Brian

National – Patrick Leahy, Democratic Senator from Vermont, threatened the Bush Administration yesterday with being held in contempt of Congress if certain terms are not met before Senate comes back in session. Leahy is head of the head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which has received no response to subpoenas concerning legal justification for the NSA’s unwarranted wiretapping of terrorist suspects. Leahy, however, stated that he “prefer[s] cooperation to contempt.” There have already been several requests from the White House for more time to present the information, but they haven’t even met their own deadlines. The fear is that some of the people being wiretapped are innocent American citizens, and without a warrant this might be a violation of some of these people’s rights.
Besides giving the Executive Branch a lot of heat, Leahy is also busy with another project. The Dark Knight, the sequel to Batman Begins starring Christian Bale as Batman, will have Senator Leahy starring in a role only known at this point as “the distinguished gentleman.”
Leahy is a big Batman fan, and has already been in Batman Movies, written the preface to a Batman book, and done voiceovers for Batman cartoons. Holy legislature, Batman!



Opinion – I think it does seem irresponsible of the executive branch not to provide the justification for their wiretapping. However, from what I read the problem has more to do with White House Lawyers than it has to do with Bush, though if nothing is done about it, it certainly will not help Bush’s diminished reputation. The idea of the government monitoring my phone calls if I was somehow suspected of terrorism wouldn’t bother me much if I was innocent, unless the people hired to do the monitoring aren’t trustworthy, haven’t been background checked, or something along those lines. But the question of the White House operating in a gray area where they may not have the power to do so does seem to be a problem.
Patrick Leahy, on the other hand, may have a good film career ahead of him. He looks like the perfect stereotype of a politician. I saw him on C-span and he wasn’t too boring to listen to (which is says something when watching a C-span broadcast). The new Batman movie doesn’t look bad either.

International – The magazine Seed: Science is Culture recently put out an article about new Robot Ethic charters in countries such as Japan, South Korea, and in Europe with the European Robotics Research Network (EURON). These charters are meant to deal with possible problems that may arise from the introduction of robots into the marketplace and everyday society. Much like cars or other machines, the use robots may have to be regulated. Other concerns include people’s strong emotional attachment to their robots, called the Eliza Effect. These charters hope to introduce robots into society with more positive results than negative.

Opinion – The day when robots will become a part of everyday life has been predicted by many authors and scientists, but it seems unlikely there will be the mayhem of the created turning against their creators so prevalent in science fiction novels and movies. This is science reality, and though the introduction of robots into society may bring up many ethical questions and concerns, charters like those in Japan and South Korea may help ease the technological jump. Robots, like all technology, will have their advantages and disadvantages. Taking measures like these charters should help in being prepared for the worst, but other obstacles are sure to pop up, and those problems will have to be dealt with when the time comes.