Ryan Lochte -Michael Phelps Slayer?

Michael Phelps may have a bit of a hard time repeating his amazing performance of the past Olympics.  Mainly due to his teammate Ryan Lochte.

Ryan is not new to swimming.  He has been a world class swimmer for a while now, but up until this point he has most been, "the best swimmer who is not named 'Michael Phelps'".

After this coming Olympics, that may no longer be true.  In the Olympic Trials Phelps and Lochte battled head to head on numerous events.  Coming in neck-to-neck and blowing away the competition.  But Lochte seemed to come out on the winning end more often than not.  Expect Lochte to come away with a nice collection of Gold medals, and at least a couple of victories over team-mate and sometime rival, Michael Phelps.

Rule 5 Saturday - Channeling the Deschanels

Today is a first for one of my Rule 5 post, sisters, Emily and Zooey Deschanel. Both native to the home ground, Los Angeles, Emily is the elder sis, born in 1976, while little sis Zooey was born in 1980.  Their father, Caleb, is a director, while their mother, Mary Jo, is an actress, so it appears that they are staying in the family business.




In addition to acting, Zooey has a musical bent, with singing and songwriting to her credit.

She been acting since 1998, and has racked up an impressive list of film and TV appearances. As a musician, she has written, recorded and performed quite a variety of pieces, including some with former husband, Ben Gibbard, lead vocalist for The Postal Service and Death Cab for Cutie.  They divorced in late 2011.

Emily, of course, is best known for her long running role as Dr. Temperance Brennan, the forensic skeleton expert on "Bones", although she has been acting since 1994 in both film and TV.

As a scientist, I should resent the way she perpetuates the all the worst stereotypes of scientists (unemotional, uncomprehending of other people's feelings, obsessive personality, etc) but I can't just because she's so darn cute...



More Deschanel Rule 5 below the jump.

Ted has Jennifer Garner as his one year Weekend Woman this week. Wombat-Socho checked in early this week with The Other McCain's Rule 5 list "Exile on Duke Street" and William Teach at Pirate's Cove lists it among the Rule 5 posts on his "Sorta Blogless Sunday and Pinup".  The Classical Liberal linked this in "Hot Legs!"

The Obligatory SCOTUS-Obamacare Descision Post

Unlike many bloggers, I won't claim enough legal knowledge to pretend to know whether the 4-1-4 decision of the Supreme Court which narrowly upheld Obama care by declaring it a permissible tax was correctly decided or not.  I don't like Obamacare, and I think it's bad policy.  That is enough to oppose it, but not to judge its constitutionality.

For intelligent commentary on this I suggest you visit Instapundit, Althouse, Patterico, the Volokh Conspiracy, to name a few.  Go to the sites and start scrolling down.

Actually, I take that first comment back; I'm pretty sure it wasn't correctly decided, since there really was no clear consensus, or even two clear opposing views from the court; somebody has to be wrong.

From my own point of view, I would have preferred a ruling that clearly killed Obamacare on the grounds that the mandate was an impermissible aggression against freedom of choice, and that the commerce clause could not be extended to regulating an economic inactivity, which is what the administration and liberals argued. Justice Roberts finding (along with 4 conservatives) that the Commerce Clause could not cover a lack of commerce, seems to be an important step in protecting us from the expansion of government through the Commerce Clause, but is it a clear enough precedent to survive the shift of a single Supreme Court justice?  I have my doubts.

His further decision (and essentially his alone) that the Obamacare mandate is an acceptable use of the taxing power of Congress (apparently taxing an economic inactivity is more legal than regulating it?) has the feeling of a contrivance. 

I would like to believe the Justice Roberts seriously believes this proposition, and that he is not presenting the argument as a convenience to get him to the point where Obamacare was upheld, but the Commerce Clause extension was denied, as many on the right have argued.  If he is that disingenuous, he is not fit to hold office.

As for theories, by many on both the right and left that having Obamacare legitimated, but declared to be tax will ultimately hurt Obama and the democrats in the 2012 election?  I'd like to believe it, but I don't have that much faith in the intelligence or predictability of my fellow man.