I still get a lot of use out of my aging iPod, but it’s always bothered me that I can’t control it without someone else’s assistance. That may change if a new type of interface that measures facial movements gains widespread acceptance. According to the designers, the device–which looks like a pair of earbuds–can translate a raised eyebrow or a nose into specific commands for the attached device. For example, a smile could turn up the volume; a frown would lower the volume.

This would work great for me, as I can contort my face like a champ. But I imagine it could lead to some awkward moments:

“Uh, no, ma’am, I was not winking at you. I was just trying to find that great M.I.A. remix I downloaded to my iPod last night.”

You might recall that I recently praised the NY Times for its great blogs. I need to qualify that praise after reading an entry in today’s Freakonomics blog taking issue with the “unintended consequences” of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Stephen Dubner writes about a verdict in a recent ADA lawsuit where a physician had to pay damages to a deaf patient for failing to provide a sign language interpreter. Dubner quotes details of the case from an obviously biased website that advocates for physicians. Dubner’s source bemoans the fact that interpreters are expensive and defends the physician for communicating with the patient via written notes. Fortunately, a little Googling unearths a more impartial recounting of the facts behind the case.

Dubner goes on to say that physicians will be less likely to serve patients with disabilities because of trial verdicts like this one, “[i]n which case a law designed to prevent discrimination will, yes, encourage discrimination.” It’s an argument I’ve heard before and it’s a cop-out; a weak excuse for softening laws like the ADA. The ADA is unique among federal civil rights laws in that it places affirmative duties on businesses both large and small. It’s not enough to simply be well-meaning; the business owner sometimes has to make reasonable accommodations for a customer or client. But this obligation is not without limit. Businesses don’t have to provide accommodations that would place an undue hardship on the business. What constitutes an undue hardship? That’s why we have juries.

Dubner wants to frame big jury verdicts as exacting an unintended “price of disability law”. But in the cases he cites, the law worked as it was supposed to. Civil rights laws without enforcement mechanisms are only so much happy talk. Physicians who refuse to see patients with disabilities are only creating more business for other physicians who rightly see accommodations as just another cost of doing business.

The only thing more troubling than Dubner’s post were the reader comments, which are illustrative of why we need laws like the ADA.

If you’re looking for more evidence that the geeks are taking over the national discourse, the Times is now running a weekly bestseller list for graphic novels and manga in its ArtBeats blog. I give it another 9-12 months before we start seeing lists in the Times for the most watched streaming videos and bestselling e-books. And now I have another resource to fuel my only slightly out-of-control comic book purchasing habit.

Incidentally, the Times’ blogs are becoming must-reads for me. Blogs like The Caucus (politics), Bits (technology), and Economix (economics with a practical twist) provide great supplements to the regular articles and links to other points of interest on the Web; exactly what good blogs should do. Plenty of newspapers, including the Times, are struggling to survive, but the Times seems to have a better grasp on how to use the medium of the Web to develop content (like this photo profile of Obama’s staff) that would be much more static and uninteresting in a traditional newspaper.

My friend Allie didn’t care for Watchmen. I’ll try to post some thoughts on it this weekend. In the meantime, this re-imagining of the seminal comic as a Saturday morning cartoon–complete with a goofy Rorschach–is clever and amusing. 

In other news from the Department of Things that Make Me Proclaim “Dude!”, here’s the latest trailer from the forthcoming Terminator movie. Three words. Killer. Robot. Motorcycles.

The Republican Party has opted to skip the civil war so many observers have been predicting and instead has chosen a suicide pact. And they’re not even going out in a blaze of glory. Instead, they’re shuffling to form a line in front of a snarling, odious little man who is more than happy to put a bullet into the head of every groveling one of them. During the election, they tried so hard to portray Democrats as a hapless bunch of ideologues in thrall to a leader with no experience. And now, they’re scratching their heads and trying to figure out how they let themselves be turned into human sacrifices for Limbaugh’s ambition and narcissism.

They should have realized the wheels were coming off when their newly elected chairman said that the party needs to “uptick [its] image with everyone, including one-armed midgets.”