Althouse: "The ugliness of the Armadillo is what makes it unique."

August 19, 2009

"The ugliness of the Armadillo is what makes it unique."

"A police car is not a particular stigma, but if people see that thing in front of your house, they know something bad is going on in there."

27 comments:

Methadras said...: How soon before the neighborhoods where this thing will be parked start to complain after all of the drug dealers are gone that it is an eye-sore and will bring down their property values. In Peoria?; 8/19/09, 1:39 PM
chuck b. said...: Until it's powered by carbon neutral fuel, this vehicle is destroying the environment.; 8/19/09, 1:40 PM
ricpic said...: The drug dealers moved away out of shame? Nigga pleez.; 8/19/09, 1:41 PM
TWM said...: "Until it's powered by carbon neutral fuel, this vehicle is destroying the environment."

Sweet. Scaring away drug dealers and killing Gaia - more bang for our bucks. More please.; 8/19/09, 1:44 PM
jag said...: How soon before every moment of life is filmed by governmental agencies and filed away for possible review?; 8/19/09, 1:45 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: Are they saying that an armadillo is preferable to a mob of zombies ?

Oh, I forgot.. Obamacare has them tied up at the “end of life” waiting room.; 8/19/09, 1:52 PM
Dustin said...: Of course the drug dealers moved away. Not out of shame, but because drug users are paranoid and don't want to walk by a huge camera bus.

This is an awesome idea.

The Macho Response?; 8/19/09, 1:58 PM
James said...: Something that makes actual armadillos unique is that they are apparently the only animal other than humans that can get leprosy...

Let the leprosy jokes begin!; 8/19/09, 2:02 PM
Fr Martin Fox said...: Mixed feelings.

I can think of some neighbors on whom I'd liked to have sicced the armadillo; on the other hand, I think the government should not be free to put people under surveillance without an appropriate threshold.; 8/19/09, 2:03 PM
bearbee said...: Any chance they can park one in front of the White House and one in front of Congress?; 8/19/09, 2:08 PM
Dustin said...: father martin fox, I don't want to live in camera happy London either.

I hope the cops are only deploying this thing when they have good cause. Lots of noise complaints, lots of drug arrests, etc. Sounds like they were trying police cars and needed something hardier, so it sounds like desperate times for Peoria.

I hope we're not talking about pot dealers.; 8/19/09, 2:15 PM
The Dude said...: A salesman used to sell at the leper colony until his business dropped off.

I blame Obamacare.

WV - pinge - really! That's the sound his business made when it hit the ground.; 8/19/09, 2:15 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: OT..

Today Palin disclosed that she received some trinkets from people around the country.

A panel calling for Palin’s death in 4, 3, 2..; 8/19/09, 2:16 PM
blake said...: bearbee wins the thread.; 8/19/09, 2:17 PM
Anonymous said...: Seems to fit with the Broken Windows theory of policing, too, in which even small signals of public order (or disorder) are shown to have a corresponding effect on behavior.; 8/19/09, 2:19 PM
traditionalguy said...: This Armadillo is like a Townhall meeting in which no one believes the Politician's talking points. It shuts down a nuisance by letting the nuisance know that the authorities (voters) are on to them. Both are "Ugly" and both do their job on targets that have successfully ignored all prior nice methods.; 8/19/09, 2:28 PM
former law student said...: Seems improbably that no one parks on the street in bad neighborhoods in Peoria. Or do the cops first tow cars away from the front of the drug dens?; 8/19/09, 2:43 PM
former law student said...: improbable

vw: oudgil. What an elderly Scotsman calls his wife.; 8/19/09, 2:44 PM
Daryl said...: 1 - is there any due process before this ugly thing is put in front of your house?

2 - I understand that courts are reluctant to meddle in police business, and will overlook shame/humiliation where it is incidental to proper police activity. But here, the very goal is shame/humiliation.

Does this mean the courts would be more willing to step in and issue injunctions against this?; 8/19/09, 2:53 PM
Synova said...: If Google Earth can legally take surveillance of anything they can see from the street, I expect that the police can as well.

I'm unsure if I think that is good or bad.

Wasn't there a court ruling some place that police could put a homer or tracer or something like that on a car to monitor the movement of suspects on the theory that they could legally tail someone with live people in cars and that was the equivalent to using technology to do the same job?

Not sure what I think of that either.

In the end privacy is an illusion maintained by pretending that the ubiquitous recording of our lives isn't actually happening. To the extent that any real privacy even exists it is a function of the ones looking thinking you are too boring to care about. Get lost in the noise.

We live in a world where infants are numbered by the government at birth.; 8/19/09, 2:59 PM
Dustin said...: FLS, you should read the actual story. It's interesting.

When the street is full of cars, they find somewhere nearby, across the street in the example in the story, to put the vehicle.

They don't tow anyone out of the way. Sheesh.

And of course this is legal, Daryl. It's a public street, and anything you do within view of it doesn't have an expectation of privacy. I think you have a good point that there's an injustice if they park their shame vehicle in front of an innocent party, but I don't think anyone is going to stop this program on those grounds.; 8/19/09, 3:25 PM
Wince said...: I wonder if anyone waited excitedly thinking it was Ed McMahon come to award the Publisher's Clearinghouse Grand Prize?; 8/19/09, 4:33 PM
NotWhoIUsedtoBe said...: Overt surveillance doesn't bother me much. It's in public. This is MUCH better than CCTV cameras all over the place.; 8/19/09, 8:00 PM
AST said...: Armadillos are cute, not ugly. I think it has more to do with the cameras. Maybe they should add a 50 cal turret on top, just for effect.

How long before some "homeowner" sues for violating his rights.; 8/19/09, 8:36 PM
Anonymous said...: ACLU's gonna be all over this one.

Maybe should park one in front of the ACLU.

wv = wiver What Meade's gone and done.; 8/19/09, 9:19 PM
Ken Pidcock said...: It's hard enough dealing with criminals, but those charged with law enforcement also have to deal with the rest of us idiots.

A couple of years ago, there was an unmarked car in front of our house performing surveillance of some drug dealers, and one of our neighbors walked over to the car to ask them how it was going!; 8/19/09, 9:47 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: I caught a real armadillo once. But I was holding him extended away from my body and it was thrashing like a fiend, they do have earth-moving claws of death. It was heavy and I didn't know what else to do so I swung around in a circle and flung it back into the thrushes whereupon it landed with a thud and scampered off.

It did not roll into a ball as I imagined it would.

Another time I spent the night at my friends house that was about 10 miles out of Shreveport on forty acres abutting a bayou. The yard lights attracted insects and the insects attracted armadillos, that gathered and approached the house like zombies!!!! Gary's sister opened the draw-curtain to the back patio and screamed at the sight of a veritable army tank battalion. Some of them were standing erect on their hind legs balancing by their tails and holding their little arms like tyrannosaurs'. Totally freaked us out because we were alone.

But none of this had anything to do with the cops or with drugs.; 8/19/09, 11:35 PM