "looked like the butt of a weapon." Longoria then lifted the couch cushion "to make sure" and found a gun. Under what theory of "plain view" may police lift cushions off a couch to make sure something is contraband? Why weren't the officers required to get a warrant — if they could — based on what they saw, before rummaging through the couch?

"I ate too much fried food, too much ice cream, too much everything."

Says Bill Clinton. To which I say "ahem."

IN THE COMMENTS: EDH said, "Jennifer Flowers, in her first tell-all interview with Penthouse, said 'he ate pussy like a champ!'" Heh. The chimp could chomp like a champ.

Who was that woman sitting in front row center who would not look at Tiger Woods as he made his apology?

Oh! He hugged her. It was his mother!

I'm waiting for the full transcript, because I'm in the mood to pick it apart, especially the material about Buddhism, which, he said, is the religion he was raised in, which teaches not to pursue desire, and which he drifted away from. Indeed! So he wants to get back to Buddhism — he said, as his mother looked down into her folded hands in her lap and then off to the side. He wants to return to Buddhism, but he's going back to therapy. Why not to a Buddhist retreat, if Buddhism is the answer? Or was he just throwing things at us that he thought might work to make us love him again? Buddhism, therapy, leave my children alone...

Deep down, what does he really believe? If I were writing a fictionalized version of his story, I'd have him believe that he is the greatest golfer of all time and that this grand stature authorizes him to do what fits his fabulous mind and body. People get to see the manifestation of that mind and body on the golf course and in those idealized advertisements, but outside of that he must do what has worked, and that means having the anchor of a beautiful family and the whole range of intense sexuality that belongs to him — because he is what he is. Now, he's been called to account by conventional minds and all those people who make money through him — the PGA, the sports networks, advertisers — and they are dragging him down to their mundane morality with no concern for what it took to build the superior mind and body that is Tiger Woods. He is cornered and contemptuous, but he must abase himself for these little people and act as though he agrees. The outrage!

IN THE COMMENTS: dbp quotes the linked CNN article — "'I know I have bitterly disappointed all of you,' said the golfer, dressed in a blue button-down shirt and a blazer" — and says:

Can we take a closer look at his shirt? The resolution of the video was not high enough for me to detect button holes on Mr. Woods collar, but I could easily see that it wasn't buttoned down . What does this mean? He wears a button down shirt but leaves it flapping in the breeze — maybe his emotions are making him miss details. I think he should stay off the links for a while more.

Either that, or the reporter was mistaken about the type of shirt.

What does it mean? It means you can't trust CNN to report even the plain facts that are visible on screen to us here at home.

UPDATE: I go through the transcript here.