The Yellow Dog Blog

Fred Thompson for President

2007-02-14T14:24:00.000-08:00

In Congress, they are debating a meaningless resolution.
Down the street, they are trying a guy for lying about a leak.
A House subcommittee had to cancel a hearing on global warming because of snow.
Just another day in Washington.
Happy Valentine's Day.

There's something to be said for divided government. Let's hear it for gridlock!

Via The Corner.

A Muslim-American defends Jack Bauer

2007-02-07T11:30:00.000-08:00

And this is what makes "24" a compelling drama every week. Instead of pretending Islamic terrorists don't exist, the show presents frighteningly real worst-case scenarios perpetrated by Osama bin Laden's followers. So CAIR thinks it's over the top for the terrorists in "24" to blow up Los Angeles with a nuke? Please, if bin Laden and his crew had nukes, most of us would be way too dead to argue over such points.

There is a dangerous trend in the U.S. today that involves skirting the truth at the risk of offending any individual or group. When Bill Cosby talks to African-Americans about self-respect and responsibility, and says publicly what many have been saying privately for years, he's branded a "reactionary," "misinformed," "judgmental," and so on. When "24" confronts America's worst fears about al Qaeda--whose goal remains to kill as many Americans as possible whenever possible--the show is said to be guilty of fueling anti-Muslim and anti-Arab prejudice.

Well, here's the hard, cold truth: When Islamic terrorists stop being a threat to America's survival, viewers will lose interest in "24," because it will have lost its relevancy. Until such time, I will continue to watch "24"--because, believe it or not, the idea that there are Jack Bauers out there in real life risking their lives to save ours does mean something to me.

Read the whole thing.

Have you gotten a new flat screen tv...

2007-02-01T07:47:00.000-08:00

...for Negro Bowl I?

Yet more invcontrovertible evidence

2007-01-31T17:50:00.001-08:00

Uh oh. Just when you thought it was safe to ridicule the global warming hysteria, along comes this. That's right. It seems the English have had a rather warm January. Yet one more bit of evidence on the ever growing pile that, not only is the world getting warmer, but the reason it's getting warmer is human activity. And not just any human activity, but activity in all of the prosperous, western industrial democracies.

But wait. Let's read the first line of the article.

January 2007 was the warmest on record in Britain since 1921, giving further evidence of a warming climate, forecasters said.

That's right, 2007 was the second warmest January. And the warmest January wasn't in the last 10 or even 20 years. No, the warmest January was in 1921. But wait. I thought global warming didn't really begin until the last 20-30 years. Let's read on, shall we?

The temperature pushes 2007 into the top five warmest Januarys in the region since records began in the seventeenth century. Only 1796, 1834, 1916 and 1921 saw milder January temperatures.

You read that right. While this January in the land of Blake and Bacon was warm, it wasn't as warm as it was in 1796. And we all know how many cars were on the road burning those evil hydrocarbons back then.

Michael Dukes, a forecaster at MeteoGroup UK, said: "It's more evidence - not proof - but more evidence towards a warming climate. It follows on from a very warm December as well."

Ah, there we go. Let's just think about that for a minute. The meteorologist says that because we had a couple of warm months it MUST be because of MAN MADE GLOBAL WARMING. Run for your lives!

That's right. A meteorologist. One of the same group of "scientists" who can't accurately predict the temperature two weeks out, tells us that not only is the world definitely heating up now, but it's going to continue to heat up in the future. Maybe for as long as one thousand years.

Now, why don't we all just take a deep breath and try to summon something that's quite clearly in short supply - a little perspective. Anecdotal evidence DOES NOT indicate a verifiable trend. Just because you you're stung by a bee doesn't mean that we're being invaded by Africanized killer bees. What is it that allows people like this to overlook those four previous Januarys that were no less than 86 years ago and as much as 211 years ago? There were, of course, many others before that but they happened before thermometers were invented.

But none of that matters to the GW acolytes. They don't even want to debate the issue. In the old Soviet style, they portray dissent from their view as evidence of either corruption or mental imbalance.

Some are emotionally invested in the theory. Many see it as a way to tax the more productive societies of the world and transfer wealth to third worlders. The self-loathers among us are perpetually guilt-ridden that we're as rich, advanced and successful as we are and see the prescibed "remedies" to global warming as ways to take us down a peg or two.

The entire hysterical global warming culture and their proposals need to be opposed at every turn. They represent a real and present danger to the economic health an sovereignty of the world's industrial democracies.

Oh, well...this changes everything

2007-01-25T16:55:00.000-08:00

Now that I know Liz Taylor is endorsing Hillary for President, Hil takes on an entirely new level of gravitas. I'll have to rethink the entire 2008 field.

A few puffs from the magic dragon...

2007-01-09T05:47:00.000-08:00

...can totally ruin your day.

Looks like Al Qaeda in Somalia took another hit yesterday. This time, rather than feeling the wrath of the Ethiopian armed forces, the blows rained down from a US Air Force C-130, nicknamed Puff the Magic Dragon for its ability to 'breathe fire' and rain prodigious quantities of lead down upon its targets from its twin miniguns (around 1000 rounds per minute) and 105mm Howitzer, among other capabilities.

Our targets appear to have been the Al Quaeda leader in the region as well as some of the perpetrators of the 1998 embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam.

It will be interesting to hear more as details are revealed, but here's to the USAF and special forces on a what certainly seems to be a job well done.

Better to be funnier in private, than foolish in public

2007-01-06T17:10:00.000-08:00

"Conservatives generally tend to be funnier in their private lives," he explains, "because of the hypocrisy factor. I am of course a big fan of hypocrisy, because hypocrites at least know the difference between right and wrong--at any rate, know enough to lie about what they're doing. Liberals are not nearly as hypocritical as conservatives, because they don't know the difference between right and wrong. But anyways the personal lives of conservatives tend to be funnier: They've always got the embarrassing gay daughter, and so on."

P.J. O’Rourke on the relative funniosity of liberals and conservatives.

In public policy, Mr. O'Rourke claims, "liberals are always much more hilarious. Liberals are always proposing perfectly insane ideas, laws that will make everybody happy, laws that will make everything right, make us live forever, and all be rich. Conservatives are never that stupid.

Guilty pleasures

2007-01-05T14:17:00.000-08:00

When two of the country's scuzziest, most self-absorbed media whores get into a spat as public and vitriolic as this, it's the pop-culture version of the Iran-Iraq war.

May they both fight on for years until neither has anything left. Just hold the chemical weapons, please.

Rule Britannia - bwahahahaha!

2007-01-05T10:47:00.000-08:00

Well, of course they're cutting their fleet in half. They're capturing the peace dividend now that there's no Soviet Union or other serious threats...

Oh, wait. Never mind.

So much for the sun never setting on the Union Jack. Well, OK, it's been a good 60 years or so since that was the case, but this is a pretty serious abdication of their duty to defend their own interests.

Looks like the British are moving toward the same stance as the other western social democracies. They're allowing the American taxpayer to provide the majority of their national security and using the savings to finance their bloated socialist welfare spending (i.e. the EU, Japan, South Korea).

Tx, munchkin wrangler

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain

2006-12-29T14:58:00.000-08:00

It would appear that the Citgo boycott movement is gaining some traction. Notice the HUGE ad that appeared this morning on Mickey Kaus's blog at slate.com:

Would a company that isn't being affected by the backlash from its Venezuelan ownership spend the money it takes to run these ads? They obviously feel it's necessary to paint themselves as "an American success story" rather than the bankroll for a third world, Central American tin-pot Castro wannabe.

I don't think I've ever bought a nickel's worth of gasoline at a Citgo. There are only a few in my neck of the woods. However, if the choice was between giving my money to Hugo Chavez to fund his anti-American screeds and walking, I'd be doing a lot more ambulating.

Congrats to Nikon

2006-12-26T17:21:00.000-08:00

It's good to see Nikon getting recognition for what has been an excellent year or so for them design-wise.

After jumping out to an early lead in digital SLRs with the D1, Canon had pretty much cleaned their clock with more innovative models in recent years. Their pro-level models are excellent, and are second to none in ergonomics and logical ease-of-use. However, the lower models in the range, while good performers, lacked the breadth of the Canon line.

But beginning with the release of the D200 about 18 months ago, Nikon has been on quite a roll, introducing winnner after winner with the D80, D50 and now the diminutive but great performing D40. All of the new models have been extremely well reviewed and have resulted in much improved financial performance for Nikon as well. There's nothing like stiff competition between number one (Canon) and number two (Nikon) to fuel innovation and keep the price/feature relationship moving in the right direction.

Some questions to ponder...

2006-12-22T06:18:00.000-08:00

...while continuing to wonder why anyone still listens to a old socialist, America-hating fool like Jimmy Carter.

So, how is it that nobody else ever seems to get called on the carpet for their lies and exaggerations? How is it, for instance, that every liberal from Ted Kennedy to Jesse Jackson can get away with pretending that American blacks are still living like slaves, and that four decades after the Civil Rights Act, the only thing keeping blacks out of the cotton fields are Democrats in Washington?

Can you think of a single human being who has been on the wrong side of more issues in the past thirty years?

And, finally, how is it that Jimmy Carter, that sanctimonious phony who was a disaster during his four years in the White House and a disgrace in the quarter of a century since, can pass himself off as equal parts statesman and saint? While most of us wished that he would simply slink back to his peanut farm after Ronald Reagan whupped his butt in ?80, we hadn?t realized how starved he was for the spotlight.

Please Jimmy, do us all a favor in this season of joy and reconciliation. Go back to Plains, teach Sunday school, build the occaisional Habitat house and never, ever speak or write publicly again. That is all.

Addressing the problem

2006-12-13T08:18:00.000-08:00

I'm still not a fan of their editorial POV, but it's good to see Reuters trying to do something about the serious problems they've had with doctored photos.

Tom Glocer, chief executive officer of Reuters, has announced that his wire service is working with Canon and Adobe to create a system that will allow photo editors to view an audit trail of changes made to a digital image. The record of editing changes will be permanently embedded in the image file itself.

This is something that's sorely needed in the digital photography age. It's simply too easy to alter a photo and, if you're any good with Photoshop, probably get away with it. At least initially. Fortunately, the more egregious incidents have been uncovered by enterprising internet readers doing the job Reuters' editors should have been doing.

Tx, Rob Galbraith

Even a blind sqirrell...

2006-12-12T10:27:00.000-08:00

It's nice to see the occaisional moment of clarity (not to mention intellectual honesty) from a paragon of the mainstream media:

It's hard not to notice, however, that the evil dictator leaves behind the most successful country in Latin America. In the past 15 years, Chile's economy has grown at twice the regional average, and its poverty rate has been halved. It's leaving behind the developing world, where all of its neighbors remain mired. It also has a vibrant democracy. Earlier this year it elected another socialist president, Michelle Bachelet, who suffered persecution during the Pinochet years.

Like it or not, Mr. Pinochet had something to do with this success. To the dismay of every economic minister in Latin America, he introduced the free-market policies that produced the Chilean economic miracle -- and that not even Allende's socialist successors have dared reverse. He also accepted a transition to democracy, stepping down peacefully in 1990 after losing a referendum.

By way of contrast, Fidel Castro -- Mr. Pinochet's nemesis and a hero to many in Latin America and beyond -- will leave behind an economically ruined and freedomless country with his approaching death. Mr. Castro also killed and exiled thousands. But even when it became obvious that his communist economic system had impoverished his country, he refused to abandon that system: He spent the last years of his rule reversing a partial liberalization. To the end he also imprisoned or persecuted anyone who suggested Cubans could benefit from freedom of speech or the right to vote.

Funny, though, how you don't read about magistrates in Spain or elsewhere inidcting Castgro as has been done to Pinochet. If you're a lefty or socialist you'll have no shortage of sycophantic politicians, media types and actors who'll suck up to you and excuse away virtually any atrocity.

Our friends the Russians

2006-11-28T06:48:00.000-08:00

Russia has been busy trading in all the wrong ways. On top of years spent selling nuclear technology to Iran, Russia?s defense ministry has just announced it is going ahead with deliveries to Tehran of anti-aircraft missiles. At the UN, Russia continues to block any serious attempt to stop Iran?s nuclear bomb program. In Iraq, during the Saddam Hussein era, Russia was the top trader with Baghdad via the graft-ridden Oil-for-Food program, leaving a trail of damning documentary evidence leading right up to the Kremlin ? which Russian authorities have somehow neglected to investigate in any meangful way. With free speech basically dead in Russia, small surprise that on many fronts there is no end to the question marks and conspiracy theories. Who was behind the near-fatal poisoning in 2004 of the leader of Ukraine?s Orange Revolution, Viktor Yushchenko? Who was behind the recent murder of outspoken Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya? ? whose shooting Litvinenko was investigating when he was poisoned. The murk is considerable, but one bottom-line is obvious. With an ally like Putin, don?t gaze into his eyes. Watch your back. And bring a food-taster.

As Instapundit would say,read the whole thing.

The wilderness isn't so bad after all...

2006-11-17T11:12:00.000-08:00

Apparently, congressional Republicans are OK with their new minority status.

House Republicans Stick With Boehner, Blunt for 110th Congress

House Republicans voted Friday to keep their top leaders in place for the next two years, just ten days after a devastating loss at the polls cast them into the minority in the 110th Congress.

I guess Boehner, Blunt and Trent Lott are just fine with House and Senate Republicans. Look how smashingly they've done under this kind of leadership.

Oh well. Setting the legislative agenda and confirming Supreme Court and federal judges is overrated. Better to leave it to the other party who apparently at least wants to do it.

This is truly ominous

2006-11-09T12:35:00.000-08:00

Definitely not a good sign for travellers. It's only a matter of time before in-flight cell phone use spreads to all airlines.

It's bad enough being trapped on a plane with little room, screaming children and conventionally inconsiderate fellow travellers. Can you imagine what it will be like in the typical 737 cabin with half of the people on the plane screaming into their cell phones?

Sheesh.

Was this a temper tantrum, too?

2006-11-08T08:01:00.000-08:00

When reflecting on the tide that washed Democrats from office in 1994, the late Peter Jennings famously reflected the conventional wisdom by intoning that what happened amounted to nothing more than a temper tantrum on the part of voters who were acting like two-year-olds.

But I haven't heard anything like that in the wake of yesterday's successes by Democrats. No, if you listen to the usual suspects, the Republican losses were the result of voters who were sick of their corruption and incompetence. Funny, huh?

Unfortunately, the stakes are different

2006-11-08T05:17:00.000-08:00

Wanted to recount the gist of a comment I'd posted here, to Christopher Hitchens' post mortem.

Last night, Republicans suffered a swing not unlike the one that hit Democrats in 1994. The distinction is that we live in a different world now.

It had taken Democrats 50+ years to so abuse their power that many of their traditional voters in the middle had had enough. Their time in power was that of the all-powerful major daily papers and three networks. Republicans, on the other hand, had the misfortune of taking over the House and Senate at the dawn of the Internet age when their constituents have unprecedented access to see them and what they do without distortion of MSM filtering. As a result, when they became every bit as imperious, out-of-touch and spend-thrift as the Dems, twelve years was all they were afforded.

In 1994, all that was at stake was simple power and the opportunity to reign in the more expansive aspirations of the Clintons' governing tendencies. Today, however, we're at war with an enemy who has struck us here at home once and wants nothing more than to do so again. It's unfortunate for the country that the party that was just thrown out appears to be the only one who recognizes that fact.

Oh, those poor dumb grunts...

2006-11-01T13:47:00.000-08:00

...too stupid to know what a bad decision they've made.

Tx, Drudge

"It's a meltdown."

2006-10-31T13:29:00.000-08:00

We all knew Karl Rove was smart, but who knew he had such great timing, too?

What struck me about this comment beyond the obvious fact that it is insulting to our troops, is just how politically incompetent John Kerry is.

Ya think?

Thanks, Johnny boy. It's Christmas on Halloween!

UPDATE: A Democratic congressman told ABC News Tuesday, "I guess Kerry wasn't content blowing 2004, now he wants to blow 2006, too."

Tx, Mudville Gazette

MORE:

In the spare space of 24 hours Kerry has resurrected the Vietnam Syndrome "at least his and the left wing of the Democratic Party's Vietnam (loser's) Syndrome. This is stupid but particularly stupid in the last week of a national election. Doubly stupid in the midst of a long, grinding war. Kerry is trapped, in an odd sort of amber. He's stuck on stupid and stuck in the past simultaneously. John Kerry, the stegosaurus of American politics. (Okay, I'm unfair to stegosaurs, they had backbones and spikes on their tails" but the drawing at the link is cute.)

Why didn't Senator Kerry just apologize? "I'm sorry for what I said. I meant to crack a joke and it came out sounding like an insult to US troops. Forgive me. We owe our defenders so much."

But we know why.

EVEN MORE:

Photography: portfolios of note, III

2006-10-30T19:20:00.000-08:00

Luciano Giombini exhibits a masterful eye for the moment. His travel and environmental photography is top notch - worthy of comparison with the best in the business.

Enjoy.

Twenty-four years

2006-10-28T12:45:00.000-07:00

That's a long time between World Series titles. I was there in the last Busch Stadium, dressed for a football game, screaming myself hoarse as Bruce Sutter struck out Gorman Thomas to beat the Brewers in 1982.

The weather wasn't much better in St. Louis last night but to the delight of Cardinal Nation, the results were pretty much the same. Only this time it was a rookie closer - Adam Wainwright - striking out Brandon Inge.

Way to go, Cards.

Man, karma's a bitch!

2006-10-27T13:54:00.000-07:00

If you're one of the literally hundreds of people outside of Michigan and Missouri who are following the World Series, you already know that the St. Louis Cardinals now lead the Detroit Tigers three games to one. Weather permitting, Game five will be played in St. Louis tonight.

Now, if you're managing the Tigers and your back is to the wall, you need to do anything you can to win tonight and get the series back to you home ballpark. Sure, the odds aren't good, but they were in exactly the same position in 1968 against the Cardinals and came back to win the series in seven games.

Knowing all of that, you logical move would, of course, be to throw your best pitcher at the Redbirds tonight. For the Tigers, that's unquestionably been Kenny Rogers. He's had one of the most amazing streaks in playoff history, throwing 23+ scoreless innings going back to the Yankee series. So it's a no-brainer decision to put him on the mound tonight, right?

Well, um, no. See, Kenny's the same guy who made national headlines on Sunday by starting the game with a "big clump of dirt" (wink, wink) on his pitching hand. This clump was big enough to have been seen by people in the bleachers at Comerica Park. It seems Kenny's pitching hand is so dirt-prone, that when ESPN and others reviewed tape of ol' Kenny going back as far as July, they found the same clump in the same place. Guess Kenny's got something of a hygiene problem. Maybe he should think about cleaning out that locker. (Photo at left is from the AL Championship Series, photo at right is from World Series game 2)

As you might imagine, St. Louis fans didn't take too kindly to Kenny being given a pass by the umpires. You see, rather than being tossed from the game and suspended as the rulebook dictates, the home plate umpire merely asked Ken to wash that ~~pine tar~~ dirt from his hand.

Tiger Manager Jim Leyland had originally set his pitching rotation such that dirty Kenny would pitch games two and six, both scheduled for Detroit. After the dirty-hand incident, that decision looked downright prescient, given the heaps of abuse sure to be hurled at Rogers by the Cardinal faithful if he were to pitch at Busch Stadium. Only now, with the Tigers at death's door, Leyland's original schedule calls for a rookie, Justin Verlander to pitch game five. While Verlander was the Tigers' best pitcher during the season, he hasn't been exactly overpowering in the last month. On top of all that, Verlander's a righty and Rogers a lefty. The Cardinals are infamous for making even the most average left-handed pitcher look like Cy Young with their inability to hit them.

Given all of that, the press asked manager Leyland if there was a chance he'd move Kenny, his best (albeit most sanitarily challenged) pitcher, up a game to pitch game five. Leyland's answer? "Absolutely none," he said. "I'm not going to pitch him in this atmosphere."

See, in addition to his slovenly personal habits, Kenny's also a bit of a psycho. He famously attacked a cameraman who was twice his age a couple of years ago. So, that puts Leyland on the horns of a dilemma. He'd like to start his best pitcher, veteran and a lefty, against the Cardinals tonight in a do-or-die game. He can't, though, because after being exposed to all the world as a ~~cheating bastard~~ messy person, Rogers will be the target of massive abuse by the red-clad St. Louis fans. Not to mention scrutiny by cameras and (one would hope) umpires that would make Terrell Owens blanch. No, instead, Leyland will have to start a rookie who the Cardinals knocked around in game one. That flapping sound Kenny's hearing are all of those chickens coming home to roost.

Say cheeeeeeez...

2006-10-27T13:49:00.000-07:00

I don't even know where to start. I'll just leave it alone.

Tx, The Online Photographer

OK, hold onto something solid...

2006-10-24T13:39:00.000-07:00

...cause this is going to come as quite a shock.

Report finds sex always on men's minds

Why he cooks

2006-10-20T14:54:00.000-07:00

There are all sorts of reasons that people learn to cook. Sometimes it takes cat house and baby caskets.

Yet another Reuters embarassment

2006-10-17T13:33:00.000-07:00

To the surprise of few, more evidence that Reuters has a serious, pervasive problem with the photographers they've been hiring in the Middle East:

A videotape that the prosecution presented to the judge shows Boghnat encouraging and directing rioters in Bil'in to throw large chunks of rock at Israeli vehicles in such a way as to cause maximum damage. The accused is heard shouting, "Throw, throw!" and later, "Throw towards the little window!"

First there was Adnan Hajj and his creative use of Photoshop. Now, Imad Muhammad Intisar Boghnat gets into the act by, um, getting into the act. Or rather, personally directing the action.

The article doesn't say wheter Boghnat is a Reuters employee or a stringer, as Hajj was. It doesn't really matter, however. Boghnat's is every bit as big a journalistic sin as Hajj's was and both reflect equally poorly on Reuters, an organization with a richly deserved anti-American and anti-Israeli reptutation.

I am a former (non-editorial) Reuters employee. It was a great company to work for and almost none of my job was related to the news side. In fact, over ninety percent of Reuters' revenue comes from selling market information to brokers and investors. The news agency part of the business is small potatoes in the great scheme of things.

However, as more of this type of thing is reported, this will undoubtedly begin to hurt the company's other business.

The onus is on Reuters to clean house in its editorial operations and prove that they can be a trusted source of down-the-middle journalism.

Photography: portfolios of note II

2006-10-17T07:38:00.000-07:00

Today's portfolio comes to us from a Brit-born photographer, Daniel Bayer. He's won numerous awards and his work has been published in a variety of prominent outlets.

His work shows great vision and control in a variety of situations. I particularly like the photos in the single photos and black and white sections (although I have a definite prejudice toward black and white work in general.

Hope you enjoy his work, too.

Heh heh...

2006-10-13T15:41:00.000-07:00

Tx, rightwingnation.com

Blockading ideas

2006-10-13T11:14:00.000-07:00

The ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas [and] the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market. Oliver Wendell Holmes

Peggy Noonan has a wonderful piece on OpinionJournal today about the crushing of dissent by the left.

Let us be more pointed. Students, stars, media movers, academics: They are always saying they want debate, but they don't. They want their vision imposed. They want to win. And if the win doesn't come quickly, they'll rush the stage, curse you out, attempt to intimidate.

And they don't always recognize themselves to be bullying. So full of their righteousness are they that they have lost the ability to judge themselves and their manner.

And all this continues to come more from the left than the right in America.

When was the last time you heard of a liberal speaker being shouted down by a conservative audience? As Noonan points out, the driving force behind this behavior is the thought that, "I feel so much, therefore my views are correct and must prevail."

And doesn't that succinctly sum up the ethos of modern liberalism? It's predominantly a feelings-based political philosophy. It doesn't matter that the policies they espouse have been proven not to work. What matters is that they will have done something (enacted a law, taxed people more, regulated an activity), and that fact alone will allow them to feel better about themselves.

The narcissism in the face of facts takes your breath away.

When pigs cars fly

2006-10-11T19:40:00.000-07:00

If you've watched any kind of sporting event on national television in the last couple of weeks, you've probably seen the commercial in which the Chevy cars and trucks that are stuck in traffic levitate 40 or 50 feet above all of the other cars. They then speed off in airborne "lanes" reminiscent of something out of Star Wars.

Upon seeing this, my wife's comment was, "They can hardly make cars that drive. Like I'm going to get in one that flies."

Disregarding her usual snarkiosity, the comment says something about the low regard in which GM products are held. My wife drives a five year old Toyota Avalon that she loves. It's been a wonderful car with virtually no problems.

I don't know the last time she's even ridden in a Chevy, let alone whether she's driven one or not. But until they do something to improve the quality of their cars (and, more important, the public perception of that quality), GM's road to profitability will be long and bumpy.

Uh oh.

2006-10-11T12:25:00.000-07:00

Aircraft crashes into highrise apartment building on east side of Manhattan on 71st street at the river.

Watching Fox as I type. FAA just confirmed that this is a fixed wing aircraft flying VFR (visual flight rules), not under air traffic control rules. According to Shepherd Smith and one of their correspondents who is on the scene (and is also a pilot) it is possible for a pilot of a small plane to fly up the East River without supervision depending on LaGuardia traffic. Hard to believe that is still allowed in this day and age.

A witness characterized the plane's activity before the crash as looking like "acrobatics". Another reporter noted the presence not of the usual yellow police tape around the area, but orange hazmat tape. Hopefully just a precaution given obvious concerns in a case like this.

The over/under for how long before someone blames this on Karl Rove in order to benefit Republicans in the election is currently running at eleven minutes.

MORE: FDNY confirms at least two dead so far with people trapped in the building above the fire.

MORE: Amazing. About 40 minutes after the crash, FDNY reports the main source of fire has been extinguished. Still some flames visible, but clearly not what it was at first. Already hundreds of NYPD and FDNY personnel on the scene. Situation just raised to 4 alarms.

MORE: DOJ says this is probably just an accident. However, NORAD has scrambled fighters over most major cities. Note was made that this is 10/11. Not sure there's any significance there, but the thought had occurred to me before it was pointed out on the tube.

MORE: It's now 3:45 eastern time and the fire appears to be out. No more smoke coming from the building and S&R people are combing the building. Fox reports the first floors of the building are taken up by a "special surgery" hospital. Everything above is condominiums.

The DOW dove over 70 points at the first report of the crash, but has mostly recovered since, now down only about 20 points as it seems to be the result of an accident.

Melbourne mutt morass makes Muslim mufti's mandate meaningful...maybe

2006-10-11T05:49:00.000-07:00

If you ever needed a reason to justify the surfing you do on the ~~greatest time-waster in the history of man~~ Internet, learning things you otherwise wouldn't have has to be way up there on the list.

For instance, did you know that the Muslim religion proscribes contact with dogs? I have to plead total ignorance here.

"I don't refuse to take people, but it's hard for me because my religion tells me I should not go near dogs," he said.

It seems that Muslim cabbies in Melbourne are refusing to pick up blind fares with guide dogs for religious reasons. That's right, the Religion of Peace hates man's best friend.

Victorian Taxi Association spokesman Neil Sach said the association had appealed to the mufti of Melbourne to give religious approval for Muslim cabbies to carry guide dogs.

Besides the fact that I own three labs, I couldn't be prouder to be the impresario behind THE YELLOW DOG BLOG.

But Mr. Sach (who's evidently lacking one) couldn't leave well enough alone in his attempts to to get special dispensation from Melbourne's mufti. No he had to denigrate Australia's white majority:

"Muslims are good people and the community has to realise that the days of the white Anglo-Saxon Protestant are well and truly over," he said.

Looks like Mr. Sach has adopted groveling and appeasement as his preferred method of staying on the right side of all those scary Muslims.

Good luck with that.

Photography: Portfolios of note #1

2006-10-10T13:46:00.000-07:00

Photography has been one of my loves since I was about 10 years old. I actually worked as a pro for a year or so as well as toiling in the depths of a commercial photo lab (back in the days of that stuff they used to use call film).

One of my favorite photo-related sites is www.photo.net. It's got some thing for everyone from the neophyte to the experienced pro.

In the six or seven years that I've frequented photo.net, I've found some photographers that I think turn out exceptional work. One of the occaisional features of The Yellow Dog Blog I'd like to start is to point you to some of these talented photogs' porfolios.

The first portfolio I'll feature is that of Ilona Wellman, an award-winning German photographer. Follow the link and enjoy.

Way to go, Alaska!

2006-10-09T19:58:00.000-07:00

Guess you have to be a red state not to grovel at the feet of a manipulative maggot like Hugo Chavez when he offers you a little free heating oil.

...a few of the small communities want to refuse free heating oil from Venezuela, on the patriotic principle that no foreigner has the right to call their president "the devil." ...

"As a citizen of this country, you can have your own opinion of our president and our country. But I don't want a foreigner coming in here and bashing us," said Justine Gunderson, administrator for the tribal council in the Aleut village of Nelson Lagoon. "Even though we're in economically dire straits, it was the right choice to make."

Too bad there aren't any Justine Gundersons in the Bay State where legislative whores like Edward Markey prostrate themselves before a petty dictator in the name of "constituent service" (nevermind taking any opportunity to poke a finger in Bush's eye).

Proud to be living...

2006-10-09T18:45:00.000-07:00

...in a D+ state.

Now if we can only figure out how to progress to the coveted F grade. Heh.

Wait, here's a good idea!

2006-10-09T06:51:00.000-07:00

More clear thinking from the nation's elite editorialists regarding gun laws:

It may be true that no law could have stopped the Pennsylvania school killer. Maybe, though, stricter laws would have given him pause. And, even if his victims could not have been saved, certainly some of the 10,100 people murdered with guns or some of the 477,040 people who were victims of gun violence last year would have been spared.

Of course. Everyone knows that psychotic child-killers always stop to consider the legality of the weapons they're using to butcher innocent little girls before they actually commit the crime.

The sick loser who killed those children would have done the job with a knife, a hammer, a garden rake or a cordless drill if he didn't have a gun. The continued advocacy of ~~victim disarmament~~ more restrictive gun laws represents willful disregard of the experience and empirical data from strict gun-control localities like New York, D.C. and all the other places that have already tried it. The writer above concedes that no law would have stopped the freak in Pennsylvania. Doesn't matter, though. It would make all right-thinkers feel better and allow them to think that they've actually done something.

Whewww...

2006-10-03T13:24:00.000-07:00

Well, I don't know about you, but I feel much better already at the prospect of France overseeing Iran's uranium enrichment.

Now if we can just get Venezuela to keep an eye on North Korea for us, we should be in great shape.

The market is a wonderful thing

2006-10-03T12:29:00.000-07:00

Try as they might, even a cartel such as OPEC can't repeal the laws of economics. A fat man may as well try to repeal the laws of physics and reduce gravitational pull because he weighs too much.

It's amazing how the price seems to rise during the summer driving/vacation season and drops after Labor Day. Instability in the Middle East and a psychotic running Venezuela don't help matters. Combine all of that with the effective efforts of the environmental lobby at blocking the addition of any new US refining capability in the last 30 years and drastically limiting our exploration for new sources of oil (ANWR, Pacific coastline) and it's little wonder that the price of gas rose as it did this year.

Yahoo is thinking of you!

2006-10-03T08:42:00.000-07:00

So I'm minding my own business last night, logging in to check my email while watching someone who claims to be Brett Favre muck up yet another game on national television. When will the commentators realize that the guy on the screen last night hasn't been 'Brett Favre', the one they lionize ad nauseum, since about 2001?

Anyway, my default home page is set to yahoo.com as ATT/Yahoo is my ISP. When the screen pops up, this is what I'm greeted with:

"Tell Hillary Clinton: How we can prevent breast cancer? The senator wants to hear answers from you."

Where does one begin to deconstruct the stupidity (and transparency) of this little venture? It's hard to know. Let's just dive right in then, shall we?

First, does Yahoo think that they have an unusual number of research oncologists viewing their home page on Monday nights? Have these enterprising physicians recently had a breackthrough such that they are now able to actually advise women how to avoid contracting breast cancer? If so, why haven't I seen this splashed across the front pages of the dinosaur press?

While all of this would, naturally, be wonderful news, why is Senator Clinton appealing to the good people at Yahoo to help her divine this kind of information. Surely someone of her position and influence would be able to find out how to avoid breast cancer from some of the fine medical institutions in the great state of New York. Could it be that she's appealing to the public for down-home, homeopathic medical advice to include in the next NIH funding bill?

No, I don't think it's any of those things. It certainly isn't something useful like reinforcing the importance of women performing regular breast self-exams and getting mammograms in order to catch problems early.

Pardon my cynical side popping up in October of an even numbered year, but this is a public service annoucement by our friends at Yahoo to let us know that Democrats really do care about us. How timely! Especially since the election is only four weeks from today!!

Thanks, Yahoo. Gosh, it's nice to know you have our best interests at heart. I'm sure that the Chinese version of the home page has an equally flattering photo of Hu Jintao with the command, "Tell President Hu which of your neighbors is insufficiently loyal to the communtist ideal: The president wants to hear answers from you."

The "torture" issue

2006-09-29T09:18:00.000-07:00

Just in time for the home stretch of the election cycle, (in addition to National Intelligence Estimate leaks and weighty new tomes hitting the shelves) it's time to resurrect the Abu Graib torture issue. Granted, the House and Senate have just approved most of what the President asked for in the interrogation and trial of enemy combatants - so the subject does have some relevance given current news.

However, Dahlia Lithwick in Slate sees the legislative approval as a sign of something much more disturbing - America's desensitization to "torture" which has brought us to this pass where the evil Bush administration is given leave to wantonly violate the Geneva Conventions (never mind the fact that the conventions don't even apply to non-uniformed enemy combatants). To what does she attribute this new callousness? Well, a variety of things, including the lionization of Jack Bauer, the number of times the Abu Graib photos were displayed and even "congressional hairsplitting" over the acceptable level of "abuse" to which we'll subject suspected terrorists.

But the answer is really none of those things at all. The real answer is something that is beyond the ability of those of the mindset of Lithwick and the other liberal war opponents to conceive.

The reason that the President got what he asked for and that congressional Democrats didn't sufficiently "express horror over the brutalization of enemy prisoners" is that their constituents, from the very first, had little or no objection to what they saw. Take a look at the Abu Graib photos. I see not a single example of what can reasonably be called torture. There is a photo of a dead body that at the time was alleged to have been the result of torture, but that was never established. If, in fact, that man died as a result of actual torture, those responsible should be held to account. However, given what we know, it's just as likely that the body was brought in as an example to the other prisoners of their fate if they didn't talk.

Torture is causing lasting, damaging pain to an individual. Putting panties on his head, scaring him with a barking dog or making him lie naked in a pile of his buddies might be embarassing, but it doesn't cause any lasting damage and it certainly doesn't rise to the level of torture.

Confronted with the media-driven firestorm that was Abu Graib in April of 2004, just two and a half years after the 9/11 attacks, the vast majority of Americans looked at the photos and came to the conclusion that if we have to pile up some naked enemy prisoners and humiliate them a little to get valuable information that would save lives in Iraq and possible at home, then so be it. I don't have any numbers as to the response our distinguished congressmen and senators received on this and you wouldn't get a straight answer from them, anyway. But all evidence to the contrary, our elected representatives aren't completely brain-dead. They have enough capacity for thought to conclude that with an election just six weeks away, it is in their best interests not to hamstring the President on this issue and allow our military and CIA interrogators to do what's necessary to get the information they need.

The idiotarian wing in both houses is big and loud enough to have taken full advantage of this issue if they thought it would benefit them back home at the ballot box. But with few exceptions, they concluded that isn't the case. What Lithwick fails to realize is that not everyone thinks about this the way that she does. Just like their support for the war's basic rationale (better to take it to them over there than fight over here), most of us looked at those photos and decided that what they saw didn't justify disabling our efforts to get life-saving information from probable terrorists.

Be aware...be very aware

2006-09-28T20:21:00.000-07:00

Hard to believe I almost let this go by without trumpeting it across the blogosphere so that it gets all the attention it so richly deserves. Just wanted to take this opportunity to wish you a happy and healthy squirrel awareness week.

Evidently, you need to be even more aware in California.

Satanic mascot goblins on the march

2006-09-27T09:14:00.000-07:00

Quick, run for your lives! Don't let them get you!

If there's a better argument for carrying a firearm, I haven't seet it.

Can't wait to get a good look at Googoo, the Internet censorship ox, though.

No confirmation yet of the rumor that these horrifying characters were modeled after actual fetuses from China's forced abortion program.

Is that a rifle in your pant or are you just glad to see me?

2006-09-26T16:15:00.000-07:00

Dontcha just love stories like this that end happily?

The second time she saw the man, she was walking up Brushton Avenue around 5:35 a.m. She recognized his clothing. "Oh my God," she thought, "It's him."

She walked faster, unobtrusively getting her gun ready, but kept it under her sleeve. When they reached the top of steep Brushton Avenue, he was out of breath and stopped; she continued. She looked behind her once, and she saw him leaning over, pulling his rifle out from his pants.

Knowing she needed to fire before he was able to take aim, she steadied her gun and fired twice at his abdomen. He continued to lean over, apparently unaffected, and Dunbar thought, "Oh my God, my bullets didn't work."

Then he stood up, yelled, and fell over.

I'm sure she's mighty glad she doesn't live somewhere like New York, D.C. or San Francisco where victims are conveniently pre-disarmed for their attackers.

The Muslim diagnosis

2006-09-26T10:50:00.000-07:00

I'm not a Catholic, but like the Pope (in some cases, anyway), I stand on the side of reason and western civilization. The following is a letter to the editor from Richard Reay of Riverdale, New York in response to a 9/21 WSJ op ed by Reuel Marc Gerecht. It's not available on-line (that I can find) so I re-type the letter in its entirety:

As Reuel Marc Gerecht points out in his September 21 editorial-page commentary "The Pope's Divisions," many Muslims wrongly perceive Islam as a political and military tool of conquest ? which will only corrupt it as Christianity was during the Middle Ages. On the other hand, Jews are often accused of doing the opposite: using Judaism to insulate themselves and exclude others in order to concentrate their own power. Therefore, the power of spirituality can be misunderstood and abused, which is why reason is an integral part of faith and a solution to the infirmities of the mind and soul.

Pope Benedict is right to appeal to logos, that nexus of reason and spirituality, to compel people to ask what is going wrong in the world at large, and Islam in particular. When you look at history, Islam is simply one of many groups through which the intellectual legacy of the world has passed. Violence, therefore, is the cartharsis of its passingand the antithesis of reason and humanism, which are the basis of monotheism and the Greek philosophical tradition. As Christianity and Judaism work toward an interfaith understanding, Islam is the prodigal son that needs to return home to the cradle of civilization that it shares with its monotheistic brethren.

But reason, as a basis for understanding revealed truth, is the same foundation for understanding politics. And when people don?t want to acknowledge the conclusions that derive from reason and logic, they become dissonant, dissociated, even violent. ?Choice? is often considered the mark of intellectual independence, but it?s also a mask for denying what follows from reason. In other words, I have a right to believe what I wish, even if I know I?m wrong. This attitude often manifests itself in liberal democracies among social militants of the left. But you also see the ideology of victimhood ? one of its offshoots ? taking root in the Middle Eastern critique of the West?s alleged intent to subjugate Arabs through ?colonialism? ? when it is really their own culture and intellectual inertia that is holding them back.

It is this intellectual inertia that is now being institutionalized through jihad that Pope Benedict wants Muslims to reject through reason. Unfortunately, and to their shame, the pope?s critics don?t understand that his dialectic approach to dialogue by using Emperor Manuel?s statement as a starting point for inquiry. Thus the violent reaction on the Arab street. However, Pope Benedict is trying to prevent the world from devolving into a Tower of Babel where the ?us vs. them? mentality can bring down the tower of universitas and its richness of human variety. The antidote to this gathering chaos and nihilism is the appeal to reason as our salvation. And it is the universality of reason, as echoed in the words of Lincoln, that is the spiritual and civic religion of all people everywhere.

I wish that I were as sanguine as Mr. Reay about the universality of reason. Islam has a particularly difficult time with self criticism and self examination, let alone abiding either from an outsider. But I do agree that the violence and terrorism that has been displayed by elements of Islam in the last fifteen years or so (along with the reluctance to confront it from within by moderate Muslims) is a reaction to a sort of dissociative pathology and the politics of victimhood that have been promoted by the Muslim world?s dictatorial strongmen for over two generations. The Muslim world is being left behind, both socially and economically as a result of its own cultural inertia. This stagnation has negatively impacted almost a billion people across the globe and provides the basis for further claims of victimhood that feeds a self-perpetuating cycle.

I don't know if democratization in Iraq is right course to conter-act this. If nothing else, the violent responses by reactionary Muslims and the scorn among western leftists should be a positive indicator. Something, however, must be done or the problem will only get worse.

Sportsmanship, pure and simple

2006-09-25T12:06:00.000-07:00

Golf really is different. It's frequently praised as the only sport in which players call penalties on themselves. But it's this kind of sportsmanship that really impresses me.

As the Euros were administering their bi-annual, ritualized Ryder Cup beating, Paul McGinley conceded a tweny-five foot putt to America's J.J. Henry. The Americans had trouble with five footers, let alone tweny-five footers, but McGinley's gesture allowed Henry to ensure a tie in the match which prevented the Euros from scoring a record-setting margin of victory.

Can't you just see the the same type of sportsmanship coming from the preening, in-your-face idiots who play NFL football or NBA basketball?

Warning, Will Robinson!

2006-09-25T10:50:00.000-07:00

I'm driving my son to school this morning when I glance at my dash and see it lit up like the Three Mile Island control board. I drive an '06 Honda Pilot with about 10K miles on it that I bought in February. Great car.

After deciphering the smoke signals, I determined that I'm being told that two of my tires are low. Much to my amazement (owner's manual - what owner's manual?), the car has tire pressure sensors that alert you when the air pressure in any tire is down about 10%.

So, after lunch I drive to my neighborhood petrol purveyor. As I needed a fill-up anyway, I topped off the tank and moved the car over to the air machine. After unsucessfully attempting to stuff my quarter into the pay slot, I asked the attendant who informed me that the machine was out of service. Natch.

I then drove up and down the street stopping at the four stations that are within a mile of my house. Three of the four had non-operative air machines Like 'Postal Service', 'service station' has become a laughable oxymoron.

I finally located a working air hose at the fourth station where the charge for air was 75 cents. Now, I'm second to no one in my capitalist bona fides and admiration for the system as a whole. The market can and should determine the price of almost every service and commodity. No other system is fairer or more efficient.

But 75 cents? For air?? Holy freakin' crap.

Um, pot...kettle...

2006-09-24T05:31:00.000-07:00

black.

The man continually redifines the meaning of chutzpah.

Deja vu all over again

2006-09-23T19:32:00.000-07:00

Haven't we seen this before?

The Euros are obviously deep in the Americans' heads. They played all day with thousand yard stares while the Euros looked like they were playing in a benefit scramble. Garcia and Donald could have harassed the chick driving the drink cart, downed three or four brews and smoked stogies the whole time without changing the outcome one iota.

This won't end well. Again.

Happy 5767...

2006-09-22T20:04:00.000-07:00

to all of my Jewish friends out there.

I just know I'll still be writing 5766 on my checks for a month or two, though.

Ick

2006-09-22T13:51:00.000-07:00

Sorry. I really should have warned you to remove any small children from the room and to be sure you weren't even contemplating food before you check this out.

Blech.

Tx, drudgreport.com

I've been a little negligent

2006-09-22T08:42:00.000-07:00

It's been pointed out to me that given the name of this little narcissistic enterprise, there's been precious little in the way of actual yelllow dog-related posting. Bowing (bow-wowing?) to popular pressure, I'll introduce the beasts that inhabit my home, share my food and make life generally chaotic.

Allow me to introduce thing three. That's right, we currently have three yellow labs in casa de YDB. Why? Because last Christmas, snookums decided that what I really needed was a new puppy to go with our two fully grown, relatively well-trained and decidedly low maintenance labs. So, she contacted the breeder from whom we got our first lab (you'll meet him later) to arrange for another yellow male.

I went along with this grudginly. Snookums said that she and my son would train the pup (um, yeah). That he wouldn't be any trouble at all (right). And that it wouldn't be a broblem for our other two furry tenants.

Along with the attendant hassles of bringing up a puppy and the fact that no sane family needs three large dogs, my biggest concern was the effect a new pup would have on our oldest lab, thing one. Since the day we picked him up from the breeder, he's been the love of my life. He's now 11+ years old, has arthritis in most of his joints and is very definitely set in his ways. I didn't want to make his life unnecessarily difficult by introducing a new dog to the mix.

Well, snookums talked to our saintly veterinarian (who long ago was given instructions that he was to do whatever he needed to do to ensure that thing one never dies) about the prospect of a new addition to the herd and he said that thing one should be able to weather the storm.

So... we picked up thing three in late January when he was about 12 weeks old. The photo above was taken at about 4 months of age. This one was taken at about the same time. He's now nine months old and you can imagine what has happened. Snookums' nefarious plan worked perfectly. I proceeded to fall in love with this one just like I did with things one and two. The evil genious!

Intros to things one and two coming soon.

Mahmoud Rosannadanna

2006-09-22T05:32:00.000-07:00

Progress in the middle east?

Never mind.

Not just experts, academic experts

2006-09-21T11:06:00.000-07:00

It seems that the esteemed Donna Shalala, along with the obligatory "committee of experts," has found that women in the fields of mathematics, science and engineering don't do as well as their male counterparts. Women working in these areas in universities "are generally paid less and promoted more slowly, receive fewer honors, and hold fewer leadership positions." And here's the kicker - this august group found "no good explanation for why women are being locked out (emphasis mine)."

So what did they concluded was the reason (good or bad) for this disparity? Why, the old reliable, of course - gender bias (cue ominous music).

Lemme get this straight. American Universities as a whole are far and away the most liberal (some would even say leftist) organizations in the country. No other industry even comes close. That being the case, we're asked by this "committee of experts" to believe that in what should otherwise be the most accepting, inclusive and nurturing of environments possible, bastions of affirmative action, the patriarchy still flexes its muscles of oppression to keep the wimmin folk barefoot and pregnant.

Uh huh.

First, let's say they've absolutely nailed the problem. The poor girls are every bit as smart and accomplished as the men they're working with, but those mean old department heads and deans won't let them fulfill their promise. That means that even in what should be the most ideal of circumstances (again, we're talking about liberal, bend-over-backward-to-be-politically-correct universities), men are still oppressing women to the extent that they're significantly underrepresented on faculties and in leadership. If that's the case, then what hope do they have of changing circumstances in the society at large?

What these experts refuse to countenance, though, is even the possibility that, Larry Summers notwithstanding, there really may be biological or cultural factors at work here that result in few women progressing in these fields.

Here's a thought experiment. Think about chess. That's right, the board game. Like sporting events, it's a meritocracy, pure and simple. If you win, you're better than the person across the board from you, no matter what sex or color you may be burdened with. Unlike sporting events, size and upper body strength aren't factors in women's success at chess. Grey matter is all that matters. OK, so that being the case, how many women grand master champions have you ever heard of. Have you ever read about any woman even playing against Bobby Fischer, Boris Spassky or Gary Kasparov, let alone beating one of them?

I'm not saying a woman won't or can't excel in chess or that one won't some day be ranked number one in the world. Good on her if it happens. I'm simply asking why is there a dearth of females in the chess world? Could it be that, like in other more obvious areas, there really are differences between men and women? Naw. I'm sure even a committee of experts wouldn't be able to find anything like that.

I think it's gonna be the P22

2006-09-21T08:16:00.000-07:00

I've been kicking around the idea of buying my first handgun for a while now and decided that I wanted a 22lr semi-automatic. They're a good choice as a first handgun as they're relatively inexpensive, produce minimal recoil and use inexpensive ammo. You can shoot all day long for just a few dollars. I'd use it to learn pistol shooting, general target shooting at the range and plinking for fun.

After doing the requisite research on the net, I'd narrowed the probables to three - a Ruger Mk III, a Buckmark Micro Standard and a Beretta Neos. So... I drove out to a Bass Pro Shop as they had all three guns (or variants thereof).

Having handled all three, the Ruger was eliminated because it just didn't feel comfortable in my hand. I then visited a range that rented a few 22lr pistols to try the Neos. I put 50 or so rounds through one with mixed results. The gun certainly feels good to shoot and is very accurate. I had a number of misfeeds using first quality ammo (Eley Tenex) but wasn't too worried. I'd learned that 22 pistols frequently require experimentation with different ammo to determine what they like to shoot best. What really nixed the Neos for me was the design - I had to use two hands to release the slide. Not good.

I took the Neos back to the counter where the friendly sales guy suggested that I try a Walther P22. This particular range isn't a Browning shop, and didn't have a Buckmark for me to try, so I figured, what the heck.

Long story short, I immediately fell in love with it. The Walther felt like it was made for my (small) hand. Everything was in exactly the right place. The gun is small compared to the three I had been thinking about (which I like) and consequently is a little less accurate, though I got pretty good groupings from twenty and even at fifty feet. I put a hundred rounds through it without one failure. It just shot like a dream.

I still felt that I should shoot a Buckmark, but afer calling all over town, I couldn't find one available to shoot, and don't know anyone who owns one. So, I checked out rimfirecentral.com and posted a few questions. But after doing the necessary due diligence, I've come to the realization that it's the Walther that I'm really lusting for.

So, after clearing a couple of financial questions in the next couple of weeks, I'll be buying myself an early Christmas present. More to follow once the pourchase is made.

Thank you, Hugo

2006-09-20T20:31:00.000-07:00

I think we all owe Hugo Chavez a debt of gratitude. The porcine Venezuelan strongman (in tandem with his kindred spirit from Tehran) did more damage to the average sentient American's regard for that rolling disaster on the East River - you probably know it as the United Nations - than any hyper-conservative, black-helicopter-fearing, one-world-government-hater could every have accomplished. Their tirades, accompanied by the hearty applause of most in attendance at the general assembly, have clearly demonstrated that corrupt conglomeration as the America-hating anti-semitic hive that it really is.

Thank you, Hugo. Thank you very much.

Outrage on the Charles

2006-09-06T12:28:00.001-07:00

Well, as if there were any real doubt, we're getting another excellent look at the kind of people that run our institutions of higher learning. Harvard, the same people who ran Larry Summers out on a rail, have invited former Iranian president Mohammed Khatami to speak on the subject of, um the ethics of tolerance in the age of violence. That whirring sound you hear is George Orwell spinning as his mind boggles.

That's right, the geniuses at Foggy Bottom have given this former tyrant and patron of terrorism a "limited visa" so that he can present his ideas to the American people. And when did the leading lights of the Kennedy School choose to have the man who arrested, tortured and imprisoned thousands to speak? The day before the fifth anniversary of the World Trade Center terrorist attacks. To use an old phrase, that's so September 10th. I think the American people got a very clear glimpse of the kind of tolerance Khatami prefers about five years ago.

Now to be fair, the State Department was probably obligated to issue a visa given that Khatami was invited to speak to the U.N. However, I'd be suprised if there isn't a way to confine him to New York City for the duration of his stay, rather than enabling his grand tour of the U.S.

As for Harvard, the same university that was so outraged by Ronald Regan that they rescinded an invitation to speak that they had extended to him (the courageous pre-summers administration caved yet again to the horror and outrage expressed by the faculty), has been able to find it in their hearts to overlook Khatami's open support of international terrorism, his crackdown against thousands of reformers in his own country, the torture he sanctioned and the uncounted thousands who have undoubtedly died in Iran's prisons during Khatami's seven year reign of terror.

How any Harvard alum can continue to donate when people that would sanction this are running the asylum is utterly beyond me.

2006-09-06T12:17:00.000-07:00

More sage wisdom from trapshooters.com

While trying to escape through Pakistan, Osama Bin Laden found a bottle along the way and picked it up. Suddenly, a female genie rose from the bottle and said "Master, may I grant you one wish?"

"You ignorant unworthy daughter-of-a-dog! Don't you know who I am? I don't need any common woman giving me anything," barked Bin Laden. The shocked genie said "Please, I must grant you a wish or I will be returned to that bottle forever!"

Osama thought a moment. Then grumbled about the impertinence of the woman, and said, "Very well, I want to awaken with three American women in my bed in the morning, so just do it and be off with you!" The annoyed genie said, "So be it!" smiled and disappeared.

The next morning Bin Laden woke up in bed with Lorena Bobbitt, Tonya Harding, and Hillary Clinton. His penis was gone, his knees were broken, and he had no health insurance.
God is good.

2006-09-04T06:27:00.000-07:00

On this Labor Day holiday, it's always instructive and helpful to remind ourselves of our history and how we've gotten to this point in history (with a little help from the scholars at trapshooters.com) :

Humans existed as members of small bands of nomadic hunters and gatherers. They lived on deer in the mountains during the summer and would go to the coast and live on fish and lobster in winter.

The 2 most important events in all of history were the invention of beer and the invention of the wheel. The wheel was invented to get man to the beer. These were the foundation of modern civilization and together were the catalyst for the splitting of humanity into 2 distinct subgroups: Liberals and Conservatives.

Once beer was discovered it required grain and that was the beginning of agriculture. Neither the glass bottle nor aluminum can were invented yet, so while our early human ancestors were sitting around waiting for them to be invented, they just stayed close to the brewery. That's how villages were formed.

Some men spent their days tracking and killing animals to B-B-Q at night while they were drinking beer. This was the beginning of what is known as "the Conservative movement." Other men who were weaker and less skilled at hunting learned to live off the conservatives by showing up for the nightly B-B-Q's and doing the sewing, fetching and hair dressing. This was the beginning of the Liberal movement. Some of these liberal men eventually evolved into women. The rest became known as 'girliemen.'

Some noteworthy liberal achievements include the domestication of cats, the invention of group therapy and group hugs and the concept of democratic voting to decide how to divide the meat and beer that conservatives provided.

Over the years conservatives came to be symbolized by the largest, most powerful land animal on earth, the elephant. Liberals are symbolized by the jackass.
Modern liberals like imported beer (with lime added), but most prefer white wine or imported bottled water. They eat raw fish but like their beef well done. Sushi, tofu, and French food are standard liberal fare.

Another interesting revolutionary side note about liberals: most of their women have higher testosterone levels than their men. Most social workers, personal injury attorneys, journalists, dreamers in Hollywood and group therapists are liberals. Liberals invented the designated hitter rule because it wasn't "fair" to make the pitcher also bat.

Conservatives drink domestic beer. They eat red meat and still provide for their women. Conservatives are big-game hunters, rodeo cowboys, lumberjacks, construction workers, firemen, medical doctors, police officers, corporate executives, Marines, para-troopers, athletes, independant real estate brokers and generally anyone who works productively. Conservatives who own companies hire other conservatives who want to work for a living.

Liberals produce little or nothing. They like to "govern" the producers and decide what to do with the production. Liberals believe Europeans are more enlightened than Americans. That is why most of the liberals remained in Europe when conservatives were coming to America. They crept in after the Wild West was tame and created a business of trying to get MORE for nothing.

2006-09-01T14:02:00.000-07:00

It follows that one of the most sensational charges leveled against the Bush White House -- that it orchestrated the leak of Ms. Plame's identity to ruin her career and thus punish Mr. Wilson -- is untrue.

As one of the leading voices, along with the NYT, that promoted the Plame affair as requiring investigation due to the possibly nefarious intent of the Administration, it's refreshing that they had the good grace to print this editorial .

I'm sure the Times will be following right along with their admission that this was all a mistaken bunch of media-promoted hype. Or not.

Can I get an amen from the blogosphere?

2006-08-29T08:58:00.001-07:00

If any other industry were doing as much public harm by producing a similarly substandard product, the press would be screaming for the government to take action.

Glenn Reynolds on Aussie PM Alexander Downer's critcism of inaccurate Israeli-Hezbo war reporting.

Meet the enemy and understand

2006-08-28T10:57:00.000-07:00

As you might expect, the MSM has missed (or perhaps avoided) a wonderful teachable moment in the release of Fox's Steve Centanni and freelance camera dude Olaf Wiig. Howard Kurtz noted the conspicuous absence of coverage by other major media outlets:

Still, the kidnapping received no mention on the CBS, ABC or NBC nightly news until the first hostage video was released Wednesday. The relative paucity of coverage, compared with the intensive chronicling of (Jill) Carroll's captivity, may have reflected the fact that there are many more journalists in Iraq, and that the war in that country is a focus of far greater debate in the United States than the long-running conflict between Israel and the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Wartime or not, television also tends to play up kidnappings involving young women, which often become cable melodramas.

Or it could be due to the disdain with which Fox is regarded by the rest of the MSM due to its perceived conservative bent.

But the teachable aspect came not with acknowledging that the kidnapping had taken place, but with the broadcast of Centanni's and Wiig's conversion to Islam at the point of a gun.

Rather than simply reporting that the two journalists had been released unharmed, what should be of note to everyone concerned is this brief but all-too-clear look into the kind of world that the jihadis are trying to bring about. One in which the infidels either renounce their heathen religion and convert to Islam or get a bullet in the head.

It's very fashionable among leftists and Bush haters to preach that we only need to understand why they hate us and address their greivances. If we only would listen to them, they won't hate us any more and they won't threaten us with terrorism. Bush is too simplistic and hard-headed. He sees everything in black and white. What we need is a more, um, sophisticated and nuanced approach.

Hogwash. What should be painfully evident is that we're fighting against people with whom talk, reasoning and negotiation are of no use whatsoever. The Islamic fascists want to kill anyone who won't convert to the violent, extremist version of Islam to which they subscribe. Our only option is to find them, fight them, and defeat (read kill) them. If we do not, they will surely fight against us (as they have for two decades) and will happily repeat the Centanni/Wiig conversion exercise with the rest of us every chance they get.

Really, what else needs to be said?

2006-08-16T13:32:00.000-07:00

Harold Evans in The Guardian:
The civil rights lobbies are working from a passé play book. They are blind to the lethal nature of the new Salafist totalitarianism. They won't recognize that we are facing an irrationalist movement immune to compromise and dedicated to achieve its ends of controlling every aspect of daily life, every process of the mind, through indiscriminate mass slaughter. It is a culture obsessed with death, a culture that despises women, a culture devoted to mad hatreds not just of Americans and Jews everywhere, but of Muslims anywhere who embrace a less totalitarian, less radical, more humane view of Islam. These Muslims are to be murdered, and have been in their thousands, along with "the pigs of Jews, the monkeys of Christians" and all the "dirty infidels".
Nor is the repellent language of hate limited to recognized terrorist groups like al-Qaida, Hizbullah and Hamas. It is in the school textbooks in palestine and in the schools of our "ally", Saudi Arabia. They promised to clean them up but a recent Washington Post investigation showed the books still tell the young they have a religious obligation to wage jihad against not only Christians and Jews but also Muslims who do not follow the xenophobic Wahabi doctrine. . . . These are historic fault lines. The right tolerated fascism in the thirties, the left Soviet Communism in the fifties. Of course these two earlier totalitarian movements were different in nature and our response when it came was not always well judged - the tendency is to think first of the excesses of the right typified by the witch hunts of the odious McCarthy, but we should remember, too, that the Democratic party in the immediate postwar years of Henry Wallace would have abandoned Europe just as the left in the eighties would have left Europe at the mercy of the new Soviet missiles.
The apologists for the Islamo-fascists - an accurate term - leave millions around the world exposed to a less obvious but more insidious barbarism.

Move right along...

2006-08-10T10:25:00.000-07:00

Nothing to see here. Just because Osama and Ali had airline manifests, airport security information and a cache of untraceable cell phones, you shouldn't draw any hasty conclusions.

As the news item says, "It wasn't clear what significance the airline information might have."

Hmm. Let's think on that for a minute. Nope, nothing immediately comes to mind.

Re-McGovernization

2006-08-09T12:13:00.000-07:00

You'd think they'd have learned their lesson the first time. Evidently, the Democrats are determined to - as is their want - snatch defeat from the jaws of victory yet again.

By booting Joe Lieberman and lurching leftward on the war, they will again sew the seeds of doubt in the minds of mainstream swing voters about the Dems trustworthiness on the one subject that is the most crucial at this point in our history. The netroots crowd (read Kos denizens) is dislocating their shoulders in their rush to pat themselves on the back and it's hard to argue that they had the critical role in focusing the far left's collective anger at Lieberman.

What they've tried to do here is create yet another litmus test for Democratic Party electability (this from the people who are always the first to complain long and loud that the Republicans are the ones that dip the paper). The first and most famous is, of course, that of abortion. As a practical matter, no one in the party that isn't pro-abortion can be elected to anything above local office.

The question is, did they accomplish this? Is there now a new line in the sand (support for the war) that no Democrat can cross? And I would suggest that, while the party center has certainly moved left, the Kossacks significantly overestimate their own power. Connecticut is a deep blue northeastern state that is in no way representative of the country as a whole. It was the ideal crucible for the nutroots to try to flex their muscles and Lamont had an unlimited personal fortune to spend on the campaign. These perfect conditions won't be duplicated anywhere else in the country.

That's not to say that the Republicans still don't have an excellent chance of losing the House (and probably deserve to). But if electing an empty suit like Lamont, whose only real issue is "bring the troops home tomorrow," does nothing else it will probably put enough of a scare into anyone who cares about the war with Islamofacism that it will make them think twice about putting Democrats in a responsible position. This is simply a fight that we can't aford to lose.

House races tend to turn more on local rather than national issues (let alone international ones), but the war is the kind of issue that can nationalize an election. If so, this should redound to the Republicans' benefit. The prospect of Speaker Pelosi can't give anyone a really comforatble feeling if they care at all about the importance of American military success in the next decade.

The John Wayne approach

2006-08-04T07:27:00.000-07:00

Ouch. Another must-read from Mr. Hitchens in todays Journal. Some rather awkward questions for the administration. As always, read the whole thing.

Echoes of the 1930s

2006-08-04T07:03:00.000-07:00

Along the lines of my Achilles post, below, is an excellent piece today by Victor Davis Hanson.

And finally examine here at home reaction to Hezbollah which has butchered Americans in Lebanon and Saudi Arabia from a prominent Democratic Congressman, John Dingell: "I don't take sides for or against Hezbollah." And isn't that the point, after all: the amoral Westerner cannot exercise moral judgment because he no longer has any?

Read the whole thing.

Swiftboats, ahoy!

2006-08-04T06:38:00.000-07:00

As you might expect, a number of current and former servicemen, along with war-effort supporters on the conservative side have had just about enough of John Murtha's late life crisis and need for his 15 minutes. Accordingly, they've started a web site designed to do to him what the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth did for John Kerry.

Save the penguins!

2006-08-03T15:39:00.000-07:00

For God's sake, save the penguins!

Heh.

Is Fidel on the roof?

2006-08-03T12:50:00.000-07:00

There's a very old joke that just may apply to the current situation in Cuba.

A man goes on vacation and asks a friend to take care of his cat. The man calls a few days later to ask about he cat and the friend blurts out, "the cat is dead." The man is shocked and after composing himself, tells his friend that he could have handled the situation a little more tactfully.

"How should I have handled it?" asks the friend. "Well," the man says, "the first time I called, you could have said that the cat's on the roof and we're trying to get him down. At the next call, you could have said that we got the cat down, but he has a cold. Then tell me that the cold is worse, but the vet is working on him. Then finally tell me that they did everything they could, but the cat has died."

"Oh, I see," the friend says. "Sorry I didn't handle the situation very well."

"That's OK," says the man. "You're a good friend for volunteering to take care of the cat for me while I'm out of town. By the way, have you heard from my mother?"

"Well," the friend says after a pause, "your mother's on the roof and we're trying to get her down."
-----------------------------------
How might this oldie-but-goodie apply to the ailing Fidel and the workers' paradise 90 miles to our south? Other than a flotilla of US Navy transports landing on their beaches, nothing would throw a scare into the ruling junta more than Fidel's sudden death. The reaction of Cuba's prisoners...er, populace would be difficult to predict. Far better to break it to them slowly, letting them absorb the reality of what they've been dreaming of for 47 years - life without their beloved dictator.

Instead, Raul and his fellow thugs are likely rounding up the generals and consolidating their control to make sure that there are no surprises when the news breaks. The planning has probably gone on for years amid hopes that el jefe doesn't simply crap out at the podium during a five hour stem-winder and has the good grace to die in private where the process can be controlled.

I'll bet you a milkshake Castro's never seen alive again.

The west's Achilles heel

2006-08-03T09:05:00.000-07:00

Many wonder why we seem to have slowly slipped further into a September 10th mindset over the last few years. This depsite atrocities like those in Bali, Madrid and London. Incidents like those in Chapel Hill and last week's Seattle mass shooting, not to mention arrests in Buffalo, Florida and others that escape me, haven't been enough to drive home the point that we really are at war with people that want to kill us all.

There are many reasons for this. Part of the blame can be laid on the President and the administration. With a few notable exceptions, it's hard to imagine a worse job of articulating why we're fighting and who we're fighting against. Then there's the fact that, despite all expectations immediately after 9/11, we haven't taken another significant hit. This must surely be due to good work by our national security apparatus as well as the national-security-above-all attitude of the President.

We can also look to the American left and the media when considering the lack of a war-time attitude in the U.S. Their obvious tack of treating George Bush and the Iraq war as a more immediate threat to American security than anything the terrorists may be dreaming up has, over time, had its desired effect. Frivolous items such as the Plame affair, as well as the attempt to criminalize (in the mind of the American public) security measures such as phone call monitoring and international bank transactions have worn on the collective will, too.

However, despite these and other recent factors, another more long-term change in the American (and Western) psychological make-up has had a more profound effect on our will to see and confront threats that should otherwise be self-evident and that is the long-term effect of the cult of multiculturalism and 'cultural sensitivity' on our colllective self worth.

Mark Steyn, in an article in Macleans, articulates this as well as anyone has:

In "Multiculturalism and The Politics Of Recognition," a very early entry into the field, Charles Taylor writes: "It makes sense to demand as a matter of right that we approach the study of certain cultures with a presumption of their value . . . But it can't make sense to demand as a matter of right that we come up with a final concluding judgment that their value is great, or equal to others." ...But, given that multiculturalism is principally an exercise in Western self-abasement, the presumption of greater value is the entire point. The problem, pace Taylor, is not that Group A holds values that are incompatible with Group B, but rather that Group A holds no values at all. In the modern multicultural state, we accord all values equal value: in effect, our values are that we have no values -- and so the best way we can demonstrate our lack of values is by deferring to those values most antipathetic to us.

With each new assault on human decency by someone named Ahmed or Ali, the first words out of the mouths of politicians and the press is invariably something to the effect of, "...while the accused was a member of the Acme mosque, there's no evidence whatsoever that the crime was terror-related... ." Uh huh.

This kind of boilerplate qualification is now de rigeur in order to conform to what have become the requirements of modern political correctness. Right thinkers everywhere feel morally obligated to begin any sentence referring to Muslim fudamentalist terror with the qualification that, of course Islam is a religion of peace and most Muslims are good people who despise the terrorists. Sure it may be hard to tell if this is purely P.C. pap or if maybe there's a certain amount of fear mixed in, but it's garbage nonetheless. You only have to look to old Europe to see where this has gotten them. They're just waking up to the fact that they're in real danger of losing their societies.

The heavy weight of white, western guilt (due to our wealth, our modernity, our culture, our Imperialist ancestors, whatever) and the incessent preaching of that guilt by sixties era socialists that have largeley taken over universities, foundations and the press in the last generation have had the desired effect of wearing down our will to believe that our society is not merely as good and morally valid as that of the Muslim world, but is in all way superior. Our moral backbone has been softened and our willingness to endure a long hard slog, as the war on Islamo-facism must surely be, has been significantly diminished. Any time we see a Lebanese civilian casualty, the first thought isn't that it's an unfortunate consequence of fighting the scum who use civilians as human camouflage. No, most think to themselves that war itself is the enemy and that Israel must stop its barbaric assault on these people.

It may take, God forbid, another body blow or two on U.S. soil before we have the moral certitude to carry this war to its necessary conclusion. As painful as that would be, it might have the long-term effect of waking the sleeping giant and saving tens of thousand of lives (or more) in the long run.

No interest in Londonistan?

2006-08-02T13:05:00.000-07:00

It appears that Muslim Fun Day will have to be cancelled at Britain's largest theme park for lack of interest. With 1.7 million Muslims in the country, one would think that there would be enough people to make such an event pay.

Maybe it was, oh, the bomb-sniffing dogs stationed at the entrances to the park and rides that dampened the response?

Bummer for the Bing

2006-07-19T13:02:00.000-07:00

Bad news for lap dance devotees in the Garden State. Tony and the boys will not be happy.

Hitchens' Middle East take

2006-07-18T11:04:00.000-07:00

Agree with him or not, no piece by Christopher Hitchens should ever be missed. Not only will it be wonderfully written and thoughtfully reasoned, but it frequenly takes a tack you hadn't thought of or expected.

Hitchens' op-ed in today's WSJ regarding the provenance of the current Middle East situation is similarly missed at one's own peril. He sites two precursors for the remarkable coincidence of Hamas's and Hezbollah's hostage taking.

First is the case of Ron Arad, an Israeli pilot captured by Hezbollah twenty years ago when his fighter was shot down over Sidon. He was used as a bargaining chip to extract the release of prisoners by the Israelis, although this ultimately failed to materialize. Arad was reportedly moved (or sold) to Iran at some point and Hezbollah reported him dead and his remains "lost" some time ago.

The second is the case of Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian President, and his attempts to coerce Hamas into endorsing a two-state solution which would, in effect, force Hamas to recognize Israel's right to exist. Abbas's ultimatum to Hamas (as paraphrased by Hitchens) was:

If you do not recognize the newly elected government of Israel as a legitimate negotiating partner...I will order a referendum among the Palestinians on the single issue of that recognition. He had in at his disposal an important letter, signed by several respected Palestinian political prisoners, that called for a two-state solution on this basis, and he was also cutting with the grain of important resolutions by the European Union and other concerned international interlocutors. (no link as the WSJ article requires paid subscription)

Hitchens point is that Hamas, rather than face the unacceptable result of a referendum that recognized Israel, orchestrated the attack and kidnapping specifically to provoke an Israeli response, thus making such a referendum impossible. He goes on to say that it seems likely that Hezbollah's similar attack and kidnapping were similarly coordinated to help Hamas. And by extension, Israel's responses in both Gaza and Lebanon play into the Islamists' hands.

This certainly seems, at a minimum, plausible. The other Machiavellian explanation for the timing of these actions was orchestration by Iran to deflect the attention of the G8 summitteers from Iran's nuclear program. I don't pretend to be as knowlegeable on the situation as Hitchens or many of the other commentators. But rather than blind luck, I have to believe one, if not both of these explanations is behind what we're now witnessing.

As for solutions, we've heard the same , predictable stupidity from Kofi Anan and his ilk, suggesting an immediate cease fire with UN peacekeeping troops inserted...becasue that's worked so well every other time it's been tried. It's more than a little disappointing that Tony Blair has subscribed to this tripe. The net effect of this would be to reward Hezbollah by restraining Israel, thus allowing them to recover, re-arm and repeat the same outrages again in the future.

Instead, nothing results in loonger-lasting peace than a decisive military campaign. Israel needs to be given the time and freedom to deal Hezbollah a serious and decisive damaging blow by destroying as much of their infrastructure and personnel as possible, while at the same time preventing resupply from Syria and Iran. Such a policy would go infinitely farther in ensuring years of peace in the region than any tens of thousands of blue-helmeted traffic cops.

Well, George is in a cheery mood

2006-07-18T06:39:00.000-07:00

Hmm. George Will seems to take issue with the Weekly Standard's position that the US's best option now in fighting militant Islam is by confronting and, most likely, attacking Iran. He doesn't like what he sees as the Standard's "no problem" suggestion on how to stem Islamofacism and and the threat it poses not only to Israel, but the US and the rest of the west, as well.

To the Standard's suggestion that there's no reason to wait to attack Iranian nuclear facilites, Will writes:

Perhaps because the U.S. military has enough on its plate, in the deteriorating wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which both border Iran. And perhaps because containment, although of uncertain success, did work against Stalin and his successors, and might be preferable to a war against a nation much larger and more formidable than Iraq. And if Assad's regime does not fall after The Weekly Standard's hoped-for third war, with Iran, does the magazine hope for a fourth?

Containment? Can he seriously believe that Iran, armed with the nuclear weapons that containment would give them time to further develop, can be contained? Will containment lessen their (financial and material) support for Hamas, Hezbollah and others like them around the world? Does he think that if they had the ability today to fire a nuclear-tipped missle at Tel Aviv, they'd hesitate at all? Has he not listened to the rantings of Ahmadinejad?

As Kristol writes in his editorial, weakness is provocative, particularly in the Middle East. Iran has seen little from the US to disabuse them of the notion that we don't currently have the stomach for a confrontation. Our reliance on IAEA, UN and the feckless Europeans can only make them laugh as they play the lot of us for more time.

Yes, there would be serious repercussions (not the least of which, a probable doubling of the price of oil) in the wake of a US strike on Iranian nuclear facilities. No, it probably isn't the ideal time for the US military to strike now. But world events seldom wait for the best time for us to react to them. Waiting will only allow Iran to further develop their nuclear capability. And if they succeed while we get ready, we'll have a much bigger problem on our hands.

Unfinished business

2006-07-17T09:37:00.000-07:00

Well, the current Israeli incursions into Gaza and Lebanon, as one would expect, bring out strong statments in many parts. One of the strongest was from Ralph Peters in this morning's NY Post. Here's the paragraph that caught my eye (emphais mine):

Europeans have more sympathy with Iran's nuclear program than they do with Israel's attempts at self-defense. But, then, the only thing continental Europeans regret about the Holocaust is that they didn't get to finish the job. Even as Europe suffers its own attacks by Islamist terrorists, Europeans defend the selfsame terrorists against Israeli retribution.

Ouch.

OK, so I took some time off

2006-07-17T08:45:00.001-07:00

Seventeen months off. But I'm back, rested and ready. It's time to post again and there's so much to post about, it's hard to know where to start.

Picking at random, let's take blatant boffoonery and idiotic anti-Americanism. No, this isn't in reference to the latest aritcle written in any of a hundred European newspapers. I'm talking about what was one of my favorite sites on the internet.

I'm an avid amateur photographer and there are a few sites on the net that I visit just about every day. One of them is (was) the The Online Photographer a well-written and interesting (for photo geeks) blog by Mike Johnston. It's probably my favorite photo-related site on the net.

However, Mike just couldn't stick to the photography theme when an outrage like Independence Day rolled around. No, he felt it necessary to tell us all what sheep-like fools we are for not being ashamed of our country and indulging in the unconscionable practice of fireworks displays. But it was in the comments section that he really let fly. Here's my favorite:

The static is beginning to have a distinctly totalitarian cast, if you ask me. The government is cracking down on dissent, limiting peaceful protest, dictating to scientists, spying on its own citizens, engaging in illegitimate wars, defying the Constitution, and at least one of the last two elections was rigged. Better wake up and smell the coffee unless you have a good idea of another country to which you can flee for the good of your own grandchildren.

I really love when the lefties scream at the top of their lungs about the crackdown on dissent, reductions of our civil liberties, limitations on protest, yadda, yadda, yadda. Are they so without self-regard that they don't see the inherent contradiction in this? Can anyone name one person who has been arrested, sactioned or otherwise told that they can't dissent from the government's policies? Has there been a demonstration anywhere broken up by truncheon-wielding thugs?

Laura Ingraham wrote a book a couple of years ago (I haven't read it) named Shut Up and Sing, the basic complaint of which was the elites who use their positions in entertainment and the media to tear down American values (think Dixie Chicks, Susan Sarandon, etc.) All the while, they enjoy the protections and freedoms here that they'd find in few other places on Earth.

Does "shut up and write" make any sense?

This girl has her priorities straight

2005-02-14T08:13:00.000-08:00

Hell, if we were worth 7.2 billion, we wouldn't be pissing it away on the DNC, no matter how hard Howard Dean was dancing our our laps. We'd be pissing it away on manservants and a private distillery.

Say what you want about her politics, but the girl knows what to do with her money. Although, you could make a pretty good case that investing in the DNC at this point is a good example of buying low.

This sounds right to me

2005-02-14T06:11:00.000-08:00

Despite all of the protestations to the contrary, I've been skeptical about North Korea's nuclear status from the beginning. I don't doubt that they would very much like to have nuclear weapons, and from all evidence it appears that they posess enough plutonium to make one.

However, owning the plutonium and being able to manufacture a nuclear bomb are two very different things. Now, we're hearing an official from the South Korean government voicing the same caution about the situation.

"It's definite that North Korea possesses 10 to 14 kilograms of plutonium that can make one or two nuclear weapons," he said. However, he said there was no "conclusive evidence that North Korea made plutonium bombs" with the material, but that other countries suspect North Korea has one or two nuclear bombs.

When the NoKo's openly declared their nuclear status for the first time last week, it had the ring of someone who doth protest too much. This was not only an excuse for Pyongyang to get out of the six party talks, but to try to force Washington's hand. More than anything else, they want direct, bi-lateral negotiations with the U.S. North Korea's economic situation only gets worse and the announcement appears to be a desperate attempt to extract aid that will postpone its collapse a little longer.

Look for the administration and its closer partners in the six-party effort to continue its position of rejecting any idea of one-on-one negotiations. North Korea is not a distraction that the U.S. needs at this time (Iran is clearly the next item on the agenda) and certainly doesn't want an open conflict. In addition, they probably believe that delays in the process can only work toward their advantage by letting North Korea move closer to collapsing of its own weight.

... (James) Baker told the host, George Stephanopoulos, that "there's a big gap" between abandoning the six-nation negotiations that had been sporadically under way for the past 18 months "and going to military force."

"There are many things we can do," Mr. Baker added.

"Quarantine?" Mr. Stephanopoulos asked.

"Quarantine is one," Mr. Baker said. "And perhaps the best one, of course, is sanctions by the United Nations Security Council for North Korea's violation of her promises to the International Atomic Energy Agency and the global community."

More evidence that islation and economic strangulation is the weapon of choice. I'm not holding my breath on those Security Council sanctions, however.

There but for the grace of God...

2005-02-10T08:50:00.000-08:00

Who among us hasn't been tempted to do the same thing?

The customer (Christopher Lame - I won't touch that) gets his order from the drive-through window, notices it's (naturally) wrong and takes the time to pull over and go inside, offending taco in hand. What kind of response does he get? The smart-ass behind the counter asks if he has his receipt.

Doing a slow burn, Lame goes back out to his car to bring the entire bag back for her inspection. She then tells him that the store is closing. In other words, "take a hike and eat what we give you." Nice treatment of a valued customer from a courteous Taco Hell associate who just wants her customers to be, you know, happy.

Now, I don't condone the launching of fast food (not at people, anyway) and I don't know if Iowa is a right-to-carry state, but Ms. Harrison should probably be thanking her lucky stars that the only thing that flew at her head was a chalupa.

Look out Kinko's

2005-02-10T08:22:00.000-08:00

"I tell people I work at Starbucks, not for Starbucks,"

If Starbucks keeps this up (free office space, wi-fi access, ready access to caffeine) it could be a significant hit to Kinko's revenue.

"I am a starving artist...I bring my own teabags and get them to give me hot water. They don't seem to mind."

Even the freeloaders must buy something once in a while.

Great moments in editing

2005-02-10T08:14:00.000-08:00

Paper tries write headline no prepositions.

The boy is incorrigible!

2005-02-10T06:25:00.000-08:00

For someone who only a week ago announced to the world that he was giving up regular blogging and 'the Dish as we know it,' Andrew Sullivan sure has been busy! It appears that our Hamlet of the blogosphere can't keep his digits off the keyboard. Evidently, "I'll still post when I feel like it" means every 20 minutes.

Not that I'm complaining. Sullivan's blog is nothing if not entertaining. But as with so much else, Andrew, our "rock in turbulent times," sways with the breeze like an old swing - or John Kerry in a "Meet the Press" interview.

I'm just glad I'm not his publisher waiting for that book he's supposed to be writing.

Imagine that

2005-02-09T12:27:00.000-08:00

Terror Group Blamed for Car Bombing
What would we do without the professional journalists at the AP to clarify everything for us?

We don't need no stinkin' fundamentalists

2005-02-08T11:47:00.000-08:00

Deborah Hornblow doesn't like what she sees in the latest season of Fox's series, 24. In her words, they've gone way over the line and are only continuing

...America's (and the rest of the world's, for that matter) not-so-proud history of demonizing various ethnic groups for the sake of our national amusement.

What is 24's sin? Why, depicting a group of - get ready for this - Islamic fundamentalists plotting against the U.S. I know, I know, shear balderdash and poppycock. Imagine how far out of their way the show's writers had to go to conjure such a far-fetched plot line just to smear an innocent monority group and feed our need for an enemy to hate.

James Lileks is all over the case, pointing out that years of movies with American Indians and Italian mafiosi shown in less-than-glowing light hasn't resulted in Americans thinking that all Indians or Italians are bad guys. As he says, "As for goose-stepping Nazis ? well, if the jackboot fits, Fritz, wear it."

Condi's good start

2005-02-08T07:36:00.000-08:00

It's quickly becoming apparent that the new Secretary of State will be taking a much tougher, more pro-active stance with America's enemies that did her predecessor. Reuters reports comments she's made directly criticizing Syria and the active roll they've taken in supporting the Iraqi insurgency.

"I cannot say it strongly enough. You cannot say on the one hand that you want a process of peace and on the other hand support people who are determined to blow it up," said Rice, on her first overseas tour since becoming secretary of state.

This is exactly the kind of straight talk that the State Department has actively avoided previously. They've traditionally been far too worried about angering states like Syria to challenge them. They held the ridiculously naive belief that they could get farther by engaging these awful regimes than by criticizing them. This was only interpreted as weakness on America's part and further encouraged the very behavior we opposed.

Rice urged other world leaders to join Washington's campaign to get "states that continue to support rejectionists and terrorists (to) stop doing that," while dangling the prospect of further sanctions against Syria if it failed to tow the line.

All that seems to have now changed, and it's long past due. Condi and the president have apparently decided that there's no reason to endure four more years of his policies being undermined by his own foreign service.

Rice will undoubtedly soon pay a price for all this in the form of media and international criticism for 'unhelpful' or 'beligerent' rhetoric. Don't be shocked if at least some of this carping originates from inside her own department, as well. I expect to see the same rash of resignations (and the subsequet sniping stories in the media) as have resulted from Porter Goss's apparently successful efforts to clean out decades of accumulated dead wood at CIA.

Seymour Hersh, call your office.

MORE: Further evidence that Rice won't be bound by the hypocrisies of traditional international diplomacy.

"Living their political values"

2005-02-07T07:23:00.000-08:00

It appears there is still a vocal minority of liberals who are still despondent enough at the reelection of Bush that they're (at least seriously considering) following through on their promise to move to Canada.

"I'm originally from a poor, lead-mining town in Missouri, and I know a lot of the people there don't understand why I'm doing this," she said. "Even my family is pretty disappointed. And the fact is, it makes me pretty sad, too. But I just can't bear to pay taxes in the United States right now." - Melanie Redman, Seattle

"It's a wrenching decision to think about leaving. But America is turning into a country very different from the one I grew up believing in." - Christopher Key, Bellingham Washington

You have to admire their stick-to-itiveness and willingness to, as Jason Mogus of Vancouver, B.C. says, "live their political values." These aren't just a bunch of Alec Baldwins who blithely throw out the threat to move overseas (as if this would prompt anyone to vote Democrat - 'Oh, no! We have to elect a Democrat or...or...we could lose Alec Baldwin!') during a campaign, and then conveniently forget their promise despite losing the election. No, these are the truly committed, who, like Ms. Redman, above, "just can't bear to pay taxes in the United States right now."

This kind of dedication to one's politics, though, should not only be admired, but encouraged. A fund (private, of course) should be established to buy all of the Volvos, Subarus and Saturns these people will be selling, along with enough cleaning fluid to remove all of the Gore/Leiberman, Kerry/Edwards and 'Re-defeat Bush!' bumper stickers (they can leave the little rainbows, but I'd take the pink triangles and 'If you want peace, work for justice' stickers off, too).

Then there are the homes and apartments these people will be vacating. The fund could purchase these, as well, perhaps donating them to new (legal) immigrants who move to the U.S. every day, looking for the freedom and opportunity they can't get in their home countries. The net increase in both IQ and personal motivation (not to mention the decrease in whining) will be enormous and a huge net benefit for America.

I'm willing to start the fund with $100. If you're interested, you can donate via my Paypal account and I'll ensure that the funds are put to good use helping our unhappy fellow (soon to be former) Americans move north.

Facing Nancy

2005-02-03T05:58:00.000-08:00

Read this post from JustOneMinute. I never thought of it before, but he has a real point there.

We've all probably written off the freakish effects of Nancy Pelosi's botox injections and surgeries to vanity taken to extremes or her pathetic attempts to remain more viable as a candidate.

But JustOneMinute has put his finger on it! Her death mask appearance isn't a bug, it's a feature! It distracts her listeners from the pettiness and vapidity of what she's saying.

Do you think her doctors are on her paid campaign staff?

Crispy critter

2005-02-02T13:56:00.000-08:00

Watch this video interrogation of a terrorist who survived the explosion of the fuel tanker he was driving in Iraq. He's a (not too bright) Saudi who traveled to Iraq to fight the Americans, but was duped by his fellow comrades who detonated his truck by remote control.

A little over four minutes into the video, he's asked the nationalities of the other terrorists he met. While he said most were Iraqi, he lists other from countries such as Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, even Macedonia. It seems the flypaper theory is working quite nicely, thank you.

Be concerned, be very concerned

2005-02-02T07:31:00.000-08:00

"Right now, the bird flu is just a blip in the newspapers, but if the avian influenza virus undergoes antigenic shift with a human influenza virus, the resulting subtype could be highly contagious and highly lethal in humans," Matthew Wexler, the president of the National Alarmist Council and one of the nation's leading fear mongers, said Monday. "My professional opinion, and more importantly, my personal belief, is that this is a cause for great national alarm."

The sad thing is that this is so close to the typical Union of Concerned Scientists or Public Citizen fire drill, it's hard to tell the Onion from reality.

Coming soon, "Study Links Second Hand Smoke to Spontaneous Nuclear Explosions" followed by "McDonalds Restaurants Found to be Source of Iraqi Insurgency".

Despite the definitive photographic evidence...

2005-02-01T14:34:00.000-08:00

the media still won't give Bush credit for this major victory in the war on terrorism.

Of course, we won't give the terrorists the satisfaction of trumpeting this victory, either.

You don't think Dan Rather...nah.

The compassionate left

2005-02-01T12:13:00.000-08:00

Andrew Sullivan announced today that he'll be taking an extended hiatus from day-to-day blogging. What did Wonkette have to say?

"And, out of the semi-blue, writer-cum-blogger Andrew Sullivan announces his retirement from blogging. This is a truly sad day for the ass-fucking community. If only we'd appreciated him while we had him! But... we just didn't."

Nice, huh? Imagine if this had been written by, say, Jonah Goldberg. Can you imagine the firestorm? Is this any less disgusting because a sensitive liberal posted it?

Hitchens to the rescue

2005-02-01T08:12:00.000-08:00

It has been one of the left's favorite arguments against any involvement in Iraq - that it will only turn into...ANOTHER VIET NAM. We've heard the invocation of the dreaded term, QUAGMIRE, over and over again in the last year by such stalwarts and Harry Reid, Ted Kennedy, Nancy Pelosi along with a rogue's gallery of the usual suspects.

Now comes Christopher Hitchens, one of the clearest and best writers on Iraq since the beginning, to draw clear distinctions between what happened in Viet Nam and the situation in Iraq today.

"Where it is not augmented by depraved Bin Ladenist imports, the leadership and structure of the Iraqi "insurgency" is formed from the elements of an already fallen regime, extensively discredited and detested in its own country and universally condemned. This could not be said of Ho Chin Minh or of the leaders and cadres of the National Liberation Front."

There was no popular uprising in favor of the cause of the Iraqi insurgents (basically, a return to the rule of Saddamites) that predated our involvement. We weren't fighting with a corrupt military-led government that commanded little popular support.

"In Vietnam, the United States relied too much on a pre-existing military caste that often changed the local administration by means of a few tanks around the presidential palace. In the instance of Iraq, the provisional government was criticized, perhaps more than for any other decision, for disbanding the armed forces of the ancien regime, and for declining to use a proxy army as the United States had previously done in Indonesia, Chile, El Salvador, and Greece. Unlike the South Vietnamese, the Iraqi forces are being recruited from scratch."

Read the whole thing. And while it's certainly wishful thinking, this should be the final word on any comparisons between Iraq and Viet Nam.

You don't say...

2005-02-01T07:43:00.000-08:00

Bush Pushing Agenda in State of Union - Imagine that...the president actually promoting his own agenda in a nationally televised speech.

Who writes these things?

Oh, please...

2005-01-31T11:09:00.000-08:00

No matter what you may think of Leonardo DiCaprio (and I'm not much of a fan - however, he was fantastic as the retarded younger brother in "What's Eating Gilbert Grape?") how can any organization that takes itself seriously give a lifetime achievement award to someone who's 30 years old?

Tom Hanks received one with a televised dinner and testimonials a couple of years ago. I remember thinking then that he was too young - he was only 46 at the time!

Can we all agree that no one under...let's say 60 years old...should ever receive a lifetime achievement award of any kind from any organization?

Thanks, I feel better now.

Curious behavior

2005-01-31T07:22:00.000-08:00

Mickey Kaus attempts to decode the seemingly inexplicable behavior of the esteemed senior senator from Massachusetts. It looks eerily similar to Al Gore's apocalyptic rantings on the imminent dangers of global warming - which he chose to deliver in New York, just as the city was hit with the coldest weather in decades.

Kaus attributes Kennedy's poorly timed analysis of Iraq - he called Iraq a "catastrophic failure" and a "disaster" three days before the wildly successful election - to the pursuit of money in a changed fundraising landscape.

His theory is that, at a time when in the past the opposition could safely get away with jumping on the majority party's bandwagon to cheer on a popular success that they'd previously opposed, the advent of internet fundraising has changed all that. Howard Dean has revealed the cash cow that web-based fund raising can be and Kaus posits that it's now more important than traditional PAC money. As Kaus sees it, in order to capture the largest portion of web money, it's necessary to appeal to the wacko-left, Bush-bashing base that makes up the most frequent contributor group via the net.

I suppose it's possible that this was part of the calculus that went into Kennedy's speech. But I attribute it to an even more simple reason than greed - self-gratification. Gore could have easily postponed his speech, or relocated to a warmer venue. Kennedy could have scheduled his speech for this week, giving him the opportunity to alter it in light of the weekend's outcome. Neither did. Why? Hatred, pure and simple. Both men represent the worst of the Democrats' current make-up, preferring to slam the president at every opportunity, no matter how ridiculous they may look as a result. It feels good to stand in front of a like-minded crowd of Bush-haters and hear their cheers as you rail against the illegitimate moron who's taken over the oval office. It confirms their moral and intellectual superiority to those neo-con cretins.

Kaus's reasoning for the apparent idiocy of Kennedy's comments requires a certain amount of self-reflection and ability to examine what may appear to be most in the Democrats' immediate interest. I don't think you can give Gore, Kennedy or a significant minority of other liberals that much credit at the moment. The extent to which they're blinded by their hatred of Bush to other considerations, can't be underestimated. We saw the same thing on the part of Republicans toward Clinton in the '90s.

The Democrats forget the lessons of history at their own peril. What makes it much worse for the them, however, is that they don't have a reserve of policies that positively resonate with a growing majority of the electorate to fall back on.

A success by any measure

2005-01-30T06:18:00.000-08:00

"Millions of Iraqis flocked to vote in a historic election Sunday, defying insurgents who killed 25 people in bloody attacks aimed at wrecking the poll.

Iraqis, some ululating with joy, others hiding their faces in fear, voted in much higher-than-expected numbers in their first multi-party election in half a century."

And this from Reuters. But most media outlets are predictably reluctant to call this the ringing success that it is. An NPR reporter insisted that it was too early to tell, and the real measure will be the turnout of Sunni voters, both in the Sunni triangle and in mixed neighborhoods. This is, of course, hogwash. As James Taranto posited in a thought experiment that he proposed,

Suppose that, when South Africa held its first postapartheid election in 1994, Afrikaner turnout had been depressed by similar measures. Would that have made the enfranchisement of a long-oppressed majority any less a cause for celebration

The very concept would have been laughable. No, the early reticence of the media to declare this the unqualified success that it is is directly attributable to their distaste for giving the president credit for a major win. The success of the Iraqi vote is a great victory, not just for Bush, but also for his foreign policy. While it certainly is still early, this would seem to be the worst nightmare of the other repressive regimes in the middle east.

No one in a position of power will be sleeping well in Syria or Saudi Arabia (among others) tonight.

Yellow snow

2005-01-28T18:00:00.000-08:00

This guy must have been planning one hell of a vacation. Something new to add to your winter emergency kit.

Abundant hot air

2005-01-28T17:43:00.000-08:00

Do you need any more evidence that the annual World Economic Form in Davos is nothing more than a huge international circle jerk masquerading as a serious endeavour?

Maybe the original intent was lofty, but it's hard to dispute that the tens of millions spent by government officials, posturing corporate muckety-mucks, self-styled intellectuals and other hangers-on could be put to much better use. How about splitting the money between cancer research and African AIDS drug distribution?