Author Archives: James J Heaney

Fifteen Questions I Would Like To Ask A Republican FCC Commissioner

by James J Heaney Posted on 16 May 2021

(UPDATE: This whole post was secretly just preparation for my interview with FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington a couple weeks later.) (TW: net neutrality, pasta racism, NCTA v. Brand X, brief but alarmingly favorable quotation of Justice Breyer, Ted Stevens Dance … Continue reading →

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Breaking Down the Chauvin Charges

by James J Heaney Posted on 20 April 2021

As we await a verdict in the Derek Chauvin trial for the murder of George Floyd, I took some time today to figure out exactly what the jury is weighing in their ongoing deliberations. The full jury instructions are here. … Continue reading →

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WandaVision Title Sequences, Ranked

by James J Heaney Posted on 8 March 2021

This isn’t a spoiler because it’s in all the trailers and the first 60 seconds of the first episode. Obviously, as someone who has 11 hours of TV theme songs in his iTunes library and who spent much of childhood … Continue reading →

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The Truth about Dr. Seuss Nobody Wants to Hear

by James J Heaney Posted on 5 March 2021

Cover of And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street. PHOTO CREDIT: Steven Senne for the AP. Photo is technically under copyright until, most likely, the mid-2130s. By order of his estate, six Dr. Seuss stories got cancelled … Continue reading →

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What I Got Wrong About Lockdowns

by James J Heaney Posted on 4 March 2021

The Uptown Theater in Minneapolis on March 28th. Photo by Lorie Shaull under a CC BY-SA 2.0 license. Last March, I strongly advocated strict stay-at-home orders (aka “lockdowns”) throughout most of the United States. When they said “two weeks to … Continue reading →

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The Evil That Runs Through Everything

by James J Heaney Posted on 22 January 2021

Some months ago, a friendly acquaintance saw a casual remark I made on a politics forum about how Democrats will never win in states like West Virginia because they are anti-unborn. My acquaintance objected: “Democrats aren’t anti-unborn. We just believe … Continue reading →

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Special Comment on the Cruz Electoral College Objection

by James J Heaney Posted on 2 January 2021

The joint session to count the electoral votes, 1925 I haven’t blogged for a while–it was Christmas, I have a life, and my mea culpa post on lockdowns can wait a few more weeks–but I posted on Facebook about Sen. … Continue reading →

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Some of Minnesota’s ICU Beds are a Mirage (and that’s Very Very Bad)

by James J Heaney Posted on 15 November 2020

If you look at the Minnesota Department of Health’s hospital capacity stats today, they don’t look that bad. There’s an even more soothing version of this data circulating on certain Minnesota-centric Facebook groups: Ordinary ICU bed usage (in non-covid times) … Continue reading →

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