the misadventures of weather boy: June 2005

I guess it was for real

The 309 exam result was a 99. Guess no grade adjustment was needed after all!

On the downside, the gpa now becomes 3.497. Just enough to make you feel like you're at 3.5, but *not* quite....

205 probably comes later Wednesday. That still will be an interesting result.

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Labels: school

Beatin' the poli sci majors....

The grade for the class that is intended for (and almost completely populated by) political science majors, PS 309 (Equality & Justice in US Law--essentially a caselaw course) came back as an A+, which was really nice in an "apparently" difficult class. Then again, it's always nice to pick up the A+ :-).

I won't know of course until 1am what the final exam grade is however. Due to the way the TRACS system operates, the grade appears in the live database lookup via "Past Semester Grades" after they make the semidaily grade processing run at about 6pm, but the static database containing final exam grades and current grades is not updated until the live system goes down for the night (sometime after midnight). Based on the grades of my tests and the assumption that the professor practices standard rounding, I needed a 97 on the exam to get the A+ (98-100 A+, 93-97 A; test 1=98 (30%) test 2=98 (30%) final 40%). It is possible that she bumps grades up a bit, since her grade distributions show a greater concentration of higher grades than test results would show. Unfortunately I'll never know the true distribution because NC State does not post grade distributions of summer session classes, even if they meet the required seat count of 20 or more.

I'm more interested in what I get on the PS 205 (Law & Justice) exam and class grade. I anticipate that that will be posted and available tomorrow. The same grading policy is in effect for that class as was for 309, but somehow in a class that is apparently "easier", I was doing worse (test 1=87; test 2=88). The professor adds 2 points to your final grade if you have 2 or fewer unexcused absences (yes), but even with that, to get the A I would need a 95 on the exam, which may or may not have happened based on the multiple choice. This class had a lower distribution of test scores, so I suspect that she may be tweaking grades somewhat if the class looks like the professor's previous class distributions. If I somehow get the mathematically impossible A+, I'll know.

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Labels: school

Swimming & Domain names

Swimming:

On the 450yard swim from Tuesday, I did it in 6:43, beating the nearest swimmer by about 40 seconds. I think I lapped everyone at least once.

Today in the 1650: 27:33, lapping everyone by about 4 times, and beating the nearest swimmer by about 2.5 minutes.

And as an added bonus, I won the auction on the domain name I wanted ($61). So I get a year of Network Solutions.

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Labels: actual swimming, computing, swimming

Flag desecration amendment

The flag desecration Constitutional Amendment (House Joint Resolution 10 [H.J. Res. 10]) passed the House today by a vote of 286-130. Since the Constitution requires that for an Amendment to be proposed, it must pass by a 2/3 majority of each House (Art. V), so 2/3 of 416 voting is 278, which is clearly plenty enough (no it is not 2/3 of 435, just 2/3 of those voting, see ____ v. ____, __ U.S. __).

The corresponding joint resolution in the Senate, Senate Joint Resolution 12 [S.J. Res. 12] has yet to be taken up by the Senate, but is expected to be taken up by the Senate after the July 4 holiday. It is the same text as the House Joint Resolution.

The text of the resolution (and the amendment) is below:

109th CONGRESS
1st Session
H.J. RES. 10

[...]

JOINT RESOLUTION
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States authorizing the Congress to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States.

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years after the date of its submission for ratification:

Article--
'The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States.'.

In order for the amendment to be proposed for the States for ratification, it must be approved by a 2/3 majority of the Senate (67 if all Senators vote). The past six times that the House successfully passed this hurdle, the amendment failed in the Senate each time:

2003--H.J. Res. 4, passed House 300-125 (2/3=284)
S.J. Res. 4, no vote

2001--H.J. Res. 36, passed House 298-125 (2/3=282)
S.J. Res. 7, No vote

1999--H.J. Res. 33, passed House 305-124 (2/3=286)
S.J. Res. 14, failed in Senate 63-37 (2/3=67)

1997--H.J. Res. 54, passed House 310-114 (2/3=283)
S.J. Res. 40, no vote

1995--H.J. Res. 79, passed House 312-120 (2/3=288)
S.J. Res. 31, failed in Senate 63-36 (2/3=66)

From what I have read currently, there are approximately 65 Senators who will vote for the Amendment (see article). The article also notes that 35 Senators may be against the amendment (should everyone be in attendance, 67 is the needed majority), so it would fail. We shall see I suppose.

Should it be proposed and pass the Senate, it would have 7 years to garner ratification in 3/4 of the State legislatures. Assuming that no new States are admitted before the end of the seven year period, 3/4 is 38 States. There is no law that States by what type of majority it must be approved by, although there are quite a few bugaboos in the process (e.g., it is unconstitutional to ratify a Constitutional Amendment by referendum in a State [ _________ v. __________, __ U.S. __], but it is constitutional to call a "consultation vote"). It is possible that the time limit could be extended. Most people agree that if the time limit is embedded in the text of the amendment, it cannot be changed, but the theory is that it can be changed if the resolution proposing the amendment is changed. This was done to extend the ERA ratification time from seven to ten years, which promptly caused a lawsuit, but I do not believe it was adequately resolved before the ratification period ending.

And for everyone who wants to know, the reason that this amendment is being proposed is because of the Supreme Court decision, Texas v. Johnson (1989), 491 U.S. 397. The Court held 5-4 that flag desecration statutes were unconstitutional because it was a form of expression protected by the First Amendment (Brennan, Marshall, Blackmun, Scalia, and Kennedy were in the majority, with Kennedy also filing a concurring opinion; Rehnquist, White, and O'Connor dissented, as did Stevens in a seperate dissent). The decision probably would be upheld today if Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer all voted with the majority as would be expected. The Court upheld a de facto reconsideration of Texas v. Johnson in United States v. Eichman (1990), 496 U.S. 310, invalidating a federal law prohibiting flag desecration (that was passed because of Texas v. Johnson) using the same reasoning (and the same 5-4 breakdown).

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Labels: law

Guess what comes out today?

Guess what comes out today boys and girls:

More Supreme Court decisions.

Any guesses what I'll be doing?

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Labels: law

Wait What?!

Wait Wait Don't Tell Me will be in Raleigh on September 15 & 16. I don't think I can resist not going....

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Labels: other

Moving up in the world?

Someone else dropped science fiction, so now I am #4 on the waitlist (of 5). Of course, if I make it in that class, it will be a minor miracle, but I'll keep sitting on that waitlist.

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Labels: school

Domain name?

So I find out that my name's domain name is potentially available. That type of opportunity doesn't show up very often, so I placed a hold on it. If I get it, it's going to cost me $60 for the hold, and then the yearly fee. I guess I can have it for a hundred years for $1000, but that's just kind of outside of my price range right now....

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Labels: computing