Stander's Point

9/11/2009: Arlene T. Babakitis

2009-09-11T16:08:00.000-07:00

Arlene is remembered as a bright, energetic mother of two, born and raised on the Lower East Side of New York City in a family that understood and taught their children the values of hard work and independence. She got her first job at the age of 16, and a couple of years later began her main career as an employee of the Port Authority of NY/NJ.

Her elder sister, Evelyn Pettignano, remembered Arlene in a NY Times article from Sept. 2002:

Mrs. Babakitis and her older sister, Evelyn L. Pettignano, were pregnant with their first children at the same time, and would take the PATH train together to their jobs in Manhattan. "When you see two pregnant women walking together, you would really see the looks," Mrs. Pettignano said. "I have to admire her as a mother. She wanted the best. She was always there, giving."

Her tenure with the Port Authority would last for 30 years and lead her to a post at the World Trade Center, before her untimely death on September 11, 2001.

Her niece, author Melissa Pettignano, recalled her love of staying active in a recent article for the Hudson Reporter, and also related just how close Arlene may have been to surviving the disaster:

Before she died on September 11, 2001, Secaucus resident Arlene Babakitis loved to exercise. But according to her niece, writer Melissa Pettignano, her weight loss regimen “had a bit of a twist. My mother, my aunt, and I would exercise together. Like, we’d walk around the track at the high school – and then we’d go out for ice cream.”

...

According to those who were in the stairwell with her who survived, she stopped walking down after emergency workers told her it was safer to stay in the burning building and wait for help to arrive. After no help came, she eventually began walking again. Babakitis made it to street level just as the building collapsed.

“The time she spent waiting made all the difference,” noted Pettignano. “Another five or 10 minutes, who knows, maybe that’s all the time she needed to get to safety.”

Ms. Pettignano has taken the memories of her aunt and used to help write a book entitled "Suzanne Lantana", a collection of stories about the experiences and views of a young girl. Details can be found here.

---------

This post was made as part of Project 2996, an online blogging effort spearheaded by Dale Challener Roe, aimed at keeping the memory of the events of 9/11/2001 alive by memorializing, one blogger at a time, all 2,996 victims of that day's horrendous attack on the World Trade Center. Anyone wishing to view any of today's other memorial posts can start at the link above, which displays a linked list of all the participating blogs. Please take some time and visit as many of them as you wish.

The Original Guitar Hero

2009-08-14T07:55:00.000-07:00

R.I.P. - Les Paul, 1915 - 2009

"I cannot imagine life without Les Paul."
-- Henry Juszkiewicz, Chairman and CEO of Gibson Guitar

Project 2,996 for 2009 - Bloggers Needed

2009-08-04T05:35:00.000-07:00

My apologies for not being around much, friends...As usual, life has been getting in the way.

But for this, I will try again.

I have signed up to hopefully participate in this year's Project 2996, wherein bloggers of all stripes create a mass-posting by each dedicating a post to the memory of one of the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

More information and links for the project will be forthcoming as I learn more. Keep yer ears up.

UPDATE - August 15, 2009: I will be researching and memorializing Arlene T. Babakitis. Anyone who has information which they think will be helpful in this effort is gratefully invited to leave note in the comments to this post. I may not be able to respond right away, but all comments WILL be read. Thank you.

Room...ten-HUT!

2009-02-17T11:01:00.000-08:00

I am pleased as punch to share the following moment with you all... My son graduated from the Boot platoon in the Tri-State chapter of Young Marines a couple of weeks ago. (If you're scratching yer heads: Think of it as Scouting ala the USMC, and he just moved up from the Cub Scouts.)

Bear with me, if you please, whilst I bask in the moment.

For those keeping score, he's the handsome gent second from right in the front rank.

A Change of Scenery

2009-02-12T04:16:00.000-08:00

Folks, I am here to announce a change.

From here on, the focus of "Stander's Point" is going to shift to more personal (and, frankly, more enjoyable) topics and will be shying away from politics and other such claptrap. It will also be updated on a less frequent basis.

For those who prefer news and views on current events, please feel free to visit my new second home, Adult Supervision Required, wherein my political (and most likely crankier) side will be more fully unfettered.

Thank you very much for your kind attention.

SIX-BUUURRRRGH!!!

2009-02-02T19:45:00.000-08:00

Now This Takes Balls (Well, Okay...Just One)

2008-12-08T07:22:00.000-08:00

One of the prettiest things to grace the White House all year, the annual Christmas Tree, is up in the Blue Room as we speak.

Every year, an artist is chosen from every district of every state to decorate an ornament to be hung on the tree. Folks, there are some real beauties in the roster.

What's that...you say there's one missing?

Hmmm. Well, whaddayaknow. You're right.

Lessee here...Yep, it's the one from Seattle, WA.

Gee....I wonder why it didn't make the cut?

"Oh, dear," said Seattle-based artist Deborah Lawrence, who created the red and white ornament that salutes Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) and his support for a resolution to impeach the president. "This doesn't really surprise me. But it's disappointing that I won't get to see it on the tree."

Laura Bush asked all members of Congress to pick artists from their districts to decorate ornaments, presumably highlighting local landmarks and heroes. Lawrence, 55, used the opportunity to honor McDermott, a strong critic of Bush. The collage artist glued tiny text on the nine-inch ball thinking no one would actually read her embedded "subversive" message.

Okay, so she tried to be sneaky about it. Alright, I can see getting a private laugh out of slipping a curve ball past the ump.

And she might have gotten away with it, too. All she had to do was not go bragging about it...

Yeah, right. She's an artist AND a liberal. You do the math.

But Lawrence shared her secret protest with friends, and the news quickly spread. "An artist doesn't always get this kind of attention," she told us. "It took on a life of its own, obviously. In a way, I'm speechless."

Oh, if only.

Awright, enough about her.

Here's the official White House photo list of the ones that remembered what they were doing this for.

My personal favorite?

Why, the State ornament of West Virginia, of course. It's purty.

Points of Interest: Dec 2, 2008

2008-12-02T07:34:00.000-08:00

Confederate Yankee shows us what happens when a chainsaw, a little ingenuity, and just enough beer meet each other in the middle.

Jammie Wearing Fool points out a handy little device that might have been useful in Long Island back on Black Friday.

Sister Toldjah kindly directs our attention to a friend of hers who has just opened up his own blog, who was once a civilian contractor in Iraq. Like most people who have gone over there in recent years, he did not come back the same as when he left, which led to the name of his new virtual home. Go find out why.

And finally,Iowahawk proves yet again why he is the REAL Lightworker. (Seriously, can this dude not go for more than a week without making the rest of us look like the subservient primates that we are?)

You have your orders. Stander out.

Giving Thanks

2008-11-27T08:02:00.000-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving, y'all...and THANK YOU.

The Theft of Hope, Part II: Meet The New Boss

2008-11-25T07:54:00.000-08:00

To those who considered themselves "winners" a few weeks ago...some words to ponder.

On the 4th of November of this year, a Democrat won the 2008 Presidential Election.

It was a hard-fought campaign stretching over the better part of two or three years, with all of the prerequisite wailing and gnashing of teeth...but in the end, there was little doubt who the clear victor would be.

All over the world, a euphoric global community celebrated the dawn of a new era of Hope and Change that promised to wrap the world in its warm, fuzzy, patchouli-scented embrace.

And you know what the best part of all this is?

Those who helped her do it are only just now starting to catch on.

What...Why the confused look all of a sudden?

Oh, right. You thought I was talking about Barack Obama, didn't you?

Well, if it's any consolation, so does he.

Looking at things the way they have developed thus far, with his cabinet picks increasingly being populated by her and Slick's old buddies - and now, apparently, by the Lady herself - I suppose there's really only one position left to fill.

Take it away, 'Hawk.

...Okay, so that was a joke.

In which case, I would make one more observation.

The Presidential Succession Act of 1947 (U.S. Code title 3.19, as noted here in the Cornell University Law Library), which delineates who shall fill the First Shoes should their current occupant be rendered unable to continue, sets the first line of succession as follows:

The Vice-President
The Speaker of the House
The Senate President pro-tempore, as chosen by the Senate

If none of those three figures are able to step up, we go to the next stage of succession, which consists of the various Cabinet Secretaries.

First on that list?

You guessed it...Secretary of State.

So, if things proceed apace, here's the short list:

1) President Barack Obama
2) Vice-President Joe Biden
3) House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
4) SPPT Robert Byrd (if I'm wrong on this, do not hesitate to correct me)
5) Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton

Many moons ago, I once joked to the wife that if Hillary got the nod for Barry's VP pick, I gave him about six months in office before she finally got tired of waiting for Nature to take its course.

The first two noted above won't take long. Barry's still too busy paving the road to notice the truck coming, and Joe...well, actually, we haven't heard much of anything from him lately, have we?

The Pineapple Princess might be a tougher nut to crack. (Ever seen what happens when you put two queen bees in the same hive?)

As for Byrd, a stiff breeze should do the trick.

No, I am NOT saying that all these dominoes will necessary start falling all at once, nor am I advocating that they should start falling at all.

On the contrary...I'm praying to God that they don't.

Care to join me..."winners"?

The Theft of Hope (and a little Spare Change)

2008-11-06T07:19:00.000-08:00

To my fellow "losers"...some words to ponder.

Yesterday was Obama's day. He deserved it.

Today we wake up, take a good hot shower, get dressed, have breakfast, take our kids to school, go to work...

Today is America's day, just like any other. Today we live our lives, same as we would have done if McCain had won the election.

Yes, there is the spectre of what might be coming down the pike once Obama gets his hands on the wheel for real. And yes, some of it is pretty ominous.

But you know what? That's OK. We got through eight years of the Clintons, and we'll get through this. Our turn will come again, just as it did for Obama's supporters this time around.

In that spirit...let's share a laugh with some people who, I think, truly appreciate our God-given right to believe and vote however we choose, and make complete asses of ourselves in public in the process if we really want to. (Because for what they do, we are talking SERIOUS job security here.)

Here's a hint:

You still think Bush's victory in 2000 was an inside job?

Fool, you ain't seen NUTHIN' yet.

MAN, I love this country.

Thanks, Cap'n Ed. We needed that.

Congratulations, President-Elect Obama

2008-11-05T07:38:00.000-08:00

The deed has been done.

And it was done well.

Those of us who voted for John McCain last night are certainly disappointed today.

We'll get over it.

I'll say this....Whatever has been said and done during the campaign: From all reports I've seen so far, the actual election went off with thankfully very little rancor.

And I'll say this...ACORN and others may have tried to unduly influence things.
But look at the numbers. Obama won this election with far greater numbers than they could possibly have given him.

The fact is, folks, he simply convinced more than enough of our fellow citizens that he is the one they want, to lift him to a decisive victory. That's what an election is.

And so I now say this.

Congratulations, President-Elect Obama. You earned it.

You've got four years. Use them wisely.

We will help you as best we can whenever necessary. All you have to do is ask. Seriously.

But make no mistake.

WE have given you the keys to the greatest nation on the planet....and if we think you're driving us too far the wrong way, we CAN take them back.

You've promised us quite a lot in the last couple of years. Don't think we'll forget it.

Please don't make us regret this decision.

Alfonzo Rachel for President (UPDATED)

2008-10-08T13:45:00.000-07:00

I can hear the cries of the incredulous even now, all the way up on top of this big ol' rock:

"ALFONZO WHO?"

The man's name is Alfonzo Rachel.

Do NOT get on his shit list.

He only just started up his own blog "The ZoNation" back in August or so.

But if what I've seen from him so far is any indication, the Democratic party may soon find themselves suddenly presented with seven different kinds of smoke that they did NOT see coming.

Want some more? (Come on. Admit it. You know you do.)

Besides the blog link noted above, you can currently find his other clips on YouTube here.

He is also on MySpace under the name "Twenty Pound Sledge", a music project which he runs through his "Macho Sauce Productions" company.

Yeah, I know...he ain't runnin' for President.

But I'd vote for him.

BIG tip o' the rock to JammieWearingFool for the initial clue-X-4.

Maggie's Notebook has noticed as well. Nice to meetcha, Maggie.

UPDATE: Bob Parks, a black conservative behemoth all by himself, has made Alfonzo a permanent partner at his own corner of the 'sphere, "Black And Right". Go say howdy.

...And To Think We've Been Neighbors All This Time: Meet John and Sarah

2008-09-05T00:07:00.000-07:00

As is painfully obvious by now, I haven't had much time in my life for blogging lately. Hell, I haven't even really had much time for politics either. I basically have caught little glimpses of current events in between sleeping, eating, working and taking the kids to and from school.

I was not interested in watching the news concerning the Democratic convention. I didn't have to. It was plastered everywhere. The anointing of the Democratic chosen one. (You know, that guy ...Be-JAY-sus H. O-Bummer, or whatever his name is.)

I'm sure it must've been nice to be present at the walking of the waters. Whatever. I'm too busy trying to keep up my own paygrade to be too worried about his.

Didn't even notice his partner...I don't know, some fat cat.

But I had the good fortune to have a couple of days off just in the right places this week, to be able to watch Sarah Palin and John McCain introduce themselves to me.

And that is exactly what this amounted to. As I said, I haven't had much chance to get to know these players very well. Oh, I knew the names well enough, from glances at newspapers in the local Sheetz as I stopped in for gas, or when my wife has some of her websites up in the morning while she gets ready to do her job. (She works at home, dontcha know. Must be nice.)

It's just as well in the case of Sarah Palin, as she's rather new on the national market in any case. But I like what I saw and heard from her this past week.

A tough broad from Nowheresville, rising up through the ranks to become the governor of an American state, raising five good kids along the way, who doesn't give a damn who you are if she thinks you're trying to pull something over on the people who depend on her.

There's something undeniably American about a beauty queen that drives herself to work every day, at the helm of the biggest state in the Union, and (if necessary) can plug that night's dinner between the eyes from out the car window on the way home.

Go ahead...browse around. Learn who this chick is. Meet Sarah Palin.

Personally, I look forward to watching her eat her Democratic counterpart's lunch for him.

But, of course, the big-ticket show happened last night.

Up until this week or so, I have only really known him as a Senator with a war record from Vietnam and a pretty lady on his arm. (Hey, some guys just got it, y'know?)

Tonight...John McCain did not rise up from behind a movie set like the runner-up in the local Moose Lodge "Moses" lip-sync competition.

He did not float down from the heavens as if the collective face of "We-Who-Are-Not-He" was not worthy of being ground beneath his shoe leather.

Tonight...John McCain walked up, shook my hand, and showed me who he was.

As usual, far more able souls than I have already sounded off on what an occasion that was.

I will just say this.

If you did not watch John McCain's RCN presidential nomination acceptance speech last night, find someone with a link to it. (Ah, what the hell. Here ya go.)

Watch it. All of it. I don't care what your political beliefs are. That doesn't matter to what I am about to say next.

Meet John McCain...if only to learn what the word "service" really means.

There's far too many people out here these days that don't know the burden of service that thousands of their fellow citizens have taken upon themselves, to help bring America to the level of greatness it has attained...and to keep it from being brought down from that level, by those who only see America as something standing in their way.

UPDATE - 09/07: Folks like this gentleman here. Watch the whole thing. It's not long, and you'll see what I'm talkin' about here. (Thanks, Don.)

R.I.P. -- Charlton Heston, 1923-2008

2008-04-07T08:28:00.000-07:00

A man who stuck to his guns, in every sense of the phrase, is dead at age 84.

Stander's Screening Room: I AM LEGEND

2008-03-22T09:06:00.000-07:00

First off, I've always liked Will Smith since the first inkling we had of him in his "Fresh Prince of Bel Air" days.

Admittedly, that show wasn't much of a stretch for him; "young rapper makes good" kinda thing. Pretty cool, but I generally got the impression that he wasn't doing much more than simply being himself, a skinny street-wise kid from West Philly, and having a blast doing it. (I mean, come on, they didn't even bother changing his NAME.)

Then he started making movies. Specifically, his first real starring role came in "Six Degrees of Separation", and he pretty much gobsmacked everybody with his performance.

In my humble opinion, he's never looked back since. (Well, okay...there was that "Wild Wild West" turkey. Even HE'S embarrassed about that one.) His ability to mold himself into whatever role has been put in front of him, coupled with a work ethic that would put a stable full of plowhorses in traction, has enabled him to become a one-man Hollywood powerhouse.

There's one thing he hadn't done, though, at least as far as I know...a one-man MOVIE.

I've always wondered what he would able to do without a cast to bounce off of. Would he be able to carry almost an entire film on just his own skills as an actor?

Enter the answer....I AM LEGEND.

If you've ever read Richard Matheson's 1954 novel of the same name, you have a reasonable understanding of what's going on here. A great plague has stricken the Earth, rendering nine-tenths of the world's population dead as doornails, and most of the remaining tenth reduced to mutated, vampiristic, not-so-dead ~~doornails~~ monstrosities...with the exception of one survivor, whose genetic structure has rendered him luckily immune from the plague. The movie strays a little from the original work as far as the cause of the plague (it's basically a viral strain of super-rabies) and the nature of the monsters (sorta "28 Days Later"-ish), but you get the idea.

The setting here is New York City, circa 2012, completely devoid of sentient life as we know it (with the exception of Will's character and his dog, Sam) for the three years since the initial spread of the virus...and, folks, it is almost seamless. The thoroughfares are overrun with the detritus of people gone missing (abandoned cars, road construction projects dropped in mid-jackhammer, etc.) and also deer, birds, and even lions (hey, zoo animals gotta eat too), and beginning to be overgrown with wild grasses and weeds. In short, this is a very realistic picture of what the place might look like if us biped-types just picked up and moved out all of a sudden, and nature began the process of reclaiming the city.

Will Smith, in the guise of Robert Neville, is the ghost in the shell of the once-bustling NYC machine. And in Will's hands, Neville is a human being who has been handed the ultimate double-edged sword.

During the day, Neville is the King of New York City. We're talking blank-check-of-the-gods here. The city is his supermarket, safari, department store, and entertainment center all rolled into one, and he recognizes it and uses it to keep himself fed, safe and -- above all -- sane. (Hey, I'd put up mannequins in the video store, too, if only to have someone other than my dog to talk to once in a while.)

He has also apparently managed to visit the local hospital enough to outfit a pretty decent-looking microbiological laboratory in his basement, where he can be found when not foraging for food and supplies. His ultimate goal (and the driving plot of the film) is to find a cure for the virus's effects on those it did not kill, and Will does a masterful job of portraying the frustrations of a scientist trying to hammer a viral nail that just won't go down.

Which brings us to the other side of the "carte blanche"...He is, indeed, the only human being he has seen in over three years -- for all he knows, he may be the only one left on the planet -- but he is also not alone. And Will's performance during the nighttime scenes carry well the juxtaposition of the two extremes: When night falls, the erstwhile kings of the castle become just a guy and his dog, boarded up in his house, praying that the horde of slavering, howling monsters patrolling outside will pass him by unknowingly, just once more.

I won't blow anymore of the movie for you. I will just say, before releasing you to see this for yourself, that Will gives the character of Robert Neville a range of emotion, strength and weakness that totally sold me. I cared about this character enough to forget for a while that I was just watching a movie, and found myself jumping at the scares and appreciating his attempts at normal life in the daytime like I was standing there with him. (Friends, there are one or two moments of absolute sadness in the movie that I defy you to watch and remain unmoved.)

Ladies and gentlemen....I AM LEGEND, Francis Lawrence director.

Just plain POWERFUL.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

2008-03-17T11:52:00.001-07:00

Forgive me, folks...I just couldn't stop myself.

July 26, 2007: Teflon Don and the Apaches

2008-03-16T08:14:00.000-07:00

Words fail me.

Well, yeah...they do that all the time. I'm not nearly the writer I think I am sometimes.

But this time is different.

This morning, I read a very special post by Teflon Don, owner and proprietor of the invaluable soldier's blog "Acute Politics", concerning the events of one day last year.

I'm just gonna shut up and let you read it for yourselves. I've supplied the link to his main page below. Start with the article entitled "FRAGO - 26 July 2007" posted on Friday, March 7 of this year. Scroll down from there. There's a very important link in the midst of that day's postings that you must not miss.

You have your orders. Proceed.

Points of Interest: March 4, 2008

2008-03-04T11:56:00.000-08:00

As most of you are probably already aware, this last week or so has seen a few changes in the conservative blogosphere. Bryan Preston, an able netwriter whom I have referenced more than once in these pages, has left the stable over at Hot Air to take a position with Laura Ingraham's radio show. I wish him all the best with his new venture.

Concurrent with the above news, blogger extraordinaire Ed Morrissey has consented to join the Hot Air crew to fill the void left by Bryan's departure. Alas, this change of scenery also means that Ed's former virtual abode, the indefatigable Captain's Quarters, is no more. CQ has been a mainstay of the right-sided 'sphere for some years now, and it will be missed. Godspeed to all aboard, says I.

Finally, Michelle Malkin, the head honcho of the aforementioned collective, has another reason to mourn a passage today (along with anyone else -- myself included -- who ever spent an Mountain-Dew-and-Doritos-choked weekend in their mom's basement hack'n'slash-ing their way through a never-ending mob of ghouls, goblins and other assorted long-leggedly beasties)....Gary Gygax, the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons, the grandaddy of all role-playing games, has rolled his last saving throw. (As one of Michelle's commenters put it..."Where's a level 7 cleric when you need him?" Where, indeed.)

Warriors, rogues and mages all -- join me in hoisting a flagon of the finest to the honor of the Grand Ol' Wizard. (QUAFF) Excelsior!

Note To Self: Grow Up, Dude

2008-03-03T11:11:00.000-08:00

First, a big thank-you to all those who have been asking after me in my absence...I'm fine. The surgery went off without a hitch, and I now basically have a clean bill of health, aside from some cholesterol issues that are being dealt with.

I will say, though...it's an unusual state, me watching my own health as closely as I am now. I mean, I ain't no Adonis, but I've never really noticed myself aging all that much. I've been told by some that I seem to have a more youthful outlook on things, and I suppose that's true to a certain point.

But I'm learning rather quickly now that I am no longer the young buck of days gone by.

I've been getting clues here and there for some time now, of course, my recent health issues notwithstanding...the occasional click in the knees getting out of bed in the morning, the leftovers on my dinner plate speaking to an appetite that used to be a lot bigger (ask my mom what I was like as a teenager -- she swears I had the metabolism of a blast furnace), the first glimmerings of a spare tire....little things like that.

But you wanna know what really drove the point home this last week or so? (Sure you do. You know you do.)

My 20th high school reunion is coming up in October. This year.

Twenty years. I have been a grown-up for twenty years.

How the hell did that happen? Time used to be that I couldn't see anything in the future past my 25th birthday. Just couldn't see myself as being some old guy (that's what 25 looked like to me, don't-cha-know).

Now I have absolutely no idea what I could have been thinking back then. I have a loving wife (who also happens to be a helluva good cook), I have a fine young kindhearted-smart-ass 11-year-old son (that's right - there's ANOTHER one of me out there! Hide the china!), a good house, a working car, and a steady job that lets me give me and my family everything we need (and even, now and then, a few of the things we want).

Sure, things can get tough now and again...but in the long run, I guess me and mine are doing alright.

I'll be back later on with more of the usual drivel, I promise. I just thought I'd get that off my chest first. (It was getting pretty heavy.)

It makes me think...what if I could say "Hi" to that young buck now? Would I tell myself to avoid or change something in my own future, on the risk that doing so could wipe out the good things I have now?

Naw, probably not. Some of the bad stuff was instrumental in my finding the good stuff. In the end, I'm pretty happy with how things have worked out.

Still...it's a pretty cool idea.

Enjoy the Silence

2007-09-21T21:59:00.000-07:00

Sorry I haven't been around lately. I have been dealing with, among other things, some minor surgery to correct a perianal fistula. (Go ahead...look it up. Those of you who are current or former military will get a good chuckle out of this, I think.)

I'll try to be back up and around more often. In the meantime, feel free to wander around and peruse at your leisure...and thanks for checking in.

---Stander

In A Word.....OUCH!

2007-08-07T13:44:00.000-07:00

Just going around the 'Net today, poking through some of the sites I haven't visited in a while....and found something I just couldn't resist sharing.

Today's dose of virtual inanity comes to you courtesy of Cookie, owner and proprietor of "The Cook Shack -- Gab n' Grub". I forgot how enjoyable a read he is. Dude knows how to bring home the funny.

He's served up many a raucous tidbit for us this week...but the item I'm highlighting today comes from his post on Monday, July 30th.

To the gentlemen in the audience...my apologies in advance.

Arbeit Macht Frei (or, Hooking for the Union Label)

2007-08-06T14:30:00.000-07:00

There's a lot of flak flying around lately concerning an idea whose time (depending, of course, on who you ask) has come.

Someone has apparently decided that forming a union for bloggers -- no, seriously, an actual bloggers' union -- would be a really good idea (thanks to Captain Ed for the link to this Denver Post article):

In a move that might make some people scratch their heads, a loosely formed coalition of left-leaning bloggers are trying to band together to form a labor union they hope will help them receive health insurance, conduct collective bargaining or even set professional standards.

The effort is an extension of the blogosphere's growing power and presence, especially within the political realm, and for many, evokes memories of the early labor organization of freelance writers in the early 1980s.

Organizers hope a bloggers' labor group will not only showcase the growing professionalism of the Web-based writers, but also the importance of their roles in candidates' campaigns.

Now, as most of you already know, I am not by any means a professional blogger. This is just a hobby for me. I am not getting paid for this.

Thus, I cannot and will not comment on what constitutes "professionalism" as it applies to this activity. There's plenty of pros out there. Ask them about that.

But the first question that entered my head when I saw this was...who the hell thinks us blog-heads need a union? I mean, seriously....do we really have some kind of labor problem that needs addressing? Is there some desperate need for an workers' advocacy program that I'm missing?

Well, let's ask the people that want the union in the first place (emphasis mine)....

"I think people have just gotten to the point where people outside the blogosphere understand the value of what it is that we do on the progressive side," said Susie Madrak, the author of Suburban Guerilla blog, who is active in the union campaign. "And I think they feel a little more entitled to ask for something now."

Hmm....ask for what, exactly? I mean, I certainly don't pay myself well enough for this, but as I said, I ain't no pro. So it's not like I'm bucking for a bonus here.

"Bloggers are on our radar screen right now for approaching and recruiting into the union," said Gerry Colby, president of the National Writers Union, a local of the United Auto Workers. "We're trying to develop strategies to reach bloggers and encourage them to join."

Somebody help me here....when the hell did writers start standing in on assembly lines in Detroit?

Sitting at a panel titled "A Union for Bloggers: It's Time to Organize" at this week's YearlyKos Convention for bloggers in Chicago, [Kristen] Burgard said she'd welcome a chance to join a unionized blogging community.

"I sure would like to have that union bug on my Web site," said Burgard, a blogger who uses the moniker Bendy Girl.

Is it just me, or is there a pattern emerging here?

[Susie] Madrak hopes that regardless the form, the labor movement ultimately will help bloggers pay for medical bills. It's important, she said, because some bloggers can spend hours a day tethered to computers as they update their Web sites.

John Edwards...call your office. There's apparently a whole new set of sufferers that have yet to see the insides of a courtroom on ~~your~~ their behalf.

"Blogging is very intense—physically, mentally," she said. "You're constantly scanning for news. You're constantly trying to come up with information that you think will mobilize your readers. In the meantime, you're sitting at a computer and your ass is getting wider and your arm and neck and shoulder are wearing out because you're constantly using a mouse."

And I suppose getting out of the chair every once in a while to stretch or go for a walk is out of the question?

(For purposes of disclosure, my wife and I work in front of a computer for many hours a day, too. However, I would note that we both get up and take a break at least once every couple of hours or so. As should we all.)

And so, apparently, we are fools to not all be on board with joining an organization that can give us so many wonderful things.

Like these guys, for example...

"The reason I like blogging is that it's very anarchistic. I can do whatever I want whenever I want, and oh my God, you're not going to tell me what to do," said Curt Hopkins, the founder of the Committee to Protect Bloggers.
"The blogosphere is such a weird term and such a weird idea. It's anyone who wants to do it," Hopkins said. "There's absolutely no commonality there. How will they find a commonality to go on? I think it's doomed to failure on any sort of large scale."

Huh....he doesn't want to join an organization that won't let him do "whatever I want whenever I want". Seems logical to me.

Mark Noonan, an editor at Blogs for Bush and a senior writer at GOP Bloggers, said he worries that a blogger union would undermine the freewheeling nature of the blogosphere, regardless of its political composition.

"We just go out there and write what is on our mind, damn the critics," he said. "To make a union is to start to provide a firm structure for the blogosphere and that would merely make the blogosphere a junior-league (mainstream media). ... Get us a union and other 'professional' organizations and we'll start to be conformist and we'll start to be just another special interest."

Forgive me, friends, but I have to agree with these two gentlemen.

Those who don't like to hear opposing viewpoints have long sought for ways to control the rolling boil that amateur (and professional) Internet journalism has become. Frankly, in my humble opinion, all this talk of unionizing the Web smacks of just another attempt to shut down the voices of those of us who do not automatically agree with those who "know best".

I'm happy enough, thank you very much, to not be involved in the kind of group-think that gives us stuff like this to look forward to.

And Now, Some Good News For A Change

2007-07-28T06:07:00.000-07:00

The 150th Army Aviation Battalion came home to Wheeling, WV from Iraq yesterday, to a rousing welcome headed up by Patriot Guard Riders both here and in Colorado, where they initially landed upon their return to the States.

From what I've read on this thread on the PGR forum, the welcome-home proceedings were a raging success. Big kudos to the Riders for throwin' our soldiers a kick-ass party.

The best news? If my information is correct, they all came home in one piece.

One of my wife's friends was on hand to welcome her husband home. Bet she's happy as hell right now. ;O)
I'll see if I can get her to let go of him long enough for me to shake his hand and put a beer in it. (Think we can make that happen, hunny?)

Welcome home, mountain warriors. You have honored us all.

Pop Quiz: What Kind of Conservative Am I?

2007-07-27T07:14:00.000-07:00

Just 'cause it's been so damn long since I did one of these....

My Conservative Identity:

You are a Flag-Waving Everyman, also known as a patriot. You believe in freedom, apple pie, rooting for America at all times, and that God gave us a two-day weekend so we could enjoy football and NASCAR.

Take the quiz at www.FightLiberals.com

Tip o'the rock to Cousin Lem over at Hillbilly White Trash.

O Sister, Where Art Thou? (or, Biting The Hand That Once Fed You)

2007-07-13T07:24:00.000-07:00

Before I begin...I will happily admit that I have had a few unkind things to say about Cindy Sheehan now and then.

But I think we have all known that, entertaining though she has sometimes been, she was never really much more than a tool for those who would have us go back to the glory days of the Clinton presidency.

Well, now she's ostensibly trying to do something other than what her erstwhile handlers would have her do, and....

...well, is anyone really surprised by this?

I can't post here anymore because my potential run for Congress
is not on the Democratic ticket.
I have been deeply grateful for all of your support over the years.
Your love and kindness helped me through lots of sleepless nights at Camp Casey '05.
If Speaker Pelosi does her constitutionally mandated duty and I don't run, then I can come back and post.
I know a lot of you are hostile towards my candidacy. Please understand that I am doing it for your children and grandchildren (and my surviving ones.)
Love always,
Cindy

That's right, fellow babies...She who was once the darling child of the American Left is showing signs of stepping off the reservation, and has been "warned" by her former fellow moonbats to not talk about it in The House That Kos Built.

True, she's been pretty much off the MoveOn payroll for some time now. But it's beginning to look like she really may have stepped on the wrong toes this time.

So...what are her chances of getting a foot in on the Pineapple Princess' home district?

Well...let's ask some of her "friends":

i have a hard time buying she rationally expected our support. She comes onto a blog she knows (or should, if she's been around so long), is a democratic blog whose purpose is to elect democrats, and lies about and trashes the democratic party.
I'm sorry, thats not rational. If she wanted our support, she should have reasonably laid out a platform for her DEMOCRATIC candidacy against Nancy in the primary. Instead, she 1. trashed democrats 2. advocated an independent candidacy and 3. gave a rant instead of a platform.
----------
Helping my children and grandchildren? I overlooked so many things about Cindy Sheehan in the past because I thought she was doing more good than harm. Our own daughter of a U.S. soldier has been attacked by "peaceniks" espousing Cindy's Code Pink views and still I supported her. That was my choice though and I make a different one today and Cindy hasn't done anything that has helped my children in a very long time, but she has done things that have hurt my children very recently.
--------
Let's see if I have this chronology correct.
1) GBCW [Good-Bye Cruel World] thread.
2) Followed by a diary of the I'm-packing-my-bags-and-you-won't-have-me-to-kick-around-anymore diary.
3) Followed--after a couple weeks when the spotlight of attention swung slowly away--by a diary of the now-I-do-something-a-little-controversial-to-get-you-to-think-about-me-again variety.
4) Followed by the self-pitying I'm really-leaving-for-good-this-time diary.
5) To be followed by another diary of the what-have-I-done-that's-so-wrong variety.
6) To be followed by yet another let-me-announce-something-controversial type of diary (see 3 above) to get you to think about her again, or, perhaps, a varient of the no-really-tell-me-what-I-did-that's-so-wrong diary (see 5 above).
7) To be followed by a self-pitying, well-if-you-really-don't-want-me-here.... diary as a penultimate grasp at attention.
8) To be followed by a GBCW diary.
Replace the diaries with text messages or voicemails, and the pattern is the same as the pattern one finds in some former boy/girlfriends who just aren't willing to believe the breakup is really over. I've seen it a million times. So have you.

....including one Mary Julia, who would appear to have been the inspiration of this latest Cindyism in the first place:

Let's get something really clear, right here, right now. If anyone else on this blog had posted the diary Ms. Sheehan had posted the other day, that poster would have been banned, and rightly so. I found that diary deeply offensive. My parents lived through the Depression, My Dad served in WWII, and they were Democratic activists all of their lives. They worked their butts off for the Kennedys. I recently lost one of my best friends to cancer caused by Agent Orange - He also worked for the Democratic Party all of his life, and died far too soon, thanks to his service in Vietnam.

I am sorry Ms. Sheehan lost her son in Iraq. I appreciate what she did in 2005. But enough is enough. We treat her differently because of all that, and I really don't understand why. I find it patronizing and indulgent, actually. Ms. Sheehan is not the only mother on earth who ever lost a child in a war. There are thousands of families right now who have lost a family member in Iraq.

As for this latest screed, I wonder if Cindy has read the comments from the last diary at all. I didn't "warn" her - I said she had offended me, and as far as I was concerned, she was no longer welcome here. I could care less whether she runs against Pelosi. Considering the views expressed in the previous diary, I doubt she could get elected to ANY office. I welcome any respite I can get from Ms. Sheehan.

Could this "ouster" from the plantation be simply an imagined slight taken overboard by St. Cindy? Hard to say. Losing a child in a war can take people in some pretty desperate directions sometimes.

Unfortunately for her -- and despite any sympathy that might be due a bereaved mother of a soldier -- she milked that cow dry a long time ago.

In short...for once, I am in agreement with the Kossacks.

I'm getting a bit tired of her myself.

----------

Others putting forth their two cents on this one:
Michelle Malkin
Little Green Footballs
Ace of Spades

Introducing....The Tygrrrr Express

2007-06-28T05:30:00.000-07:00

We've got a new friend over on the left there that I'd like you to meet.

He styles himself as the Black Tygrrrr, and seems like a pretty well-written guy for one who only started this whole blogging thing a few months ago. (But then, if he's good enough for Townhall, he's gotta be doin' something right.)

Ladies and gentlemen...The Tygrrrr Express, leaving the station pretty much whenever it suits him (but the trip's worthwhile, so what the hell?). Go on...hop on board for a spell.

Points of Interest: June 19, 2007

2007-06-19T05:09:00.000-07:00

Florida Cracker, the grande dame of Gator country, starts things off for us with a rare gem indeed: a dumpy little cellphone salesman from Cardiff, Wales, who trudged onstage at the start of the English TV show "Britain's Got Talent" almost wishing he hadn't bothered, opened his mouth....and ended up taking the whole enchilada with an operatic tenor that left even Simon Cowell slackjawed. (She's got a clip of his first audition performance all ready and waitin' for ya. Give it a listen, and remember...he has had ZERO vocal training.)

Cousin Lem over at Hillbilly White Trash has his usual plethora of political pontifications to plow through, but also took time enough to point to an indication that all this political stuff really doesn't matter much anymore....now that the end times are near. (The sign says it all.)

Sister Toldjah sounds off on (among other things) that dude in North Carolina (you know, the one who couldn't prosecute a rape case even if he HAD one), English war veterans being honored on the 25th anniversary of their victorious defense of the Falkland Islands (including what happened when a Tennessee gentleman met the Iron Lady herself), a few choice words for the BBC, and probably the most creative excuse the UN has to offer for the situation in Darfur. (Nope. You'll never guess it.)

Folks, the inestimable Greyhawk has gone back to the Big Sandbox. Go on...stop on by and give him some sugar. While you're there, go ahead and give Mrs. G's Dawn Patrol a good rolling through. There's more news there about the state of the GWOT than in a week's worth of any ten newspapers you could name. No lie.

And finally, raise a glass with me to the health of Matt Currier Burden and the crew of the good ship Blackfive, which celebrated its fourth bloggiversary yesterday. Good on ya, gents....and thank you for keeping the deeds and memories of our truest heroes alive and well. [CLINK]

To All Soldiers, Past And Present....

2007-05-31T06:46:00.001-07:00

My humblest apologies.

I had hoped to create my very first slideshow in tribute to the fallen and still-standing amongst you on Memorial Day, but was unable to do so due to a nasty little surprise known as "DRM" -- Digital Rights Management.

Basically, I bought a download of a beautiful piece of music by Bobby McFerrin...his gorgeous rendition of "The 23rd Psalm", which he dedicated to his mother.

Then, when I tried to import the song into Windows Movie Maker to start the project...WHAM! The import was denied, thanks to a little piece of code somewhere in the clip which is apparently designed to limit how I can use the clip....

AFTER I've already paid for it. *Sigh*

Oh, well. Enough with the useless bitching. It's not getting me anywhere.

Sorry, folks. I'll get it right next time.

As a token of good faith, I hereby present a ready-made collage accompanied by another song that haunts me...considering where we buried my father about six years ago.

Keep a box of Kleenex handy, friends...this one just plain HURTS.

Courtesy of 2ndLT Mistie Beardmore, JROTC, Mesquite High School. (The Force is STRONG in this one.)

Well done, Cadet. Keep up the good work.

One Helluva Birthday Present

2007-05-25T04:52:00.000-07:00

A little background, first.

One of my blogger buddies, Russ Emerson, has been facing off with a pretty nasty-sounding series of health problems this year, including seriously reduced control of his legs. He's had several MRIs, and has been dealing with some serious difficulties just in his daily living. (Taking out the trash, for example, has gotten rather adventurous lately.) Theories as to the cause have been bouncing around between things like tumors or multiple sclerosis.

Well, yesterday he finally got the results of his third MRI...and some really good news.

Say it with me, kiddies...."idiopathic hydrocephalus". (Google it. I did.) Suffice to say, it's still something to be looked after (brain surgery is certainly still in the foreseeable future), but it's better than everything else he's been fearing might have been the cause.

And to top it off....today's his birthday.

So come on, y'all....stop on by and wish him a happy one. (Click on the Health tab at his site for the full skinny.) A few more new friends in his corner will no doubt do him some extra good.

Oh---and say hi to Mycah (heh...and Homer) for me.

A Brief Pause to Rally The Troops

2007-05-14T08:31:00.000-07:00

I don't have time to go into the specifics of this, but I wanted to sound off on a couple of things related to it.

There's a big story going around -- at least, it's going around in those circles who are willing to report on it -- that Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius took a cue from DNC head honcho Howard Dean as to what could be done politically to gain some points from the recent Greensburg, KS tornado disaster. Sam Brownback is apparently involved as well, in one form or another.

I only have limited knowledge of the whole affair, so I refer you to Bryan of Hot Air, who seems to have the best roundup of the battle so far.

Here's the part I want to put my two cents in on.

The radio show which has stuck their necks out the most with this story -- America's Morning Show, hosted by Jim Quinn and Rose Somma-Tennent -- has been a fixture in the Pittsburgh morning radio scene for a long time. We're talking at least a couple of decades here, if not more. Longtime readers of this site know that I have referenced them in many posts past.

I myself have been an avid listener since about 1998 or so, after moving into the area about two years prior, when they were hosted only on local radio station WRRK 96.9 FM. Within the last couple of years, they have started gaining national-level attention (by way of involvements with such political talk luminaries as Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, as well as being aired on XM radio channel 165) upon attaining syndication at their new home, Pittsburgh NewsTalk Radio station 104.7 FM.

In the years that I have listened to them, I have never had any reason to doubt their bonafides as far as credibility. They have always conducted themselves as professionals, and have always been the first to make note if they have any doubt about the veracity of the news they put out. And this incident is no exception.

They have several sources that they use to check out possible show material, and (if what I understand is correct) have made extensive use of one source in particular in verifying this one. I do not believe that they would keep a source active if they thought for one second that they were being lied to.

This morning (as I was taking the kids to school), they announced on air that they have been threatened with legal action -- personally -- by a law firm representing the DNC Headquarters, if they do not immediately cease and desist from their work on this story AND put out a complete and total retraction of all material they have issued on the subject. Needless to say, they have rejected these demands.

However...they continued in their announcement that, if it is discovered that their source in this issue gave them false information, or sandbagged them in any way...they would happily not only retract the story on air, but also PUBLICLY reveal the identity of the source him/herself. (As earlier stated, they do not appreciate being lied to.) And I have never known these two to take a stand like this without following up on it.

In other words, it is my humble opinion that they would not go to air on something like this without doing their level best to be able to back it up first, or at least let everyone know that it's still a developing story that they're in the process of checking out.

There. That's my say on the matter.

I again refer you to the above link to Bryan's post, as he himself has personally been in touch with Jim & Rose to get their side of the story.

Points Of Interest: May 8, 2006

2007-05-08T07:30:00.000-07:00

The well-read-and-equally-well-written Baldilocks is never at a loss for words (when her computer isn't screeching blue-bloody-murder at her, anyway). Lately, she has posted a quick article about things to do in Mexico when you're nekkid (no, there are no burros involved, you sickos) and a somewhat more loquacious piece about someone who may be starting to feel a bit of a draft herself.

Teflon Don of Acute Politics -- a warrior-poet if ever there was one -- wraps up a three-part missive on what he did in the war today. It is well worth the read, and (in my view, at least) gives a stellar demonstration of what would be lost if that ban on battlefield blogging ever really DOES come to fruition.

Our old buddy Pat Sajak shows how revealing those old "come-in-for-a-conference" letters from teachers to parents can be concerning a child's future achievements.

The DANEgerus one opens up a tall-boy on...hell, just about everybody. Today, that number includes:
1) ABCNews for their coverage of the recent DNC candidates' debate;
2) those who would like to conveniently forget something Billary once said about Saddam;
3) Ted Rall for...well, being Ted Rall; and
4) anyone seriously considering paying reparations to....Guam???

And finally, Val Prieto over at BabaluBlog gives us a quick picture of the Cuban-American community as seen in Florida, as a means of contradicting the statements of someone who recently made a film that apparently does not paint them in the kindest light.

(Disclosure: My brother married a Cubana a couple of years ago, and I got the chance to meet my new relations at the wedding. For what it's worth, they certainly seem like fine and decent people to me.)

Welcome Back, Grey Eagle

2007-05-04T08:22:00.000-07:00

Now THIS is something that does my heart good.

In recent months, I have noticed that Grey Eagle's blog, An American Soldier 2, has been conspicuously inaccessible. I began to worry quite a bit over this for a couple of reasons:
1) she's one of the relatively few female war-bloggers out there (and a damn good one at that), and
2) she has an unfortunate past history of attracting some pretty nasty hacker trouble.
That last one had me worried that someone had yet again managed to knock her site out of commission.

Then, of course, there's always the occupational hazard of
3) ....well, you know...not coming back.

Thankfully, all that has been put to rest. She's been home for a while now, and (if I have this right) may now actually be prepping to go back into Iraq. While she's been home, she has been resting up and making up for lost time with her family -- and put her hubby in charge of a general overhaul of her website.

Ladies and gentlemen...do yourselves a favor, and go check out the new and improved home of Grey Eagle. There's still a few bugs to work out (hubby's not quite put the final spit and polish on it just yet), but they're mere annoyances. I'm just happy to see the gal back in the saddle.

Glad to have you back, Cin....and THANK YOU for all you and your comrades are doing.

Californistan Or Bust: Throw Momma Down The Memory Hole

2007-05-02T07:48:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the ever-overly-informed Jim Quinn for the initial tip-off to this.

-----------

It could be argued, O faithful reader, that one of the biggest hurdles the American left faces in its battle to remake America's children to its own liking can be summed up in one word: "Parents".

Seriously. Many a lefty initiative (more than you might know) has fallen to the outcry of the average American parental unit.

Well, like any good proponent of cultural Marxism (thanks for the phrase, Jim), the California state legislature has fallen back on an old stand-by when dealing with its adversaries: legislating them off the face of the earth.

After all, it's hard for you to have a dissenting opinion if you don't exist:

A plan that has been launched in the California state Assembly – again – could be used to ban references to "mom" and "dad" in public schools statewide by prohibiting anything that would "reflect adversely" on the homosexual lifestyle choice.

It's similar to a plan WND reported was approved by lawmakers last year, but fell by the wayside when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed it.

That's right...they tried it once already. Thankfully, Ahhhnold tossed it out the window.

But why let a little ol' thing like a gubernatorial veto get in the way, when you can simply pretend it didn't happen?

[Capitol Resource Institute Executive Director Karen England] noted that Los Angeles schools already have implemented most of the proposals now pending for districts across the state, and among the changes are:

"Mom" and "dad" and "husband" and "wife" would have to be edited from all texts.

Translation: "You don't need to listen to those grownups in your house. They'll just get in the way. Listen to us. We know you know we know better."

Cheerleading and sports teams would have to be gender-neutral.

Translation: "Why huddle when you can spoon? The coaches won't mind. They won't have a choice."

Prom kings and queens would be banned, or if featured, would have to be gender neutral so that the king could be female and the queen male.

Translation: "Either everyone gets a chance to hold the royal sceptre, or no one does. It's only fair."

Gender-neutral bathrooms could be required for those confused about their gender identity.

Translation: "We know you really don't know who you are. This way, you don't even have to think about it. Why tax your puny little brain so?"

A male who believes he really is female would be allowed into the women's restroom, and a woman believing herself a male would be allowed into a men's room.

Translation: "No, dude, really, go ahead. That hot chick won't mind if you follow her into the john. Just tell her you think you're a girl. Then she can't stop you from showing her your girl-power."

Even scientific information, such as statistics showing AIDS rates in the homosexual community, could be banned.

Translation: "No, dude, really, go ahead. Gay people don't REALLY get sick from doing it with other gay people. The Man just tells you that to keep you from exploring ~~whoever we want you to~~ who you really are. How can you tell if you don't try?"

Basically (at least, as far as I can tell -- logic doesn't fit well with stuff like this), the idea here seems to be this: "It'll be a lot easier to mold these kids the way we want to, if we can take everything their parents learned when THEY were growing up and turn it inside-out and upside-down again and again and again, until the only thing these little brats know what to think is what we tell 'em to."

Yet another reason I thank God every day that my folks came from Iowa.

'Bout Time Somebody Said It: Jeff Foxworthy at the 2007 CMT Awards

2007-04-22T10:40:00.000-07:00

As you may have already surmised from past postings, I generally like country music.

I didn't used to, though. There was a time, as an impressionable young lad, when I lived in Denver and swam among a more liberal school of fishes. As a result, I never had much use for the stuff at the time.
Don't get me wrong, now...I wasn't so bad that I particularly minded if someone else liked it, and wouldn't necessarily jump to switch the radio station if it was an alright song. I just didn't care for it much myself.

It's amazing how things change when you become a daddy. It's a complete change of scenery.

For one thing, you start noticing with a fresh set of ears and eyes -- at least, I did -- that the list of things that you enjoy, and the list of things you wouldn't want your kid getting involved with just yet, are starting to become the same list.

And I also started noticing that country music -- you know, all that twanging and stuff made by a bunch of backward hicks that can't "keep up with the times" -- wasn't sounding quite so "backward" as I had previously thought.

If I'm boring you with all this, I apologize. I'm not all that good at describing this kind of experience. I guess it just took me a while to recognize the good stuff when I hear it.

Thankfully, there's people around like Jeff Foxworthy, who's known about this stuff all along...and, if his recent speech at the 2007 CMT Awards is any indication, is a LOT better at articulating what it's all about.

Bryan over at Hot Air has the goods. Go give it a listen. It's worth the trip...and goes further than anything else I've heard towards explaining country music's huge upswing in recent years.

'Bout time somebody said it.

Artists of the Week: Igudesman and Joo...and Friend

2007-03-25T08:15:00.000-07:00

I've decided to shy away from most of the political stuff for a while. Real-life circumstances notwithstanding, I find I'm losing some of my stomach for the constant argument. (Well, that, and I've never really been all that good at that stuff anyway.)

So, then...a bit of a levity break today.

And who better than these two classical clowns?

This diabolical duo consists of Aleksey Igudesman (violin, Rachmaninoff sticks, cutlery) and Richard Hyung-Ki Joo (piano, screaming, janitorial equipment) -- two sophisticated gents who met at the age of 12 as students of the renowned Yehudi Menuhin School. After a few years of palling around and honing their classical chops, they decided to take the music on a bit of a scenic route, generally gawping at the scenery and making things up as they went along.

The result is a show that had them rolling in the aisles when they premiered at Vienna's Musikverein festival in 2004. They've been galumphing their way around the world ever since, and show no signs of stopping anytime soon.

I would say something like "the likes of which has never been seen before"...but that would be a bald-faced lie.

After all, we could not have had the students...without the master.

Ladies and gentlemen, I now present the Great Dane himself -- the undefeated and undisputed King of Classical Comedy...Victor Borge, performing off-the-cuff at a concert presented in his honor.

On his EIGHTIETH birthday.

When eighty years I reach, look as good I will not. Heh.

P.S. -- If you still don't remember this guy, take a look at a tape of the old PBS kids' show "The Electric Company" sometime....and see if you can find the bit with the guy who does the punctuation-sound-effects thing. (Yep. That's him.)

A Tale for the Ages

2007-03-25T07:41:00.000-07:00

If you haven't seen today's installment of Chris Muir's Day By Day cartoon...well, hey, you're in luck. It's just to the left there.

For those who arrive at this particular party a little bit late, here's the link.

Go forth, say I...and prepare thyself to say, "Yea, verily."

Introducing....One from the Eye of the Storm

2007-03-12T04:30:00.000-07:00

I know, I know...way too long since my last post. Life marches on. (As per SOP, it's doing so right over my blogging schedule. Yee-ha.)

Just have time for a quick note...but it's no less important for all that.

Major Chuck shouts over the rooftops from his position to shine a clarion light on one who allegedly has been ordered not to write about one's current situation.

Understandable these days, I suppose...considering what's currently going on where one says one is.

Thus, as you have no doubt noticed, I have decided to follow Chuck's lead as far as one's identity is concerned. (None of my damn business anyway.)

One apparently only just started writing on the 'Net on Saturday or so, but is already showing more than a dab hand with the virtual pen. Stop by and give some love. I'm certain that (if my understanding of one's situation is correct) one could use all the support one can get.

Californistan or Bust: And The Golden Dildo Goes To...

2007-02-26T08:07:00.000-08:00

As if there was any doubt about THESE two:

In the biggest non-surprise of the night, Al Gore's film on global warming won the Academy Award for best documentary on Sunday, and the former vice president and his Hollywood friends used the opportunity to push their cause before a billion-strong global audience.

"An Inconvenient Truth" also walked away with a second Academy Award, for best original song -- Melissa Etheridge's "I Need to Wake Up." Etheridge performed the song earlier in the evening, before a backdrop that flashed messages such as, "You can even reduce your carbon emissions to zero."

Would installing some eco-friendly storm shutters on this idiot's mouth help?

Never mind that the film is being challenged for ....well, for being a crock of polar bear shit, that's what:

"A new scientific study shows that for the first time they're finding polar bears that have actually drowned swimming long distances - up to sixty miles - to find the ice," Gore says in the movie.

John Berlau, author of a new book on the environmental movement entitled "Eco-Freaks," claims the polar bear scene alone should disqualify Gore's film from consideration for best documentary, because it departs from reality.

Berlau noted that while the movie's companion book says the bears were drowning in "significant numbers," the study Gore is most likely referring to only found four polar bear carcasses in the sea off Alaska.

That episode took place after a severe storm, he noted, but Gore makes no reference to a storm during the film's animated polar bear sequence.

Gore also never cites a source for his polar bear claim, Berlau points out, but scientists on both sides of the polar bear debate told Cybercast News Service he was probably referring to a recent report filed by the U.S. Minerals Management Service.

Researchers with the service in 2004 found four dead polar bears floating in the sea off Alaska but said in a report that the bears "are believed to have drowned as a result of the storm."

Never mind the preternatural speed with which the Academy dropped trou and spread 'em for their new hero...

Hmm....anyone else sensing a pattern here?

Dan Gifford, an Academy Award nominee himself, has called on the academy to investigate whether Moore "fabricated scenes and video of real people that has been edited to manufacture a fictional reality intended to mislead viewers."

If it is determined those accusations are true, Gifford, the producer of "Waco: The Rules of Engagement," wrote to Bruce Davis, executive director of the academy, Moore should be stripped of the Oscar and it should be awarded to the runner-up.

"Failure to conduct such an investigation and act according to its findings will diminish the stature of the Oscar, establish an exploitable precedent for future rule violators and be grossly unfair to the other nominees who did follow the rules," Gifford wrote. "That unfairness will be particularly bitter to those whose film would have been nominated in place of 'Bowling for Columbine.'

"Even the accusation of such rule violations taints the Academy Award with implications of politics and favoritism that are most damaging," he continued. "So, I again respectfully ask that you not delay your attention to this matter."

That letter was written April 21. Repeated attempts to reach Davis by telephone were unsuccessful.

Never mind that a goodly chunk of the great unwashed lost interest in Melissa Etheridge long before her beloved partner did. (I wonder what it took to get ol' Wooden-head to let her climb aboard his coattails?)

A fading lesbian rocker and a BDS-suffering Earth-monkey in the same movie, at the Oscars? Please. This was a phone-in.

UPDATE: How 'bout THIS for an inconvenient truth?

In his documentary, the former Vice President calls on Americans to conserve energy by reducing electricity consumption at home.

The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, according to the Department of Energy. In 2006, Gore devoured nearly 221,000 kWh—more than 20 times the national average.

Last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year. As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359.

Since the release of An Inconvenient Truth, Gore’s energy consumption has increased from an average of 16,200 kWh per month in 2005, to 18,400 kWh per month in 2006.

Yet another example of the Democratic mantra: "Do as I say, not as I do."

David Vs. The Goliaths

2007-02-22T08:23:00.000-08:00

Dick Morris has a few things to say about his former boss, and how she handles political criticism. (What, you thought I was talking about Bill? Please. We all know who wears the pants in that organization.)

Take it from someone who knows...pissing off the Clintons is not done lightly:

If you like the idea of censorship of critical political speech, you’ll love Hillary Clinton as president.

To Hilary, open political discourse apparently means that her opponents and their surrogates are free to compliment her. If they do otherwise, it’s off with their heads.

Not even supporters of Hillary’s opponents are allowed to disparage her. If they do, the wrath of Hillary surfaces and it is not a pretty sight.

Case in point: movie mogul David Geffen, who was once one of Bill's biggest supporters (to the tune of about 18 milllion bucks), now says Hillary's not the pretty princess she would like us to think she is. (Gasp! Blasphemy!)

Geffen gave an interview to New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd. Here’s a few tidbits from him that apparently rankled Hillary:

“… I don’t think that another incredibly polarizing figure, no matter how smart she is and no matter how ambitious she is — and God knows, is there anybody more ambitious than Hillary Clinton? — can bring the country together.”

“Obama is inspirational, and he’s not from the Bush royal family or the Clinton royal family.”

“It’s not a very big thing to say, ‘I made a mistake’ on the war, and typical of Hillary Clinton that she can’t.”

Geffen also call Bill Clinton “a reckless guy” who “gave his enemies a lot of ammunition to hurt him and to distract the country.”

Instead, he's backing Barack Obama, having raised $1.3 million already for the senator from Illinois.

The Clintons' response? Screaming for Obama to renounce his new best friend AND give back all that money.

Obama is no fool, however, as evidenced in the Obama campaign's response to Her Majesty's demands:

“It is ironic that the Clintons had no problem with David Geffen when he was raising the $18 million and sleeping at their invitation in the Lincoln bedroom…It is also ironic that Senator Clinton lavished praise on Monday and is fully willing to accept today the support of South Carolina Senator Robert Ford who said if Barack Obama were to win the nomination, he would drag down the rest of the Democratic Party because he’s black.”

We have not heard the last of this, friends. She Who Would Be Queen will not stand long for this spurning of the Royal Hand.

Tip o' the rock to Cousin Lem over at Hillbilly White Trash for the initial clue-X-4.

The Victory Caucus

2007-02-18T06:42:00.000-08:00

Just a quick note for the morning.

I have recently become a registered member of a new collective of bloggers and other noteworthies who are heavily concerned with the successful prosecution of the War on Terror, and with the treatment of the soldiers currently engaging the enemy therein.

This new grouping is known as the Victory Caucus, and was put together by several people -- including such blogging heavyweights as Hugh Hewitt, Ed Morrissey of Captain's Quarters, and Matt Currier Burden of Blackfive -- who decided they wanted to take a more active hand in things by focusing attention on the activities of our Congressmen & Senators, on both sides of the aisle, as the fight for victory in Iraq and Afghanistan continues on Capitol Hill.

I'll leave you with a link to Matt's post on the subject -- he can fill you in on some more of the details. You may also check the Caucus out for yourselves by clicking on the new link button over to the left there. Happy hunting.

'Til Death Do Us Part...

2007-02-14T18:35:00.000-08:00

For stony limits cannot hold love out,
And what love can do that dares love attempt.

---William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

Now THAT'S amore.

My wife says she would've handled this differently, had she been the one to discover this little vignette...and I agree.

Let the eggheads take all the pictures they need...and then put these two crazy kids back where we found 'em. They deserve a little privacy, don't you think?

Happy Valentine's Day, y'all. (Luv ya, hunny. *SWAK*)

All Evidence to the Contrary

2007-02-10T06:11:00.000-08:00

Remember the old song from Sesame Street that started with "One of these things is not like the others"?

This picture was taken from the front page of the Weather Channel website on Feb. 6, 2007.

See if you can find the odd man out.

Here's a hint: If you click on it, you get this.

Artist of the Week: Prince

2007-02-06T05:06:00.000-08:00

I don't care if he IS damn near 50 years old.

Dude STILL knows how to throw a helluva party.

Anybody who can channel Tina Turner, Jimi Hendrix and the Foo Fighters -- in ONE performance -- and give 'em all justice in the process has my unconditional respect.

'Course, knowing how to definitively silence a room full of reporters don't hurt none either.

All hail His Royal Badness!

The Liar, The Bitch, and The War Zone -- Part Deux

2007-02-04T08:07:00.000-08:00

Well, lo and behold...I come back a couple days later, and I find a clip that goes EXACTLY where I was headed, by comparing the things Hillary said to the Code Pink group to what she told the crowds while stumping in Iowa on the 27th of January THIS year.

Okay...remember all that stuff she told the Pinkos four years ago -- behind closed doors, mind you -- about how glad she was that, all those years ago in Kosovo, "we did it alone as the United States. And we had to do it alone"?

Now, flash-forward to the song-n-dance she gave the good people of Iowa last weekend about a war the Clintons AREN'T in charge of, and....

Ta-DAAAH! A completely different story!

"I said that we should not go to war unless we have allies. So, he took the authority that I and others gave him, and he misused it. And I regret that deeply...."

Four years ago, she had been patiently gathering and studying information about Saddam's exploits "for more than a decade".

Last Saturday...POOF! It was gone in a flash:

"....And if we had known then what we know now, there never would've been a vote, and I never would've voted to give this president that authority!"

Four years ago, when the time came to decide whether to go after Saddam, she said SHE voted for the resolution "after carefully reviewing the information and intelligence that I had available".

Last Saturday...."What, me? (looks around, then shrugs) Don't look at me. I'M not the one in charge here."

"I think it's the height of responsibility, and I really resent it. This was HIS decision to go to war, he went with an ill-conceived plan and an incompetently executed strategy, and WE should expect HIM to extricate our country from this before he leaves office."

Translation: "...because the last thing I need right now is for us to win the war in Iraq on HIS watch."

As for her husband's record as a terror-fighter....well, here's what he said last September about his efforts to round up Osama bin Laden:

WALLACE: "Do you think you did enough, sir?"
CLINTON: "No, because I didn't get him."
WALLACE: "Right --"
CLINTON: "But at least I tried. That's the difference in me and some, including ALL the right-wingers who are attacking me now. They ridicule me for trying. They had eight months to try. They did NOT try. I tried. So I tried and failed."

....and here's what he said -- yep, you guessed it -- four years earlier (emphasis mine):

"We'd been hearing that the Sudanese wanted America to start dealing with him again. They released him. At the time, in '96, he had committed no crime against America, so I did not bring him here because we had no basis on which to hold him, though we knew he wanted to commit crimes against America. So I pleaded with the Saudis to take him, 'cause they could have. But they thought it was a hot potato and they didn't, and that's how he wound up in Afghanistan."

In the end, the only thing he really tried was our patience.

So there you have it. What they said then, and what they say now.

Keep this in mind as we approach the 2008 Presidential election.

Do we REALLY want to give these two used-car salesmen a crack at the ultimate do-over?

The Liar, the Bitch, and the War Zone

2007-02-01T09:16:00.000-08:00

Russert: "Do you believe we could have disarmament without regime change?"

Clinton: "I doubt it....I can support the president, I can support an action against Saddam Hussein because I think it's in the long term interest of our national security."

---Hillary Clinton, Senator (D-NY)
NBC, "Meet The Press" - September 15, 2002

Now pay special attention to this next clip, in which Hillary speaks in person to a group of Code Pinkos about six months later in March 2003, just before the invasion of Iraq got going. (Fair Warning: This is a long one.) You can safely ignore the first four minutes or so, which consists of a bunch of chicks dressed all in pink with apparently way too much time on their hands.

At about the 4:45 mark, the lead tulip (hey, Hil said it, not me) says they decided to organize to protest the idea of going to war in Iraq because they "care deeply about the Iraqi women and children".

Well, sure they do...now that there's someone they don't like in the White House that they can safely lambast for actually wanting to take down the guy responsible for their having something to "care deeply about".

But I digress. At about the 6:30 mark, Her Majesty begins to speak. Hear her words, mere mortals, and tremble.

First she dispenses the standard acknowledgement of the group's willingness to speak out for the women and children -- after all, they do care so deeply -- and then this pops out (emphasis mine):

"There is a very easy way to prevent anyone from being put into harm's way, and that is for Saddam Hussein to disarm, and I have absolutely no belief that he will. I have to say that this is something I have followed for more than a decade. If he were serious about disarming, he would have been much more forthcoming..."

More than a decade, eh? We'll get back to that one in a little bit.

She blathers on for a while about the travesties of Saddam Hussein's governing techniques, the success of the Missile Destruction program, and eventually states that she "ended up voting for the resolution after carefully reviewing the information and intelligence that I had available, talking with people whose opinions I trusted."

So the consummate politician, possibly the smartest woman on the Hill, with all the resources at her disposal, followed Saddam Hussein's efforts to up his arsenal for over a decade...and then decided to "allow" some other President to do what should have been done -- well, over a decade ago -- because she can always call him to the carpet for it later if it goes kerblooey. Okay.

Now, fast forward a bit to about the 12-minute mark (you can stop off a bit if you like, to hear some old bag from N.O.W. say something about how going to war will put our men and women of color in danger of being shot at -- no, really, listen to her) -- and we find this little gem of a response to a comment made by the aforementioned old bag that it is not OUR responsibility to deal with Saddam, but rather that of the "world community"...in which Hillary explains why we (read: "Bill and I") ordered troops into Kosovo WITHOUT the backing of the UN (again, emphasis mine):

"I just do not believe that, given the attitudes of many people in the world community today, that there would be a willingness to take on very difficult problems were it not for the United States' leadership, and I'm talking specifically about what had to be done in Bosnia and Kosovo, where my husband could not get a Security Council resolution to save the Kosovar Albanians from ethnic cleansing. And we did it alone as the United States. And we had to do it alone. It would have been far preferable if the Russians and others had agreed to do it in the United Nations. They would not. I am happy that, in the face of such horrible suffering, we did act."

And almost a decade later, we're still there. Funny...I don't hear anyone ponying up an exit strategy for THAT one.

Why? Simple....it was done by a Democrat. And when you're a Democrat, the usual rules don't apply. So Bill makes a mess and doesn't clean it up himself, and that's cool.

But let a Republican try to go in and clean up a mess the Useless Nations made (I wonder why no one there would back us this time either?), and he gets fifty lashes.

There will be more to come on this later, I promise. But this is shaping up to be a bigger post than I expected, and right now, I need to get to bed. But I think you get the jist for now.

Until then...flame on!

Experiencing Existential Difficulties...Please Stand By

2007-01-24T06:40:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the non-posting lately...life has been crowding in again. I'll try to get back to posting regularly again as soon as possible, I promise.

In the meantime, there's plenty of good blogs listed to the left. Pick one you've never met before, and jump in. Lotta high quality folks there.

As If Iraq Wasn't Having Enough Problems....

2007-01-17T08:53:00.000-08:00

I have never much read the L.A. Times, mostly because -- and I thank my lucky stars for this -- I don't live in L.A. But even if I did live there, I have found another reason to not read this rag.

Apparently, they don't see a problem with giving precious column space to dumbass ideas like this one, as written by Niall Ferguson (link courtesy of Uncle Jimbo at Blackfive):

Yet even if the president were in a position to send in 215,000 extra men, I doubt they would suffice to halt the civil war. Why? Because, having been the war makers who precipitated Baghdad's descent into anarchy, U.S. forces now lack the legitimacy to be regarded as peacemakers.

Bush's medium-term goal of handing over responsibility for law and order to the Iraqi security forces is also fatally flawed. Left to their own devices, those forces will become at best ineffective and at worst active participants in the civil war.

For these reasons, I see only one credible alternative to Bush's strategy: U.S. forces should hand over responsibility for Iraq's security not to the Iraqis but to a new force provided by the United Nations.

Here's part of Unca J's response:

Let's indulge the fantasy and magic 150,000 Malaysians, Ghanians, and unionized Dutch troops to Iraq with all kinds of brand new gear. They have no common operating procedures, often don't even speak the same language, and have exactly zero experience fighting counter-insurgency. Sounds like a winning hand to me. Maybe we just didn't paint our helmets the right color.

If Ferguson had been paying any attention at all to what the vaunted "peacekeepers" at the UN have accomplished in the Democratic Republic of the Congo after being there since 1999, according to this April 2006 report from the Global Policy forum (link courtesy of Don Surber), he might have thought twice about making himself look this stupid.
The report itself is in PDF format and is rather long, so here's an excerpt or two:

In 2006, DRC continues to endure the world’s deadliest
humanitarian crisis, with more than 38,000 people dying every
month as direct and indirect consequences of the armed conflict,
according to the International Rescue Committee (IRC).
Approximately 45 percent of these deaths occur among children
under age 18. In addition, children are targets of human rights
violations committed by armed forces and groups on a daily
basis. The overwhelming majority of these crimes are committed
in an environment of utter impunity....

...All armed forces and groups continue to perpetrate rape and
sexual violence against girls and women. The victims of rape or
other forms of sexual violence in DRC are believed to number
in the hundreds of thousands. In many cases, the rapes are characterized
by severe cruelty, including against young girls and
sometimes boys...

...Armed forces and groups also pillage and loot hospitals and
other medical facilities. As a result of these attacks and the general
devastation of the nation’s healthcare system, children are
dying each year from preventable causes, such as malnutrition,
malaria, diarrheal diseases, acute respiratory infections, measles,
tuberculosis and others. The war has left the nation largely with
out drugs, medical equipment and skilled medical personnel,
and with the national health infrastructure in a state of collapse...

And there's this:

...In addition to the six egregious violations identified by the
United Nations Security Council, children in DRC continue
to face a spectrum of other horrific abuses and crimes. These
include: forced displacement, forced labor, forced involvement
in the illicit exploitation of natural resources and others.
Approximately 150 cases of sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA)
by United Nations (UN) personnel have been uncovered and
investigated...

And let's not even talk about Darfur.

And THIS is what Niall wants Iraq to become? Geez, what'd they do to HIM, piss in his lunchbox or something?

I will agree with him on one point. I, too, believe that 21,000-odd extra troops ain't gonna be enough.

But, unless the new guy in Turtle Bay starts making some drastic changes soon, it's better than anything we would get out of the Useless Nations.

UPDATE: 21,000 troops not enough? Hmm...perhaps I spoke too soon.

A New Era of Police Brutality?

2007-01-16T08:25:00.000-08:00

There's rumors going around that the Police might be mobilizing again.

Yes, THE Police. Sting, Summers and Copeland. The reggae/punk/pop comet that blazed across the 80's like a Patriot missile on steroids for five albums, and then flared out from....well, getting on each other's nerves.

Mike Ventre of MSNBC blames the frontman for the long hold-out:

The stumbling block to a Police reunion up to this point had been Sting’s lack of need for one, both financially and creatively. Much to the chagrin of fans of the Police, Sting drifted off on a musical cloud, far away from the punk-reggae roots that grabbed listeners in the first place. In a sense, he did what David Byrne of Talking Heads did: Although he delved into new worlds and dabbled in different genres, the priority seemed to be to get as far away as possible from the band that provided him with fame and success in the first place.

Yeah, okay, Sting can be a bit of a prick sometimes. So can Stewart, and I like his stuff just fine, too. Haven't heard much from Andy since then, but then years of working with those two had to have given him a healthy talent for keeping his head down.

My wife, a huge fan of the old stuff and Sting's solo work, will probably go on high holy alert mode if this holds true. I'll report from the ramparts as events and cover-fire permit. :O)

(AWRIGHT, awright...I'm looking forward to it too.)

Tip o' the rock to Allahpundit of Hot Air for the initial groundburst.

When Charlie Met Nancy (or, Chicks on a Power Trip and the Fish Packers who Love Them)

2007-01-12T18:14:00.000-08:00

By now, of course, you've all heard the news.

On Wednesday, the House obeyed orders and passed what has been called the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, which would raise the minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 over the next three years:

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), who had garnered support for the issue in June while the Democrats were still the minority party in Congress, said passing a mininum-wage increase now was important to "honor the work of Americans."

Sen. Ted Kennedy, in a press conference before the vote, called the bill a matter of both "family values" and "civil rights," citing the large proportion of black and Hispanic workers the minimum wage affects.

Okay, so that's black and Hispanic Americans accounted for. Is that everybody? (Keep that in mind, friends...we'll get back to this in just a sec.)

Assuming it gets through the Senate, this bill will force all currently operating American businesses with employees at the minimum-wage level to raise those employees' pay, regardless of whether said employees deserved it or not.
Which will, in turn, force those companies to raise the prices on their products, or lay off other employees, or conduct any number of other cost-cutting procedures in order to stay profitable and/or stay in business.

Unless your business happens to have its headquarters in Nancy Pelosi's main district...in which case, apparently, it's different:

The bill also extends for the first time the federal minimum wage to the U.S. territory of the Northern Mariana Islands. However, it exempts American Samoa, another Pacific island territory that would become the only U.S. territory not subject to federal minimum-wage laws.

Ah, now see? I just KNEW we were missing somebody.

One of the biggest opponents of the federal minimum wage in Samoa is StarKist Tuna, which owns one of the two packing plants that together employ more than 5,000 Samoans, or nearly 75 percent of the island's work force. StarKist's parent company, Del Monte Corp., has headquarters in San Francisco, which is represented by Mrs. Pelosi. The other plant belongs to California-based Chicken of the Sea.

(Insert "smelt" joke here.)

This should have come as no surprise to anyone who read the title of the bill. Anytime you hear a liberal Democrat use the word "fair", you can bet SOMEONE'S getting shafted.

In this case, it's the majority of an entire nation of people who technically fall under the umbrella of American governance...yet, at the same time, seemingly don't qualify for whatever Ted (hic) Kennedy defines as "family values" and "civil rights".

A spokeswoman for Mrs. Pelosi said Wednesday that the speaker has not been lobbied in any way by StarKist or Del Monte.

Translation: "This is just a particularly magnanimous gesture on ~~The Exalted One's~~ ~~Sugar Mama's~~ Mrs. Pelosi's part...and they'd better not forget it."

----------------

Tip o' the rock to Don Surber for the initial reference.

Introducing: Acute Politics -- The Tales of Teflon Don

2007-01-12T08:25:00.000-08:00

"I walk softly, for I tread on the ghosts of years."

--Teflon Don, founder and proprietor of the weblog Acute Politics

Ladles and table-mints, allow me to present a new and most worthy addition to the Point's blogroll...Acute Politics, the brainchild of a soldier running under the moniker Teflon Don, a journeyman student of history who shows a great appreciation of just where he is and what he's doing there.

He's been in-theatre over in the Big Sandbox since September of last year (about the same time this notable blog first appeared on the radar, incidentally). He has had much to report since then, and does so with a more-than-able hand with the virtual pen and a keen view of how he and his comrades fit in the grand scheme of the present conflict.

In short, chilluns...this dude can WRITE.

Stop by and give him a look-see. It's worth the trip.

Points of Interest: Jan 12, 2006

2007-01-12T07:50:00.000-08:00

Jules Crittenden proves that he has a pretty good idea what it takes to win wars, by highlighting a soldier who puts it in practice every day he's in combat.

Among other things, Jason van Steenwyk over at CounterColumn shines a light of honor and respect for a fallen soldier or two, shows us what a little ingenuity can do for the tone-deaf, and verbally spanks yet another pressmonkey for inaccuracies in their writing.

Sniper One of 7.62mm Justice writes a pretty damn good explanation of just what it means to voice dissent AND be patriotic about it at the same time, and gives our political mommies and daddies a "time-out" in the process.

Beth of Blue Star Chronicles does a yeoman's job of pasting Mr. Peanut for conduct unbecoming a former Head Honcho. (I worked for Habitat for Humanity briefly once, and it's a good thing. If only Jimmy-boy would have left it at that, I might like him a little more.)

And, finally, our friendly-neighborhood-pipe-smokin'-assassin Iowahawk gives us several more reasons why he is simply the coolest of the cool, including creepy critters, babes in the big house, and an exclusive documentation of Hunter S. Thompson's most hallucinatory road-trip EVER. (And you though Scooby Snacks were tasty before.)

You have your orders. Stander out.

Fair Tax Blogburst: Jan. 10, 2007

2007-01-10T05:57:00.000-08:00

by Debbie of Right Truth

John Edwards is running for president of the United States on his same old theme, 'two Americas'. He hopes to get votes by pitting the 'haves' against the 'have nots'. He even chose New Orleans to make his announcement, with the unspoken message that the government failed the poor people and he has stepped in to be their savior.

Edwards is promising universal health care, pulling out of Iraq ,taxing oil company profits and eliminating President Bush's tax cuts to pay for his priorities. Edwards is not alone in his thinking about the evil rich (of which he happens to BE ONE). Yesterday Thomas Sowell had a wonderful article that relates to this, titled 'A Dangerous Obsession'.

Mr. Sowell picked up on the media, the left, and academia's continuous obsession with “gaps” and “disparities” in income. 'As one talk-show host put it, “It makes no sense” that a corporate executive makes over $50 million a year.' Sowell says, "Ninety-nine percent of all the things that happen in this world “make no sense” to any given individual."

If you cannot understand something as simple as making a lead pencil, why should you be surprised that you don’t understand why someone is making a lot more money than somebody else?

Moreover, if this obsession with income disparities is to be something more than mere hand-wringing or gnashing of teeth, obviously the point is that somebody ought to “do something” to change what you don’t understand.

That's what the left, liberals, and Edwards wants to do. They want to correct what they perceive as something wrong, ...some people having more money than others. And how would one go about correcting such an atrocity? That's easy. Take away the excess from one, and give it to another. Or as Mr. Sowell puts it, "Usually that means that the government — politicians — should impose policies based on your ignorance of what is going on."

Of course, such political control of incomes is usually advocated only to deal with “the rich.” But, when income taxes were imposed in the early 20th century, they applied only to “the rich” and they took a very small percentage of their income.

Once the floodgates are opened to this kind of political power, however, we have seen with the income taxes that they not only spread far beyond “the rich,” they took a serious share of even middle class incomes.

Moreover, the income tax has spawned an intrusive bureaucracy, creating so much complexity and red tape that millions of ordinary citizens have to go get some accountant to fill out the forms for them — and then sign under penalty of perjury that it was done right.

If you knew how to do it right, you wouldn’t have to go to somebody else to have it done, would you? ...

It is also worth noting that the people who are said to be earning “obscene” amounts of money are usually corporate executives. There is no such outrage whipped up when Hollywood movie stars make some multiple of what most corporate executives make.

In short, Mr. Sowell is asking, "Whose wealth is it anyway?" Did the government earn this wealth? No, they didn't. Why should they be the ones to decide who is worthy to spend that wealth? Did the government produce any product, any widgets, any business that will employ others? Unless you count the bureaucracies needed to collect and redistribute this wealth, the answer is no.

In reading Mr. Sowell's article, I thought directly of the United States, but Tom at Libertarian Leanings looks at this from a world view.

Israel has nowhere near the natural resources of the Arab states, yet they are wealthier by far. According to the CIA World Factbook, Israel produces a measely 2740 barrels of oil per day. At the same time Saudi Arabia puts out 9,475,000, and Iran 3,979,000. Yet Israel enjoys a per capita GDP of $25,000, while Saudi Arabia and Iran come in at $13,100 and $8,400 respectively. The income gap is not a crisis in Israel because Israelis have the freedom to produce wealth. Arab state citizens have less freedom, less wealth, and less hope for getting it.
Unfortunately, leftists (and Democrats) can't bring themselves to support the spread of freedom. Their antidote to the growing gap between the rich and the poor is to prevent the creation of wealth. Taxation discourages an activity, so the lefty solution to their contrived crisis is to tax wealth (income) at ever higher rates as a person demonstrates ever higher success in creating it. The Arab solution is to wipe Israel off the map. Actually, there are Democrats who seem to be coming around to that view.

This brings me back to the United States, to the Fair Tax, which would replace the federal income tax system with a progressive national retail sales tax. It provides a "prebate" to ensure no American pays federal taxes on spending up to the poverty level, dollar-for-dollar federal revenue replacement and, through companion legislation, repeal of the 16th Amendment.

This nonpartisan legislation (HR 25/S 25) abolishes all federal personal, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, self-employment, and corporate taxes and replaces them all with one simple, visible, federal retail sales tax – collected by existing state sales tax authorities.
The FairTax taxes us only on what we choose to spend, not on what we earn. It does not raise any more or less revenue; it is designed to be revenue neutral. (more)

Why should people be punished because they took the risks to build a business, to produce a product, to creat a new widget? Why should they be punished by having the government take away a large portion of their profits, profits that could be used to produce MORE jobs, more widgets, more wealth? Why should the creators of wealth, who give much of that wealth away to worthy and needy organizations, be punished? They shouldn't.

On the world scene, Brad leaves a comment at Thought Streaming

"One can never force a productive, ambitious, disciplined spirit to subsidize weak mindsets girded by overactive libidos, they will always rebel,...". Graeme also leaves a comment, " ...if you give people a "voice" at work, they will produce more. They have incentive to work."

If you let people produce wealth, reinvest wealth, and use it as they see fit without government intrusion, you will actually see more help being given to those in need; more opportunities for those in need of better jobs, higher salaries, more education. Don't punish people for using the gifts and opportunities God gave them.

That my dear friends is what folks like Edwards (and Hillary Clinton) want to do.

The FairTax Blogburst is jointly produced by Terry of The Right Track Blog and Jonathan of Publius Rendezvous. If you would like to host the weekly postings on your blog, please e-mail Terry . You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll.

Artist of the Week: Brad Paisley

2007-01-06T06:31:00.000-08:00

For this next installment, I have decided to focus on a cowboy poet from Glen Dale, WV who has taken the country music world by storm in recent years. His work combines a deep appreciation of old-time mountain gospel, western swing, and just plain unbridled musicianship to present the world with a fully-ranged ear-friendly package that's hard to resist, even for those who generally dismiss country music out of hand.

Case in point: this recent duet concert with John Mayer, originally broadcast on the CMT Network's acclaimed series "Crossroads". In this clip, Brad joins John (a journeyman guitarman in his own right) on Mayer's Grammy-winning song, 'Daughters'.

I chose this clip to illustrate Brad's ability to make himself fit in quite nicely with whatever music happens to be going on around him. Watch John's face, and listen closely to his last comment at the end of the clip, and you'll get an idea of how impressed people -- especially other musicians -- tend to become when they get a taste of what Brad can do.

If you liked what you just heard (it's okay, you're among friends here), feel free to dig a little deeper at Brad's official site. (Oh, and take a listen to some of his recent Christmas album while you're there. It's a gem.)

...And A Star To Steer Her By

2007-01-03T14:05:00.000-08:00

Earlier today, Mom emailed us a couple of pictures which she had received from one of Dad's old NASA buddies. In her words..."Sometimes it pays on know a retired NASA engineer." (The pics are pretty big, so I'll just post my one favorite here.)

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you a view of the recent launch of the Space Shuttle back on September 9th...

...from about 150 miles up.

The International Space Station just happened to be passing by at exactly the right time to grab the ultimate front-row seat for the lift-off.

Eat yer heart out, Bob Eucker.

Happy New Year

2007-01-01T07:33:00.000-08:00

Music performed by Friction Bailey.

In With a Bang, Out With a Whimper: The Death of Saddam Hussein

2006-12-30T08:08:00.000-08:00

"HE was a broken man. You could see the fear in his face." These were the words of a witness to former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's death on the gallows yesterday.

Well, it's about time he felt some.

Fret not, o gentle reader...his fear did not last long:

Shiite politician Sami al-Askari witnessed the event and said the process of Saddam's execution took 25 minutes but once he was dropped through a trap door his death was quick.

"One of the guards pulled a lever and he dropped half a metre into a trapdoor. We heard his neck snap instantly and we even saw a small amount of blood around the rope, they left him hanging for around 10 minutes before a doctor confirmed his death and they untied him and placed him in a white body bag," Mr Askari said.

And there you have it. Fifteen years too late, if you ask me, but there it is.

Saddam Hussein has been executed by his own countrymen, for crimes too numerous to mention. Not much more to say, really.

Oh, this won't fix everything, of course. There's still a lot of work to do over there.

But this is a step that's needed taking for a long time, a milestone in the process of Iraq getting itself back on its feet.

Still...there's just no pleasing some people. I wonder how long it'll take for this to get "revised" beyond recognition.

No matter. The Iraqi people know what he was, and they know why this needed to happen. Those of us in America who have been there know these things, too.

And no amount of hand-wringing, whining, and self-delusion from those who refuse to accept that someone they don't like is capable of good works in the world will change this.

R.I.P. -- Gerald Ford: 1913 - 2006

2006-12-27T06:43:00.000-08:00

Gerald Ford, the 38th President of the United States of America, has passed away at the age of 93.

He was also the youngest Boy Scout ever to reach the rank of Eagle, the highest in Scouting and no mean feat. That alone should tell you what kind of man he was.

Others offering their words on this occasion:
Blue Star Chronicles
Michelle Malkin
Perri Nelson
TexasFred
Don Surber
Captain's Quarters

Some Clay in a Manger: Clips from Will Vinton's Claymation Christmas

2006-12-24T19:30:00.000-08:00

Just a little break from the usual eleventh-hour chaos of Christmas Eve.

I saw this when it originally aired on TV (dear God, how long ago was that?) and laughed my eggnog-soaked arse off. Never, in my humble opinion, has there been a more original, warm-hearted, and just plain enjoyable embrace of the classic Christmas carols on the small screen.

Imagine my joy when I found them again, courtesy of this user on Youtube.

Here's a couple of my favorite segments from that special:

"Angels We Have Heard On High", performed by two walruses and a posse of pitilessly pummeled penguins...

....and "Carol of the Bells", as rendered by Notre Dame's Paris Bellharmonic Orchestra, conducted by -- well, who else?

If you like, you can find the rest of the clips that are up on Youtube by clicking on the user's link above. I just really loved these two, and felt like sharing. :O)

We now return you to your last-minute shopping. Good luck, and aim high.

Jingle Bell Tag: I'm It! (Christmas Meme)

2006-12-24T11:59:00.000-08:00

Here's a little Christmas cheer, to spread around both far and near.

The rules of the game: I whip up a quick blurb about 1) the 3 things I want most for Christmas, and 2) the 3 things I definitely DON'T want for Christmas. Then, I proceed to tag players B, C, D, E and F (that's five other other people, for the sequentially-challenged) in the Comments section of one of their recent posts with a note leading to my post inviting them to do the same thing. Simple, easy, and free traffic for everybody involved. What's not to love? (Oh -- and you have the Minuteman to thank for this. Heh.)

Here's mine...

The WANTS:
1) a really BIG, deep and lively djembe drum, with good range and tone from crisp high edge-slaps to gut-shaking center-booms (some nice carving on the wood would be cool, but is not necessary -- I'll take "plays great" over "looks great" every time)
2) a nice-sounding acoustic/electric guitar, amp & cables
3) enough rehearsal space to really play 'em in (preferably sound-proofed, but I'll take what I can get)

The DON'T-Wants:
1) sweaters - never been a sweater-wearin' kinda guy
2) anything that will help clean my chakras (I don't know where my chakras are, let alone whether they need cleaning or not, so it ain't anyone else's business either)
3) anything that requires a subscription (that's the grown-up version of "some assembly required" as far as I am concerned)

And there you have it.

I hereby tag thee....

TacJammer
The Anchoress
Florida Cracker
From My Position...On The Way!
The Contrary Goddess

Participate as you see fit, of course. If you decide to play with us on this, please be so kind as to leave me a Trackback.

Thanks, y'all....and Merry Christmas to all, players and passers alike.

Artist of the Week: Lunasa

2006-12-20T07:24:00.000-08:00

I've decided to start posting clips of musicians I like, on a more-or-less weekly basis. Why? Well, hell, if Cousin Lem can do it, so can I.

To kick off this new endeavor, I've chosen a long-time favorite gang of five from the Emerald Isle.

Ladies and gentlemen...Lunasa, seen here rippin' off a fast one in a outdoor session.

These guys have been around for nine years or so, and just keep getting better. I first heard their work on a Green Linnet "best-of" 25-year compilation, in which was featured a strong, measured piece of theirs called "The Church" that just plain struck me. They are additionally rare in Irish circles in that one of their number, Trevor Hutchinson, exclusively plays a bass fiddle in their arrangements (he once played with the Waterboys, don'tcha know), and Trev makes it fit right where it needs to. Wonderful stuff.

You can check 'em out for yourself if you like, here, at their official site.

Fair Tax Blogburst: Dec. 20, 2006

2006-12-20T04:21:00.000-08:00

by Jonathan of Publius Rendezvous

I came across this article several weeks ago from one of my favorite columnists. Professor Williams has a very succinct way of conveying complicated topics and themes. If you are not a regular reader of his, you should at least check out his regular column at Townhall.

In this piece, Professor Williams tackles the Fair Tax, and as we would hope he describes some of the highlights and benefits that would be reaped upon its passage.

If enacted, the Fair Tax would eliminate: the federal individual income tax, alternative minimum tax, corporate and business taxes, capital gains tax, Social Security and Medicare taxes, and estate and gift taxes. These taxes would be replaced by a 23 percent sales tax on all goods and services sold at the retail level. The Fair Tax would be revenue-neutral in the sense that it would replace the revenue from current federal taxes; thus, it would change the way government is funded. Our current tax code is an abomination, and we desperately need that change. The time Americans spend simply complying with our tax code comes to 5.8 billion hours of record-keeping, filing taxes, consulting, legal and accounting services. Breaking those hours down to a 40-hour work week, it translates into a workforce of 2.77 million people. That's more than the workforce of our auto, aircraft, computer and steel manufacturing industries combined.

The Fair Tax has much to recommend in its favor, such as being a more efficient form of taxation. It would go a long way toward protecting our privacy and preventing Congress from using the tax code to micromanage our lives. The Fair Tax is an excellent idea, but only under three conditions: first, the repeal of the Sixteenth Amendment that created the income tax; second, a provision fixing the tax at, say, 23 percent; and third, a constitutional amendment mandating that a tax increase requires a three-fourths vote of Congress. Notwithstanding any provisions within the Fair Tax, if the Sixteenth Amendment weren't repealed, down the road we'd find ourselves with a national sales tax and an income tax.

But, what I found to be the most interesting is the Professor William's take on the prospects of the passage of the Fair tax. Seeing it as a tremendous obstacle, Professor Williams is quite pessimistic in outlook. While we here at the Fair Tax Blogburst respectfully disagree with this synopsis, his underlying rationale for the difficulty of passage of the Fair tax cannot be ignored.

You say, "Williams, it sounds as if you don't trust Congress." I don't trust Congress any farther than I can toss an elephant. During the debate prior to ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment, congressmen said that only the rich would ever pay income taxes. In 1917, only one-half of one percent of income earners paid income taxes. Those earning $250,000 a year in today's dollars paid one percent, and those earning $6 million in today's dollars paid 7 percent. The lie that only the rich would ever pay income taxes was simply propaganda to dupe Americans into ratifying the Sixteenth Amendment.

Here's my prediction: The Fair Tax will never become law. The two most powerful congressional committees are the House Ways and Means and the Senate Finance committees. These committees write tax law, and as such they are able to confer tax privileges on some Americans at the expense of other Americans. The Fair Tax would reduce or eliminate this form of congressional privilege-granting power and, subsequently, campaign contributions from the beneficiaries would dwindle.

The method used to finance the federal government is very important, but I've always argued that government spending is the true measure of its impact on our lives. If there were a Fair Tax, what's to stop Congress from deficit spending or inflating the currency? Deficit spending and inflation are simply alternative forms, albeit less obvious, of taxation.

You say, "What's Williams' solution?" My solution is an amendment limiting federal spending to a fixed percentage, say, 10 percent of the gross domestic product. You say, "Why 10 percent?" If 10 percent is good enough for the Baptist Church, it certainly ought to be good enough for Congress.

The question we must ask is "What makes Williams think that this will pass any easier than the FairTax?" The outcome is doubtful for the exact same reasons that Williams argues would doom the FairTax -- the committees which decide where certain monies are spent can also confer privileges on some Americans at the expense of other Americans. Limiting spending to 10% would eliminate much of the congressional privilege-granting power, and corresponding campaign contributions.

The one thing that the FairTax has behind it is the power of a grassroots organization. Ultimately, this is still a government of, by, and for the people. It is up to us to see that our representatives perform as we believe they should. It is up to us to insure passage of the FairTax bill. We must take Mr. Williams arguments for the FairTax and spread them as widely as possible, while ignoring his pessimism. Together, we can get this done.

And maybe in the meantime we can also cut spending, thus reducing the amount of tax required for the FairTax. Now isn't that an idea?

The FairTax Blogburst is jointly produced by Terry of The Right Track Blog and Jonathan of Publius Rendezvous. If you would like to host the weekly postings on your blog, please e-mail Terry . You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll.

2006 Weblog Awards -- The Winners

2006-12-18T07:03:00.000-08:00

This year's winners have been posted. You can check out the full monty here.

A personal note of congratulations to:

Blackfive - Best Military Blog
Well done, Matt, as always...and especially to Uncle Jimbo, Froggy, Wolf, and the rest of the crew. Group-blogging has destroyed some fine establishments, and raised others to the heights of glory. Yours is definitely among the latter. Keep up the good work, y'all.

Babalu - Best Latino, Caribbean, or South American Blog
Val Prieto and the gang at Babalu have taken up the cause of liberty in Latin America like few others. If you ever wanted a real education on how things are south of the border, I can't think of a better place to start looking. Enhorabeuna, mis amigos.

Congratulations to all this year's winners....yes, even this guy. (But it was CLOSE.)

As for my own humble establishment...hey, I threw my hat in. That's all I can do.

But that's okay...'cause I'm Person of the Year, and the year ain't over yet. So there. Nyah.

Absence Makes The Heart Grow Fonder

2006-12-18T06:56:00.000-08:00

And to think all I had to do was go away for a month...

Seriously, if y'all really missed me that much, all ya had to do was say so. :O)

For Those Of Us Who Need Reminding: They Have Names

2006-11-18T13:49:00.000-08:00

Folks, blogging is going to be a bit light around here for a while. Priorities at home have shifted somewhat lately, which means I won't be able to devote much time to the Point.

Before I go, here's something worth keeping an eye on...brought to you courtesy of Blackfive.

According to Matt, a blogger named CJ was recently inspired to create a website dedicated to tributes to fallen soldiers who might otherwise have been forgotten in the media's rush to undermine their efforts in Iraq.

The site is called "They Have Names", and thus far, is an impressive display of honor and respect. I've checked out the site in question, and the authors seem to have gone to great efforts to deeply involve each soldier's families and friends in the process, in order to offer a fitting tribute to their fallen warriors.

Go take a closer look for yourself. It's relatively new, and so there are only a few stories posted at the moment, but I reckon you'll get the idea right quick. This virtual memoriam is worth the time to read.

UPDATE: Courtesy of the author of the site, you may now access the site at anytime by clicking on the "They Have Names" image located in the left sidebar. Thank you, CJ.

Fair Tax Blogburst: Nov. 15, 2006

2006-11-15T06:41:00.000-08:00

by Terry Dillard of The Right Track

Well, the elections are over and I've heard everything from "It's a sure thing" to "No way it'll even make it out of committee now" regarding the FairTax.

One thing I do know -- never underestimate the power of a grassroots movement. Democrats were shown in 1994 not to take their power for granted, and Republicans had that same lesson hammered home to them a week ago. The American people have no hesitation whatsoever about "flushing the toilet" as I prefer to call it.

Whatever your political orientation, it's been amply proven by now that lower taxes produce a stronger economy -- if we can keep spending in check. Giving Americans the ability to choose exactly how much they pay in taxes via the FairTax is a win-win situation for individuals and our government.

I found an interesting blog article that managed to work the FairTax into a post on national security. From "Freedom Is Always the Right Answer", the post is titled "Defeating China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran in the Cold War of Terror". The post begins:

China and Russia are allied and using all the tools at their disposal, including supporting North Korea and Iran, and to a lessor extent Venezuela, to defeat us in a new Cold War of Terror. China and Russia have supplied weapons, diplomatic cover, and economic support to these rogue states to drain American resources, our respect in the international community, and generally create chaos. China is stealing our technological secrets through a coordinated program of traditional intelligence and computer infiltration. China and Russia are threatening our satellites. China constantly threatens our ally, Taiwan. We can use the lessons from the first Cold War to figure out how to win this new one.

The author postulates that winning the war against terror and those who sponsor it -- directly or indirectly, it would seem -- will require the same tactics used by JFK to get the missiles out of Cuba, and by Reagan to defeat the Soviet Union. Part of this, of course, is economic in nature. According to the author's theory:

Once we put China in this position, it won't allow North Korea to be the tail that wags the dog. China will be upset with the U.S., as will the rest of the world who will call us dangerous cowboys, like they did Reagan, but China's only good option would be to work for a nuclear free Korean peninsula. China would suffer the economic pain (no more Kentucky Fried Chicken) of losing the world's greatest consumer as a costumer, plus it would be in the untenable position of being at the mercy of the madman in North Korea. America could get China's support for regime change or some other policy to remove the nukes in North Korea.

America would also suffer economic pain (T-Shirt prices would rise) from these trade restrictions, but domestic policy would limit that pain, and turn it into an advantage. By adopting the FairTax, America would begin to return as a manufacturing juggernaut. Reducing government interference in the free market would assist this process. American products, no longer burdened by the income tax, would compete with Chinese made products on the world market, further enriching America and hurting China/NK. This American growth in manufacturing would drive prices lower to compensate for the price increases from restricted trade with China/NK. This would put pressure on China to democratize. [TD - emphasis added]

But aside from National Security, the FairTax is just a good idea. The Kodiak Daily Mirror came out in favor of it because it is grassroots in nature. You know, "We the people" kind of thinking. In "New Tax Act Gives Power to the People", the Daily Mirror gives its reasons for supporting the FairTax:

A proposed bill, The Fair Tax Act, would change the way our government collects our tax money. It sounds the death toll for the Internal Revenue Service, paycheck withholdings and tax returns. As the replacement, a national sales tax, designed to fund our government at its current rate, would replace our old system. It relieves the burden of an overly complicated tax code as special interests lobby for loopholes.

The national sales tax will be collected on all new goods and services and takes the place of our income withholdings. The system is blind to income levels, yet ensures the basic necessities of life are not taxed through a tax pre-bate system. This prevents the government from dictating what the basic necessities are and affords us the ability to make our own decisions. [TD - emphasis added]

How cool is that? What a novel idea! Letting us make our own decisions! I like it! The Daily Mirror finishes the article by referring to no less a document than our own Declaration of Independence:

As stated so eloquently in our Declaration of Independence, we hold the power, not the government or our elected officials. It is time for a real change offered by the Fair Tax Act to encourage economical growth and investment. It is time to do away with the burdensome taxation system that we detest and political officials use to gain votes.

All I can add to that is a hearty "Amen"!

The FairTax Blogburst is jointly produced by Terry of The Right Track Blog and Jonathan of Publius Rendezvous. If you would like to host the weekly postings on your blog, please e-mail Terry. You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll.

Veterans' Pride: A Message From R. James Nicholson

2006-11-11T16:05:00.000-08:00

I know it's a little late for this now (sorry, it's been a busy day), but I still wanted to go ahead and put it up, because I think the below is a good idea.

While on a visit to Australia a while back to attend their ANZAC Day ceremonies (basically Australia's Veterans Day), Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson was introduced to a tradition carried out by the veterans there:

Military veterans display their medals and service ribbons all day once a year in Australia. It's a tradition that Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson would like to import to the U.S....

(snip)

"...My wife and I went into a cafe and the guy who took our order had his ribbons on, and the guy who made our cappuccino had his ribbons on," Nicholson said in an interview Thursday. "It made me think, it's the kind of thing we should develop as a tradition in our country."

And so, back here at home, he has put out the call to all our veterans to do the same: Wear our ribbons and/or medals on our civvies all day on Veterans Day, Memorial Day and Independence Day.

Sounds like a helluva good idea to me. So I did.

But you know what? Let's take this one step further.

I hereby declare this post to be open to all blogging military personnel (former and current) and family members for Trackbacks....specifically, for the purpose of displaying one of your awards/medals/ribbons in your respective pages.

Here's one of mine:

Kuwait Liberation Medal

If you wish to join me in this endeavour, simply put up a post in your own pages with a picture of one of your medals, and then Trackback to this post. I will update this post with a link to each new site that does so, as I find them.

This could be a good thing to start doing on a yearly basis, if people are so inclined. Let me know what you think.

The first link goes to Don Surber, who gave me the initial inspiration for this idea. Thanks, Don.

R.I.P. -- Jack Palance: 1919 - 2006

2006-11-11T05:11:00.000-08:00

One of the last real men in Hollywood is dead.

Take a bow, Jack.

Things to Do in D.C. When You're Out of a Job

2006-11-09T06:30:00.000-08:00

Lessee here...

Write a book about me?
....Nah. Tried that already. Easier to just wait for someone ELSE to do it, and then sue their ass off.

Get my hair done?
....Please. Do I look like some kinda media whore to you?

Hey, I know...

Sit on some old guy's porch all day screeching like a stoned magpie, just in case somebody with a camera happens to walk by?

BINGO.

And Now for Something Completely Different

2006-11-09T06:07:00.000-08:00

Excuse me while I take a station break from all this post-election stuff (I'll get back to it later, I promise) to make a special announcement:

----------------

It's BLOGGIE TIME!

Yep, it's that time of year, folks. The floor will be open for nominations on November 10th.

In the meantime, the call is out for ideas for new categories. Think they're missing something good? Drop 'em a line.

And, though I'm certainly FAR too modest for any kind of virtual panhandling or stuff like that (*COUGHullshiCOUGH*)...I would be profoundly honored to receive a nomination or two.

Or, in the words of the immortal Crash Davis..."When you speak of me, speak well." :O)

----------

We now return you to my regularly scheduled existence.

And So It Goes....

2006-11-08T07:09:00.000-08:00

"Today, the American people voted for change, and they voted for Democrats to take our country in a new direction. And that is exactly what we intend to do."
---Nancy Pelosi

The choice has been made.

Congratulations, Democrats.

You wished for it, and you got it.

For all our sakes, I hope it turns out to be the right choice. We'll do everything we can to help. Seriously. We are all Americans, however we may translate it. Work with us. I wager you'll find it a lot less painful than you think.

But...if it turns out to have been the wrong choice after all...

Hey, we tried. That's all we can do.

Two Words (Midterm Election Edition)

2006-11-07T04:55:00.000-08:00

....for anyone who thinks it won't make a difference if they vote or not:

PRESIDENT PELOSI.

Think I've gone crazy? Perhaps.

But it cannot be argued that, if the Democratic Party gains too much power in the House and Senate today...the possibility DOES exist in the not-too-distant future.

Keep this in mind, too....we Americans aren't the only ones with a stake in this election.

I'll shut up now, and let you get on with your day. But I'll leave you with this bit of prose from one of my favorite people in the world (who, by the way, happens to be a Canadian):

You can choose a ready guide in some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice
You can choose from phantom fears and kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that's clear
I will choose free will

---Neil Peart, lyricist and percussionist
for the rock band Rush

Do your duty, y'all. Go out today and vote.

The only way you'll regret it...is if you don't.

Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against The West

2006-11-06T07:39:00.000-08:00

With the limited amount of time that I have to do this during my work week, I sometimes have trouble keeping up with things.

But I heard on the Jim Quinn radio show this morning about a recent film which gives an unprecedented view of what makes up the mindset of radical Islam -- in the Middle East, Europe, and even here in the States -- and how their message has been spread around the world with frightening efficiency.

I found it in this post from Sunday by the intrepid crew of the USS Neverdock, a blog which delves into multiple issues from around the world on a daily basis. The clips within the post eventually direct you to this page in YouTube, in which you may view the entire movie in a series of eight clips lasting about ten minutes or so apiece.

The film is called Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against The West, and was directed, written and edited by Wayne Kopping.

This is just one of many chilling quotes from the film:

People, think about it, yes, jihad does mean 'self-struggle', struggle within. But so does Mein Kampf. Mein Kampf means 'my struggle'. But what struggle? Nazism had a struggle with what? What did the Jews do to tango in Nazi Germany? Jihad is being used in the Middle East as struggle with the Jewish people, struggle with the West.

---Walid Shoebat, former PLO terrorist

This film contains numerous samples of real terrorist propaganda films, using everything from traditional film work to MTV-style music videos, portraying America and George Bush as Satan. One in particular shows a clip of the Statue of Liberty as seen from behind, with a blood-red sky and sea in the background. When the camera pans around to show the Lady's face, it is that of a grinning skull.

This film also goes in depth into how American media and academia was quick to rush in and ask -- very loudly -- "what did we do to make them so mad?" Whether intentionally or just by dint of how we view ourselves as people who are above such acts, these two aspects of our own society have done much to fuel radical Islam's beliefs that we are weak and easily consumed.

Folks, I can't stay up to watch the whole thing this morning because I have to get some sleep before I go to work again tonight. But I do plan on watching it a bit at a time for the next few days, and letting it sink in as I do it.

I cannot more strongly recommend that you do the same...and spread the word. America needs to see this.

FAIR WARNING: The film you will be watching contains a great many disturbing images, including parts of the Eugene Armstrong decapitation film, and several clips involving the corruption and murder of children. DO NOT ALLOW YOUR CHILDREN to see this without seeing it first yourself.

It's Official: Saddam Hussein Found Guilty

2006-11-05T06:06:00.000-08:00

I remember, during my stint in the Gulf War, talking to several Iraqis while visiting their towns on humanitarian missions. Every one of the villages we visited was destitute, and every one of the people I talked to blamed it on Saddam Hussein.

I also remember talking to another Iraqi man in order to keep him calm, while he was being treated in one of our medical tents for chemical burns all over his body. He said he received them when his village was bombarded by Saddam's enforcers. He said he was just happy to see someone who wasn't trying to kill his family. And, as he was being taken out of the tent after we patched him up, he insisted on planting a kiss on my forehead before he left.

Everywhere we went, the one question I was asked the most (yes, by the burn victim, too) was, "When are you going to get Saddam?"

And, of course, the only answer I could give was, "When George tells us to." Which they understood.

I've always found that strangely funny. They had never met George H. W. Bush once. But they knew his name, and they already liked him better than their own "beloved Uncle Saddam".

Flash now to the present day. Different war, different George.

How sweet it is, to me, that in the end WE aren't the ones who got him. All we did was drive him out of his glittering palaces and pull him cringing out of a hole in the ground.

This morning...the IRAQIS got him:

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Saddam Hussein, the iron-fisted dictator who ruled Iraq for nearly a quarter of a century, was found guilty of crimes against humanity Sunday and sentenced to death by hanging.

The so-called Butcher of Baghdad, who was president of Iraq from 1979 until he was deposed by Coalition forces in April 2003, was convicted of the 1982 killings of 148 Shiites in the city of Dujail.

When I heard the news this morning, I got to thinking about my friend the burn victim. I can't believe it's been fifteen years since I talked to him in that medical tent.

And I wonder what his kids are doing right now.

As for Ramsey Clark, who apparently just couldn't resist getting one last little insult in before the sentencing...

Well, I'll let the judge say it.

Bravo, Your Honor...on BOTH counts.

(Oh...and don't bother asking these folks what they think of all this. You already know.)

--------------

Here's some others covering this one. Share the love, y'all.
Right Truth
Hot Air
Sister Toldjah (as covered by guestblogger Bryan of Iowa Voice)
TacJammer
Mensa Barbie

And The Last Word Goes To....

2006-11-03T06:09:00.000-08:00

...those who defend our right to have OUR words.

As for ol' Jean-Claude himself...well, I've already spoken on the subject, so I think I'll let Chris Muir finish it off. As usual, he pounds the last nail in with style.

Verbal Ballistics 101: If You Gotta Shoot Your Mouth Off, Don't Aim Straight Up

2006-11-01T06:48:00.000-08:00

BWAAAAA-hahahaaa....

DES MOINES, Iowa A Democratic Congressional candidate from Iowa is canceling a campaign event later this week with Senator John Kerry.
Brucy Braley says Kerry's recent comments about the Iraq war were inappropriate.

Forgive me, folks....but I just LOVE watching this fool get his forward-assist tapped for him.

So how about he stand up like a man, apologize for making an all-too-human mistake, take the lumps he has ordered up for himself, and MoveOn?

Are you kidding? Apologize to a bunch of knuckle-draggers? He's John Kerry, dammit! He's no lowly human! He NEVER falls!

Sen. John Kerry held a press conference moments ago to address a controversial remark he made implying those who are uneducated serve in the military and get stuck in Iraq. Kerry made it “crystal clear” that he apologizes to no one, adding his remarks were a “botched joke” about the President, not the troops.

Translation: "Don't blame me! Blame that idiot that ~~I lost to the last time I took a bite out of my own ass~~ stole the White House from me! He MADE you think I said ~~you idiots are~~ soldiers are stupid!"

And according to Michelle, the New York Slimes (big surprise) is more than happy to help him make someone else atone for his sins:

You have to read 15 paragraphs down into the story before you learn what Kerry said. Because "the mounting death toll" in Iraq, RINO Lincoln Chafee's disavowal of the war, NJ GOP Senate candidate Tom Kean's and Washington GOP Senate candidate Mike McGavick's thoughts on the war, and the Democrats anti-Iraq war ads are all more important to the Times reporters than Kerry's actual words.

Well, there's a whole lot more people -- including Chuck and Greyhawk -- who are more than happy to help hold ol' Frenchy's feet to the fire. Preach on, pastors.

Down Under, Jihadi-Style: A Believer's Travelogue

2006-10-29T07:43:00.000-08:00

This is just too funny to pass up, from a guy who makes it look WAY too easy:

Ask The Aussie Imam
Islamic Advice from Imam Yahu al-Zirius
Spiritual Leader, Fostaz al-Vegimita MosqueLakembabongabinga, Sydney, NSW

Read on for insightful chunks of wisdom from the Didgemaster of Islam.

(Click here if you haven't placed the name yet.)

Californistan or Bust: Here Come Da Judge

2006-10-27T08:40:00.000-07:00

Today's edition is brought to you by Debbie over at Right Truth (who, by the way, celebrated her first year in the blogosphere yesterday, and may there be many more to follow -- Happy Blog-day, sugah!)

Meet Hamza Yusef Hanson, the Mufti of California.

"The WHAT?", I hear you cry.

From Wikipedia:

A Mufti is an Islamic scholar who is an interpreter or expounder of Islamic law (Sharia), capable of issuing fataawa (plural of "fatwa").

In theocracies like Saudi Arabia and Iran, and in some countries where the constitution is based on sharia law, such as Egypt, the Grand Mufti rules if capital punishment is in accord with Islamic jurisprudence and the sharia and sometimes overrules criminal courts.

You read right, folks...this guy has apparently proclaimed himself to be THE legal arbiter in the state of California when it comes to all matters Muslim.

Which would, of course, require that Muslim law had been set into action in California...which, according to Stephen Schwartz, it hasn't:

Why would California have a mufti? Sharia governs such minor aspects of Islamic life as the issuance of halal butchers’ licenses, which are comparable to certification of kosher meat by rabbis. Sharia also determines the propriety of certain financial transactions between observant Muslims, and many American and other Western banks, investment houses, and related institutions have sharia consultants for the preparation of business contracts by their Muslim clients.
But California has no sharia courts. California’s Muslim population is about one million, or 3.4 percent of the whole population, which does not justify appointment of a mufti. How then does a major Saudi daily describe Hamza Yusuf Hanson as “mufti of California?”

So how did this come about? Read on:

...Born of a Catholic father and Greek Orthodox mother, Hanson became Muslim as a youth and distinguished himself, until September 11, as one of the loudest, most radical, vulgar, and provocative Islamist agitators in the West. In 1995, Hanson delivered himself of the opinion that Judaism is “a most racist religion.” (No such condemnation appears in the Koran or in mainstream Islamic theology, which honor the Jewish prophets.) ...

But don't worry...if his response to the events of 9/11 are any indication, he's pretty flexible:

With the passage of two days, of course, the world changed. Hamza Yusuf Hanson saw the difficulties that would face radical Muslim preachers in the West. He briskly reinvented himself as a peaceful, spiritual Sufi, although he has never given any indication of a real knowledge of the Sufi way or its cultural legacy. He also had the incredible luck to benefit from cluelessness inside the Beltway, and got to meet President George W. Bush. On the strength of that trivial encounter, he has built himself up as a major Western Muslim leader, claiming now to be a “Bush adviser” as well as the epitome of moderate Islam...

Well, he certainly seems to have done pretty well for himself thus far. For such a title to be bestowed upon oneself by one's brethren is a lofty honor indeed.

Especially for a white guy from Walla Walla.

I must say, though, that my initial reaction to the clip above is that he's cribbing from someone else's playbook. But that's just me.

When Kicking Puppies Just Isn't Enough

2006-10-26T06:59:00.000-07:00

Man, how desperate was THIS guy?

A child wearing a Cub Scout uniform is robbed of money he raised for his pack by a hooded man at a convenience store.
"I feel mad that he took the money," said 7-year-old Cub Scout Brennan Starr.
Starr and his mother were at a Wawa store in Upper Chichester Township selling popcorn to raise money for the Cub Scouts.
But a man lurking in a hood apparently cased Brennan, and when the scout raised $200, he struck.

Seriously. The dude asked the kid's mom for change, and then ripped the envelope right out of her hands. Right out in the light of day.

How do you get to a level where a grown man steals from a 7-year-old? Somebody help me out here.

Oh, wait, I forgot....the Boy Scouts of America are evil discriminating intolerant hatemongers. Therefore, by association, so are the Cub Scouts. My mistake.

Now all the guy needs to do is find an old lady to flash, and his day's complete.

Fair Tax Blogburst: Oct. 25, 2006

2006-10-26T04:29:00.000-07:00

(Note: Sorry for being a day late with this...life kinda got in the way yesterday. ---Stander)

With this heated election approaching faster than one could imagine, we thought it would be a time to throw the FT BB into the debates to see where each of our respective candidates reside in these matters.

We have grown fast and have expanded further than Terry and I anticipated in such a short time, which should prove to be interesting as we will hopefully see. Since we have members of numerous states, and numerous districts of the House of Representatives, let us see where the incumbents and their challengers reside when it comes to the Fair Tax.

This is where Terry and I ask for a small Homework assignment, but Terry and I will be participating, as well.....

What we shall do is send a letter to each of the respective campaigns for the district you reside asking them how they feel in regards to the Fair Tax. It can be something as simple as an e-mail, and you can tell them that the Fair Tax BlogBurst will be curious to see their answers....that way, when we hear back from them, we can all report for our readers where these individual candidates stand. We have provided a form letter below, so feel free to borrow this letter and use it/modify it for your convenience. Readers of the FT BB, we encourage you to do the very same and send either Terry or I an e-mail and let us know what they have to say.

This should prove interesting, and should prove to be informative for voters, as well.

Good Luck!

Here is a valuable resource to look up the individual e-mail addresses of your Representatives.

Sample letter to Congress: The Fair Tax Act, a nonpartisan bill (rewrite this to be your letter)

[Date]

The Honorable [First and Last name of congressman or senator]

United States [House of Representatives or Senate]

Washington, D.C. 20510

Re: The FairTax replaces the current tax system.

Dear [Congressman or Senator Last name]:

The Fair Tax Act, a nonpartisan bill sponsored by Representative John Linder (GA) and Senator Saxby Chambliss (GA), removes the burden of the income tax and other federal income-based taxes.

The current tax system is incomprehensible. It is beyond reform. It simply has to go.

The Fair Tax Act replaces the current tax system with a national consumption tax that:

Allows Americans to keep 100 percent of their paychecks, pensions, and Social Security payments.

Provides a prepaid, monthly rebate for every registered household.

Allows families to save more for home ownership, education, and retirement.

Raises the same amount of money for the federal government.

Makes American products more competitive overseas.

I urge you to heed the vast majority of voters who will surely support you if you are seen as responsible for passage of this historical tax reform measure.

As a constituent, I would like to know where you stand on the FairTax.

Sincerely,

Your Constituent

[Name]

[Address]

[City, State ZIP]

[Phone number]

The FairTax Blogburst is jointly produced by Terry of The Right Track Blog and Jonathan of Publius Rendezvous. If you would like to host the weekly postings on your blog, please e-mail Terry. You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll.

Fox in a Box: A Tale of Tangled Strings

2006-10-24T07:10:00.000-07:00

By now, most of you know of the huge debate going on concerning the efficacy of embryonic stem cells, as opposed to adult stem cells, in relation to the search for a cure to various diseases. To be sure, it has become one of the bigger talking points leading up to the coming elections.

Michael J. Fox, who has suffered from Parkinson's disease for some years now, has now thrown his hat in the ring with the following advertisement in support of Missouri Senate candidate Claire McCaskill, on the grounds that her opponent, Jim Talent, opposes ESCR:

Some have said that his portrayal of himself is just that -- a portrayal by an actor, done for the sole purpose of tugging at voters' heartstrings enough to make them want to vote for McCaskill purely out of compassion for folks like him.

Carol Liebau has this to say on the subject:

It's up to each viewer to decide whether the ad is an over-the-top example of Fox allowing his illness to be exploited. Dean Barnett, who has some "street cred" to speak about exploitation of illness, has some thoughts that are well worth reading.
But, in any case, let's not fool ourselves that Fox is doing anything more than shilling for a Democratic politician. That's because there's already a stem cell initiative on the Missouri ballot -- so whether one votes for Jim Talent or Claire McCaskill has no impact on what happens with stem cell research in Missouri.

Now, I myself do not necessarily see this as being purely political. Mike showing himself "au naturel", as it were, doesn't seem all that inappropriate to the situation. Let's face it, folks...no one suffering through this disease without the benefit of treatment is gonna look all that good, and that's what he is putting forth.

So I'm not gonna beat up on Mikey because he's throwing his support behind a candidate whom he thinks will bolster his cause. We ALL do that.

I will, however, question the wisdom of his choices.

I mean, for a Democrat, she's not all that smart:

Tim Russert: "You had Bill Clinton come in and raise money for you, do you think Bill Clinton is a great President?
Claire McCaskill: "I do. I have a lot of problems with some of his personal issues. I said at the time, I think he's been a great leader but I don't want my daughter near him."

Nipping the hand that feeds you -- on national television -- is never a good idea. Hillary's not going to forget THAT one anytime soon.

Then there's the recent scandal about ACORN workers doing some serious voter-card-cooking on her behalf:

St. Louis ACORN workers, who have still not been paid by the way, reveal that all of the people who were being trained at ACORN headquarters (many at the same time) were told to go out and canvas for "(Democrat) Victory 2006" and Claire McCaskill!

But leaving Claire (and, apparently, Ben Cardin of Maryland as well) aside for the moment....there's something else about this that should be mentioned.

There are many -- the venerable Anchoress among them -- who fear that Michael's stumping for ESCR (and the candidates he thinks will support it) will do him, and those he represents, little good:

So, we see that in 2001, ESCR was showing the embryonic stem cells tended to be unmanagable and, actually, too powerful, too malleable. We see in 2006 that labrats treated with the stem cells tended to show some improvement but within a short time tissue growth becomes abnormal - one might assume that the rats, which were killed, might have displayed similiar behavior as was seen in 2001, had they lived. For all the talk we hear about the "great promise" of Embryonic Stem Cells, the research doesn’t support it. Nor, apparently, does private funding.

Don't get me wrong, Mike. I like you a lot, and I admire your devotion to your cause. I really do. Would God that a cure comes quickly.

But it's looking more and more like you're being used as a puppet for someone else's purposes...and in politics, strings get cut on a daily basis.

Points of Interest: Oct. 20, 2006

2006-10-20T16:25:00.000-07:00

Today's edition starts off with a missive from our ol' pal Pat Sajak. (Yes, the Wheelwright himself...who would appear to be one of the few people in Hollywood with an actual sense of reality. Go fig.) In his latest installment of "Sajak Says", Pat pops off on the perils of perpetually putting one's prognosticating proboscis in the public puss. (AWRIGHT, awright...I'll stop. Sheesh.)

Next up, Jason over at CounterColumn delivers a solid pimp-slapping -- yet again -- to the good folks at CNN, for their airing of several video clips depicting sniper attacks upon our soldiers...and shares with us an article depicting the pounding the Supreme Court recently took when a new law, just signed by the Commander-in-Chief, put them at least a few steps closer to back in their place.

Don Surber, a fellow West Virginian, chimes in next with a reprint of a recent column of his that got so many hits at once (thanks to linkage from a Drudge report which credited him) that it killed the servers at his home newspaper, the Charleston Daily Mail. It concerns a certain "Grandma" who purports to oppose the "party of the rich"...but wait'll you hear what SHE'S worth. Yowza. (I wish I could afford to be that hypocritical.)

Next we pay a visit to the home of the Dumb Ox, who has a bone to pick with...well, okay, just about everybody, but the big targets lately are George Soros (that's "Saint George" to you, you paeans...just ask the MSM, they'll tell ya) and Madonna. (Because it's SO hard to be a good adoptive mom when you spend every night plastered on a cross done up like a mirror-ball -- oh, the SACRIFICE of it all!)

Finally, Kit Jarrell of Euphoric Reality provides us with an update or two on the status of her Innocent Pendleton 8 Family Fund...and, folks, it's doing some good, according to the mothers of some of the accused. (Keep up the good work, y'all. It IS making a difference.)

----------------------------------

Now, for the first time in the all-too-short history of my humble establishment, I open the floor to all comers for a Open Trackback session. You are hereby invited to share your own Points of Interest herein.

Reggie White is Spinning In His Grave

2006-10-17T07:55:00.000-07:00

Somewhere in the neighborhood of twelve years ago, I read a short story by Norman Spinrad called "The National Pastime". In a nutshell, the story predicts the future of professional football in a world where the NFL finds itself with some stiff competition with a newer, brasher league which gleefully promotes feeding-frenzy-style violence, both on the field and in the stands.

In other words....something a little bit like this.

What you are seeing is a bench-clearing brawl which occurred during Saturday night's game between the Univ. of Miami, and Florida International University. (Pay special attention to what one knuckle-dragger does with his helmet just after the Miami flaggers run past. I bet his momma's just BURSTING with pride right now.)

If I have my information right, over 30 students got suspended when the whole brouhaha finally got put back under wraps by Miami police.

Do these thugs have any idea how they're representing themselves here?

If you ask me, the whole game shoulda been tossed out the window right then and there, and both teams' remaining schedules right along with it. They deserve it.

Oh, sure, it won't make much difference to the players (who must have been looking for an excuse anyway, judging from the speed at which this donnybrook developed).

But maybe the loss of some serious broadcast and box office revenue will get the UM & FIU Boards of Regents to do something to rein in these bums.

Tip o' the rock to Kevin Aylward over at Wizbang.

I Can't Decide Which One Is Funnier...

2006-10-13T20:42:00.000-07:00

"The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived and dishonest—but the myth—persistent, persuasive and unrealistic."
—John F. Kennedy, 1962 Commencement address at Yale University

"Reality is that which refuses to go away when I stop believing in it."
—Phillip K. Dick

(Tip o'the rock to On Matters Of Most Grave Concern, an excellent storehouse of quotes for all occasions.)

Russian To Judgment: Bullets in One Hand, A Bullhorn in The Other

2006-10-09T16:02:00.000-07:00

Anna Politkovskaya, an investigative reporter known for her criticism of the policies and actions of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has been gunned down in Moscow:

MOSCOW, Oct. 7 -- Anna Politkovskaya, a Russian journalist whose byline defined the fading craft of investigative and crusading reporting in President Vladimir Putin's Russia, was fatally gunned down Saturday in the lobby of her apartment building in central Moscow.

Politkovskaya, 48, was renowned for her probes of the brutality of Russia's military campaign in Chechnya as well as the banality of corruption permeating Russian life, from the remote provinces to the bright lights of Moscow.

(snip)

She was a harsh critic of Putin's rule and was working on a story about torture in Chechnya, where a Kremlin-backed strongman has all but routed a separatist movement that sparked two bloody wars, at a cost to Russia that has yet to be measured.

The article was to be published Monday, according to her newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, one of the few independent media outlets in a country where much of the press is timid if not directly controlled by central authorities or regional power brokers.

From former Soviet premier Mikahil Gorbachev, who owns part stock in the Novaya Gazeta:

"It is a savage crime against a professional and serious journalist and a courageous woman," Gorbachev told the Russian news agency Interfax. "It is a blow to the entire democratic, independent press. It is a grave crime against the country, against all of us."

But don't bother asking ol' Vlad about this...he's too busy shaking his pom-poms for this little sis-boom-bah:

MOSCOW - Russia's defense minister said Monday that North Korea's nuclear test was equivalent to 5,000 tons to 15,000 tons of TNT.

That would be far greater than the force given by South Korea's geological institute, which estimated it at just 550 tons of TNT.

(snip)

The U.S. Geological Survey said it recorded a magnitude-4.2 seismic event in northeastern North Korea. Asian neighbors also said they registered a seismic event, but only Russia said its monitoring services had detected a nuclear explosion.

No one has reported detecting any radiation.

Captain Ed is not impressed by the boom -- or Putin's grandstanding about it:

Even a 5000-ton-yield nuke would have a questionable deterrent level, considering the inventory in the arsenals of the world's declared nuclear powers. It might have some value as a terrorist weapon, but it would do no more damage than a Stealth bombing run can do, and the latter has a lot more accuracy than the former. No one would shrug at a bomb that has one-third of the power of the bomb that leveled Hiroshima, but we expected more than that -- and right now, it looks like Kim only has a bomb one-tenth of that size.

So why is Russia insisting on overstating Kim's success? Other than sheer bloody-mindedness, it's hard to say. If we take them at their word, then we'd have to insist that Russia join in sanctions immediately, which they have so far refused to do. They may want to make the argument that Kim has enough of a nuclear deterrent that we should leave him alone, but that won't fly either.

So here we have a journalist who makes a living exposing Russian corruption mysteriously shot dead while getting off the elevator in her apartment building on one hand...and at the same time, we have a Russian president issuing atta-boys to a North Korean nuclear nut-ball with delusions of grandeur on the other.

I don't know where Putin thinks he's taking his country right now, but I'd hate to be the guy riding shotgun.

Others covering these events:
Don Surber
Wizbang
Right Truth
Sister Toldjah

An Old Fart Reminds Me of an Old Friend

2006-10-07T17:26:00.000-07:00

Well, y'all certainly don't need me to tell ya it's been an interesting week.

Among the things we've learned lately:

1) God hates Amish people (don't take my word for it -- ask the experts)
2) There really are examples of true, honest tolerance in the world (and these folks ain't it -- how's THAT for a news flash?)
3) Some guys will do ANYTHING to get their name in the papers (yeesh -- next time, just take the cash, alright?)

And finally:

4) One of my all-time favorite storytellers...has finally lost his marbles.

All of these really made me sad (well, okay, number 3 made me laugh my ass off, and number 2 I pretty much saw coming -- that's generally how the Amish roll), but especially that last one.

I grew up listening to the Prairie Home Companion on the drive home after church on Sundays, back before I had any real political inclinations. Being of Norwegian descent myself (my family hails from Iowa & Minnesota), I've always felt a sort of distant kinship with the people Garry talks about in his tales of Lake Wobegon, and he never fails in bringing interesting people & entertainers into the mix during the rest of the show.

It saddens me greatly to hear of him doing things like what you saw in the links above. Part of me wants to put it down to old age, maybe even senility. It may also well be that he's always been this way, and I just never really noticed before.

No matter, says I. Whatever he may have done in the years since, I will always be grateful to him for at least one thing...

Introducing me to this guy.

No....not THAT guy (although the video in this link does contain two of my OTHER favorite people in the world). He has SO outgrown that song.

I mean THIS guy.

The first time I saw him was on the Prairie Home Companion's annual "Sound-Off" show, where they invited many unique vocal performers to come out and strut their stuff. I was in high school at the time, and it was just before he hit big with...well, you know.

Bobby's entry was a 10-minute solo a capella summarization of "The Wizard of Oz", and it was gorgeous. I've been hooked on the guy's work ever since.

Through the years since, he has been stretching himself in every direction there is. His astounding vocal talents, effortlessly playful spirit, and willingness to step over-around-and-through every musical boundary in sight have helped him evolve from a one-hit pop wonder into one of the world's great musical treasures. He even claimed the position of Creative Chair with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra back in 1994 (that's right -- he's a classical conductor, too), and made a point of taking the gang out to schools every chance he got, to introduce kids to classical music the fun way.

Thanks, Garry. At least you got this one right.

Fair Tax Blogburst: October 4, 2006

2006-10-04T04:35:00.000-07:00

by Jonathan Garner of Publius Rendezvous

It has been interesting lately to observe just what the critics of the Fair Tax have to say. Lately, much of what has been said has centered around percentages. Clever as it may be to confuse people with cleverly worded assertions that tend to fool the average American when it comes to these issues. If anyone in the audience is similar to me, it takes focused attention lest my eyes glaze over at the thought of following someone's lessons involving percentages, statistics and numbers in general.

Succinctly, what has been asserted that I have seen generally resembles something such as this: (http://www.jpfo.org/fairtax.htm)

Remember, even the proponents admit they'd need a 23 percent tax rate to fund the current size of the federal government. However, they are starting out their new "fair" tax system with highly deceptive language.
H.R. 25, Section 101(b)(1) states "FOR 2005- In the calendar year 2005, the rate of tax is 23 percent of the gross payments for the taxable property or service." Note the phrase "of the gross payment."
Here's how it works: You buy a candy bar for a total price, including tax, of $1.30. One dollar of that price pays for the candy bar; $.30 goes to the federal government.
One dollar purchase + $.30 in tax sounds like 30 percent to you and me (and to every state that currently has a sales tax). But the "FairTaxers" don't calculate it that way. They say: $1.30 total price. $.30 = 23 percent of $1.30, therefore the tax is 23 percent.
Many critics have pointed out that this is a deceptive way to calculate a sales tax. AFT rebuts the critics by saying (we paraphrase for simplicity), "If you made $1.30 in income and paid $.30 of it in tax, you'd call it a 23 percent tax rate." The 23 percent figure is what AFT refers to as the "tax inclusive" rate.
But a sales tax is not an income tax, and when we see national sales tax advocates and uncritical journalists promoting the 23 percent figure without giving the underlying explanation, we can only think that some very thick wool is being pulled over people's eyes.

But, as we shall see, there is yet again another major study that has been conducted that definitively illustrates the merit of the Fair Tax. As has been reported by The Fair Tax Blog (http://www.fairtaxblog.com/20061002/kotlikoff-study-23-fairtax-revenue-neutral/), Boston University Economics Professor Laurence Kotlikoff's much-anticipated study of the necessary revenue-neutral rate for the FairTax has been published and released. Terry and I will refrain from reproducing the entire study, but peruse through the abstract below to see just how much the supporters already know!

As specified in Congressional bill H.R. 25/S. 25, the FairTax is a proposal to replace the federal personal income tax, corporate income tax, payroll (FICA) tax, capital gains, alternative minimum, self-employment, and estate and gifts taxes with a single-rate federal retail sales tax. The FairTax also provides a prebate to each household based on its demographic composition. The prebate is set to ensure that households pay no taxes net on spending up to the poverty level.

Bill Gale (2005) and the President's Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform (2005) suggest that the effective (tax inclusive) tax rate needed to implement H.R. 25 is far higher than the proposed 23% rate. This study, which builds on Gale's (2005) analysis, shows that a 23% rate is eminently feasible and suggests why Gale and the Tax Panel reached the opposite conclusion.

This paper begins by projecting the FairTax's 2007 tax base net of its rebate. Next it calculates the tax rate needed to maintain the real levels of federal and state spending under the FairTax. It then determines if an effective rate of 23% would be sufficient to fund 2007 estimated spending or if not, the amount by which non-Social Security federal expenditures would need to be reduced. Finally, it shows that the FairTax imposes no additional real fiscal burdens on state and local government, notwithstanding the requirement that such governments pay the FairTax when they purchase goods and services.

Implementing the FairTax rate of 23% would produce $2,586 billion in federal tax revenues which is $358 billion more than the $2,228 billion in tax revenues generated by the taxes it repeals. Adjusting the base for the prebate and the administrative credit paid to businesses and states for collecting the tax results in a net tax base of $9,355 billion. In 2007, spending at current levels is projected to be $3,285 billion. Revenues from the FairTax at a 23% tax rate, plus other federal revenues, are estimated to yield $3,209 billion which is $76 billion less than current CBO spending projections for 2007. The $76 billion amounts to only 2.73% of non-Social Security spending ($2,177 - $2,101). This is a remarkably small adjustment when set against the more than 30% rise in the real value of these expenditures since 2000.

Ensuring real revenue neutrality at the federal level, given the net base of $9,355 billion, implies a rate of 23.82% on a tax-inclusive basis and 31.27% on a tax-exclusive basis. These and other calculations presented here ignore a) general equilibrium feedback (supply-side and demand-side) effects that could significantly raise the FairTax base (see, for example, Kotlikoff and Jokisch, 2005), b) the possibility that tax evasion would exceed the considerable amount automatically incorporated here via the use of NIPA data, which undercount consumption expenditures due to evasion under the current tax system, and c) the roughly $1 trillion real capital gain the federal government would secure on its outstanding nominal debt, were consumer prices to rise by the full amount of the FairTax.

The FairTax redistributes real purchasing power from state and local governments to their state and local income-tax taxpayers. It does so by reducing factor prices relative to consumer prices and, thereby, reducing the real value (measured at consumer prices) of state and local income tax payments, which are assessed on factor incomes (namely, factor supplies times factor prices).

Gale (2005) and the Tax Panel (2005) recognized this loss in real state and local government revenues in claiming that these governments need to be compensated for having to pay the FairTax. But what they apparently missed is that this loss to these governments is exactly offset by a gain to their taxpayers.

Were state and local governments to maintain their real income tax collections - the assumption made here - by increasing their tax rates appropriately, their taxpayers' real tax burdens would remain unchanged and there would be no need for the federal government to compensate state and local governments for having to pay the FairTax on their purchases. The second is that H.R. 25 does not preclude state and local governments from levying their sales taxes on the FairTax-inclusive price of consumer goods and services. This produces significantly more revenue compared to levying their sales taxes on producer prices.

Moreover, Gale (2005) and the Tax Panel (2005) arrived at a higher tax rate because they did not estimate the FairTax rate, but instead estimated a sales tax of their own design which had a substantially narrower base.

The FairTax Blogburst is jointly produced by Terry of The Right Track Blog and Jonathan of Publius Rendezvous. If you would like to host the weekly postings on your blog, please e-mail Terry. You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll.

First Aid Kit: The Innocent Pendleton 8 Family Fund

2006-10-02T08:14:00.000-07:00

By now, you have most likely heard about the case involving the "Pendleton 8". In short, seven Marines and one Navy corpsman have been tossed in the brig, under accusations of (among other things) cold-blooded murder during a raid to capture insurgents in Hamdania, Iraq.

There have already been any number of prominent people out there covering the legal matters involved, Michelle Malkin and Michael Savage chief among them. I'll let them handle that aspect of the issue -- they've already done it way better than anything I could supply here.

The part I want to focus on today concerns their families.

Think about it, folks...While these soldiers have been taking fire from all sides in the legal battle of their lives, what have their families been put through? Coming to their loved ones' defense costs money -- a LOT of money -- that most of these folks just plain don't have. They've already sacrificed WAY too much in order to help their young men face their accusers, and no end appears in sight.

Well, Kit Jarrell over at Euphoric Reality has taken up the mortar plate for them with the creation of the Innocent Pendleton 8 Family Fund, a charity drive specifically designed to help those families make up the difference in their day-to-day living expenses, such as food, bills, diapers and formula for their little ones.

As Kit puts it:

Behind the news articles and interviews and drama are the families. The financial burden of these hearings and upcoming courts-martial have drained them completely. None of them were financially well off; they refinanced homes, took second, third, and even fourth jobs, and pulled other children from college to pay for the defense. Three of these men have very small children who need things like formula and diapers. But the question is inevitable: If every penny goes to defending their sons from being wrongfully convicted and having their lives ruined, what is left over for groceries? How do their everyday bills get paid? And why are they even in the position of having to choose between a defense and a package of diapers?
That’s where we come in.
The Innocent Pendleton 8 Family Fund is not for legal fees. It is not for defense experts or trial costs. It is for phone bills so their sons can call home from the brig. It is for diapers for their babies, groceries for their cupboards, gas for their cars so they can get to work. It is to help them survive financially while these horrifying circumstances are going on.
A total accounting for all monies will be made public to all who ask, and the money will go directly from me personally to the families, in order of immediate need.
In front of Camp Pendleton, where these 8 men have been held in special confinement for over 130 days, there are rallies and media and national TV coverage. But back in little towns in Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Washington State, and other locations, their parents and wives don’t have enough money to feed their children. This story breaks my heart, and I hope that you can find it in yours to give even a few dollars to help these families.
If you have a blog, please consider putting the button below on your site and linking back to this page, or even just putting up a post to tell your readers. These men and their families have sacrificed everything they have.
You can give through Paypal, Mastercard, and Visa. If you’d like to send a check, please email me at kit.jarrell@gmail.com and I will give you an address to send to.

You heard the lady. Do what you can. If you're too strapped to give financially, help spread the word. These people are marching up a mountain, and they need our help to keep their lives on track while they're doing it.

Tip o'the rock to Uncle Jimbo over at Blackfive. Thanks for tapping my forward assist on this, Jim.

A couple more pertinent links to this topic, including signposts pointing to several legal defense funds set up for the soldiers themselves:
Pendleton8.com
MarineParents.com

The Guitarist from Another Planet

2006-10-01T06:07:00.000-07:00

I was gonna get all newsy today. Really, I was.

But you know what? I just got off a long shift at work, and I'm tired.

Instead, I offer a performance of the instrumental guitar piece "Aerial Boundaries", as rendered by its creator. (Okay, okay...I just wanted an excuse to put up another Youtube clip, 'cuz it's fun. But this is a good one, I promise.)

Ladies and gentlemen...meet Michael Hedges.

When I first found this gentleman's work while I was in Monterey, I learned a very humiliating lesson of life: Contrary to my beliefs, I cannot play the guitar very well.

For the next three months, I sat in my room, surrounded by broken guitar strings, a heinously abused tape recorder or two, and ten or twelve forests' worth of sheet music, trying (and failing miserably) to grow two extra hands.

Hedges' dizzy-blizzard fingerwork, damn-the-tunings-full-speed-ahead compositional techniques, and Salvador Dali-esque ability to make any song you could name sound as if it were meant to be a solo acoustic piece all along (no, seriously -- I had the honor of watching him perform live his own version of Neneh Cherry's "Buffalo Stance", and did it ever WORK!) made him one of the most dynamic forces of creativity the world of guitar music has ever seen.

Sadly, he died in a car crash in late '97, on his way to the studio to finish what has become his swan song album, Torched.

Do yourself a favor---take a look here, and see what can be accomplished with two hands and a good-sized chunk of wood and steel.

R.I.P. -- SFC Paul Ray Smith: 1969 - 2003

2006-09-28T07:02:00.000-07:00

This one comes from an unlikely source...the mainstream media.

According to Blackfive, MSNBC has started putting together a series of small clips dubbed "Faces of Courage", and released the first of them last night.

Ladies and gentlemen...meet SFC Paul Ray Smith:

Bravo, MSNBC. If you guys keep this up, we might almost be persuaded to forgive you for keeping this guy on the air.

Almost.

UPDATE: John over at Castle Argghhh! has brought to our attention that Paul's widow and son, Birgit and David Smith, recently had the honor of christening the Freedom, the first Littoral class combat ship in the U.S. navy.

As such, Birgit is also the sponsor of the ship, whose function (if I have this right) is to act as the sailors' contact with folks back home, to coordinate and participate in special functions such as homecomings, and basically support her sailors in any way she can. Good on ya, luv.

Fair Tax Blogburst: Sept. 27, 2006

2006-09-27T05:52:00.000-07:00

A note to regular readers: With this post, I am proud to announce my acceptance into the fold of the "Americans for Fair Taxation" blogroll. Anyone who wishes to join me and my new neighbors should find all the information they need at the bottom of the post.

But I digress. Onward.

-----------------------

by TD of The Right Track

A quick and dirty search through Google News for articles, news, and editorials revealed no less than 14 pieces written in the last month regarding the FairTax. Fully 1/3 of those were editorials agreeing with the need for the FairTax.

A sampling:

From the Denver Daily News, an editorial titled "FairTax, not flat tax, needed to fix nation’s taxation woes":

Dear editor,
The IRS needs to be eliminated and replaced with the FairTax, not the flat tax, as suggested by columnist Aaron Harber in Monday’s Denver Daily News.

The flat tax changes absolutely nothing — the IRS, tax code, regulations, 16th Amendment, corporate taxation and payroll taxes (the way Social Security is funded) stay exactly the same under the flat tax.

At best, the flat tax is temporary, the wrong direction to move towards simplification.

From the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, "The Fairer Tax":

The Fair Tax (FairTax.org) will make our true tax burden -- most of which is concealed in the price of goods and services -- visible to all and is a necessary first step toward smaller and less-intrusive government.

We cannot allow the perfect to become the enemy of the good.

So first, let's replace the current complex and dishonest system of taxation with a fair and transparent system that will allow the people to choose how much government they can afford in full knowledge of how much it really costs.

The Raleigh/Durham News & Observer has an editorial headlined "Total Replacement":

Our tax code has grown steadily more complex, unwieldy, expensive and out of control ever since its overhaul in 1986. The IRS is increasingly unable to cope with the tax code, and puts much of its resources to uses unrelated to raising revenue and contrary to the wishes of the Founders.

Like Icarus flying ever closer to the sun, the tax system appears to be headed for self-destruction. It is far beyond any fix and is losing respect and credibility. The only reasonable solution is to finally and completely scrap it and replace it. I support the revenue-neutral FairTax plan.(http://www.fairtax.org/ 1-800-FairTax).

This is just a sampling of what people are saying all across the country. Truly a grassroots effort, it takes people willing to step up and show public support for the FairTax to convince politicians that it's in their best interest to support the bills.

One way to show public support is to write an editorial to your local paper, no matter how large or small. Use the FairTax category that may appear on this participant blog, visit http://www.fairtax.org/, or read the FairTax book by Boortz and Linder to learn more. Get your facts straight, then write your editorial and submit it. Many papers now have a way to submit online or via e-mail.

However you decide to do it, your public support for the FairTax is vital.

The FairTax Blogburst is jointly produced by Terry of The Right Track Blog and Jonathan of Publius Rendezvous. If you would like to host the weekly postings on your blog, please e-mail Terry. You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll.

Two Words: Sept. 25, 2006

2006-09-25T06:08:00.000-07:00

....for Bill Clinton:
Oh, please.

....for the denizens of DailyKos:
"Duuhhhhh.....HEY!"

....for Keith Olbermann:
Stained sportcoat?

...for Louisiana Gov. Mary Landrieu:
Rebuilding....RIIIIGHT.

....to the head of the European Union:
'Bout time.

Somewhere, The Dead Cry Out: DISCRIMINATION!

2006-09-21T07:57:00.000-07:00

Anybody surprised by this stuff anymore?

Anytime someone comes up with an idea that makes it harder for someone to take advantage of the system -- ANY system -- in order to break the rules and get away with it, you can depend on at least one thing to happen....

...the ACLU will come out against it:

WASHINGTON - The American Civil Liberties Union today expressed its disappointment with the House passage of a bill placing undue and unnecessary burdens on Americans’ fundamental right to vote. H.R. 4844, the "Federal Election Integrity Act of 2006," requires voters to present a government-issued photo ID in order to vote in federal elections. In addition, beginning in 2010 voters would be required to present a photo ID that was issued based on proof of citizenship in order to vote. The measure passed by a vote of 228-196.

The following can be attributed to Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office:

"Less than two months after the renewal of the Voting Rights Act, the House of Representatives has chosen to pass legislation disenfranchising the very citizens the VRA was designed to protect. No eligible citizen should have to pay to vote. There are voters who simply don’t have photo ID and requiring them to purchase one in order to vote would be tantamount to a poll tax. This measure will disproportionately impact racial and ethnic minority voters, senior citizens, voters with disabilities, and others who do not have photo identification nor the financial means to acquire it."

Translation: "Oh, no! Say it ain't so! How dare they make it so ~~convicted criminals, illegal aliens and dead people~~ law-abiding American citizens can't ~~vote as many times and in as many places~~ express their political will the way we they want!? We cannot allow the ~~useful idiots~~ poor and minority voters of ~~the world~~ America to be ~~caught red-handed~~ disenfranchised by ~~those mean, nasty people who won't give us what we want no matter how much we cry, whine and stamp our little footsies~~ the Bush administration!"

How can we possibly be so cruel to our photo-ID-less brothers and sisters who...
1) can't legally get a job
2) can't legally cash a check even if somebody gave them a job
3) can't legally drive a car
4) can't legally apply for federal aid of any kind
5) can't legally begin any kind of post-high-school education...

...in short, anyone who hasn't bothered to make any real effort to become a law-abiding, productive citizen of this country in the first place?

(Boy, that word "legally" sure pops up in a bunch of places on that list, doesn't it?
I wonder why.)

I tell you what, if you ever wanted to discourage honest people from immigrating to this country and trying to live their own lives as part of the American experience, THAT'S the way to do it.

But then, why do it the hard way....when there's any number of people over here who'll promise you the moon and the paperwork to back it up, as long as you do what THEY want you to?

After all, they're looking out for your rights. Right?

For those who wish to peruse the bill as it was passed, here ya go. (Wherein is explained, by the way, how ANY LEGAL CITIZEN of this country would be able to obtain -- at little to no cost, depending on the situation -- a specific photo ID which will allow him/her to vote.)

Tip o'the rock to the crew at Stop The ACLU.

UPDATE: The ever-informed Don Surber brings to our attention that the New York Times, never to be outdone by a bunch of piss-ant lawyers, is jumping up-and-down in lockstep outrage over this, too:

The bill the House passed yesterday would require people to show photo ID to vote in 2008. Starting in 2010, that photo ID would have to be something like a passport, or an enhanced kind of driver’s license or non-driver’s identification, containing proof of citizenship. This is a level of identification that many Americans simply do not have.

As I stated above...If you legally have a job, drive a car, receive federal aid, or are continuing your education, YOU ALREADY HAVE A LEGAL PHOTO ID. And I would wager that any law-abiding citizen who already has one form of legal photo ID won't have too much of a problem getting another one in order to LEGALLY vote, because they understand WHY it is necessary.

The bill was sold as a means of deterring vote fraud, but that is a phony argument. There is no evidence that a significant number of people are showing up at the polls pretending to be other people, or that a significant number of noncitizens are voting.

Don says he can prove otherwise. Go ask him.

Noncitizens, particularly undocumented ones, are so wary of getting into trouble with the law that it is hard to imagine them showing up in any numbers and trying to vote. The real threat of voter fraud on a large scale lies with electronic voting, a threat Congress has refused to do anything about.

As many times as I've seen evidence of this newspaper's real intent, I STILL cannot believe they say things like this.
IF YOU ARE NOT A CITIZEN OF AMERICA, YOU CAN'T VOTE FOR THE LEADERS OF AMERICA!!! We do it this way for a reason. We do NOT want the next Hugo Chavez to have a say in who runs this nation!

The actual reason for this bill is the political calculus that certain kinds of people — the poor, minorities, disabled people and the elderly — are less likely to have valid ID. They are less likely to have cars, and therefore to have drivers’ licenses. There are ways for nondrivers to get special ID cards, but the bill’s supporters know that many people will not go to the effort if they don’t need them to drive.

*BZZZZT* Sorry, not the answer we were looking for. Thanks for playing.

The bill's supporters know that any LAW-ABIDING citizens who want to vote will HAPPILY make the effort to get one, be they poor, elderly, disabled, black, white, red, yellow, or purple-polka-dotted -- even if they have to take the bus to do it -- because they know they have nothing to gain (and possibly quite a bit to lose) by NOT doing it.

Thanks for the heads-up, Don. We at the Point greatly appreciate those who willingly strap on the hipwaders and keep tabs on the Shady Lady, so the rest of us don't have to.

Kidnapped Missouri Baby Found Alive & Well

2006-09-20T04:33:00.000-07:00

You may have heard in the news this last week or so about little Abby Woods, a newborn baby girl kidnapped not long after her birth by someone who slashed her mother in the throat while snatching the child from her arms in Missouri.

It is now being reported that this little trooper has been found alive and well. She had been kidnapped by one Shannon Beck, a local woman who lived just a skip away from the baby's home and had miscarried her own child recently, but was returned to her family by Beck's sister-in-law, Dorothy Torrez, who quickly noticed something fishy:

On Sunday, Beck contacted Torrez to say she had given birth, Corvington said. Beck had been pregnant but apparently miscarried shortly before her own child was to be born.

Torrez visited Beck on Monday and urged her to take the child to a doctor, the FBI agent said. Beck agreed, and Torrez accompanied her to St. Louis on Tuesday, about 45 miles away.

Torrez noticed what appeared to be makeup on the baby's forehead, Corvington said. When she rubbed the forehead, makeup came off what was covering a small birthmark.

In publicizing the abduction, police had described Abby's strawberry-red birthmark. Her suspicions aroused, Torrez confronted Beck, who gave her the baby, Corvington said.

Torrez contacted police, and the baby was handed over to authorities around 5 p.m. Tuesday.

The baby has since been reunited with her family.

I just LOVE happy endings.

(Although I would advise that whoever wrote the headline for the second story might want to be just a LEETLE more careful next time. Heh.)

A Pope With A Pair

2006-09-18T08:08:00.000-07:00

Well, at least now we know why the Pope wears a dress.

It's 'cause he needs the extra trunk space....as demonstrated by his recent homecoming speech at the University of Regensburg in Germany, where he was once a theology professor.

From a rather in-depth article in Wikipedia:

In three paragraphs at the beginning of the speech, Benedict quoted from and discussed an argument made by Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos in a 1391 dialogue with an (unnamed) educated Persian, as well as observations on this argument made by Theodore Khoury, the scholar whose edition of Manuel II's dialogues to which the Pontiff was referring. Benedict used Manuel II's argument in order to draw a distinction between the Christian view, as expressed by Manuel II, that "not acting reasonably is contrary to God's nature", and the Islamic view, as explained by Khoury, that God transcends concepts such as rationality, and his will, as Ibn Hazm stated, is not constrained by any principle, including rationality.

From the speech itself:

In the seventh conversation edited by Professor Khoury, the emperor touches on the theme of the holy war. The emperor must have known that sura 2, 256 reads: "There is no compulsion in religion". According to the experts, this is one of the suras of the early period, when Mohammed was still powerless and under threat. But naturally the emperor also knew the instructions, developed later and recorded in the Qur'an, concerning holy war. Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the "Book" and the "infidels", he addresses his interlocutor with a startling brusqueness on the central question about the relationship between religion and violence in general, saying: "Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached". The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. "God", he says, "is not pleased by blood — and not acting reasonably is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats… To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death…

Yeah, you in the back, you heard me. How ironic is it, pray, that the only guy on the planet with big enough balls to bring a truly historical perspective of the Muslim faith to the world stage is the current leader of the Roman Catholic Church -- a religious entity which, on the whole, at least nominally commands that its preachers have no use for them?

Note that word "historical", folks. Whether these words reflect his true opinions of Islam is irrelevant here, because he didn't present them that way. He cited a quote from a man over 600 years dead, as an example, in an intellectual study of the subject.
That's right, folks...Pope Benedict XVI doesn't just go with his gut. He goes with his brain, too.

Don't take my word for it. Ask Time Magazine's Jeff Israely:

On Tuesday, in a riveting and provocative university lecture, the Pope explored the philosophical and historical differences between Islam and Christianity—a speech that would become the surprise centerpiece of a five-day visit that many had expected would be mostly just a walk down memory lane. There is little doubt left that Benedict is indeed highly attuned to the risks of fundamentalist terrorism. In fact, it is testament to where this problem stands on his list of priorities that he used the occasion of his triumphant return to Regensburg University, where he taught theology in the 1970s, to deliver a lecture that explored how Christians and Muslims may have historically viewed the relationship between violence and faith, based on the two religions' conceptions of the divinity.
[snip]
This is indeed Benedict doing it on his own terms. Rather than tackling the challenge of fundamentalist terrorism with a pithy remark packaged for the 9/11 anniversary or reaching for a John Paul-inspired sweeping gesture, the professor Pope went digging into his books.

Oh, wait, I forgot...the God of Islam transcends rationality. How silly of me.

And so, without the benefit of rationality, the followers of Islam fall back on their old stand-by -- REACtionality -- and prove the dead guy to have been...well, dead on.

And you know what? He even issued a statement of regret afterwards. And that still isn't enough for these people.

Why? Simple.

He didn't say he was sorry he said it, because he wasn't. He didn't say he was wrong, because he wasn't.
He simply said he was sorry people didn't like it. Which is all he needed to say.

Now I'm no expert here, friends, but it seems to me that Islam has had this coming for a long time. Muslim history -- like other religions, Christianity included -- has a pretty good-sized trail of blood in its past.

The main difference between Islam and other world faiths (to me, at least) is that, through the centuries, most of the world's other surviving religions have eventually learned how to answer the secular world with something other than steel, and to find ways to live peaceably enough within it that they can attract new converts simply by letting their own lives speak for their faith.

Sadly, the lives of a great many practitioners of Islam seem to have only one method with which to attract new followers: "Convert or die."

How is it, you might ask, that I say this is the only message Islam has for outsiders?
A good question. To answer, I will say that I have indeed heard a different message from a Muslim.

ONCE.

If only one of them has the 'nads to call out his faith's own monsters, the rest of them have NO room to bitch and moan when someone else stands up to do it for them....not that that'll stop them.

I will end this post with a missive from The Anchoress, who quite rightly points out what happened the last time someone stood up to the rattle of scimitars. (Hint: two guys got shot, and the rest is history.)
Read her other posts on this topic, too...they're an earful.

Oh -- and a tip o'the rock goes to the crew at Wizbang for the links to the Time and New York Post articles.)

Nice Work, Bone Daddy

2006-09-15T06:04:00.000-07:00

I've spoken of my parents before on this humble little blog. They were good people who did good things.

The time has now come to reveal a little factoid about my dad that hasn't been told much outside the house.

I found about it when I was around 11 or 12, when my mom gave him a copy of a jazz/fusion album called "Mr. Hands" for Christmas that year.
My dad positively gushed over it...and then explained why he was so taken with the gift.

During his college days at Grinnell, he played jazz trombone in a local combo with the guy who made that album.

A guy named Herbie Hancock.

It's just one of those little things you find out about someone by accident, because they don't like to blow their own horn about it (pun fully intended).

A few years later, my dad somehow managed to get tickets to a concert thrown in tribute to Thelonious Monk at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C.
And man, EVERYBODY was there...Roy Haynes, David Amram, Dizzy Gillespie, Gerry Mulligan, Dave Holland (Bill Cosby, too -- he was the host), a whole bunch of others whose names I do not now recall....and Herbie. It was too cool for words.

After the show, Dad tried to check backstage to see if he could chat with his erstwhile college buddy. Sadly, security wouldn't allow it.
But the look on my dad's face as we watched his old friend on stage was enough for me. He was in heaven.

My dad died in March 2001 during treatment for prostate cancer, when he had a relapse and it basically ate him alive in the space of a year-and-a-half. He died when my son was five years old.

Thus, my now-10-year-old son was largely cheated out of the experience of growing up with a grandfather. It's always been one of my great regrets when it comes to my son's upbringing. My dad was a hell of a man, and he would've made a stellar grampa.

I told you that story to tell you this one.

About a week ago, my son brought home a flyer from school advertising signups for this year's incarnation of the middle school's orchestral band. He evinced interest in it, so we signed on the dotted line, and went with him to the school music room the other day for the initial conference with the band teacher.

The band teacher had (wisely, I think) brought in several local professional musicians to help out with the crowd of kids that came in to try out several instruments. One guy (the trombone-man with a local band that opened for Three Dog Night not too long ago)
tried my boy out on a trumpet and a trombone.

Son-of-mine did pretty decent on the trumpet, and was able to produce something quite resembling a note or two, amidst the bleatings and fuzz-bombs usually attendant when someone tries a brass instrument for the first time.

Then came the trombone. My kid licked his lips, blurted one little false start, took a deep breath...and flared out a good, long, clear blast from all the way downtown that made the pro's eyebrows jump skyward.

"Whoa," said he. "We've got a natural here."

My son was as impressed as he was, and took only a moment's thought before declaring the trombone as his instrument of choice.

But that's not the best part. This is.

I called my mom down in Texas last night, to see if she might still have Dad's old Conn trombone kicking around somewhere. (She had said not too long ago that she was considering giving it to a local high school band department, since no one was using it.) I was hoping to not have to shell out the bucks for a new one.

Thankfully, she still has it. In fact, she said, my brother had taken it out to the music store where he worked a while back and had it refurbished, so it is now in great condition, and she was absolutely thrilled with the idea of her grandson getting his hands on it.
She's shipping it to us as we speak, with the admonition that he practice long and hard with it...because "his grampa will be listening."

How 'bout that. There may well soon be a new bone daddy in the family...with the very same horn that my daddy played right alongside Herbie Hancock back in the day.

CAN I get a witness!

2006-09-13T15:23:00.000-07:00

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

...And A Little Child Shall Lead Them: Meet Colton Lockner

2006-09-13T09:25:00.000-07:00

"Hmmm...the Force is strong with this one..."
--- Darth Vader

I don't know about you, O faithful ones...but I can think of a lot of "grownups" who could learn a thing or two about leadership from THIS little giant-killer:

SEBRING, Ohio, Aug. 3, 2006 – If Colton Lockner’s summer project is any indication of his future success, his name is one everyone should remember.
Colton, 9, has taken it upon himself to organize this small village’s first America Supports You Freedom Walk, a move that surprised no one who knows the slight boy.
"You don’t expect this from a 9-year-old kid," former local elementary school principal Vito Weeda said. "We look for great things for Colton because of the type of person he is."
Colton’s mother agrees that her son, who has no problem talking business with adults only to turn around and jump into the pool or play soccer with his brothers, is unique.
"That’s just Colton," Robyn Lockner, his mother, said. "Colton’s always wanting to organize something."
America Supports You is a nationwide Defense Department program that highlights grassroots and corporate support of the nation’s servicemembers. ASY Freedom Walks are intended to commemorate the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and honor U.S. troops.

I flim-flam you not, friends...this short man did damn near ALL the legwork himself. He talked businesses into sponsoring the event and donating food and other goods, posted flyers, placed donation cans, and even brought Sebring Mayor John Smith into the loop:

"(The walk) is to honor (servicemembers) and thank them for what they’re doing for our country and to remember the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11," Colton said. "We’re trying to get it to be an every-year thing, like a permanent holiday."
Sebring Mayor John Smith said Colton has his backing on that idea.
[snip]

John Pappas, owner of the local Pizza Pan restaurant, said he was so impressed with the way Colton conducted himself that he agreed to help him make the walk happen.
"He was a little man walking in," Pappas said. Though he’d not met Colton before, he listened to his pitch to put a donation can in the eatery. Not only did Pappas agree to the can, but he talked with Colton and his mom about sponsoring the food, banners and t-shirts for the event, as well.
"We didn’t think it was going to be such a big deal," Pappas said. "We thought there were going to be 50, 75 people (participating in the walk)."
His commitment hasn’t wavered as the numbers have climbed, though. In fact, he’s upped the ante by offering all walkers who pre-register a certificate for a free large pizza.
"This is small-town America and this little man … is what it’s all about," Pappas said. "My hat’s off to little Colton. He really got a lot of people together."

Heh..."Little" man, indeed.

Stand to attention, y'all...there's a TALL man walkin' heah.

(Tip o' the rock to my new HE neighbor and fellow Mountaineer, Uncle Mac Is Pissed. Welcome to the family.)

Dammit Bolts & Jesus Springs (UPDATED)

2006-09-13T08:11:00.000-07:00

Anyone who's ever worked on a large piece of complex machinery knows what that means.

For those who don't...a "dammit bolt" is any small, hard-to-reach piece of hardware that you just spent 20 minutes struggling to grasp with your wrench/pliers/fingers/whatever, that falls off its mount to the ground just as you finally reach it.

The "Jesus spring" is roughly similar...the difference being that instead of going *CLUNK* to the ground, it goes *TWOIINNNGGG* in the air, launching itself in random direction A to unknown location Z.

You've no doubt already guessed where the names came from.

This is what I am experiencing at the moment with my mumble-grumble-rassin-frassin Haloscan Trackback links.

They appear on my main page just fine, as you can see below. But for some reason, they won't show on my individual post pages for love, money or nuthin'. (No, threatening to manually reprogram the computer with a large prybar didn't work, either. Why won't this thing listen to reason?)

So, until I get this figured out, anyone who wishes to Trackback to a post of mine can only do so from the main page. In other words, just click HOME from the Permalink URL, and you'll be able to do it there. My sincerest apologies for any incovenience this may cause. (Any swings with a Clue-X-4 would be greatly appreciated.)

(P.S. My buddy TacJammer is also having some problems with his Trackback code, and is asking for assistance. I have already represented the Haloscan service there, so if anyone out there who uses MovableType or WordPress would be so kind, please go over and send him a test ping, won't you? He thanks you in advance.)

UPDATE: Looks like I finally got the bugs worked out. I'll be sticking with Haloscan for the comments now. It does mean the Blogger-ized comments are lost, unfortunately, but hopefully I won't be having any more of these problems in the future.
Many thanks to Don Surber, and Deb over at Right Truth, for their kind assistance.

Sept. 11, 2001: Where We Were...and Where We Are Now

2006-09-11T10:11:00.000-07:00

I was at work.

I had not been a member of my department for very long, having just been promoted up from the entry-level floor, and didn't know the people there very well. There was a shortage of space until things were arranged to fully integrate me into my new workspace, so I was tucked into the corner of the QA room, and just doing my thing like any other day.

My company's policy is relatively lenient about what it lets people have around them while they work, so a couple of the gals in the room had radios going, as they liked to check in with the local country-station morning show as they got on with their duties (it was the only station that could get through the walls of our building). I pretty much tuned out the sound and chatter, as I did most mornings.

Then one of them started shushing everyone else down and turned up her little transistor radio, so everyone could hear the news breaking into the DJ's schpiel to tell us that a large airplane had just crashed into one of the WTC towers.

At first, we just kind of sat there, wondering exactly what it was we were hearing. Certainly, airplane accidents do happen from time to time...but one of the two tallest buildings in the city? One of the gals wondered aloud what kind of a moron the pilot had to be to hit something that big and visible.

That line of talk actually went on for some time, interspersed with half-hearted joking from some, and admonishments from others to "jeez, stop it, people probably got hurt".

Then the second plane hit.

Nobody said much of anything for hours after that.

By that time, the management had parked a large TV on the main floor, so everyone in the building could see what was happening. I couldn't hear anything through the window which looked out from where I was to that area, but the looks on people's faces told me everything I needed to know.

For my part, I just shut up and got on with things, while I turned these events around in my head.

I was reminded of a concept I'd read about in a book by Terry Pratchett, wherein he spoke of "the Trousers of Time"...those decisive moments in one's life where Fate goes down one leg or the other, dictating the rest of history from then on as it does so.

And -- as silly as this may sound, it really did happen -- the image formed in my head, as the improbability of two airline pilots being that inattentive in the same place at the same time asserted itself, of Fate tripping in mid-leg and tearing a hole in the knee.

Then, as if to top it all off, we listened as the towers went crashing to the ground.

And I remembered a church trip to the Big Apple that I had gone on when I was still in high school.
I remembered us entering one of the WTC towers, and going up to the observation floor -- the 104th, if I remember right.

There was a lowered platform running the entire edge of the floor, with a handrail jutting up from the floor about two-and-a-half feet from the windows that formed the outer shell of the building....so that if one had the guts to do it, one could step down onto the low platform, grasp the handrail, and actually rest one's head on the window and look....DOOOOWWNNN.

I have always had a great fear of heights, and my heart was lodged firmly somewhere in the region of my left ear, but (with one of my friends holding my hand down on the rail in case I blacked out)...I did it.

The view was....unbelievable.

It saddens me, to this day, that no one will never see that view again.

It is also humbling to think of the difference between that view...and what it must have been like to look out from the gaping, burning hole where your office used to be a few minutes ago.

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Today.

As I sit here composing this, I am watching a stream from FOX News of the live newscast which played as those events unfolded, and thinking about where I was then....and where I am now.

Have I changed somehow? I'm not sure. It's hard to put it down in words. And frankly, whatever I might write (including everything I've puked up onto the screen thus far this morning) would not do this the justice it deserves.

Better, I think, to give you -- my fellow climbers of the rock of life -- a trail or two to follow on your own paths of remembrance.

As you might expect, there are signposts everywhere today, but perhaps none on as grand a scale as the 2996 Memorial Project. Quite simply, it is a concerted campaign involving over 3,000 bloggers to have every single victim of the WTC attacks memorialized individually. (Yes, you read right -- EVERY SINGLE ONE.) Each participating blog writer chose one name to place in a memorial "plaque" on their own blog, and post a tribute to that person...all at once, all today. The original base website of this effort ("www.dcroe.com/2996/") is currently "suspended" -- I will choose to assume that it simply crashed and burned from too much traffic -- but I have found a way to reach the list of bloggers through Google. (Search for "2996 blog", and click on the "Cached" link of the second entry on the results page. They're all there.) But if you like, you can probably just wander around and stumble on one here and there. That's how many there are.

Lorie Byrd of Wizbang has assembled as comprehensive a collection of articles and tributes as can be found anywhere on the Web, going back through each of the five years since the attack. In addition, her comrade-in-arms Jay Tea has undertaken a blow-by-blow, post-by-post playback of the events of the day as they occurred.

In contrast to the pictures and video that we have all seen, Peggy Noonan offers tribute to the sounds that were heard that day...with special focus on the phone calls that flew back and forth, as people frantically tried to phone home before the worst came to pass.

Captain John Maniscalco, a pilot with American Airlines, wrote this article a while back about the way things have changed since then. He speaks of what...and who...he's noticed. It's an older piece, but it still rings powerfully about what the attacks have done to some of us as people.

Here, on the FOX News front page, you will find the link to the stream I've been watching this morning of their actual live coverage as run on Sept. 11, 2001. At this writing, it's been running for over four hours, and it's still going. Feel free to point this to anyone whom you think REALLY needs to be reminded of what happened. But act quickly if you decide to do so...I do not know how long it will be up.

Cox and Forkum, a collection of artists editorial, shares with us a cartoon to which they have added a new panel for each of the five anniversaries. They paint rather a cutting picture of what it apparently means to confront terrorism now...as opposed to what it meant then.

Finally...allow me to share one moment of great personal resonance to me.

A year or two ago, I was allowed the rare honor of participating in the flag-lowering ceremony at Walt Disney World (and the honorary title of Veteran of the Day) as my family looked on. The following picture was taken on that occasion...but I think it's appropriate today.

Bow your heads today, folks. Go find a flag to salute. Do something nice for someone.

Do SOMETHING.

But, as we return to our lives tomorrow...whatever you do....

DON'T FORGET.

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Testimonials, tributes and musings on this day from:
From My Position....On The Way!
Don Surber
Free Will
Right Truth
Hot Air