Ashcroft

Courtesy of Body and Soul:

Attorney General John Ashcroft is reportedly planning to reverse current policy on the availability of asylum for victims of domestic violence and issue new regulations which could severely limit the ability of women fleeing many forms of gender-based human rights abuses – including sex trafficking, sexual slavery, honor killing and domestic violence - from seeking asylum in the United States.

Here's the press release from the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights. I can't find a source for the "reportedly" in the above statement, but if it's true, it'll happen March 1, before the INS moves out of Justice and into Homeland Security.

(no subject)

This is also revolting.

too many movies

I'm going to spend much of the next two weeks (Thursday through Sunday) at the Cinequest San Jose Film Festival. (I'm also going to be working, and on March 7 I have a gig at Red Rock Coffee Company in Mountain View.) I don't drink--wait, the segue is coming--but for the last few years I've felt that this is my annual drinking binge--I sit around and drown myself in movies until I'm completely overwhelmed, and then I watch some more movies.

A couple of years ago I gave up on trying to plan out my schedule--too many things change around due to cancelled screenings, bad traffic, buzz about good and bad films, etc. But a few nights ago I sat down with the program just to look things over, and a little while later it was 2:30 AM and I had the whole festival planned out. So, very much subject to change still, but if you're curious, here's my plan.