Google on April 1 (so I hope this is no joke) will start rolling out its new free email. It isn’t clear from reports when then service will be available, Cnet says testing started for 1000 users on Wednesday, and the NY Times says that the service is scheduled to be released on Thursday, and Infoworld says that the service will be available to the general public in weeks or months. The service is called Gmail and unlike Hotmail measly 2 megabytes of storage space, or Yahoo’s slightly better 4 megabytes of storage space, Gmail will offer a 1 gigabyte limit! Make sure to sign up quickly to reserve the email address you want.

EUobserver observes that “EU funds to the Palestinian Authority (PA) had been misused – that between 21,500-39,000 US dollars of EU funds may have been transferred to terrorists.” Are we surprised?

Thanks to LGF.

After seeing pictures of what the animals in Falluja did to the bodies of the people they killed, I am sick and angry. As Yahoo news reports, “As the victims lay burning, a crowd of around 150 men chanted

George Will fisks Richard Clarke in today’s Washington Post. Will writes:

Combating terrorism was only “important” to the Bush administration (by the eighth day Clarke was calling the Bush administration “lackadaisical” about terrorism), whereas for the Clinton administration it was “urgent” — “no higher a priority.” Except when it wasn’t. When Clarke recommended “a series of rolling attacks” against al Qaeda’s “infrastructure in Afghanistan,” his recommendation was rejected. But Clarke says “to be fair” we should understand that the Clinton administration decided it had higher priorities — the Balkans, the Middle East peace process.

By the eighth day Clarke was telling Tim Russert that the difference is that Clinton did “something” whereas Bush did “nothing.” Nothing except, among other things, authorizing a quadrupling of spending for covert action against al Qaeda.

Clarke’s apology to the American people, delivered to the Sept. 11 commission, should be considered in the context of the book, the publication of which was timed to coincide with his testimony. When, presuming to speak for the government, he said “we tried hard,” he must have been using the royal plural, because the gravamen of his book is that only he was trying hard. Indeed, parts of Clarke’s memoir call to mind Finley Peter Dunne’s jest that Teddy Roosevelt’s memoir of the Cuban expedition should have been titled “Alone in Cuba.”

Just more reasons why Richard Clarke is a hack.

Here’s some great satire about Condi Rice and Richard Clarke.

Ronald Rotunda, a law professor at GMU, writes on NRO about Scalia’s “scandalous” hunting trip with Dick Cheney (among others). Some think that Scalia should recuse himself in the case involving Cheney’s Energy Task force. For example, Thomas Friedman writes that Scalia should recuse “himself from ruling on the case involving Cheney’s energy task force . . . because our Supreme Court is so sacred, so vital to what makes our society special — its rule of law — that he wouldn’t want to do anything that might have even a whiff of impropriety.” That sounds fine and good, but we need a little perspective on the issue of recusal. Rotunda give that perspective. He writes:

Judges do not divorce themselves from the world when they don their robes. They still are allowed to have friends, go on hunting trips, and live a life. Years ago, when I was clerking for a federal judge, he asked me, after the oral argument, what I thought of the two lawyers’ performances. Before I answered he said, “Those are two of the finest lawyers you’ll ever meet. One was the best man at my wedding and the other is one of my very best friends.” The judge did not think of disqualifying himself.

Nor did Chief Justice Harlan Fiske Stone disqualify himself from cases involving President Herbert Hoover, although he was a buddy and a member of Hoover’s informal “medicine ball” cabinet. (They would throw medicine balls at each other before breakfast.) Nor did Justice Jackson, who was a personal friend of FDR, and took vacations with him. Nor did Justice Douglas, who was a poker buddy of FDR. Nor did Chief Justice Vinson, who was a poker buddy of Truman. Come to think of it, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has given her name and presence to a lecture series cosponsored by the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, an organization that often argues women’s-rights issues before Justice Ginsburg. Should she disqualify herself from issues involving women’s rights?

I am a member of a legal ethics list server. One of the other members recently argued: “Censure by Congress, even articles of impeachment, should at least be considered” against Justice Scalia. Funny that one does not hear similar calls to impeach Justice Ginsburg because of her actions. Maybe that’s because the calls for Scalia’s recusal

I don’t like the UN. I think the UN’s discussions of greater UN control of the Internet are a good example of problems with the UN. C|Net reports:

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan set the tone in a speech Thursday, criticizing the current system through which Internet standards are set and domain names are handled, a process currently dominated by the United States, Canada, Europe and Japan. Such structures “must be made accessible and responsive to the needs of all the world’s people,” Annan said.
…
Dozens of delegates from developing nations echoed Annan’s remarks throughout the rest of the day, arguing that their governments do not have a voice in the way the Internet is operated and that more money and investment from richer nations is the only way to end the so-called digital divide. Khalid Saeed, the secretary of Pakistan’s Ministry of Information Technology, said his country must “play an active role in all layers” of organizations that control the operation of the modern Internet.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. If Pakistan and the rest of the world wants an active role in the Internet, then they should create their own Internet. If Kofi Annan wants the Internet to be “be made accessible and responsive to the needs of all the world’s people,” then the UN should create an Internet that is just that. The UN and the rest of the world has done nothing for the Internet and the “rich countries” owe them absolutely nothing.

The Washington Post and NY Times have big headline on their homepages about the Administration

I’m not a fan of Lawrence Lessig. I haven’t read anything that he has written that has any value and Lessig’s stuff usually gets the economics wrong. But Alex Tabarrok, an economist I trust, thinks that Lessig has some valuable things to say. Maybe I’ll reconsider.

Why has Richard Clarke’s story changed over time? According to Drudge, he is on track to earn over $1 million in cash advance and royalties for his book Against All Enemies.