No, no, not streetcars!

The Wisconsin State Journal reports on the continuing effort to impose streetcars on the city of Madison.

Mayor Dave Cieslewicz wants to press ahead with his idea for city streetcars regardless of other regional rail proposals.

Cieslewicz announced his plan to create a separate City Streetcar Committee at Monday night's Transport 2020 Implementation Task Force meeting.

Cieslewicz said he plans to present this new committee as a resolution at the Dec. 14 City Council meeting. Cieslewicz, who favors a plan to run electric streetcars Downtown, led a delegation of community leaders and developers to Portland, Ore., to study a trolley system earlier this year.

An emailer, who flagged this article, writes:

I am fascinated that no one brings up the fact that the cities that our city fathers & mothers are emulating all have much larger populations, very different demographics, and much longer commute times than Madison. And it is population, demographics and commute times which determine the market for light rail or trolleys. If someone can show me a similarly sized city to Madison that has a successful light rail/trolley system I might be convinced; but to the best of my research there is none. Chicago has about 3 million people. Portland has 1.7 million people. San Diego has 1.25 million. And, having lived in both areas, I can tell you that the commute from Middleton to downtown Madison IS NOTHING like the commute from San Ysidro to downtown San Diego. I am not hearing many people complain about the "grueling" 15 minute slow down on the beltline so where is the popular mandate for all this talk about light rail or trolleys? As an obviously enlighted conservative maybe you can explain to me what I am missing here.

You're missing this (to go back to the WSJ article):

The city has secured $300,000 from the federal government that will go toward a streetcar study, Cieslewicz said.

The feds are willing to pay for this particular boondoggle. And note that the main dispute within the city government is about the possible conflict with a separate commuter rail plan for the city (which also taps federal money).

"We need to have one vision about how we deal with transportation, and it needs to be regional," said County Board Sup. Scott McDonell, co- chairman of Transport 2020....

"I do think this is the wrong direction," said Michael Blaska, Transport 2020 committee member and former County Board member. "I always thought the problem was regional. It seems like that's where our priority ought to be. I really don't think that our community is large enough to support two systems."

McDonell said Transport 2020's next step is to figure out a process for dealing with the different ideas for commuter rail and streetcars and how they fit together.

There is $1 million in federal money for the commuter rail and $300,000 for the streetcars. I guess that ought to cover it. What's to worry about? Let's play with trains, trains, trains.

Is there anything wrong with selling a 1,420 calorie hamburger?

I say no. Hardee's is getting a lot of attention for its "Monster Thickburger." But the fact is that fancier places that sell hamburgers regularly sell things like this. All Hardee's is doing is selling something for much less.

I bought the DVD of "Super Size Me" a while back, and like the filmmaker trying to eat his super sized meal, I'm having trouble getting through it. Why? Well, partly because I'm exasperated listening to the soundtrack of a man chewing, which is disgusting, whatever he's eating. But what irks me more is the attempt to say something about real life by forcing yourself to eat what you don't even want and to eat a big McDonald's meal three times a day every day.

How about a little consideration for the many people who work hard all day, without eating much, and want to have a big, satisfying dinner without paying much? 1,420 calories is not that unreasonable for an adult man who is having his main meal of the day.

"The company got the idea from mothers just storing umbilical cords and navels in an album or what-not."

Yeah, what not.

Desperate film ad.

A two inch square on page B4 of today's NY: "Christian Bale Lost 63 pounds" and then some almost invisible writing ("It's one of the reasons the film works so well"), the name of the film, the fact that it's now playing, and a grungy little photo of said emaciated actor. The things one has to do to get attention.

Another last-week-of-law-school drawing.

Another drawing from the margin of my 1981 Federal Courts classnotes.



Law people may detect that the topic is habeas corpus -- FvN is Fay v. Noia -- a subject usually placed at the end of the fedcourts course. That placement seems to symbolize habeas as the last hope. The Supreme Court took certiorari in a significant habeas case yesterday, as Lyle Denniston reports over on SCOTUSblog:

The time period prison inmates have to file challenges in federal court to their convictions and sentences might be considerably longer than the one year set by Congress, depending upon how the Supreme Court decides the one case it agreed on Monday to hear, Dodd v. U.S. (docket 04-5286). The case, coming from the 11th Circuit, tests when that one-year deadline starts to run, under the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996.

Under AEDPA, Congress set the requirements federal and state prisoners must meet if they want to try to take advantage, through a federal habeas challenge, of a constitutional right that has been newly recognized by the Supreme Court. Among the provisions of AEDPA is a one-year limit on the time such habeas petitions may be filed in federal court. Congress, however, apparently did not speak plainly enough in saying when that period starts to run, because the circuit courts are split on that question. The Supreme Court agreed to rule on the Dodd case to clear up that conflict.

The law specifies that the period runs from the date on which the Supreme Court “initially recognized” a new right. But it goes on to say that the right must have been made “retroactively applicable to cases” that are still pending in post-conviction court proceedings. The question before the Court is whether that second provision is a separate factor in calculating the time period.

In the case of Michael Donald Dodd, who was identified by prosecutors as a leader of a large Jamaican drug gang in New York City called the “Sprangler Posse,” the 11th Circuit ruled that the one-year period starts to run as soon as the Supreme Court has issued a ruling setting up a new right. The time, it said, is not extended until the point at which a court decides to apply the new right to cases still pending – an extension that could run a year or longer after the Supreme Court’s initial decision. The Circuit commented: “It would not be logical for Congress to have enacted a strict one-year limitation and then qualified that time by reference to ambiguous events,” such as a later ruling on making the right retroactive. The clause specifying retroactivity, the Circuit added, “qualifies the right asserted – not the time limit.”

That view, cutting off habeas challenges at an earlier point, is shared by the Second, Fifth and Eighth Circuits, but conflicts with the views of four other circuits – the Third, Sixth, Seventh and Ninth. Those four have ruled that, unless a court has declared that a new decision applies to already pending cases, the filing window has not yet opened. That approach can considerably lengthen the one-year span.

Just deal with it.

You've got to learn how to behave in airports.

"I said if it's that big a deal, just keep it," he said. "But then the screener gets really officious with me. He's taking everything out and looking at it, and then they're calling my flight, which inexplicably they call 30 minutes early. I kept saying, 'Look, I got to get going.' I look toward the gate."

"The screener says: 'You cannot look away from me. You have to have your eyes on me at all times,' " Mr. Stevens said. "Every time I would turn, this guy would stop and say, 'Do not look away!' I said, 'O.K., I'm sorry. Please just get me out of here.' "

That only brought over reinforcements. "Then a big fat guy who was sitting there eating comes over and says, 'If he does that again, we're going to throw him out of here.'"

"Every time I tried to reason with them they got nastier and nastier..."

I say deal with it. The man who tells this story was trying to get on a plane with two bottles of carpet cleaner in his carry-on bag! It's irrelevant that he was bringing home his wife's favorite cleaning product. I want the screeners to take account of a person's behavior. Everyone has a flight to catch! You think you're special because you're really a nice person -- with a wife! and a dog! You have to be awfully self-involved not to realize the screener doesn't know that. The man in the anecdote should have thought about how his behavior affected other people and just apologized.

UPDATE: Hamilton's Pamphlets takes a much more negative view of the screeners. I don't fly enough to have a first-hand opinion of what it's like out there these days. I do think the men described in the Times article were being childish, and I'm certainly not saying people ought to put up with everything in the name of security.

An interesting turnabout.

The Third Circuit takes the Boy Scouts case, in which the Supreme Court found a first amendment right to exclude a gay scoutleader, and uses it as a basis to say that universities have a right to express their opposition to discrimination against gays by excluding the U.S. military recruiters on campus.

A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, in Philadelphia, found that educational institutions have a First Amendment right to keep military recruiters off campuses to protest the Defense Department policy of excluding gays from the military.

The 2-to-1 decision relied in large part on a decision in 2000 by the United States Supreme Court to allow the Boy Scouts to exclude gay scoutmasters. Just as the Scouts have a First Amendment right to bar gays, the appeals court said, law schools may prohibit groups that they consider discriminatory....

"Just as the Boy Scouts believed that homosexual conduct is inconsistent with the Scout Oath," Judge Ambro wrote, "the law schools believe that employment discrimination is inconsistent with their commitment to fairness and justice."

Seinfeld on "Oprah."

Jerry comes out to a huge ovation. He looks at the audience and says: "This is something. You do this every day?"

The audience constantly over-applauds. Oprah notes that she and Jerry are the same age (50), and the audience goes wild.

Jerry's response is perfect: "I love being 50. It means I'm almost done." Oprah goes into no! no! mode and Jerry has to say "it's just a joke" and a few other things until he finally lands on "it doesn't matter how old you are," and the audience goes wild again.

Oprah asks why they've only released the first three seasons on DVD, and Jerry says, "That's 40 episodes. How much time do you have?" There's a very distinctively Seinfeld way to say "How much time do you have?" and you've got to imagine it to find it funny. It's impossible to render in type. Something like: "How … much time … do you … have?"

Oprah asks him what he finds funny on TV today, and he says he watches a lot of "Sesame Street," and he thinks about how people tell him he should do another show: "I sit there and I watch this Elmo guy. And he is so likeable and so funny and so charming. And I sit there with my daughter, and I think: let him bust his little red ass."

Jerry's wife is there (and moved to tears by the experience of being 20 feet away from Oprah), so the conversation turns to marriage. Jerry says he was surprised at all the questions. He thought "Do you take this woman?" would be the last one. But now it's "How long are you going to sit there watching TV?": "I wish I knew the answer to that one myself."

Jerry's wife tells us he's "sweet," but can't come up with much of an answer to Oprah's request for a story. He's nice to his kids.

Oprah asks him about his obsessions: dolphins (they have "nice smiles"), Bic pens ("Every joke for the Seinfeld show was written with a Bic pen"), sneakers ("I'm wearing shoes just for you.")

The Puffy Shirt is being put in the Smithsonian, we're told.

Seinfeld's wife says has not seen all the episodes of "Seinfeld."

Oprah brings out Jason Alexander. The crowd acts pretty thrilled, even though it's just Jason Alexander.

Oprah brings out Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Clearly, the audience (nearly all women) likes her more than Jason. She looks great, Oprah tells her. Truthfully! Oprah shows Julia a clip of several audience members imitating Elaine's little steps dance [added: technically, it's "The Little Kicks."]. Julia says "wow" but doesn't seem that enthused. She seems not to be so much like the people in the audience, even though they identify with Elaine. Jerry helps out with a joke: "It's really true that girls just wanna have fun."

Oprah brings out Michael Richards. His hair is slicked down. He describes looking for "little things" in the script, ad libbing "the sound effects," practicing lines off by himself, and feeling that Kramer was playing him and that what he needed to do was to "get out of the way."

We're told Jerry bought Billy Joel's house in the Hamptons and we're shown some photos of him and his wife and kids on a windswept beach and in a sparkling, white kitchen. The audience goes "aaah!"

Talking about the last "Seinfeld" show, Jason Alexander says that, as they were about to shoot, Jerry said to them, "For the rest of our lives, when anyone thinks of any one of us, they'll think of all four." The audience goes "awwww." Oprah goes, "That is sweet." When the show ended, Jerry took some parts of the set (which he keeps with his Porsches). He took the door, the couch, and one of the booths from the restaurant. Michael Richards and Jason Alexander just took their shoes and (Alexander only) his glasses. Julia Louis-Dreyfus took her wardrobe, and jokes that she doesn't know why. (On the DVD commentary, she often talks about how bad Elaine's clothes were, and also how bad Jerry's clothes were. George's clothes were always intended to look bad. Kramer's clothes were supposed to be strange, and it's noted in the DVD commentary that only Kramer's clothes look good now. That vintage look aged well.)

After the final commercial break, there's only time enough to push the DVD one more time and say good-bye, but Oprah whips the crowd back up into a hysterical, jubilant cheer. As the closing credits roll, Oprah hugs each of the "Seinfeld" castmembers, kicking one leg up when she hugs Jerry and again when she hugs Michael Richards.

UPDATE: The group continues, more casually, on "Oprah After the Show." Oprah talks about how Jerry and his wife invited her to dinner but she had to refuse because she's on a diet that has a rule against eating after 7:30 at night.

We're shown photos of Julia Louis-Dreyfus's house, which has a retractable roof is dedicated to ecological principles. "It has sustainable woods" causes Jerry to say "What does that mean?" The question isn't answered. It's a joke. The tile, we're told, is made from recycled carpet. "It is a totally green house," Louis-Dreyfus says. Much applause.

Jerry offers this piece of advice: "If you never make a career choice based on money, you'll always have money." Hey, it worked for him!

Oprah asks what's your favorite episode. Jerry: "The Marine Biologist." Jason: "The Parking Garage." Michael: "The Parking Garage." Julia: wasn't asked.

They talk about Jerry's favorite comedian, Bill Cosby. When he walks down the street, Jerry says, he's happy to meet everyone who comes up to him. Oprah tells us that when he appeared on her show, he was dropped off alone! She clearly thinks this is flat-out amazing.

What comedian does Michael Richards love? Charlie Chaplin, Stan Laurel, Jacques Tati, the early Peter Sellers. Good answer! So good it almost makes me cry to think that more roles have not come Richards' way. He adds: "And I love the great Red Skelton." Ah! I loved Red Skelton so much when I was a child. I loved him in that deep, childlike way where you completely believe that everyone loves him.

Julia Louis-Dreyfus? "I think Ellen DeGeneres is unbelievably funny." She also loves the funny actresses, specifically, Mary Tyler Moore and Lucy.

Jason? Jon Stewart. And Jerry.

What's next for TV?

I find this a little surprising:

Fox brass are said to be particularly high on a project that one could dub "That '70s B.C. Show": It imagines Jesus as a slacker teen under pressure from his parents -- God and Mary -- to enter the family carpentry business.

UPDATE: Actually, I don't think this is such a bad idea. Referring to it as "That '70s B.C. Show" was an incredibly lame joke, but I think the show could be well done. Have you ever watched the beginning of the DVD of "The Last Temptation of Christ" with the director's commentary on? Jesus is just writhing on the ground, but Scorsese is saying that what interested him was the idea that Jesus would have gradually understood and had to face the reality of who he was and that this would have caused him a great deal of personal turmoil. With that approach to the subject matter, go back to an even earlier period, where Jesus is a teenager. We have no Biblical text describing this period of his life, so a leap of imagination is required. You have to invent a character. I'm sure that would offend some people, but "The Last Temptation of Christ" offended some people and so do many TV shows for one reason or another.

I think the show seems as though it might be like "Joan of Arcadia," which handles the subject of a teenager singled out by God and dealing with it in an American teenager way. "Joan" is a drama, and I think the Jesus TV show is a comedy, but conceivably it could be well-written.

I'd like to see more sitcoms set in historical time. There's "That 70s Show" and other shows in the "Happy Days" mold that use the recent American past, but not much else. If you're as old as I am, you might remember "It's About Time," which took place in the Stone Age (and included some time traveling astronauts, one of whom was played by one of the "Car 54, Where Are You?" actors -- not the one who became Herman Munster ... the other one). "It's About Time," like "Car 54," had a very memorable theme song.

ANOTHER UPDATE: A correction. The "Car 54" actor (Joe E. Ross) played one of the cavemen.

The medical marijuana oral argument.

The first report looks good for the federal government on this, as Justice Souter seems dubious about the plaintiffs' argument:

Backers of California's law seem to think "everybody is going to get it from a friend or from plants in the back yard," Justice David H. Souter told the lawyer for the two women. "They're going to get it in the street. Why isn't that the sensible assumption?"

UPDATE: Justice Breyer also seemed unreceptive to the plaintiffs' argument:

Justice Stephen Breyer said supporters of marijuana for the ill should take their fight to federal drug regulators before coming to the Supreme Court, and several justices repeatedly referred to America's drug addiction problems.

But it's important to note that Breyer and Souter have strongly and consistently backed strong deference to the policy choices of the federal government and opposed the enforcement of constitutional federalism. To be principled and consistent, they really should be expected to reject these arguments, as I noted yesterday.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Justice Scalia shows some signs of agreeing with the federal government's position that it may regulate an entire market, even trivial parts of the market that seem quite separated from the ordinary trade in the product that gave rise to the motivation to control it:

Justice Antonin Scalia asked [plaintiffs' attorney Randy] Barnett how his argument of a trivial economic effect from medical marijuana would apply to federal laws protecting endangered species. Those laws ban possession of ivory or eagle feathers without regard to whether a person obtained them through interstate commerce.

"Are those laws likewise unconstitutional?'' Scalia asked.

The 9th Circuit had relied on the notion that the medical use of home-grown marijuana does not interact with the market in marijuana, and Justice Stevens asked a question that seemed designed to pursue this theory:

Stevens asked Barnett how allowing medical use of marijuana would affect the illegal market. The lawyer said it would slightly reduce demand and reduce prices.

"Reduce demand and reduce prices? Are you sure?'' Stevens said.

Barnette seems to have conceded a point that related to a key part of the 9th Circuit's decision, which is why Stevens express some surprise, saying "Are you sure?"

Justice O'Connor is reported as asking whether medical use of marijuana is "something traditionally regulated by states.'' It's hard to tell, without more, which way she may have been leaning by asking this. I'd like to see more of the transcript before speculating any more, but I'll just note that O'Connor's vote is often crucial. Still, from what I've seen so far -- admittedly little -- I think the Court will find the federal government has the power to regulate here.

UPDATE: Marty Lederman at SCOTUSblog predicts the decision for the federal government will be unanimous (though Justice Thomas might conceivably dissent). Lyle Denniston, also at SCOTUSblog, seems to perceive a ray of light for the plaintiffs. I'll read the whole transcript when it's available, but as indicated above, I agree with Lederman.

The last week of law school, and an old law school doodle.

It's the last full week of the semester here at the law school. Consequently, I feel a lot of pressure to get through the material--none of the usual expanding into areas that stimulate good discussion. It's time to be crisp and on task. You can't just increase the flow of information because it's close to the end. That's not fair. Yet you have to get to the end somehow. In one class, we've stayed on schedule and will finish simply by continuing at the pace we've followed all semester. In the other class, I've had to use the technique of cutting readings and switching to lecturing. But then there is a special obligation to make the lectures clear. Things we would have puzzled over, had we read a case on the subject, must be simplified now.

I'll have some more news-oriented blogging later. I'm especially interested in two federalism cases to be argued in the Supreme Court today. But, for now, I'll leave you with a doodle I did years ago in the margin of my law school class notes. I used to find drawing in the margins like this helped me focus on what I was hearing. The date was 5/6/81, sometime close to the end of the semester in Federal Courts, where maybe we were encountering new material, tying things together, and still leaving a few threads dangling.

Jerry Falwell's curtain imagery.

Jerry Falwell was on "Meet the Press" today. Tim Russert reminded him of the offensive statement he made shortly after 9/11:

I want to ask Reverend Falwell about something and broaden the conversation. We talked about Iraq and the war on terrorism. Something that you said two days after September 11, when you were with Reverend Pat Robertson: "I fear... that [September 11th] is only the beginning. ...If, in fact, God continues to lift the curtain and allow the enemies of America to give us probably what we deserve ... I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle ... all of them who have tried to secularize America -- I point the finger in their face and say `you helped this happen.'"

Falwell answered:

And I went on to say in a sleeping church, a lethargic church likewise is responsible. I do believe, as Ben Franklin said, that God rules in the affairs of men and of nations. I believe that when God blesses a nation, as he's blessed America for a lot of reasons, things happen that don't happen other places. I believe when we defy the Lord, I think we pay a price for it. So I do believe in the sovereignty of God.

In our house, for example, my wife of 47 years and our three children, eight grandchildren, we begin every day in prayer. We ask the Lord's blessings. This morning in the shower I prayed for all 15 of our family by name, by need, because I want the curtain of God's provision upon them and protection along the highways and decision-making, God's wisdom.

Falwell praying in the shower? I could have gone my whole life without having that picture in my head. But now that he's said it, I have some idea where he gets his imagery. "God continues to lift the curtain ..." Was that the shower curtain? God as Norman Bates?

First, a multiple choice question, then some discussion of wabi-sabi.

Fill in the blank, completing the sequence:

sewing machine, fan, tea kettle, toaster, _________

a. iron

b. vacuum cleaner

c. vibrator

You can find the answer in this article, pointed to by Nina, who comments on something else about the article, wabi-sabi, to be specific. As to why she's sitting next to a potato-chip-spilling guy, read the previous post.

Wabi-sabi is a cool Japanese aesthetic.

It's about spare living spaces and well-worn handmade objects, and an appreciation of quiet pleasures — indeed, of plain old quiet. Sweeping a floor rather than vacuuming, taking up knitting, washing the dishes by hand — these are wabi-sabi activities....

Don't buy a new couch .... Try not to freak out when you come home to a dirty house. Turn the lights off and light some candles, making sure they're strategically placed away from the dirty dishes and the dog hair on the carpet.

Hmmm.... I've been following this aesthetic for years. Minus the dog and the knitting. Ideally, I want to live in a place with only wood floors and no carpeting and throw out the vacuum altogether. It's such an ugly thing.

Speaking of sweeping (and things Japanese), on Friday evening, we parked the car on the street in front of a lit up Aikido place. Inside were about ten men in traditional Japanese clothes, holding what at first I thought were swords. But they were brooms. They were sweeping the place, possibly ritualistically, and it was such a fascinating sight that I watched them as I walked a couple steps and knocked into a telephone pole. Even though the street was otherwise entirely deserted, at that very moment a man walked by, as if he had been dropped onto the earth for the purpose of laughing at me. Really, that happened. That was not a Freudian dream.

The marijuana case: a great test of law and politics.

Tomorrow the Supreme Court hears oral argument in Raich v. Ashcroft, the medical marijuana case, which sets the federal government's interest in comprehensive regulation of the marijuana market against the state's interest in controlling small, isolated uses of marijuana. In the case at hand, California would like to be free to legalize the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.

Generally, judicial and political liberals have opposed the Supreme Court's enforcement of constitutional federalism, which limits the reach of federal governmental power and leaves room for individual states to experiment with their own policies, suited to local conditions and local political preferences. But some state policy experiments are appealing to those who did not like it when the Supreme Court used ideas about federalism to strike down the Gun-Free School Zones Act and part of the Violence Against Women Act.

So it will be interesting to see the response of those who have harshly criticized the majority's recent federalism decisions and have professed abject deference to Congress and the Executive branch about federalism matters. From a liberal perspective, one might want to think: I support the enforcement of federalism limits when federalism is really a stand-in for individual rights, and I support strong federal government power when the federal policy in question is really a stand-in for individual rights. But it is rather hard to translate that instinct into sound constitutional law.

Conservatives face a dilemma too, if their conservatism is the kind that puts great importance on strong anti-drug enforcement. But conservatives who take the libertarian position on drugs can happily seize a two-fold opportunity: they can demonstrate a principled fidelity to constitutional federalism and, at the same time, improve federalism's reputation among liberals.

My earlier posts about federalism and medical marijuana are here and here .

Drawing of the day.

Here's a photograph of a drawing that I like in part because on the left side you can see through to the drawing on the previous page. Another thing I like about the photograph is that red background, which happens to be the Corvette brochure that got me blogging about cars a while back. That gives me a good opportunity to save readers the trouble of sending any more "so are you buying the Corvette?" emails and say there was virtually never any chance I'd buy a Corvette (even though it won on the blogpoll)). So am I buying the Audi TT? That's what I'd buy if I were to buy a new car, but right now I'm keeping my Cosmic Green Beetle (to which I recently added a spectacular dent).

The President is fat.

The NYT is exploring new ways to knock the President:

Yes, the president of the United States, known for his robust good health, is officially overweight, according to the standards of the National Institutes of Health. At 6 feet and 194 pounds, his body mass index, or B.M.I., a measurement of height relative to weight, is 26.4, and 25 or above is officially overweight for both sexes.

Actually, I was just noticing in the video of the President from his visit to Chile that his Texan walking style now involves leading with a prominent belly.

Click on "graphic" at the link to see a chart comparing presidential BMIs. We all know who the fattest President was, but did you know what a teeny tiny man l'il Jimmy Madison was? At 5'4" and 99 pounds, don't you just want to pick him up and carry him around?

I should note that the article is also another one of the NYT's many attempts to remind us of the horrendous American fatness problem, which is always presented as a matter of health rather than aesthetics.

UPDATE: A medically trained reader notes that writes:

Just commenting on BMI. BMI is a cookie cutter measurement and we all know everyone is built different- some are beanpole, some are stout. A six foot 250 lb predominantly fat person would have the same BMI as a 250 lb six foot professional athlete. The BMI only uses two metrics: height and weight. It should be used as one tool in evaluating someone's health along with fitness, comorbidities, family history, etc... The problems are obvious when you consider muscle is heavier than fat.

Hey, the last person who mentioned that fact to me was the butcher that sold me a pork loin roast!