October 3, 2003
Ah-nold: Damage control
I have to admit, as an ex-pat Californian, even I was surprised by the success of the recall campaign. California politics has long been under thrall to a single party, and the budget meltdown over the past two years (as well as Gray Davis' lying about it during the last gubernatorial race) seemed heaven-sent for California Republicans. After all, California was the laboratory for the more radicalized elements of the Democrats, and it was turning into a quagmire. All that the Republicans had to do was to stay out of the way, and they were assured of significant gains in the next couple of election cycles. Well, as usual, California Republicans had to show that they are bested by no one in shooting themselves in the foot. After pushing through an almost-unprecedented recall of a governor, who incidentally is not accused of any special malfeasance except being an idiot and...
Damage control (cont)
The fallout continues, or sort of. Arnold's back on the campaign trail, being greeted by cheering fans -- er, voters -- but after his apology and non-acknowledgement of the Hitler reference (from almost 30 years ago!), he's keeping his mouth shut. As a strategy, this is probably as much of a winner that he'll come up with at this point of the campaign. I wonder, though, if a third shoe is being prepared for the Sunday edition... Arnold may be under attack, but the LA Times appears to be suffering the damage . Susan Estrich gets her shots in from the editorial page of the LA Times itself: So this is the October surprise? The Los Angeles Times headline that Arnold Schwarzenegger groped and humiliated women? ... But none of these women, as The Times emphasizes, ever came forward to complain. The newspaper went looking for them, and then waited...
The Franco-American War
Here's another reason to hate the French, courtesy of Merde in France. Does anyone still think that if we had just tried harder to woo the French, we could have gotten their support?...
David Kay's report explained in better detail
Power Line's Big Trunk has posted an e-mail he received from author Dr. Laurie Mylroie that explains more about the David Kay report. Go now and read the entire message, and while you're at it check out all of Power Line. It's a great blog. Also, they have an entry two posts below the Mylroie e-mail with a link to an article in the Sun, a British newspaper, on the Kay report....
Damage Control, etc
Mickey Kaus continues to have fun with this story. Unfortunately, he's probably right about the transient nature of the bounce; it's likely a result of Ah-nold trying to "terminate" the scandal with a quick mea culpa, as well as the high level of disgust at the LA Times for spending several weeks specifically to dredge up this kind of crap. It's not that I don't think that the women are lying, although the fact that four of the six won't identify themselves, and all six never availed themselves of the legal system, does not give me confidence. Arnold himself acknowledged that he's done something, after all. And the incidents in the report are all ugly. But for crying out loud, after all the screeching the Times did over the Clinton sexual peccadiloes (that occured while he was in office, with staff underlings, on the public dime) being blown out of...
Oh, here come the protests
I can see PETA protesting this -- perhaps they'd prefer Cheney or Wolfowitz take a turn as a beefeater. Or, better yet, Bush could do the tasting to keep the mice safe....
October 4, 2003
Who says we ain't got couth?
President Bush surprises everyone with his deep, artistic side by writing poetry. This ought to silence those of his foes who dare to challenge his intellect, eh?...
Damage Control, etc II
Here's an AP update to all the Schwarzenonsense from the past 24 hours or so. According to an Austrian news source, California's leading candidate for Governer terminated a meeting of neo-Nazis when he was 17 years old, hunting them down and dispersing them. There's been five more women who've come forward with more groping stories, which Mickey Kaus covers in his latest entry....
Somalia Anniversary
Courtesy of Little Green Footballs -- today is the tenth anniversary of the battle in Mogadishu that became the focus of the film, Black Hawk Down. Particularly interesting are Osama bin Laden's comments from a 1997 interview with Robert Fisk....
Minnesota Politics: Down and Dirty
Hindrocket blasts off at Minnesota Democrats on the Powerline blog. It certainly looks like Mike Hatch is flailing at anything to ruin Pawlenty. Maybe he's a protege of Gray Davis....
Israel Sabotages Peace Again
Once again, those darn Israelis have sabotaged peace again by having the arrogance to die in large numbers when a Palestinian freedom fighter blows herself up in a Haifa restaurant. You can check out the blogosphere reaction at Little Green Footballs (where it's about what you'd expect), Power Line, and Roger Simon....
David Kay redux
A guest column by Andrew Apostalou puts it all into perspective. (Thanks to Roger Simon.) From what I see, we may be the first nation to have such poisonous debate over a war we won, with minimal losses on both sides, and that resulted in liberating over 20 million people (not to mention removing a dangerous regional threat). Does anyone else find this as silly as I do? We knew he was a brutal dictator; we know now that he was actively avoiding compliance with UN resolutions and the terms of the truce that left him in power. At the same time, a significant amount of our overseas military was pinned down enforcing the terms of that truce, and our presence in Saudi Arabia was not helping matters. Eventually we would have to have left, with Saddam in power, which would only embolden other dictators and bin Laden wanna-bes. The...
Oman stages first free elections - Oct. 4, 2003
This is more good news, and a good indicator that our campaign is bearing fruit in other areas. The only way we will ever be safe is to transform dictatorships and creaky monarchies into liberal democracies......
Did he sell Gray Davis a brain?
Okay, this is just a bit grim, don't you think? I'd hate to think where all these parts eventually ended up. I do think it's interesting that this guy was sentenced to a lot more prison time for selling dead body parts than most drunk drivers get sentenced for vehicular homicide -- in fact, about six times more....
Third-year slump
I'm not sure if Hindrocket over at Power Line has had a chance to read this Fred Barnes article at OpinionJournal, but maybe it would make him feel a little bit better. The impression I get so far is that the Democrats are doing all the talking, and that's accounting for the slipping numbers. As Barnes points out, that's natural; it's Presidential election season, with the first round of the primaries coming up in three or four months. When Dubya has a chance to focus on the election, the numbers will move back, probably significantly, unless something goes disastrously wrong in the war....
Opening a Window on North Korea's Horrors (washingtonpost.com)
North Korea: a horror show. Read the whole thing. (via Instapundit)...
October 5, 2003
Israel attacks training camp in Syria, IDF says
This ... is not good. No word on Syria's reaction yet, although I doubt it will be very friendly....
Steve Lopez again
Damn ... I still don't agree with him on everything, but you have to admit, he makes a pretty good point here. I just wish the Times covered Gray Davis like they covered Arnold. Then I wouldn't have a gripe....
Officer Charged in Sex Deal with Teen Defendant
Yeah, I know that there would be a different reaction if this involved a female defendant and a male officer, but I still can't help but have some small part of me think that this kid really lucked out. He got dinner, booze, pot, and lucky, and now as a result, he will probably wind up having the charges against him dropped or at least a very lenient sentence....
Mary Carey, uh, Enlarges Leno's Ratings
Set your TiVos -- Mary Carey has an ad that will run on Monday night's "Tonight Show". Please submit any puns this inspires!!...
One sign of the impending apocalypse
Frog eggs fall from the sky onto home in Berlin...
Makes a fella proud to be Minnesotan
Idiots. Maybe the best course of action would be to cancel next year's homecoming. It's one thing (still bad) when economically and socially repressed groups riot; while you don't condone it in any way, and you prosecute those responsible, there's some understanding of the desperation involved. What do we have in Mankato? A bunch of spoiled, rich kids who decided to piss all over their surrounding neighborhoods, beat people up, and destroy property. Everyone involved should be expelled, tried, and thrown in jail for a few weeks. It's only at times like this that I wish we had a military draft....
Gray Davis: Open Mouth, Insert Foot
Oh, man ... if you want to read why Gray is going down, just read this article from today's Times. Here's a great quote of the master at work: "We need immigrants to pick our food and put it on our tables," he said as the audience — middle-class Latinos, primarily — shifted uncomfortably. "We need immigrants to clean our hotels and office buildings and take care of the elderly." And: "That work is important.... Whether people are janitors or maids or busboys or cooks, it's all part of the experience we enjoy when we're at a restaurant or a hotel." If any of the Latinos in the studios of the Spanish-language station Univision felt patronized, they didn't say so. But the governor's words landed with a dull thud Monday night, creating one of many awkward moments as he fought for his political life in the final week of the...
Why the recall will win
Here's a great article by Daniel Weintraub about why the recall came to be, and why it will win. Money quote: Although Davis ridiculed the recall as sour grapes from sore losers and attacked it as a right-wing coup, he realized too late that it was much more than that. The movement might have begun on the far right, but it became a deep, almost cathartic expression of frustration on the part of voters who felt cheated in the 2002 election by the governor's meddling in the opposition party's primary, by two unsatisfactory candidates who ran uninspiring, negative campaigns, and by a political elite who seemed to relish leaving them out of the game. Couldn't have put it any better....
Was McNabb a ruse?
An interesting theory from Frater Libertas. Hmmmm .... Dittoheads should reserve judgment (not that I've ever been one; Rush irritates the snot out of me)....
October 6, 2003
Budweiser for Bustamante!
Let's face it, Bud sucks anyway ... but I sure as hell won't be buying any of their beer now (third item). I wonder what all the anti-globalists and anti-corporate idiots who support Gray Davis, Algore, etc think about this corporate sponsorship. Could it be that, as opposed to Republicans who actively support businessmen and job creation, these guys spout off platitudes to hoodwink socialists while selling out to the corporate interests they supposedly oppose? True. True....
Jill Stewart speaks out on LA Times, Gray, & Arnold
Jill Stewart, who wrote an article on Gray Davis that I linked a couple of days ago, puts the Times story in perspective at the LA Daily News. Main thrust: After my story ran, I waited for the Times to publish its story. It never did. When I spoke to a reporter involved, he said editors at the Times were against attacking a major political figure using anonymous sources. Just what they did last week to Schwarzenegger. Be sure to read the whole thing....
October 7, 2003
He was running?
Bob Graham drops out of presidential race; polls show no one knew he was in it to begin with....
Gary Davis and his supporters in the home stretch
Daniel Weintraub has a hilarious bit on last minute campaigning by Gray Davis and his supporters. This, of course, could only take place in San Francisco: As [Mayor Willie] Brown spoke, a man with an oversized Arnold Schwarzenegger mask strapped to his face, money in his hands and a large blue E symbolizing Enron pursued a woman dressed in pink around the plaza, groping her between faux slaps in the face. And here's something that will make Davis sleep easier: Charles Duff, 24, a student at San Francisco State University, sat with his back to the rally. I asked him what he thought of the recall. “Crazy,” he said. “It’s crazy.” What’s crazy about it? I asked him. “The idea that you can take out a guy and have all these people running to replace him.” So you’re going to vote against the recall? “When’s the election?” he asked before...
LA Times Blows Its Credibility
If anything should finally underscore the fact that the LA Times has become a Democratic Party shill, this ought to do it. Bill Bradley at the LA Weekly (as mentioned before, no friend to conservatives) reveals a pre-publication leak of the Ah-nuld hit piece to the Davis campaign, who took the ball and ran with it with suspicious "alacrity". More: [T]he paper Monday backed off its previous contention that none of the women in subsequent stories came forward at the urging of Schwarzenegger’s opponents in the wake of the Weekly’s revelation that Jodie Evans, who pushed one of the women to come forward, is not merely the peace activist described by the Times but also a former close colleague of Governor Davis and longtime friend of chief Democratic hit man Bob Mulholland. This is, of course, what the LA Weekly has reported before, and is finally getting out to the...
Ambivalence
Chris Muir captures my own ambivalence perfectly....
Gay marriage: What's the problem?
Here's where I part company with the Right, and my annoying libertarian streak comes out. AndrewSullivan covers this topic in great detail, as he should; he's got a much larger stake in this than I do. (Full disclosure: I'm hetero, married, Catholic, pro-life, anti-death penalty.) He covers a USA Today poll showing the public is evenly split over this topic. And here's my take on this. Marriage, in my faith, is considered a sacrament between a man and a woman which exists for the glory of God and the perpetuation of God's primary creation, etc etc etc. That is my faith, and I subscribe to that view. However, the Church is perfectly free to set those rules for itself and its members, and it's perfectly free to tell members who don't comply to take a hike. Most Christian denominations view marriage in a similar, but not exact, way. Civil marriages...
Playing Keep-Away from Chads
Here's a good interim report on Recall Day in California from the Post. The post I'm reading is from 2:30 PM, and it looks like a heavy turnout in California. Terry Neal points out that there's been some efforts to educate voters on the punch-card ballot process, but I voted in California for almost 20 years and I can tell you that every ballot I every used was punch-card, and most of those were of the notorious butterfly configuration. Californians aren't as stupid as Democrats would have you believe Floridians are. There's an interesting point in one of Neal's earlier dispatches (10/6 11:10 PM): Davis, the final speaker, was introduced by his wife, Sharon Davis, who alluded to the allegations against Schwarzenegger. "My husband has never been accused of anything worse than being dull," she said. Maybe Sharon hasn't read this yet....
Fox News Predicts Possible Landslide in Recall
No link -- I'm watching Fox News, and Brit Hume used the phrase "possible landslide" for the recall. Interesting. They're predicting Ah-nuld the winner, based on exit polling. 69% of voters opposed giving driver's licenses to illegal immigrants. Oops!...
Heavy Voter Turnout Marks Historic Election
Maybe the ACLU can explain why this is undemocratic: The secretary of state said that turnout by late afternoon was running on target at about 60%, according to department official Terri Carbaugh. That turnout is consistent with earlier predictions that the rate would fall roughly between the 70.94% turnout in the last presidential election and the 50.6% turnout in the gubernatorial election last November. The high turnout indicates that "voters are highly attentive and highly engaged," Carbaugh said....
Trouble Already??
This didn't take long. Wesley Clark's presidential campaign is already in disarray: Wesley K. Clark's campaign manager quit yesterday in a dispute over the direction of the Democratic presidential bid, exposing a rift between the former general's Washington-based advisers and his three-week-old Arkansas campaign team. Donnie Fowler told associates he was leaving over widespread concerns that supporters who used the Internet to draft Clark into the race are not being taken seriously by top campaign advisers. Fowler also complained that the campaign's message and methods are focused too much on Washington, not key states and the burgeoning power of the Internet, said two associates who spoke on condition of anonymity. Keep in mind that this organization is only three weeks old, at least officially. If he can't avoid this kind of chaos in his own organization in that period of time, what does that say for his ability to manage...
Numbers holding for a landslide
With 13% of precincts reporting, CNN reports that the recall is winning by 12%, and Arnold leads Cruz Bustamante by a margin of almost 2-1. I wouldn't get too complacent yet, but this is looking pretty darn good for the Terminator -- excuse me, the Governator....
October 8, 2003
Recall Results
With 94% of all precincts reporting, the results are clear -- Californians spoke clearly for a sea change in state government. Recall: 54% Yes, 46% No Part B: Schwarzenegger 48%, Bustamante 33%, McClintock 14% This means that in a statewide election, where Democrats have a registration lead of at least 10 percentage points, 62% voted Republican and only a third voted for the only major Democratic choice. Granted, Republicans may have been more motivated to go to the polls, but that excuse only flies if the overall turnout was low; instead, it was a record high for a non-presidential election. The state Legislature has to be very, very nervous now. Wait for the elections next year -- we'll see how pissed off the electorate is and will remain....
At least they're leaving ...
... even if they couldn't leave with a vestige of class and grace. (via California Insider) This type of insult-based dirty campaigning explains why Gray Davis' approval ratings are below Richard Nixon's post-resignation ratings. Good riddance. Take Cruz with you....
Day By Day again
Another good point made by Chris Muirabout the Big Lie of dissent-crushing in America these days. I get so tired of people screaming in the streets and all over television that the Bush administration is forcing them to stay silent, without any sense of irony whatsoever. Quick way to see if you live in a free society: If you call the leader of your country a Nazi, which happens in a fascist state? 1: You're arrested and spend 20 years in a prison or mental facility; 2. You get put on TV and Hollywood sends you cash. If you're too dense to pick Option 1, perhaps you aren't qualified to speak to any other issues....
Numbers firming up
It looks like a ten-point margin of victory for the recall, and Arnold took 46.4% of the second part, against 31% for Bustamante and 12.8% for McClintock (99% of all precincts reporting now). This means that slightly under 60% in a record turnout voted Republican against a lone Democrat. Also, since Proposition 54 went down in flames (64% no), you can't chalk it up to a conservative turnout. If anything, Prop 54 turns out to be the bellwether, the control group if you will, on who voted in this election. The 7.7 million people who voted were completely representative of Californians statewide, and they enthusiastically rejected Gray Davis and the Democrats. Unless Arnold [that's Governor Arnold to you, ex-pat boy!] screws up, this is trouble for the Democratic visegrip on California politics....
Steve Lopez crosses the line
Roger Simon is right about this title and article; Steve Lopez takes a cheap shot (specifically about the Fuhrer part of it). Otherwise, bitter as it may be, it's still a pretty good article. I'm happier about the outcome than Lopez, but he is right in that the situation that created the recall in the first place -- gridlock, Gray Davis in office, mandated spending -- was created by California voters in the first place. Gray Davis only made it a hell of a lot worse than it had to be....
Doesn't anyone in Europe believe in enforcing treaties?
The Euro took another baby step towards oblivion by ignoring France's economic violations of its underlying agreements. Isn't this the same country that insisted that countries could not act unilaterally in defiance of the community of nations? Sweden's looking smarter and smarter every day....
Wasn't this guy supposed to be the competent Democrat?
Just three weeks into his campaign, and Wesley Clark is already self-destructing. First his campaign manager quits after three weeks on the job, and now it looks like the General is breaking federal election laws: Under the laws governing the financing of presidential campaigns, candidates cannot be paid by corporations, labor unions, individuals or even universities for campaign-related events. The Federal Election Commission (FEC) considers such paid political appearances akin to a financial contribution to a candidate. Clark is getting paid as much as $30,000 for speeches, according to people familiar with his arrangement. He has two more scheduled for next week. Clark, like any other candidate, would likely be permitted to deliver the paid speeches only if they did not "expressly" cover his campaign or his political opponents, the experts said. But in his speeches, Clark has talked about his campaign positions and criticized President Bush's policies. At DePauw,...
Strib idiots strike again
Comparing California voters to unruly toddlers, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune spouts off again on a subject about which they know little. Most parents have witnessed a version of the Toys "R" Us scene in which a child, caught up in the frenzy of toy overload, cries out, "Mommy, I want it, and I want it now!" California politics, always a raucous affair, has become over the last 30 years more shrill, impatient and petulant, more of a toy-store experience. This may be a funny metaphor but sells voters short. California didn't get rid of Gray because of shiny, cool Arnold: they got rid of Gray because Gray has repeatedly sold out Californians to his contributors, and Californians got tired of it. Or perhaps the Strib never bothered to research sweetheart deals like the Oracle contract. Voters in the largest state knew what they didn't want -- more Gray Davis, whom they...
October 9, 2003
One large helping of grapes, extra-sour please
California Democrats are mighty grouchy today. It's like waking up with a huge hangover, I guess. (via California Insider) Aides to Sen. John Vasconcellos confirmed the liberal San Jose Democrat called Republican Governor-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger "a boob," said voters "made a mistake," and announced that when the Legislature reconvenes in January, "I'm not sure I'll go back... If people want this actor to govern ... they don't need or deserve me." Which just goes to show you that Arnold really does get results. Is this what the Democrats has picked as a new strategy? Picking up their ball and going home? Assemblyman Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, said he will introduce legislation he dubbed "Arnold's Law" to increase the penalty for sexual battery in the workplace. At least that has some wit to it. In what would be a pointed show of dissatisfaction, some Democrats may boycott Schwarzenegger's State of the...
Strange Bedfellows
Arnold the Governator has picked his transition team, and it's certainly unusual. There will be 65 people from such diverse viewpoints as Mayor Willie Brown, the former King of the Assembly (I'm not kidding about that), Bill Simon Jr, Susan Estrich, and Rep. David Dreier, a well-connected Republican with close ties to the Bush administration: Today, he characterized the transition team that he will head as widely varied, made up of people who are both "very liberal and very conservative." "I will tell you this will be a somewhat unusual group," Dreier said. "The reason I'm so convinced we can have a diverse group is the strength of Arnold Schwarzenegger. He's in a position where he will get a wide range of recommendations from people throughout the state and from around the country." Arnold obviously wants to project an inclusive, healing image for his new administration, and I'm sure Willie...
Has the LA Times No Shame?
Seldom do you see a major news outlet sell itself out so completely, but the recall seems to have unhinged the editors of the Los Angeles Times. I read the Times on the Internet, as you will see if you scroll through my archives, but I do so with the knowledge that this newspaper has almost no credibility in its news coverage. Consider the following: The Los Angeles Times said it "corroborated" its stories that Schwarzenegger groped or humiliated more than a dozen women over a nearly 30-year period. But in no case did an eyewitness substantiate for the Times any of the tales despite the fact that the alleged incidents took place while hundreds of crew members on movie sets were present. As for the important "second source" news organizations often require on sensitive stories, the Times usually used a friend or relative who heard about the incidents afterward...
October 10, 2003
This is what happens when people don't learn history
Power Line features an excellent essay on the history of the Liberty Bell, and how the historically ignorant are misrepresenting it in its new setting.
Heh heh heh ...
I'm more a fan of green, myself ......
Kobe plays a nasty defense
Lawyers, as officers of the court, are expected to play by the rules. One or two slips is forgivable, but six times should have resulted in a contempt charge. Kobe's lawyers knew that they weren't supposed to identify the alleged victim by name during the hearing. It looks like this will be going to trial soon. Let's hope the judge gets more control over the court. Kobe's going to have enough problems as it is; if he's really innocent, he won't want a OJ-style circus that will undercut the validity of an acquittal with the general public....
Let Immigrants Run?
Despite the results of the recall, letting foreign-born citizens run for President is a bad idea. As the descendent of immigrants -- I am third-generation on my mother's side -- I do not see the need or the benefit of a foreign-born citizen filling the role of head of state. The Washington Post editorializes: The nation has profited from the service of naturalized citizens in sensitive posts such as secretary of state and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and American public life is rife with people whose commitment to this country is one of choice, rather than birth. In every other sphere, American law welcomes such citizens and acknowledges parity between them and the native-born. Yes, I agree, although Kissinger's loyalties were often questioned during and after his tenure. Look at the vitriol thrown at American-born Jews in the Bush administration, such as Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle....
Steve Wynn explains tiger "attack"
I have to admit, what Steve Wynn says about the tiger "attack" makes sense. It's a real shame that it happened, but it appears to be an outrageously unlikely fluke. One question, though: if your tiger is going to be distracted by "big hair", why would you use that tiger in Las Vegas? Have you ever seen the women in the audience for these shows?...
October 11, 2003
"Zero tolerance" rules make zero sense
I understand the motivation behind dress codes such as this, but when they're implemented in an inflexible manner, it makes everyone look ridiculous. An 11-year-old Oklahoma girl has been suspended from a public school because officials said her Muslim head scarf violates dress code policies. Board officials met Friday to discuss the fate of suspended sixth-grader Nashala "Tallah" Hern, who was asked to leave school in the eastern Oklahoma town of Muskogee on October 1 because she refused to remove her head scarf, called a "hijab." "Zero tolerance" rules really mean "zero thinking", and this is a great example of it. Gang members do identify themselves through clothing, including headgear, usually with professional sports merchandise. Prohibiting such displays makes sense, and public schools should try to eliminate them. However, instead of exercising some judgment or making the effort to determine what is and is not acceptable to wear, administrators take...
Lawyers outta control
I'm sorry that this little girl got paralyzed, but I fail to see how you can blame it on anyone but the drunk driver. The parents of a girl paralyzed in a car wreck caused by a drunken football fan have sued the National Football League, claiming it should be held responsible for the girl's injuries. The lawsuit, filed Thursday, contends the league promotes the type of behavior that led the fan to drink 14 beers at a New York Giants game in 1999 and then drive home. Why include the NFL? Because you won't get that much money out of a guy who's serving several years in prison for the crime. Tailgating is not inherently a bacchanalia; most people handle their alcohol respectably, and there's a lot of other things that go into tailgating, like grilling food, etc etc. It frustrates me when lawyers attempt to hold people responsible...
Next up, on America's Most Wanted ....
How the heck do you let a guy like this escape? A suspect in the murders of five people whose bodies were unearthed from his backyard escaped Friday night from the jail where he was awaiting trial, officials said. Hugo Selenski, who was charged Monday in two of the deaths, and another inmate used bedsheets to escape from the Luzerne County Correctional Facility around 9:30 p.m., officials said. I'm thinking about Ted Bundy, and what happened when he escaped ... I hope they catch this guy quick. I hope that the Luzerne County Correctional Facility changes its security procedures ASAP....
Haunted House of Ill Repute?
Here's an idea whose time, apparently, has not quite come -- an adult haunted house, complete with simulated genital mutilation and lesbian scenes: To open, a couple of exhibits had to be toned down, including a mock mutilation of male genitals, as well as a couple of women kissing. Says one performer, "They've completely violated our right to free expression." But due to the adult content, and the fact that many of the actors are minors, Wentzville city officials decided the haunted house needed an adult entertainment permit. I suspect it was the lesbian kissing scene (oh! I'm so shocked!) that really got panties in a twist, but the simulated male genital mutilation certainly seems beyond the pale and qualifies the exhibit as adult entertainment. I certainly can't imagine allowing kids to work there or go through the house, but not everyone agrees: A much different opinion comes from event...
Robertson Declares 700 Club as a Nuclear Power
If there was still any doubt at all, Pat Robertson has made it clear that he is a dangerous lunatic with no credibility at all to speak on issues. Last seen exhorting his mindless sheep to pray for the deaths of certain Supreme Court justices, now Robertson has decided that it's quicker to nuke the State Department rather than praying for the 10,000 or so heart attacks it would take: "I read your book," Robertson said, according to a transcript of the interview posted on his Christian Broadcasting Network's website (www.cbn.com). "When you get through, you say, 'If I could just get a nuclear device inside Foggy Bottom, I think that's the answer'," he said. "I mean, you get through this, and you say, 'We've got to blow that thing up.' I mean, is it as bad as you say?" Robertson asked. The State Department, oddly, takes offense to suggestions...
October 12, 2003
A Winning Strategy in a Fractured State: Unite and Conquer
Steve Lopez, in today's LA Times, nails the recall election in another funny column: Conservatives eagerly abandoned sacred covenants and joined moderates — and even some liberals, for God's sake — in voting for a serial groper who smoked dope, skipped elections and was a poster boy for Hollywood's gun violence and mayhem. Who would've thunk it? Lopez not only notes that, but actually understands what this means for the California electorate: We're politically polarized beyond caricature, undermining any useful problem-solving, and great hordes of people need to be locked in their rooms. But as far as anyone can tell so far, Arnold appears to be somewhere in the middle — a fiscal conservative and social moderate. If so, that would put him more in touch with California than Gray Davis, who pumped helium into the state budget, or any of the knuckle-draggers the GOP keeps sending into the game....
PETA: People Empty of Tact and Aptitude
I'm surprised it took PETA this long to take a life-threatening tragedy and crassly use it for their own purposes. The group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals held a rally Saturday outside the Mirage hotel-casino to urge entertainers Siegfried & Roy to retire their felines after Roy Horn was nearly killed by a tiger during a performance. Carrying signs reading, "The Strip Is No Place for Tigers" and "Big Cats Big Danger," about two dozen demonstrators gathered near the entrance to the resort's large Siegfried & Roy marquee. It's understood that PETA opposes animals in entertainment, or in almost any other contact with humans, so it's not surprising that they want Siegfried & Roy to eliminate the tigers from their act. In fact, I believe they've protested the act several times previously. But since it's pretty clear that the act will be off the stage for a long...
A breath of fresh air from the Democratic Leadership Council
For those who may not know, the DLC is the centrist Democrat group that promoted Bill Clinton as a potential party leader as early as 1988. Now they're trying to keep California Democrats from going off the rails by giving them a major reality check. After acknowledging the right-wing origins of the recall, it tells them [I]t's clear the success of the recall effort was no mere right-wing conspiracy. Californians are deeply frustrated by what they perceive as a political establishment -- in both parties -- that's not listening to their concerns, acting on their needs, or paying much attention to anyone who does not belong to a bedrock partisan constituency group. Then they warn some of the radical elements of the party against following through on threats made on Election Night: There's already talk of Democrats going to the mattresses, denying cooperation to the Governor-elect, or even launching petitions...
October 13, 2003
Coleman straddles the fence
Sen. Norm Coleman tries to eat his cake and have it too on the issue of school vouchers. He proposes putting a school voucher plan in place for Washington DC schoolchildren, but tries to claim he's not considering any application to any other state, including Minnesota: "I'm not going to push for vouchers for Minnesota kids," Coleman said in an interview. "I'm not going to push for a national program. But I will certainly support the local mayor in his effort to provide greater opportunity for his kids." Well, why not? I understand that DC schools are especially poor performers, but there are certainly schools like that in Minnesota, too, and elsewhere. Are those schoolchildren any less trapped by the educational monopoly? Why are DC schoolchildren special cases? I suspect it has a lot less to do with geography than with mollifying Education Minnesota, the state NEA outfit, who weighs...
What would Winston do?
Today's Strib features a column by Isaac Cheifetz titled "What would Winston do?" It doesn't give any answers to that specific question but instead talks about a little-discussed side of Winston Churchill: the accomplished manager. I found it interesting, since Churchill is one of my favorite historical figures, and I believe his life and philosophy are so applicable to today's global issues. Afterwards, check out the post that pointed me to it at Power Line....
The Top 10 Most Dangerous Jobs in America
No, this is not a David Letterman list, but it's really the most hazardous jobs in America, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The top 10 most dangerous jobs are: 10. Truck drivers 9. Construction workers 8. Farm occupations 7. Electrical "power installers" (as opposed to workers?) 6. Roofers 5. Drivers - Sales Workers (incl. pizza delivery, vending machine workers) 4. Structural metal workers 3. Pilots and navigators 2. Fishers And the most dangerous job in America is ... 1. Timber cutters!...
Saudi Arabia to Hold First Elections
In a move that indicates the US is beginning to make a major impact on the Arab world, Saudi Arabia announced its first ever free elections: Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy, announced Monday it would hold its first elections to vote for municipal councils, seen as the first concrete political reform in the Gulf Arab state. ... Since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States -- in which 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis -- Riyadh has come under intense pressure by key ally Washington to implement social and political reform in the kingdom which is the cradle of Islam and the world's largest oil exporter. ... "The council of ministers decided to widen participation of citizens in running local affairs through elections by activating municipal councils, with half the members of each council being elected," the state news agency SPA said. It's not just the election,...
Ed Asner: Historical Idiot
I don't know what's more disturbing about this story on Ed Asner: his predilection for mass-murdering tyrants, or his swollen ego regarding Rush Limbaugh, or just his entire, pathetic schtick ever since he started taking himself seriously after Lou Grant was canceled. I first read this story at Andrew Sullivan's site this morning, and it's been picked up by Instapundit (who discussed it in his MS-NBC column, too), but here's the original story, from Kevin McCullough at WorldNetDaily: "Mr. Asner, I do have a question ... if you had the chance to play the biographical story of a historical figure you respected most [emphasis mine] over your lifetime, who would it be?" "I think Joe Stalin was a guy that was hugely misunderstood," said Asner. "And to this day, I don't think I have ever seen an adequate job done of telling the story of Joe Stalin, so I guess...
Dean's 'Urban Legend'
I recall when this happened, and how the Dean campaign tried backing away from it at warp speed. Quite frankly, I just considered it to be a typical reaction from the no-war-for-any-reason set, and in that context it makes perfect sense: "Questioned about the deaths of Saddam's sons, Odai and Qusai, in Iraq, Dean dismissed suggestions that it was a victory for the Bush administration. `It's a victory for the Iraqi people . . . but it doesn't have any effect on whether we should or shouldn't have had a war,' Dean said. `I think in general the ends do not justify the means.' " Nevertheless, when challenged on this, Dean has gone on the attack rather than explain what he meant, or more likely, that he forgot he said it because he shot his mouth off without thinking about it at the time: "I never said that. I never...
Israeli raid on Syria alters a 30-year-old 'proxy game' in the Mideast
I found an interesting article on the decades-long proxy game between Israel and Syria, and how Israel is looking to change the rules, with the first gambit being the attack on the terrorist training camp last week: No matter how much violence raged around it, the Israeli-Syrian border has been quiet since the armistice following the 1973 Arab-Israeli war. If the bitter foes wanted to fight, they squared off on the battlefield called Lebanon, or deployed various proxy forces. The attack a week ago Sunday on what the Israelis said was a Palestinian terrorist training camp changed that formula, perhaps forever. This article gives a much clearer explanation of what the attack means to both Israel and Syria and what Israel hopes to gain from the escalation: The Syrians say they give no logistical support to the Palestinian groups, but cannot expel Palestinians who have lived legally here for decades....
Gun Control Fails Miserably in Great Britain
Good luck on reading anything about this in the New York or LA Times, but Strange Women Lying in Ponds (a cool Monty Python reference, for those who don't know) picked up on a story in the Guardian which details the effects of banning all handguns: Handgun crime has soared past levels last seen before the Dunblane massacre of 1996 and the ban on ownership of handguns introduced the year after Thomas Hamilton, an amateur shooting enthusiast, shot dead 16 schoolchildren, their teacher and himself in the Perthshire town. It was hoped the measure would reduce the number of handguns available to criminals. Now handgun crime is at its highest since 1993. SWLIP reacts: Let's see, when Britain passed the handgun ban, many pro-gun ownership types predicted that Britain would eventually see a rise in violent gun crimes as guns became readily available on the black market for criminals, and...
October 14, 2003
The Soviet Republic of Texas (washingtonpost.com)
The Washington Post rails against the latest redistricting plan in Texas, but misses an important point. The current district plan was not implemented by the Texas Legislature but was imposed as a temporary plan by a federal court. Districting is a function of the Legislature and not the courts and it was entirely appropriate for Texas to redistrict, even if it was oustide the census cycle. That being said, the Post has a point about the results of the plan, and ultra-partisan districting plans in general: YOU MIGHT THINK America's rigged system of congressional elections couldn't get much worse. Self-serving redistricting schemes nationwide already have left an overwhelming number of seats in the House of Representatives so uncompetitive that election results are practically as preordained as in the old Soviet Union. In the last election, for example, 98 percent of incumbents were reelected, and the average winning candidate got more...
The President's End Run
The Washington Post reports that President Bush will start bypassing the national, traditional media and start focusing on regional and non-traditional media in order to get his message out more clearly and with less editorial filtering. Power Line links the story in its essay on the decision and its possible impact. Read the entire essay; it's excellent, although I disagree with it in one respect: And he and other administration officials should criticize Democratic jounalists and news outlets by name. The Democratic news media have overplayed their hand, and everyone knows how biased they are. (I'll link to a recent Gallup poll on this issue later in the day.) Why should hacks like Dana Milbank get a free pass to attack the administration on behalf of the Democrats, in the guise of objective journalism? I'll have to disagree with Hindrocket on taking such a confrontational strategy. Bush and the senior...
A Hope for France?
I'm not shy in sharing my views on France, but this article in Reason gives hope that change may be coming in the person of Sabine Herold, a 22-year-old Opposition leader in Paris: Herold, the 22-year-old leader of Liberté, J’ecris Ton Nom (Freedom, I Write Your Name), has in the last few months emerged as the massively popular and highly photogenic leader of -- zut! -- a burgeoning pro-market, pro-American counterculture in France. Earning comparisons to Joan of Arc, Brigitte Bardot (!), and Margaret Thatcher in the panting British press, she represents something French politics hasn’t seen in years: a public figure eager to take on the country’s endlessly striking unions. Herold's youth, passion, and eloquence earned her enough of a following that she was able to draw 80,000 to a protest against union strikes early this summer in Paris. I've read about her before, mostly through Merde in France...
Pledge to be Reviewed by Supreme Court
The Volokh Conspiracy has an excellent series of posts on this subject, starting (or ending, I suppose) with this one. I hadn't heard that Justice Scalia had recused himself, but considering his ill-advised commentary, it's probably for the best. It's not the content of the commentary that is a problem; he shouldn't have been commenting on the case at all, since it was always likely to be reviewed by the Supreme Court. It was a rare example of bad judgment on his part....
Pawlenty to Tie Drivers Licenses to School Performance
Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty has proposed making underage drivers licenses dependent on school attendance. Pawlenty describes the link between truancy and criminal behavior and says: "I have no hesitation linking expectations around school attendance and the privilege of driving," Pawlenty said. "We need to make sure we have the horse before the cart." "Students need to understand the importance of education and that there are consequences if they don't take it seriously," Pawlenty said in a statement. "Chronic absenteeism is one step away from crime and we need to do everything we can to stop it." Right now, the only consequences of truancy are borne by the parents; if the truancy becomes chronic, the parents can be taken to court to correct the situation. Truancy undoubtably underlies a significant part of teen crime, and the failure of the system to provide any significant consequences to the teens themselves doesn't do...
Name-calling as political discourse
Speaking of Amygdala, I noticed that he has posted (way down the left column) Farber's First Fundamental of Blogging: If your idea of making an insightful point is to make fun of people's names, or refer to them by rilly clever labels such as "The Big Me" or "The Shrub," chances are high that I'm not reading your blog. On the way home from work this afternoon, I listened to The Patriot, the conservative talk-radio outlet here in the Twin Cities. At my drive-time, Michael Medved is on the air, and I have enjoyed Medved from when he wrote The Golden Turkey Awards back in the 70s. It's out of print now, but it's hilarious. Anyway, unlike some of the other hosts on the Patriot, such as the screechy and utterly reactionary Michael Savage, Medved is thoughtful to his callers and encourages those who disagree with him to give him...
October 15, 2003
Jill Stewart's Rebuttal to John Carroll
Jill Stewart has penned an extensive and detailed rebuttal to John Carroll's "explanation" of the groping stories at the LA Times and how they were nothing more than good journalism. (John Carroll's editorial had been listed in a featured position at the top of the Times' web site for several days; today is the first day it's gone.) Stewart writes: Carroll claims that the groping story was published as soon as it was done. In fact, in journalism, a story is done when the boss says turn it in. Carroll himself saw to it that the story was strung out until the last. That is why some staffers continue to insist to me that the story was sufficiently nailed and should have run two weeks beforehand. One of Carroll's major gripes with Stewart -- whom he never bothered to name -- was that she claimed he held the story back...
Woman Gets Jail In Assault On Boy, 4 (washingtonpost.com)
Who wants to keep tabs on this woman's baby for the next 18 years? A woman who chased a 4-year-old boy through a McDonald's restaurant in Montgomery County, pinned him in a headlock and screamed obscenities as she smeared his face with hot french fries was sentenced yesterday to four days in jail and ordered to attend anger management and parenting classes. Milikia Hayes, 18, of Gaithersburg was nearly nine months pregnant with her first child when the incident took place in May. The boy, whom Hayes did not know, accidentally smeared ice cream on her clothing at a McDonald's in Germantown, authorities said. She should be getting lots of follow-up visits from Children's Services as well....
Demosophia: Mr. Moore's Neighborhood
I avoided commenting on the latest foolishness spewing forth from Michael Moore during an appearance on CNN's Crossfire, with Robert Novak and Julian Epstein, who sounds as if he couldn't suck up enough to the pseudodocumentarian. EPSTEIN: And, in your book -- I love you. I think you say a lot of useful, important things that need to be said to shake the system up. Yeah, well. Anyway, Moore said in the course of the interview: MOORE: I'd like to ask the question whether September 11 was a terrorist attack, or was it a military attack? We call it a terrorist attack. We keep calling it a terrorist attack. But it sure has the markings of a military attack. And I'd like to know whose military was involved in this precision, perfectly planned operation. I'm sorry, but my common sense has never allowed me to believe since that day that...
October 16, 2003
That's okay, he can inspect home-schooling parents
It's decisions like this that make an even bigger joke of scare stories like the one from CBS News that argues that home-schooling is dangerous because there is no government oversight: At the same time that Donald Leonard Keys was being investigated on suspicion of having an illegal sexual relationship with a 16-year-old Woodbury boy, he was granted a renewal of his social worker's license. The renewal was approved by the Minnesota Board of Social Work despite knowledge that the 58-year-old St. Paul man had convictions for attempted sodomy with a child in 1971 and for fraud, for bilking an elderly man in Hennepin County in 1996. But it's okay, really, he's had a criminal background check .... he's licensed ......
Leaks, and the leaking leakers who leak them ...
Man, I had a tough time trying to decide whether this White House leak qualified as Current Affairs or Humor: Concerned about the appearance of disarray and feuding within his administration as well as growing resistance to his policies in Iraq, President Bush - living up to his recent declaration that he is in charge - told his top officials to "stop the leaks" to the media, or else. News of Bush's order leaked almost immediately. I feel bad for Bush, I really do. I can just imagine the scene in the Oval Office this evening: Bush has his staff gathered around him in the Oval Office, chewing them out for allowing this last leak to occur, and soon as he turns his back to face one person, all the others grab notepads and scribble furiously until he turns around again. Every modern President has had to deal with leaks,...
Isn't this the ultimate goal of the nanny state?
It looks like the jig is up for an ex-patriate German just trying to make ends meet on a German disability pension in Florida: Maybe it is the image of a German pensioner, deeply tanned and dipping his toes in the surf on Miami Beach, while retired people here trudge windswept streets in dismal German burgs. Or maybe it is the notion of a housekeeper, paid for by the German government, to keep the fellow's apartment tidy. Whatever the reason, the curious case of Rolf John, a 64-year-old former banker who is living a sun-dappled retirement in Florida on $2,200 a month in German welfare checks, has driven people here batty. Germany currently pays over $6 million a year in pensions and benefits to just over a thousand German citizens living abroad in 88 countries. Rolf John's monthly benefits include: * $1,023 for rent * $854 as a "living allowance"...
October 17, 2003
We're Sorry You Can't Comprehend Our Genius
The Malaysian government, after being scolded for the remaks of its Prime Minister at the OIC the day before, tries a little bit of damage control: "I'm sorry that they have misunderstood the whole thing," Syed Hamid, the foreign minister, told The Associated Press. "The intention is not to create controversy. His intention is to show that if you ponder and sit down to think, you can be very powerful." If that was his intention, then I suppose he failed miserably, considering this: Mahathir said the world's "1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews," but suggested the use of political and economic tactics, not violence, to achieve a "final victory." Final victory, final solution, Jews running the world ... they didn't ponder or sit down to think, they're just channeling the Nazis. "Please forget about anti-Semitism," Syed Hamid told reporters. No, we wish you Muslims would...
October 18, 2003
Man who accused officers of assault denies he's an informant
A journalistic kerfluffle of another sort has erupted in Minneapolis, as the man who has accused Minneapolis police officers of sodomizing him with a toilet plunger denies that he is a police informant: "I'm not an informant, never will be," Stephen C. Porter said, responding to a story in the Star Tribune that reported he'd worked for the police. He asked his friends to believe his word. "Stick with me, I need you," he said. He added that his friends no longer talk to him. Members of the community were outraged that the Star Tribune printed the story that Porter worked with police in the past, and questioned the motivation of both the newspaper and its sources: Spike Moss, vice president of The City Inc., lambasted the media for reporting that Porter was a confidential informant for Jindra. "Why would you participate in a setup to get him killed?" Moss...
Three Americans Jailed in Bizarre Mexican Land Dispute
This story underscores the difficulty in doing business with Mexico, a country that has never fully respected private property rights and whose law enforcement efforts have always been a bit questionable: Three U.S. citizens, including a man dying of cancer, have been jailed here and face up to 14 years in prison in a land dispute involving a member of President Vicente Fox's cabinet. ... Ames and his wife lived together on the land until Jean Ames died in 2000 at age 92. Then, in May of this year, Ames was served with an eviction notice by the university, giving him nine days to vacate the property and ordering him to pay nearly $40,000 in back rent -- $1,000 a month since the death of his wife. Ames said he was stunned and angry. In this case, a 92-year-old widower has been ordered off of his land by the Mexican...
October 19, 2003
The Clouds May Be Clearing for Bush and GOP
Today's LA Times practices a bit of balanced editorializing regarding prospects for President Bush and the GOP: Like the Chicago Cubs, though, the Democrats may have peaked too soon. Bush's poll numbers have stabilized. Arnold Schwarzenegger's victory in the California gubernatorial recall election has sent a thrill through the Republican Party. In Iraq, the violence continues, but the lights are now on, kids are returning to school, Turkey has agreed to send troops to the most dangerous part of the country (Sunni Iraq) — and the Bush administration won unanimous support from the U.N. Security Council for its plan for Iraq. That's not to say that Bush & Co. can expect easy sailing, either, at home or abroad: The French, Germans and Russians still steam over the U.S.-led invasion. They remain worried that a new Iraqi government, with U.S. backing, may try to repudiate some of the debt Hussein contracted...
October 20, 2003
Report: Army unit massacred 100s of Vietnamese civilians in 1967
The Pentagon's investigation into Army war crimes in Vietnam in 1967 has apparently stalled out before it was made public: An elite unit of U.S. soldiers mutilated and killed hundreds of unarmed villagers over seven months in 1967 during the Vietnam War, and an Army investigation was closed with no charges filed, the Toledo Blade reported Sunday. ... The Army's 4 1/2-year investigation, never before made public, was initiated by a soldier outraged at the killings. The investigation substantiated 20 war crimes by 18 soldiers and reached the Pentagon and White House before it was closed in 1975, the Blade said. The Pentagon had a difficult task in trying to piece together a case from actions that took place 36 years ago, but the level of atrocity of which the volunteer Tiger Force is accused was disturbing: Soldiers of Tiger Force, a unit of the Army's 101st Airborne Division, dropped...
Colorado teen found after Amber Alert
Another example of how well the Amber Alert system functions: A 16-year-old girl who was apparently abducted in Denver, Colorado, early Sunday was found alive and unhurt hours later, after police issued a statewide Amber Alert, police said. ... Police were still looking for a man in a white Honda who had apparently kidnapped Mitchell, she said. Investigators said the man was 25-30 years old, about 5-foot-4, with a pot belly. He was described as having short, thinning black hair, a thick mustache and thick eyebrows. When last seen, he was wearing a light black jacket, a white shirt with stripes and jeans. Police described the vehicle as a white, 4-door Honda with a gray interior and dark-tinted windows. It has a scorpion decal in the rear window. Let's hope they catch the man responsible before he tries this again....
Two Democrats Decide Discretion Is The Better Part of Retreat
Lieberman and Clark are bailing out of the Iowa caucus: Democratic presidential candidates Joe Lieberman and Wesley K. Clark have decided not to campaign in the initial caucus state of Iowa, gambling on winning the nomination with a later surge in the primary race. Lieberman and Clark have decided not to spend their money in a state they probably have no chance of winning. Their decisions allow them to shift money to New Hampshire and other states with later contests. This makes some sense for General Clark, who just started in the race (and just started being a Democrat) and may not have a strong enough organization yet to really work the caucus. Lieberman, on the other hand, has been running or threatening to run since Bush finished saying the oath of office. He doesn't want to go up against Dean in Iowa, but feels comfortable tilting at Dean in...
A Question of Accountability
Merde in France asks a good question, in his inimitable style, in the wake of French President Jacques Chirac representing Germany and France simultaneously at the European Summit: Where certain numb minded brainwashed individuals, stuffed full of dogma through their every orifice like cheap streetwalkers, see an elegant gesture, we see further proof that the EU is nothing more than a complete con job whose purpose is to smelt national sovereignties into a bland rotten broth of concentrated non-thought served up as a snack to feed a political void. Who answers to the German people now? Schroeder or Chiraq? Did it occur to Germans when the EU was launched that their head of state would casually assign representation of their sovereignty to a French politician? It would be equivalent to George Bush telling Canada to sit in for the US at the next Security Council meeting. This was no low-level...
Why Did Willie Brown Join Arnold?
Mickey Kaus answers one of my questions regarding the Schwarzenegger transition team: Brown had been widely expected to run for the Bay Area Senate seat now held by powerful Senate President pro Tem John Burton, who will be termed out next year....But Schwarzenegger is wildly unpopular in this district--teaming up with the Governor-elect would seem suicidal for Brown. It makes sense only if you assume Brown has abandoned plans to run for the seat. Why might he do that? Perhaps because he's seen private polls like the one kausfiles just saw--showing him with an unfavorability rating in the district of 40 percent, way above that of potential rivals. Brown's no dummy, and he's not about to pick a fight he's likely to lose, but I can't help thinking that once he got serious about the race that he would win it anyway, despite the early polling numbers. This is the...
Update on War Crimes Post
I've added an update to my earlier post on war crimes in Vietnam, in order to clarify the timeline. You may want to reread the entire post with the new information in mind. Why did this come out now? I assume that one of the veterans involved had either too much guilt or too much anger to keep quiet about it and talked to the Toledo Blade, who then checked it out and discovered the Army investigation in the 70s. Now that it's out, the question is what to do about it. I think staying silent is a poor choice. If we are to lead the world militarily, we must project complete professionalism and competence, and demonstrate that we will not tolerate war crimes on anyone's behalf....
Which quote was accurate?
Yet another reason not to trust the "traditional media" outlets. This was Howard Dean, according to the Washington Post, speaking to a group of Arab Americans on October 18th: "Because John Ashcroft touts the Patriot Act around the country does not mean John Ashcroft is a patriot," Dean said to rising cheers. "That American flag over there belongs to every American -- not only to John Ashcroft, Rush Limbaugh, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson." But according to Reuters, this is what Howard Dean said: "It does not belong to General Boykin, or John Ashcroft, or Rush Limbaugh or Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson," the former Vermont governor said to cheers in the packed hotel conference room in the Detroit suburb which is home to one of the highest concentrations of Muslims and Arabs outside the Middle East. Bear in mind that the addition of Boykin is no small matter. When...
October 21, 2003
I'm Sorry You Can't Comprehend My Genius
Malaysian PM Mahathir attempts to explain what he really meant in the Bangkok Post: "In my speech I condemned all violence, even the suicide bombings, and I told all Muslims it's about time we stopped all these things and paused to think and do something that is much more productive," Mahathir told the Bangkok Post. "That was the whole tone of my speech, but they picked up one sentence where I said the Jews control the world." But just in case no one misses the point, Mahathir helpfully added: "The reaction of the world shows that they [Jews] do control the world," he told the Post. Mahathir is often described by Western leaders as a "moderate" in the Muslim world. Isn't that just peachy?...
St. Paul's Outreach Program Gets Results ....
... only maybe not the ones they're hoping for: Patrons at Lucy's Saloon watched in amazement around 1 a.m. Sunday when the man they say started a bar-clearing brawl began barking orders at police officers who arrived to quell it — and the officers responded. The man turned out to be St. Paul police Sgt. Jon Loretz, the son of Police Chief William Finney. On Monday, the department referred an investigation into the fight to the state's Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to avoid a conflict of interest, Finney said. For Sgt. Jon Loretz, "outreach" involves "scream[ing] slurs against homosexuals" and getting into a number of "scuffles", such as these: "This guy, this big guy — he was actually swinging on women," Hill said Monday. He was choking one woman when bar security stopped him, she said. Then he began to verbally attack Noble, who was trying to kick Loretz out...
October 22, 2003
Just when you thought it was safe ...
Showing the wit and intelligence long associated with the white-supremacist movement, Richard Butler, the Aryan Nations founder, is running for mayor in Hayden , Idaho, where the organization used to have a large facility until they lost a $6 million lawsuit: "I'm not really anxious to become mayor," Butler, 85, said recently. ... Butler said his campaign is intended to restore Christian ideals, especially the Ten Commandments, to public life. But in truth, Butler admitted, Hayden is "running pretty well." Okay, Dick ... can I call you Dick? ... You don't want to become mayor, and Hayden's running all right without you at the helm, but you're running for mayor anyway. Do I have that right? Hmmm ... kind of plays hell with that whole "superior race" thing, doesn't it? White supremacists have not had good luck running for office in northern Idaho. Several years ago, Butler supporter Vincent Bertollini...
Senate Dems Fight GOP Efforts at Tort Reform
Senate Democrats are threatening yet another filibuster, this time to protect their trial lawyer constituency: Moving the cases to federal court would curb frivolous lawsuits and keep trial lawyers from getting millions of dollars in fees while their clients get little compensation, GOP senators say. Federal courts are assumed to be less likely to issue multimillion-dollar verdicts against big corporations. [In] both the House and Senate versions of the bill, class-action lawsuits in which the primary defendant and more than one-third of the plaintiffs are from the same state would still be heard in state courts. But if less than one-third of the plaintiffs are from the same state as the primary defendant, the case would go to federal court. Under the Constitution, anything affecting interstate commerce falls under the scope of the federal system, and most class-action suits have interstate impact, even if they're filed on a state-by-state basis....
Alan Dershowitz Speaks Out Against Self-Representation
Alan Dershowitz, noted appellant lawyer, Constitutional scholar, author, and a member of the OJ dream team, proposes that self-representation be banned in capital crime trials: Should a defendant facing the death penalty have the right to defend himself, even if his defense will be unprofessional and could result, potentially, in his own execution? That may be the question the U.S. Supreme Court eventually faces in the case of Virginia vs. John Allen Muhammad, the alleged mastermind of the D.C. sniper murders. Dershowitz discusses the cases of Colin Ferguson (the Subway Shooter) and Doctor Jack Kevorkian, who won in court three times while represented by counsel but lost when he chose to represent himself. There are success stories as well that Dershowitz only touches briefly on: Angela Davis and Clarence Darrow, but of course Darrow was a brilliant attorney. The only real strategic advantage of defending one's self is this: In...
Update: Sniper Defendant No Longer Acting as Attorney
According to the Star Tribune and the AP, John Allen Mohammed has ceased acting as his own attorney and rehired his "advisory" attorneys as his new counsel: Prosecutors complained about Muhammad's self-representation Tuesday and asked the judge to rescind it. They said Muhammad was receiving too much help from Shapiro and Greenspun, whose role as standby counsel was supposed to be limited. Fortunately for Mohammed, he had not had the opportunity to do too much damage to his case, and even at that point his rehired attorneys were able to reverse some of it: After today's announcement, Greenspun launched a series of objections during the testimony of Chris Okupski of Trenton, N.J., who sold Muhammad the Chevrolet Caprice prosecutors believe was the vehicle used in the sniper attacks. Greenspun won many of his objections, something that happened only rarely while Muhammad represented himself....
Power Line on Terri Schiavo
I believe Gelernter has it backwards. I believe that we became numb to the value of human life and so then supported widespread abortion, as well as capital punishment, assisted suicide, euthanasia, etc. That there are arguments, good arguments, to made on behalf of all of these to some extent is not in dispute. There are good arguments to be made for a lot of bad policy decisions based on honest and heartfelt beliefs and experience. It doesn't make the outcome any less wrong. The saying "Life is cheap" is so common and trite that is has become essentially meaningless, but was it always thus? I don't believe so, although capital punishment has certainly been around long enough. I think that in the post-Holocaust, post-nuclear world, we began to accept a fundamentally nihilistic and existential view of life. Nothing mattered when you could have 6 million people die in camps without even hearing about it until years later. Life meant nothing under the threat of nuclear annihilation. Once you accept these as everyday truths, then the litany of life-destroying policies makes sense and sounds perfectly reasonable.
October 23, 2003
British Patrols Walking Tall in Basra
Here's an update on our staunch British colleagues, winning hearts and minds in southern Iraq: Battersby's men here in the nation's second-largest city wear soft berets and patrol neighborhoods at a leisurely pace, enjoying a level of contact and trust with residents that still eludes many U.S. units in and around Baghdad. ... But unlike the areas west and north of Baghdad — heavily populated by minority Sunni Muslims, who dominated Iraq under Hussein — there is little public sympathy for the resistance here. Many of the city's residents are Shiite Muslims, who suffered under the former regime and say they are grateful that U.S. and British troops chased Hussein from power. "We don't say 'leave,' we say 'thank you,' " said Wael Abdulatif, governor of Basra province. Basra has always been a center of anti-Saddam sentiment, and of course Basra is also where an insurrection was attempted after the...
People For the American Way Fights Free Speech?
People for the American Way, a leftist group that is "fighting to maintain and expand 50 years of legal and social justice progress that right-wing leaders are trying to dismantle," weighs in against free speech in their campaign against Janice Rogers Brown, the latest Bush judiciary nominee. While there are reasonable limits to free speech in a workplace, it's up to the employer to set them, not the state, and I think Eugene Volokh is dead on with his excellent post today. Read through Justice Brown's opinion in the case PFAW cites and see what, if anything, you find "very disturbing". Remember this when you hear about PFAW and its allies screeching about the stifling of free speech in John Ashcroft's America....
Have They Finally Gone Too Far?
Make sure you read this post from Power Line as soon as possible. Ask yourself if the cartoon used by the Black Commentator, the NAACP, and PFAW were used by conservatives to protest a Clinton judicial nominee (or hell, in any context) what the scope of outrage would be amongst the Left. Every physical stereotype of African-Americans are included in this depiction of Justice Janice Rogers Brown. It's crude, it's disgusting, and it should be unacceptable for anyone interested in fair-minded debate. I'm not saying it should be outlawed -- they have a right to create this -- but it should generate outrage from the same people who are using it to further their purported political goals of equality and fair treatment. I don't know what Justice Brown's credentials are for the position -- I haven't read enough yet to have a grasp -- but I do know that if...
October 24, 2003
Strib and Pioneer Press burying bad news about Dayton?
Minneapolis's local NBC led its morning news with this story, but the Star Tribune, which strongly endorsed Senator Mark Dayton last election, buries this story deep within its web site: An office manager for Sen. Mark Dayton who says he was fired after developing a heart condition was found sleeping on the job and terminated for "exceptionally" poor job performance, according to new court filings. That account, provided by attorneys for Dayton's office, represents the Minnesota Democrat's most aggressive attempt yet to head off a lawsuit brought by Brad Hanson, his former state office manager. Hanson, giving his first extensive account of the case Thursday, called Dayton's assertions "blatantly false" and an attempt to smear him in the press. It would be an attempt to smear him in the press, if the press was interested in reporting bad news about Dayton. The story, which is fair and balanced, cannot be...
Media Bias Explained (in a Fair and Balanced Manner)
OxBlog's David Adesnik posts one of the clearest definitions of media bias: The implicit premise of Matt's statement is that any factually correct statement has a legitimate place in the news. Yet surely a professional journalist such as Matt knows that editorializing is not just a matter of expressing subjective opinions, but emphasizing certain facts at the expense of others. Check out the example that David uses, and how he rewrites it in a completely factual manner but changes the entire tenor of the piece. This should be required reading for any of us who express frustration at media bias and get challenged to define it....
A Tale of Two, er, Three Headlines
'Tis a far, far, more biased headline the LA Times writes, than has been written before (otherwise known as It Was The Worst of Times, and the Even More Worst of Times): LA Times, 10/24/03: Immigrant Wal-Mart Janitors Arrested Reuters, 10/23/03: Feds Arrests 300 Wal-Mart Workers AP, 10/24/03: Sources: Wal-Mart Knew of Illegal Workers Aha! It took the AP to put the word "illegal" into the headline. The Times just uses the word "immigrant" as if there is no difference between legal and illegal immigration, like the government was rounding up janitors for no reason, and Reuters doesn't bother to note immigration as an issue at all in its headline. Federal agents investigating Wal-Mart seized documents from an executive's office Thursday and raided 61 stores across the country, arresting about 250 illegal immigrants working on cleaning crews, authorities said. The investigation grew out of two earlier probes into the use...
Do student loans do more damage than good?
Michael Kantor over at The Calico Cat posts an intriguing and provocative question regarding the value of students loans to our society and their effect on tuition: The article mentioned how the cost of college education has been increasing faster than the rate of inflation, but the issue of why was never addressed. I believe student loans are part of the reason. By making more money available to students, this just gives the colleges the leeway to raise tuition even more. I know it's very anti-mainstream to question the value of a college education, but I'm going to go ahead and question it anyway. My experience is that the majority of college students are just in it for the piece of paper they get at the end which they think will be a ticket to a "good job." Yet we have so many college students graduating with no job awaiting...
October 25, 2003
Lieberman would tap McCain for administration
He later claimed he was joking, and John McCain laughed it off, but this only makes Lieberman look more attractive than any of the other defeatist Democrats: Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Lieberman said Friday that if elected president, he would tap Republican Sen. John McCain as defense secretary. Doing little to dispel the criticism that he's a closet Republican, Lieberman told Don Imus' syndicated radio program that he would want the Arizona senator, a colleague and a friend, for the Pentagon post. Such a move would attract centrist voters who want to remain strong on defense but feel that the Bush Administration have gone off the rails on other issues. In fact, despite what the White House leaks about being "scared" of Gephardt, Lieberman is the only Democrat who could seriously challenge Bush for the centrists in 2004, and the center will be critical. What this announcement will repel are...
Arguing over the Iraqi Victory Must Be Getting Old
The LA Times revists another US military victory to question tactics, strategy, and necessity: As U.S. troops wrestle with an intervention in Iraq, the success of the Grenada invasion 20 years ago might be seen as inspiring evidence of long-term payoffs for determined campaigns to put a troubled world in order. But even here, where military action was a comparative cakewalk once troops got past 800 Cuban construction workers, deep divisions persist over the value of that Cold War-era intervention. Are we really going to argue over Grenada again? Wasn't that over in about 15 minutes? Although most Grenadians agree they are better off as a result of the American action, they tend to see the storming of their tropical shores not as a rescue mission to evacuate students from the U.S. medical school, as the Pentagon claimed, but as an aggressive strike to thwart the spread of communism in...
Spain Asserts Its New Leadership in Europe
Being on the right side of history pays off for Spain (via Merde in France): All the same, until the Iraq war, Spain's notion of a New Europe - defined in cooperation rather than rivalry with the United States and reflecting loyalties, interests and instincts different from those of decades of postwar European habit - was largely talk. But in blocking, with the British and others, what it regarded as an attempt to turn the war into a European confrontation with America under a French and German banner, Spain achieved a new visibility in its effort to be seen be as a singular - even global - player. Spain has used Old World charm to vault itself into a leadership position by aligning itself as a medium between the Anglosphere on one hand and the emerging EU nations from the east, already inclined to support Anglo-American goals of democracy and...
Power Line Is Humming
Power Line has an impressive series of posts this morning on a number of issues. First, Big Trunk posts about appearing on a panel at the National Lawyers Guild convention this week in Minneapolis, and how far left this organization goes: Entering the convention precincts was a little shocking; the ambience, the displays, and the literature really marked the convention as hostile territory. Many handouts touted the cause of the only Cuban prisoners championed by the Guild -- "the Cuba five." The five, of course, are not any of Castro's prisoners, but rather are five Cuban men held in federal prison on conviction of offenses including espionage against the United States. The cause of the Cuba five is part of the Guild's old-time religion. The Guild's PATRIOT Act panel demonstrated how the Guild has moved seamlessly from defending America's Communist enemies to defending America's Islamofascist enemies. The common denominator between...
Your education dollars at work
Ho hum, another day, another protest staged by the last organized apologists for Stalinism. The Belligerent Bunny Blog went out and visited the vast crowd at the Washington protest and brings back pictures of the International ANSWER event. Check out all of the pictures -- they'll make your day, trust me, especially Clowns for Saddam. No, I know it could describe everyone there, but I'm talking about actual clowns. Best quote in Anna's post, under a picture of a sign that uses a swastika in Bush's name: Honestly if you're going to introduce the National Socialist trope, you could pick a better venue than a rally organized by a national, Socialist organization. Oh the irony! Somehow, I am sure the irony was lost on all of the attendees. (via Instapundit)...
October 26, 2003
North Korea Joins Iran in Acquiescing
"Speak softly, and carry a big stick." That was Theodore Roosevelt's foreign-policy philosophy, and it's paying off for George Bush in North Korea, at least so far: In its first concession after months of hostility, North Korea on Saturday signaled that it would consider President Bush's offer of written security assurances in return for dismantling its nuclear program. The conciliatory statement, first reported by the North Korean news agency, marked an abrupt about-face for the government in Pyongyang, which days earlier had ridiculed Bush's offer as "laughable" and "not worth considering." ... Iran also bowed to international pressure several days ago, saying it would suspend its uranium enrichment program and sign an agreement permitting international inspections. China put more pressure on North Korea to consider the Bush Administration's offer of written security assurances in lieu of a formal non-agression pact (which would undermine the military alliance with South Korea). Iran...
Big Trunk on TV in the Twin Cities
In a common-sense way, we can view the 90% level to test its reliability. How often does a police officer pull abreast of you before pulling you over? In my experience, unfortunately in multiple experiences, never. At least half of all stops occur in night conditions, where it's impossible to see the skin color or race of a driver until you are already stopped or have lit up the interior of the vehicle with door-mounted spotlights, and that only happens when you've committed to stopping the vehicle.
Nancy Pelosi: Enforcing Immigration Laws "Terrorizes" People
According to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, the INS and FBI are terrorist organizations for enforcing immigration laws: U.S. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said on Friday police raids on dozens of U.S. Wal-Mart stores in the search for illegal immigrants this week amounted to "terrorizing" workers. "It instills a great deal of fear in people who are only trying to earn a living and put food on the table for their family," Pelosi, a California Democrat, told reporters on a Congressional visit to Mexico. I believe that we need to create a mechanism that will allow us to track migrant workers and still allow them to work in the US. Despite what reactionaries on the right proclaim, such workers fill a vital need in the agricultural industry, as well as some service industries. However, until Congress develops such a program, it's still illegal to come into the US without...
October 27, 2003
Who's Laughing Now?
New Yorkers who had a great time poking fun at the California recall have discovered that direct democracy isn't even an option in their city: It started during the summer when Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, a Republican in a heavily Democratic town, placed an initiative on the city's Nov. 4 ballot that would ban partisan local elections. The mayor has contributed $2 million of his own money to pass the measure, which would reduce the traditional clout of the Democratic Party in New York City politics. He also took steps to block voters from considering an initiative signed by 115,000 residents that would compel the city to form a commission on chronic overcrowding in public schools. Bloomberg, like other mayors before him, invoked a little-known state law that bars other initiatives from appearing on a municipal ballot once a charter-reform measure is placed on it. The Mayor of New York...
South Park Republicans
In the Autumn 2003 edition of City Journal, Brian Anderson asserts that the right is no longer losing the culture wars: The Left’s near monopoly over the institutions of opinion and information—which long allowed liberal opinion makers to sweep aside ideas and beliefs they disagreed with, as if they were beneath argument—is skidding to a startlingly swift halt. The transformation has gone far beyond the rise of conservative talk radio, that, ever since Rush Limbaugh’s debut 15 years ago, has chipped away at the power of the New York Times, the networks, and the rest of the elite media to set the terms of the nation’s political and cultural debate. Almost overnight, three huge changes in communications have injected conservative ideas right into the heart of that debate. Though commentators have noted each of these changes separately, they haven’t sufficiently grasped how, taken together, they add up to a revolution:...
The Power of Modern Fads
Robert Bartley has written an excellent essay in today's OpinionJournal about instant cultural obsessions and the price paid for them: In an age of instant communications, we become members of a huge world-wide tribe, in constant contact with the thoughts and emotions of our fellow members everywhere. This carries many blessings, not least in undermining of local totalitarian regimes. But like tribal societies throughout the ages, it's vulnerable to sudden surges of emotions, to shared if unexamined assumptions that harden into instant fads. Bartley reviews two cases championed by the Wall Street Journal: the Amirault child-abuse conviction and the forced bankruptcy of Dow Corning caused by pseudoscientific hysteria about silicone breast implants. In the Amirault case, the best that Bartley can claim is a draw; Gerald Amirault is getting paroled without ever acknowledging any kind of confession in the supposed child-abuse cases for which he was convicted. Amirault and Bartley...
Well, geez ... would he lie?
Bill Clinton's idea of helping Tony Blair with his heart problem doesn't ease the angina one bit: Downing Street says it is "mystified" by reports that Tony Blair discussed his health problems several years ago with Bill Clinton. Mr Blair's spokesman insisted that his irregular heart beat, which caused him to be hospitalised briefly last week, had never happened before. But ex-US President Clinton was quoted in the Sunday Mirror as saying: "I've known about this for a long time. He told me about it quite a few years ago. As soon as I heard what happened, I called to check he was OK. We had a talk and he sounded in good shape." Excuse me for having a memory and a brain, but if anyone remembers, Mr. Clinton has a reputation for being a bit loose with the truth, and while we're at it, does anyone think this sounds...
October 28, 2003
In case you thought City Journal is biased
Either this is the meme of the moment, or we are truly seeing a striking social phenomenom. From the Minneapolis Star Tribune: While the liberalism of young adults has long been taken for granted, there is accumulating evidence that conservatism is making inroads. Recent polls and election results show that, at the least, this group of potential voters is up for grabs, prompting Republican and Democratic strategists to scramble to win their loyalty. Apparently this has been the dirty secret of Academia, at least up to now. As I said yesterday, this threatens the leftist (as opposed to liberal) hegemony that currently exists on university campuses, as these students will eventually replace existing faculty and curriculum management. In fact, that's what they're specifically aiming to do. What reason do they give for this sea change? "As far as the baby boom generation is concerned, Vietnam demonstrated that the United States...
Clark waning, liberals waxing in primaries
Oh so predictable: supposed White Knight General Wesley Clark is sliding in the polls, while support for liberal candidates is increasing: The small boom of support for retired Gen. Wesley Clark, which pushed him to the front of national polls in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, appears to be ebbing, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll. ... Among registered Democrats queried about their 2004 choices, 15 percent chose Clark, down from 21 percent who expressed support for him in early October, when he led the field less than a month after joining the race. In the latest poll, Dean was in first place, with 16 percent support, just a whisker ahead of Clark and within the poll's margin of error. Clark, pushed into the race by the Clintons and staffed with a number of Clinton supporters, has been an embarrassment on the stump. Either he can't come up...
Gangs Won't Let You Rest in Peace
Despicable behavior by gangs is nothing new, but this has to be a new low: A shootout at a mausoleum during a funeral Monday sent hundreds of mourners and visitors at Inglewood Park Cemetery crouching or running for cover as bullets were fired by suspected gang members and police. At least two men were hit, but both appeared stable and conscious, paramedics said. Police, who were investigating the crime scene six hours later, said they had no information on the men's conditions and only sketchy details about what happened. ... The 27-year-old mourner said Bailey's chrome casket was being put into a wall in the mausoleum at the end of the burial service, and the words "ashes to ashes and dust to dust" were being recited when gunfire broke out and people began screaming. She ran outside and saw police firing their weapons, she said. Another witness, a 19-year-old man,...
The inevitable results of socialized medicine
How would you feel if the government-controlled medical care -- for which you've paid -- decides to deny you medicine based on where you live? If that sounds good, then by all means keep pushing for "universal" health coverage: The government has vowed to end so-called "postcode prescriptions" which result in some patients being denied potentially life-saving cancer drugs because of where they live. Health Secretary John Reid said on Monday he had ordered an inquiry into why some local health authorities are prescribing new drugs to combat cancer while others are not -- even though the drugs have been approved nationally. Yes, I know, the British government has vowed to end the practice of denying cancer medication based on patient location, but it's creepy that the practice exists in the first place....
Munich in 2003?
DEBKAfile postulates that certain European government officials are considering sacrificing Israel to appease the Arabs: Nineteen days before the New York article appeared, a DEBKAfile informant dining at a Knightsbridge restaurant with a highly-placed British intelligence official heard him drop this remark: “Some people in the West have come to the conclusion that the creation of the state of Israel in 1948 was a mistake.” When asked to explain whether this meant that the Jews were to be evicted from the Middle East, he replied: “Certainly. Israel has a little more than 5 million Jews. If the United States and NATO were to finance their relocation in other countries, that would solve many Middle East problems.” ... In October 2003, the same British intelligence officer once again dropped a warning of schemes being spun in secret in Brussels to de-legitimize the Israeli democracy, whittle away its independence and eventually bring...
October 29, 2003
Second guesses follow Wellstone memorial
As part of a fortnight-long retrospective on Paul Wellstone's death, the Star Tribune today features a story about the controversial Wellstone memorial and its impact on state and national politics. Unfortunately, it's also the cause of some blame-shifting as well: In a gathering counterattack aimed at revising the conventional views of the memorial, liberal commentator and comedian Al Franken in his recent book castigates state and national conservatives for their take on the memorial. Franken blasts Republicans from Rush Limbaugh to Peggy Noonan to former Minnesota Congressman Vin Weber for claiming that a Jumbotron screen prompted the audience (the words on the screen were closed captioning for the hearing impaired); claiming that "20,000 people" booed Majority Leader Trent Lott (only some jeered), and constantly alleging that the event was scripted. ... Nonsense, responds Weber, a key adviser to Coleman whose immediate denunciation of the event as a "complete, total, absolute...
Why Condi? Why Not Condi?
Instapundit pointed out a new web site pushing Condoleeza Rice as Bush's running mate in 2004. In the Why Condi? page, the site explains its zeal to dump the current Vice President: Conventional wisdom has long held that the first woman, or first African-American in the White House, would be a Democrat. It would be the ultimate double-whammy to beat the Democrats at their own game. The beauty of it all is that she would not be not chosen because of her merely being a woman or an African-American, but rather because of her intelligence, qualifications, talents, experience and confidence of the president. I'm actually a fan of this idea, but this explanation sort of boggles the mind. On one hand, we want to "beat the Democrats at their own game", by electing a female African-American on a Presidential ticket, but, ah, not because she's a woman or an African-American....
And on the other side ...
After an attack by Al Sharpton, calling Dean's agenda 'anti-black', how can Dean respond affirmatively? Howard Dean's opposition to affirmative action, his current support for the death penalty and historic support of the NRA's [National Rifle Association's] agenda amounts to an anti-black agenda that will not sell in communities of color in this country," Sharpton said in a statement. Can this be a tripwire to the Dean campaign? After all: Until now, the Dean campaign's brushes with racial issues have been less vitriolic. Earlier this year, some critics, noting that Dean comes from a heavily white state and campaigns extensively via the Internet, questioned his ability to reach low-income and minority voters. Taking a page from my previous post, would the Dean campaign consider Carol Mosely-Braun as a potential VP choice? She's obviously not going to be a factor in the primaries and is running primarily to rebuild her reputation...
But does he wear boxers or briefs?
Governor Dean apparently struggles with some confusion issues: Dean declared himself a "metrosexual," the buzz phrase for straight men in touch with their feminine sides, as he touted his accomplishments in "equal justice" for gay and lesbian couples. But then he waffled. "I'm a square," Dean declared, after professing his metrosexuality to a Boulder breakfast audience with an anecdote about being called handsome by a gay man. "I like (rapper) Wyclef Jean and everybody thinks I'm very hip, but I am really a square, as my kids will tell you. I don't even get to watch television. I've heard the term (metrosexual), but I don't know what it means." Okay, so what this supposedly razor-sharp genius says is that he hears words he doesn't understand and then likes to use them in campaign speeches to impress voters. People talk about Bushisms -- is anyone keeping track of Dean's hoof-in-mouth disease?...
Zell Miller Endorses Bush
Retiring Georgia Senator Zell Miller endorses George Bush for the presidential election in 2004: Miller said Bush is "the right man at the right time" to govern the country. The next five years "will determine the kind of world my children and grandchildren will live in," Miller said in an interview. And he wouldn't "trust" any of the nine Democratic presidential candidates with governing during "that crucial period," he said. "This Democrat will vote for President Bush in 2004." Fred Barnes writes about Miller's discontent with the Democrats, both in the Senate and as a national political party. Miller's dissatisfaction has been known for some time and was recently vented in his new book, A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat, in which, among other items, he dismisses Howard Dean as "shallow". Miller's endorsement is certain to cause problems for the eventual Democratic nominee, especially in...
Don't make me pull this car over!
Seems like a squabble has erupted between the Dean and Gephardt campaigns: The incident occurred during a Gephardt speech at a Des Moines, Iowa, senior center Tuesday. A Dean campaign worker got into an altercation with members of the Gephardt staff and was escorted from the event, according to Rod Boshart, a reporter for The Gazette, of Cedar Rapids. In a letter to the Gephardt campaign late Tuesday, Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi said, "I urge you to find the staff member responsible and fire him, and send a strong signal to the rest of your staff that behavior of this kind will not be tolerated." Erik Smith, spokesman for the Gephardt campaign, said Wednesday, "this guy was belligerent and we escorted him out." He referred to the incident as political dirty tricks. Now, now, boys ... Late word out of the Dean camp says that the Gephardt people started...
October 30, 2003
U.S. Slowly Scaling Back Role in Israel
The above headline is quite misleading; the US isn't pulling away from Israel, they're telling the Palestinians to start meeting their obligations before expecting anything else from us: Call us when you're serious about disarming militants — that's the message Palestinians are getting from U.S. mediators who have scaled back their presence in the region. The apparent disengagement comes amid a deadlock in the U.S.-led "road map" peace plan, Washington's growing troubles in Iraq, and the distractions of the U.S. presidential election campaign. Unless the AP defines Israel as inclusive of the West Bank an Gaza Strip. Now that would be news! Israeli and Palestinian critics warn that reduced U.S. involvement will likely lead to more bloodshed, further harm America's image in the Arab world, and in the end bring on another round of U.S. mediation. With the sides here so far apart on the issues, many previous peace moves...
Bad News for Democrats
The headline in today's Washington Post: Economy Grows at 7.2 Percent Rate in Third Quarter: The economy grew at a scorching 7.2 percent annual rate in the third quarter in the strongest pace in nearly two decades. Consumers spent with abandon and businesses ramped up investment, compelling new evidence of an economic resurgence. The increase in gross domestic product, the broadest measure of the economy's performance, in the July-September quarter was more than double the 3.3 percent rate registered in the second quarter, the Commerce Department reported Thursday. The 7.2 percent pace marked the best showing since the first quarter of 1984. It exceeded analysts' forecasts for a 6 percent growth rate for third-quarter GDP, which measures the value of all goods and services produced within the United States. Could it be that the tax cuts, designed to put more cash into the hands of middle-class consumers, may be working...
Wait ... Michael Moore tells lies?
Quite frankly, I'm having a little trouble deciding for whom to root: James Nichols, the brother of Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols, says he was tricked into appearing in the documentary "Bowling for Columbine," according to a federal lawsuit filed against filmmaker Michael Moore. Nichols also alleges in the lawsuit, filed Monday in Detroit, that Moore libeled him by linking him to the terrorist act. Nichols accuses Moore of libel, defamation of character, invasion of privacy and intentional infliction of emotional distress. His lawyer is asking for a jury trial and damages ranging from $10 million to $20 million on each of nine counts, the Detroit Free Press reported. It's sort of like trying to figure out, at a Oakland Raiders - St. Louis Rams game, who you want to see lose more: Al Davis or Georgia Frontiere....
October 31, 2003
Video cell phones causing unforseen issues, pardon the pun
Quite frankly, this issue never occurred to me until I read this article: It's a health club patron's nightmare: Someone surreptitiously snaps a digital photo of said patron in a shower or locker room, then shares the snapshot far and wide via e-mail or by posting the picture on a Web site. The likelihood of this happening has dramatically increased in the past year or two as digital cameras have shrunk in size and become inconspicuous parts of everyday devices such as mobile phones. Now, local health-club chains are scrambling to preempt such mischief. The latest is Eden Prairie-based Life Time Fitness, which has just banned any cell-phone use in locker room areas. Northwest Athletic Clubs and the YWCA of Minneapolis also have instituted similar bans, according to a check of area clubs by the Pioneer Press. Health clubs have banned film and video cameras in the past for these...
The Definition of Insanity ...
... is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result: Senate Democrats yesterday blocked President Bush's selection of Charles W. Pickering Sr. for a federal appeals court after a two-year struggle that evoked conflicting interpretations of the past, present and future of race relations in Mississippi and Pickering's role in them. It's far past the time that Senate Republicans should have forced the Democrats to really filibuster a nominee, instead of the Filibuster Lite that they've allowed so far. Force the Democrats to shut the Senate by continuous speechifying, all the while on C-SPAN, preferably with that political cartoon of Justice Brown on the dais behind them. If the Democrats choose obstructionism, force them to do it for real. Let the country see what they are. Either that, or dump the nominees and find new ones, because this process has been grossly unfair to them....
This Accident Brought To You By ...
As Warren Brown says in this column, I'm a free-market kind of guy, but there are limits: Some Internet entrepreneurs, apparently more interested in cash than in road rage, or the possibility of a fatal crash, have been offering MIRT and MIRT knockoffs for $300. Their pitches are quite tempting: "Never wait for a red light again!" and "Tired of Waiting for Red Lights?" and "Changes Stop Lights From Red to Green in Seconds." Of course, there are buyers; and at the moment, the commerce is legal. MIRT transmits an infrared beam, instead of a radio wave. The Federal Communications Commission regulates the use of radio waves. Infrared transmission falls outside of the agency's purview. As a result, currently, there are no federal laws restricting civilian use of MIRT technology. Federal regulation would help keep these off the market, but individual states can and should make sale, possession, or use...
Defector: N. Korea's Kim Is World Problem
In keeping with Roger Simon's challenge, here's what North Korea's highest-ranking defector says: The only way to combat North Korea's dictator is for the world to unite against him as it has against terrorism, North Korean's top-ranking defector said in an interview with The Associated Press on Friday. ... On his first trip to the United States, Hwang Jang Yop also said he believes North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is fully prepared to start a war and that there's no telling whether Kim will ever give up his nuclear program. "It's like ... asking whether a venomous snake will bite or not," Hwang said in the interview. Roger feels, and I agree, that the pledge made in 1945 -- never again -- has transformed definition from 'never allowing genocide to happen again' to 'never recognizing genocide again'. We missed it completely in Cambodia after the much-derided "domino theory" came...
November 1, 2003
Bam-Bam Lives
In a unique and, shall we say, fantastic defense, a father on trial for the beating death of his infant daughter claims that the real cuplrit is his 2-year-old son: A jealous 2-year-old battered his infant sister so badly that it left her vulnerable to death when her father tripped in their St. Paul apartment and dropped her last November, Said Moussa Gouleed's lawyer said Friday, the first day of Gouleed's murder trial. Six-week-old Faduma Moussa Gouleed died from the accidental fall, not from a beating by her father, lawyer Eric Olson said. They're not called the "terrible twos" for nothing, I guess. Let's see what this brawny baby managed to inflict on Sis: An autopsy disclosed evidence that the baby had been repeatedly injured before her death, including several broken bones and a previous skull fracture. Olson said pre-existing injuries inflicted by her brother, coupled with the accidental fall...
Ain't Got Time for Green
Has anyone asked Ralph Nader how it feels to be potentially replaced by Jesse Ventura? Do you suppose Nader may be a bit reluctant to spend a year campaigning on behalf of a party of environmentalists who wanted to throw him overboard for a pro-hunting, pro-snowmobiling, pro-boating candidate?
The Pot Calls The Kettle Black
The LA Times features an article today on how Fox News intentionally skews its news writing to support a conservative bias: A veteran producer this week alleged that Fox News executives issue a daily memorandum to staff on news coverage to bend the network's reporting into conformity with management's political views, refocusing attention on the partisan bias of America's most watched cable news operation. The charges by Charlie Reina, 55, whose six-year tenure at Fox ended April 9, first surfaced Wednesday in a letter he posted on an influential Web site maintained by Jim Romenesko for the Poynter Institute, an organization that promotes journalistic education and ethics. (Romanesko's site, BTW, is on my blogroll to the left.) Read on for a taste of delicious irony: The corporate boards and family investors who control most of the American news media generally feel obliged to maintain a wall of separation between news...
Howard Dean, Confederate Racist?
It's an old story for acclaimed "metrosexual" candidate Howard Dean -- Open Mouth, Insert Foot: "I still want to be the candidate for guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks," the former Vermont governor was quoted as saying in Saturday's Des Moines Register. "We can't beat George Bush unless we appeal to a broad cross-section of Democrats." Say, Yankee boy, don't you know them's fightin' words, at least among the Northeastern-elite-style Democrats? "I don't want to be the candidate for guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks," Gephardt said in a statement. "I will win the Democratic nomination because I will be the candidate for guys with American flags in their pickup trucks." Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts contended that Dean's "pandering" to the National Rifle Association gave him an inroad to "pander to lovers of the Confederate flag." Will the Democrats be as quick with the BUSH...
November 2, 2003
Maureen Dowd Watch
The Belgravia Dispatch posts a fisking, of sorts, on Maureen Dowd's latest column (via Instapundit): But here's the point. Bush, for a good while now--including back during his September speech to the United Nations--has increasingly made reference, not only to terrorists opposing the U.S. in Iraq, but also regime "holdouts." Put differently, he's been more frank about the somewhat variegated nature of the opposition in Iraq recently. So my concerns at least, as someone who has followed the issue pretty closely, have been allayed somewhat recently. But then MaDo comes in and ignores all the evidence to the contrary to facilitate her slanted, anti-Bush op-ed writing process. Gregory Djerejian then provides the specifics on various Bush speeches where he specifically speaks about the difference between terrorists in Iraq, who mostly come from somewhere else, and regime holdouts like the Saddam Fedayeen and ex-military officers. Djerejian lumps Dowd in with Stephen...
Is this the end of 'the West?'
I don't know what breakfast cereal Thomas Friedman's been eating lately, but the man is on fire, this time asking if Europe has thrown in the towel, "Europe" mostly meaning France and Germany: At the Madrid conference, Saudi Arabia pledged $1 billion in new loans and credits for Iraq — and Germany and France pledged zero new dollars. The bottom line is clear: Saudi Arabia cares more about nurturing democracy in Iraq than Germany and France. Ah, you say, that’s unfair. Germany and France opposed the war, so why should they pay more than their share of the paltry EU contribution? Actually, it’s not unfair, when you remember that before the war France and Germany were obsessed with the lifting of UN sanctions on Saddam’s regime — in the name of easing the suffering of the Iraqi people. Friedman sheds quite a bit of light on the disconnect between the...
Minnesota teen dies while being a good samaritan
I normally like to finish on an up note, but that's not possible when you read something like this, which happened in North Carolina but involves a Minnesota teen: When Nolan Myers saw somebody was in need he was always willing to lend a helping hand, his family and friends said. ... He and three friends came upon the accident and stopped to be good samaritans. As Myers, 18, of Carver, Minn., reached one of the injured motorists, the driver of a speeding van plowed into the vehicles and the bystanders, killing five people, including Myers. A sixth person died en route to the hospital, authorities said. You may ask how someone driving by an accident could kill six people standing by the site. Take three guesses: The driver of the van, Larry Robert Veeder, 32, was charged Sunday with driving while impaired and with six counts of involuntary manslaughter,...
November 3, 2003
Good Luck Selling This to the Pelosi/Boxer Crowd
A group of centrist, concerned Democrats have published a manifesto that attempts to fight the McGovern tilt amongst the Presidential candidates: Last week, an impressive group of centrist Democratic foreign policy thinkers released a thoughtful document urging the party to adopt a "progressive internationalism" built around a strong defense, free trade and American leadership through international alliances "to shape a world in which the values of liberal democracy increasingly hold sway." ... Signed by prominent party thinkers like Will Marshall, president of the Progressive Policy Institute, and Iraq expert Kenneth Pollack of the Brookings Institution, the paper updates for a new century the vision advanced by Democratic presidents like Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman. In that tradition, the authors envision an America that expands its own security by working with allies to encourage the spread of trade and freedom around the globe — but defends its interests with...
First Zell Miller, Now This
Another Democrat appears to be poised to defect in a major election, this time in the Louisiana gubernatorial race: Mayor Ray Nagin, a Democrat, crossed party lines Monday to endorse Republican Bobby Jindal in the Nov. 15 runoff election for governor. Jindal faces Lt. Gov. Kathleen Blanco in the election. Perhaps the Democrats should call in the UN -- 2004 is looking more like a quagmire every day. But this news, combined with the Zell Miller bombshell a few days back, and the sudden retirement announcement of Bob Graham in Florida, and it's becoming clear that the Democrats are losing the South. Despite their recent decision to abandon gun control, the South isn't likely to trust that Dem policy to be permanent, and the screechiness of the anti-war themes at the Presidential debates may play well in Hollywood and San Francisco, but among the NASCAR dads and the Confederate flag...
November 4, 2003
Kerry's wife calls presidential debates 'silly'
... and I completely agree with Theresa Heinz Kerry: Heinz Kerry said debates have become about scoring a punch with quick soundbites. "It's just silly," she said. "I think those debates are really unproductive and they made it hard for all of them to (get their message across)." In fact, I would call them exceedingly silly, made so by live audiences who ooh, aah, gasp, titter, and applaud the most banal and trite comebacks. These debates embody the vacuity of modern hight-tech media sound bite-ism. The formats do not allow for thoughtful policy discourse, and in fact are designed to eliminate any hope of that. They are entertainment, at least in theory, a type of gladiator arena where the fight is not so much between the gladiators themselves as it is between the audience members to stay awake long enough to punctuate their champions' verbal jabs with the appropriate sound...
Building character through sports
If intramural sports exist to build character for young adults, then one of the best success stories can be found in Nate Haasis, a Springfield, IL high-school quarterback: Nate Haasis dropped back for one more pass as the clock wound down on his high school football career. But this one was different: As he threw a 37-yard completion, his opponents just stood around and watched. With that, Haasis became the new all-time passing champion of the Central State Eight Conference, with a record 5,006 yards. But it turns out the two opposing coaches in the Oct. 25 game orchestrated the play to ensure Haasis' place in history. And now the 17-year-old senior wants to nullify the pass and give back the record in a dispute that has roiled this football-crazed city and led to a debate over honesty and fair play. Some in the community have made the coaches out...
November 5, 2003
Republicans Make Gains in the South
The Democrat position in the South continued to erode, as the Republicans gained two governorships in elections yesterday: With a presidential campaign only months away, Republicans picked up two governorships in the South, ousting Mississippi's Democratic incumbent and seizing Kentucky's top job for the first time in 32 years. GOP Washington lobbyist Haley Barbour unseated one-term Democratic Gov. Ronnie Musgrove, while in Kentucky, three-term Republican Rep. Ernie Fletcher defeated Democratic Attorney General Ben Chandler. In an echo of the California recall, neither election was as close as pre-election polls indicated, especially in Mississippi, where newspapers had the race as a dead heat; Haley Barbour wound up winning by eight percentage points, far larger than the margin of error in the polls. Fletcher won by 10 points. Mississippi Democrats criticized Barbour for his connections and years spent in Washington as Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) and other...
Barbra Streisand Decries Right-Wing "Censorship"
As expected, Barbra Streisand leaps to the defense of her husband and his movie: I am deeply disappointed that CBS, the network that in 1964 gave me complete artistic control in creating television specials, now caved in to right wing Republican pressure to cancel the network broadcast of the movie The Reagans. (And I say MOVIE - because this is NOT a documentary - it's a television drama.) She has a point -- this is a movie, after all, not like Michael Moore's supposed documentaries, although I doubt she'd hesitate to defend his intellectually dishonest works. All crying aside, the movie will still be broadcast, just on a different Viacom outlet. However, this part of her argument made my eyes roll back into my head: I don't believe Democrats often, if ever, try to muscle the First Amendment like this. Let's see ... it wasn't more than a few years...
Dean's Confederate Comment Reverberates on Internet
Over the past few days, I have observed a fascinating phenomenon: my post on Howard Dean and his outreach to people who have a Confederate flag on their trucks gets over 10 hits an hour from various search engines, notably Google. Despite the fact that I post regularly on political topics and the War on Terror, this is by far and away the most-requested post from search engines. Granted that this is not a scientific sample, and the Internet is not necessarily representative of the nation as a whole (and some of these searches are originating internationally), but it appears that Dean's comments have inflamed a large number of people who are looking for something on the Internet. No one has posted any comments on my original post, so I can only guess as to what it specifically means, but in general, those comments have resonated to a greater degree...
Weight Isn't The Most Important Thing
My talented and very good-looking friend, Haddayr Copley-Woods, has a new column in the Minnesota Women's Press regarding society's obsession with weight: As a feminist, I am ambivalent about having lost weight at all. Fat is a feminist issue, and although my weight loss was well within the scientific standard for my height and frame, I feel in a way as if I have betrayed the sisterhood. We should love ourselves for who we are, I tell myself, and people should love us for what’s inside. We should not be afraid to take up space. Also, I used to look a little tougher. Quit laughing. I said “a little.” Make sure you read the whole thing, and check out her previous columns as well. Haddayr always delivers an intelligent and entertaining column, I suppose even when we disagree, although so far that hasn't happened....
The DNC Discovers Humor
Nothing that has happened in this tempest in a teacup is scarier than the DNC's statement. This isn't a fringe group, for crying out loud, these people want to run our government! Either they're about to drive off a cliff in the next year, or centrist Democrats need to stage a palace coup and eject Terry McAuliffe. They have become delusional in their bitterness.
Howard Dean's Foot Strikes Again
Howard Dean, a man reportedly so intelligent that he is allowed to prescribe medication for people, needs something for his chronic foot-in-mouth disease: Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean told a Tallahassee audience today that southerners have to quit basing their votes on "race, guns, God and gays." Is Dean trying to lose the nomination? He traveled all the way to Tennessee just to tell Southerners to their faces that they're idiots who only vote on the basis of bigotry, religious fanaticism, and homicidal rage. Oh, and please stop doing that. What's next on the Dean itinerary -- a stop at the Bar Association to tell a few bad lawyer jokes, followed by an appearance at the NEA to tell the teachers that they should learn how to read first before trying to teach kids? It's one thing to tell voters what they need to hear (for instance, on entitlements) when...
November 6, 2003
Democratic Pickup Lines
George Will writes an excellent column in today's Washington Post, one of three at least nominally about Howard Dean, but Will expands his review to the entire Democratic field of candidates: For Dean and Deanites, the idea of courting the Confederate-flag-and-pickups cohort gives them the frisson of walking on the wild side, the tingle of keeping bad company, like a professor in a biker bar. But Dean's statement, which dripped a kind of regional disdain, was a clumsy attempt to make a sensible point: Disdain no voters. The other candidates, instead of getting past the clumsiness (a Dean trademark), jumped all over Howard Dean to prove their own diversity chops, missing the point entirely. Dean sees that the South is about to depart from the Democrats for a generation, in part because the same disdain that dripped from Dean's statement has been part of the radical Left since the Civil...
The Meme of the Moment: Saint Ronald?
It didn't take long for the left to spin the CBS decision to cancel the "Reagans" miniseries and shift it to Showtime instead. Now we are about to be bombarded with accusations that right-wing nutbars are insisting that Ronald Reagan be portrayed as a saint. Consider this from Timothy Noah in Slate: It isn't especially troubling that CBS would bow to angry protesters in canceling The Reagans, given that the miniseries itself, if at all typical of the genre, is likely a piece of hackwork. (Those who live by popular tastes, die by popular tastes.) But it is troubling that the public, or at least a highly influential segment of it, has apparently ruled any criticism of President Reagan out of bounds. When did the Gipper become St. Ronald? The answer is, of course, that he didn't, and no one is insisting that he was. What generated the vehement protests...
And There Was a Great Wailing and Gnashing of Teeth
... at least amongst Democrats, as productivity continues to rise and jobless claims fell to their lowest rate in almost 3 years: Productivity — the amount an employee produces per hour of work — grew at an annual rate of 8.1 percent in the July-to-September quarter, the fastest pace since the first quarter of 2002. That was up from a 7 percent clip in the second quarter, the department reported. ... In a second report, new applications for jobless benefits last week plummeted by a seasonally adjusted 43,000 to 348,000. That marked the lowest level since the week ending Jan. 20, 2001, and was much better than the 380,000 level that economists forecast. The four-week moving average of new claims, which smooths out weekly fluctuations, dropped to 380,000 last week, the best showing since the week ending March 10, 2001. So now that the economy and the job market are...
November 7, 2003
Jesse Jackson says Iraq is a 'quagmire' akin to Vietnam
Jesse Jackson runs off at the mouth again: Rev. Jesse Jackson on Friday said the U.S. occupation of Iraq was a "quagmire" similar to that seen in Vietnam and that the United States must form alliances through the United Nations if it is to withdraw from the country peacefully. ... While the United States is viewed as an occupying force, the United Nations could be seen as a liberating force, he said, adding that "the key to that is to really appeal to China, to France and to Germany to come in as partners under the umbrella of the U.N." Once again, we get the tired recitation of who needs to approve our foreign policy before the US can take any action in its own interest. This is the first time I've heard China trotted out; as far as I know, China wasn't threatening to veto the 17th resolution. France...
The Partisan Diet
It loks like the "clubby" and "bipartisan" atmosphere of the House Appropriations Subcommittee may be a thing of the past -- and the winners will be American taxpayers: Rep. Ralph Regula (R-Ohio), who chairs the subcommittee that controls spending on education, health and jobs programs, recently stunned Democrats by announcing plans to reject every "earmarked" project they are seeking in the final, compromise version of the bill, which funds the departments of Education, Health and Human Services, and Labor. His reason: When the House passed the bill on July 10, all 198 Democrats present voted against it, several of them saying it shortchanged education programs. The bill passed, 215 to 208. So what happened was that the subcommittee loaded up the bill with both Republican and Democratic pork, and then the Democrats stiffed the Republicans when it came to voting on the bill in the House, including (apparently) Democrats who...
Voting Without a Choice
The Washington Post sends out a clear warning signal about the effects of radical gerrymandering on democratic processes: VIRGINIANS CAN FLATTER themselves that they held an election this week, and in some technical sense they did. Votes were cast, and by day's end candidates had won state offices. Yet there was one glaring problem, which should gnaw at everyone who left the polls with a cheery "I Voted" sticker: Most of the legislative races were hardly more competitive than elections in the old Soviet Union. And just as it is in non-democratic societies, this absence of meaningful competition was the product of deliberate manipulation -- in this case the gerrymandering of legislative districts by the politicians who then run for reelection from those districts. Most results were known before a single vote was cast. This problem occurs more frequently than ever in more and more states, and why this is...
QandO: Job Recovery Fastest in 20 Years
Jon at QandO sheds a little light on the "bleak" job recovery progress. Job recovery to a 6.0% unemployment rate from past recessions took 57 months after the 1982 recession and 41 months after the 1991 recession. Recovery time for this recession? 23 months. Now, compare our previous post-recessionary periods with our current post-recessionary period and try to figure out why this unemployment rate is being called unusually bad. Oh. Right. Elections. My bad. When Jon observes, Jon gets it right. Check out the entire blog, if you appreciate rational and fact-based argument. (Hell, check it out even if you don't.)...
It Seems A Little Odd for a "Jobless" Recovery
I know we're in a jobless recovery, because all of those truth-tellers like Al Sharpton keep telling us so, but shouldn't the primary characteristic of a jobless recovery be one that doesn't create jobs? The economy has created nearly 300,000 new jobs in the past three months after a half-year drought, pushing unemployment down to 6 percent in October and leaving little doubt that the jobs market is bouncing back. The Labor Department reported Friday that payrolls grew by 126,000 last month, many more than economists had predicted. That followed a revised 125,000 new jobs in September, more than double what initially was reported. U.S. companies added 35,000 to their payrolls in August. 250,000 jobs added in the last two months. At that rate, we'll add 1.75 million jobs by Election Day next year. We aren't out of the woods economically, though: The new jobs added last month mostly were...
Rip Van Wepner
I know boxers tend to get a little slow in their old age, but this is ridiculous: The boxer who was the inspiration for Sylvester Stallone (news)'s "Rocky" films plans to file a lawsuit against the actor for illegally using his name to promote the films and other merchandise, attorneys said Friday. Chuck Wepner, 65, is seeking $15 million in damages from the right of publicity claim, said his attorney Anthony Mango. The suit will be filed next week in New Jersey State Court. Uh, Chuck ... Rocky first came out 27 years ago, pal. Why the delay? Mango said Wepner waited almost 28 years before filing the suit because he always expected Stallone to compensate him. "Stallone said there was going to be something in this for Chuck. But he was giving him shallow promises to placate him. Chuck took him as a man of his word, but then...
Finally, the Strib figures out finance, sort of
Okay, maybe this is a sign of the impending Apocalypse, but even the Minneapolis Star-Tribune has figured out that the economy is improving: For the second time in two weeks, the economy has delivered terrific news for President Bush -- and all Americans. The employment report released Friday shows that the nation's long jobless recovery has come to an end, and that the recovery's job-creating phase probably started last summer, earlier than analysts thought. Coupled with a strong report on gross domestic product released last week, the data suggest that the economy finally is picking up steam after two years of lackadaisical expansion. But, being the Star-Tribune, it simply cannot allow that Bush's economic policies may have been correct all along: More worrisome are the long-term consequences of the president's budget policies. Rather than offer temporary stimulus -- the solution prescribed by a broad spectrum of economists -- the White...
November 8, 2003
Subtleties of Media Bias
Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit discusses an apparently common experience in media -- reporters who go into an interview with a predetermined agenda. I won't excerpt it as Glenn mostly uses an article by Roger Ebert to illustrate his point. Glenn relates this to interviews specifically, but I suspect that this phenomenon is more widespread in journalism. I would guess that reporters already know what their approach to a story will be before they ever write a word or spend an hour investigating. Read Glenn's post; it's very illuminating....
Michael Moore: Man of the People
As if we needed another reason to dislike Michael Moore, try reading this letter (3rd item): Recently, a co-worker asked me if I had seen the movie Bowling for Columbine yet, I told her absolutely not! My answer surprised her, given the fact my son, Matthew, was one of the 13 murdered during the deadliest school shooting in our country's history. I explained to her that prior to the public release of the movie the families of the injured and dead were invited by Michael Moore to attend a preview screening. How thoughtful. Our family and others considered attending because we were genuinely interested in his message to the public regarding gun control and school violence. However, once we discovered he was going to charge us admission we refrained from doing so. It's laughable that Moore attempts to portray himself as an anti-establishment liberal who is the voice of the...
Republicans Going to the Mattresses?
Today's Washington Post offers hope to those Republicans who believe that the Senate has allowed the Democrats a pain-free filibuster option for too long on federal judiciary nominees: A brewing rebellion by conservative activists has prompted Senate Republican leaders to plan to devote at least 30 straight hours of debate next week to their bid to confirm a handful of judicial nominees being blocked by Democrats. The Republicans are bringing in food and cots for the "Justice for Judges Marathon," scheduled for Wednesday night through Friday morning. It seems like they may be starting to take the filibusters seriously. No one has ever filibustered federal judiciary nominees before (with the exception of Abe Fortas' Supreme Court nomination in the sixties), and the Democrats have done it four times this session. But their obstructionism hasn't gotten a lot of play because the Republicans have allowed them to filibuster without actually doing...
November 9, 2003
Demosophia on John Edwards
John Edwards is increasingly irrelevant, except as a Quayle-like VP candidate, but that doesn't stop Demosophia from one of the best political skewerings I've heard this election cycle: He's the kind of guy who would try to make a horse out of parts from a zebra, a hippo, and a giraffe, and then blame the resulting bloody mess on the poor quality of the animals. The actual post is not too much longer than that -- go read and enjoy....
The System is Broken
The continuous front-loading and jockeying of state primaries has led several states to cancel presidential primaries as a waste of time and money: Several states have moved to drop their presidential primaries next year, worried about costs in still-tight financial times and wondering if the political exercise would serve any purpose. Some say they can't afford the millions of dollars it costs to put on an election. Others say the decisions reflect the lopsided nature of modern primaries: The front-runner gets anointed by the media and campaign donors after the first few state primaries and the rest of the primaries are formalities. Quite frankly, it's well past time for Congress to take a hand in this process. What happens now is that presidential campaigns start up to eighteen months prior to the election, a lot of money and time gets spent, only to have candidates fall by the wayside early...
Drug War Insanity
This one is all over the blogosphere today, and I hesitated to link to it, but it's just too outrageous to ignore: Gun-toting police burst into a South Carolina high school, ordering students to lie down in hall ways as they searched for drugs. The commando-style raid has parents questioning the wisdom of police tactics. The raid occurred Wednesday at Stratford High School in Goose Creek, S.C. Surveillance video obtained by CBS Affiliate WCSC in Charleston shows the police waving their guns and searching lockers as students lie flat on their stomachs or sides. Police officers burst in on a bunch of high-school kids, waving automatic weapons around and acting much like you'd expect from takeover-style bank robbers, and for what? "We received reports from staff members and students that there was a lot of drug activity. Recently we busted a student for having over 300 plus prescription pills. The...
November 10, 2003
Welcome to Sacramento, Mr. Governator
It didn't take long to indoctrinate Governor-elect Schwarzenegger into backstabbing, Sacramento style: The mystery began a month ago, when Lockyer revealed to a crowd of consultants, political scientists and journalists that he had broken ranks with the Democratic Party and voted for Schwarzenegger in the Oct. 7 recall election. Lockyer also seemed to trivialize allegations that Schwarzenegger mistreated and groped women over the span of three decades, dismissing the conduct as "frat boy" antics. But last week, Lockyer said in a news conference that the allegations aren't about to fade and deserve to be investigated — and he shared a few nuggets from a conversation with Schwarzenegger on the topic the day before. That infuriated Schwarzenegger's transition team, whose spokesman a few hours later accused Lockyer of betraying a confidence, in violation of attorney-client privilege. The battle escalated the next day. Lockyer told San Francisco radio station KGO that he...
But they were doing so well!
Not a great shock: CNN is reporting that Senator John Kerry has fired the manager of his struggling campaign: Democratic candidate John Kerry fired his campaign manager Sunday night in an attempt shake up his beleaguered presidential bid, The Associated Press learned. ... [Jim] Jordan will be replaced by longtime Democratic operative Mary Beth Cahill. Cahill has worked for Emily's List, a lobbying group on behalf of women's political issues and Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts. Kerry was supposed to be the front runner, but as events unfolded, it appears that both Kerry and Howard Dean have been surprised by Dean's pole vault to the front of the pack, if you'll pardon the mixed metaphor. I think Dean expected to be able to sit around #2 or #3 until the primaries, snipe at Kerry and maybe Lieberman from behind and keep expectations low, and then claim momentum from a...
Dowd Watch x2 at the Daily Dish
Andrew Sullivan hits Maureen Dowd with two blasts today from his blog. I won't excerpt; just go read both, especially the second, where Andrew discovers the source of the "imminent" claim that's been obsessing Maureen of late....
Tommy Franks Rejects Wes Clark as Presidential Material
The Clark campaign took another broadside from a former senior military commander: Gen. Tommy Franks, who retired after leading the first stage of this year's war against Iraq, says in a new report that Wesley Clark, another former general, would make a lousy president. "Absolutely not," said Franks, when asked if Clark, who recently joined the pack of presidential wannabes, would make a good commander-in-chief. This follows the comments previously made made by General Hugh Shelton, which alluded to integrity and character issues. That two former senior military peers would openly disparage General Clark's presidential campaign is unprecedented; in the military, normally great care is taken to support former comrades-in-arms, at least in terms of their leadership and their service. Nor is this the only odd thing about the Post story. He insinuates that his termination as commander during the Kosovo conflict was engineered by Secretary of Defense William Cohen...
November 11, 2003
CNN: Creating the News as We See Fit
CNN reportedly wrote and distributed questions for the Rock the Vote debate and required audience members to ask them, according to an LA Times report: CNN, which has marketed itself as an outlet for serious news, planted a question about computer preferences at last week's debate of the Democratic presidential candidates, according to the student who posed the query and on Monday wrote about it in an online forum of Brown University's Daily Herald. During the debate, cosponsored by the nonprofit Rock the Vote organization, Alexandra Trustman asked the candidates whether they preferred the PC or Mac format for their computers. Despite uncertainty about the relevance of the question, Trustman was told that she could not ask her own question: But when she arrived in Boston for the debate, she wrote, she was "handed a note card" with the question and told she couldn't ask her alternative "because it wasn't...
Kerry Campaign Turmoil Deepens
The turmoil in the Kerry campaign deepened as two key officials quit in protest over Jim Jordan's firing: Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites)'s press secretary and deputy finance director quit Tuesday, adding to the bitter turmoil on Kerry's team after the dismissal of his campaign manager. Robert Gibbs, chief spokesman for the Massachusetts lawmaker, and deputy finance director Carl Chidlow quit in reaction to the firing of Jim Jordan, abruptly let go by Kerry Sunday night. Both expressed dissatisfaction with the campaign, according to officials. Kerry initiated the shake-up by firing Jordan, his campaign manager, to demonstrate that he intended to reverse the poor showing of his campaign against Howard Dean. Some Democrats feel that Kerry was the problem more than the people in his campaign, acting as if the nomination was his "entitlement". and allowing Dean's energy to blow him off of the stage. But...
November 12, 2003
It's The Diva in All of Us
Syl Jones, a writer I don't normally recommend, has a good column in today's Strib about the growing sense of uncivility in today's society: At twilight a few weeks ago, on I-394 East, I witnessed yet another sign of our impending demise as a species. A young man held a "Howard Dean for President" sign on an overpass, waving at the passing cars. Directly in front of me, a bull-necked idiot driving a Jeep Wagoneer leaned out of his window and violently thrust his middle finger in the air, causing a temporary loss of vehicle stability that put me and several other drivers at risk of injury. To say that some people are angry these days is an understatement. The streets are boiling with unhappy, impatient and selfish people just spoiling for a fight. Sometimes, it's hard not to give them one. Jones presents a new theory of Divalution; if...
Best of Veteran's Day
In honor of my father (Korea), father-in-law (WWII, Korea, d. 1991), paternal uncles (WWII, Korea, peacetime), maternal uncles (Vietnam, peacetime), and cousins (peacetime, current), here are a few posts around the blogosphere that represent the best of the blogosphere's remembrances of Veteran's Day... Power Line has the best veteran's story, one of an unrecognized hero: Capt. Harry Hornbuckle. Venomous Kate reminds us of the everyday sacrifices of military families. Leave her a message telling her how much we appreciate both her and her husband. Michelle at A Small Victory has two notable posts about Veteran's Day. In the first, she talks about how much of our lives we take for granted, and how much of that is possible only due to the sacrifice of our military. In the second, she notes how a few mouthbreathers spent their Veteran's Day disrespecting that sacrifice. To our soldiers, past and present: thank you...
Executive Life, Now Dead, May Come Back to Haunt the French
Forbes has an update on the fallout of the Executive Life scandal, which may ensnare prominent French politicians (via Zonotics and Instapundit) : In April 1991 a California insurance company called Executive Life, having gone bust, became the object of an investigation by the state of California. In 1992 what had once been France's most successful bank, Crédit Lyonnais (now a decrepit institution), put together a deal whereby the bank would buy Executive Life's junk bond portfolio, and a new French insurance company would take over Executive Life's insurance business. At the time of the deal, Crédit Lyonnais was owned by the French state. Under U.S. federal law banks could not own insurance companies; under California law state-owned companies could not own insurance companies. The deal was agreed to because U.S. insurance regulators were assured that the new insurance company was independent of Crédit Lyonnais. ... The clash of cultures...
Kristof: Hold the Vitriol
Some words of warning to the left (and the right), courtesy of Nicholas Kristof in today's NY Times: Liberals have now become as intemperate as conservatives, and the result — everybody shouting at everybody else — corrodes the body politic and is counterproductive for Democrats themselves. My guess is that if the Democrats stay angry, then they'll offend Southern white guys, with or without pickups and flags, and lose again. We could argue about the origins of this polarity or who was angrier earlier, but at this point, both sides are equally guilty of irrational political hatred and it needs to stop, or at least those who indulge in this sort of behavior need to be marginalized. We are all Americans, and most of us come to our beliefs through heartfelt experiences, observations, and philosophy. We can learn from one another and we can compromise where necessary so that we...
Filibuster: Your Remedy for Insomnia
I'm not linking to anything specific here, but just a couple of bipartisan thoughts on tonight's debate in the well of the Senate. I've been flipping back and forth (I can't miss a new episode of South Park, after all), and my insistence on watching the marathon debate claimed its first victim: my wife. She fell asleep at 7 pm and went to bed. My insomnia seems to be more resistant to the blathering, but it's getting to be a close-run thing. Right now, I'm watching Harry Reid, D-Nevada, who had a clever moment earlier. He claimed he had a chart showing the administration's efforts to create jobs, and put up a blank white board. He then said, "If you turn it around, it shows the exact same data." Despite everything, he's pretty entertaining. Now, Charles Schumer, D-NY, keeps pointing at the score, 168-4, saying that the 4 were rejected,...
Poll: Bush Approval Rating on Economy Up
I haven't seen too much of these poll numbers today -- it's enough to make one believe in that mythical left-wing media bias: Public approval of President Bush's handling of the economy has increased amid signs that the economy is recovering, according to a poll out Wednesday. Half in the NBC-Wall Street Journal poll, 50 percent, approved of Bush's handling of the economy, up from 43 percent who approved two months ago. Bush's overall job approval was at 51 percent, with 44 percent not approving. That's largely unchanged from that same poll two months ago - when he was at 49 percent. Despite the relentless carping Bush has endured, his polling continues to improve on the economy. Since his economic packages were passed by Congress, we've had growth in every quarter, and now the employment numbers are falling into line, too. The AP released this story at 7:32 pm today....
November 13, 2003
We're From the Government, We're Here to Help
A Minneapolis couple who called for medical advice after a home birth nearly lost custody of their children -- and now they're suing the city and the police: As they had with many of their eight other children, Daniel and Karen Mathias chose for Karen to give birth to Gabriel in their Minneapolis home last Christmas. Their call to a hospital the next day seeking advice on the newborn's eating behavior ended with child protection workers phoning, police knocking on their door and what the couple contend was a forced trip to a hospital. ... A hospital staff member who called back that evening "became agitated" on learning the baby had been born at home and insisted that he be brought in immediately and examined. Karen Mathias didn't believe it was necessary. The baby appeared happy and healthy. She said in an interview that she intended to take the child...
Generalissimo Franco Is Still Dead
I noticed this morning that the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and New York Times still have not put Bush's rising poll numbers anywhere on their main web pages. The Minneapolis Star Tribune doesn't even carry the story on its Politics section. MS-NBC has a prominent link on their main web page, but since NBC sponsored the poll, that makes sense. CNN? Nothing on its main page, nothing on its Politics page. Seattle Times? Nothing, not even on its wire service. AP wire on Yahoo? It's right there, in time order. Remember when Bush's numbers were falling? Did you have to search all over the place for that story, or was it headline news? But there's no such thing as a left-wing bias in the media. Riiiiiiiiiiiiight....
Moore No More: Alabama Chief Justice Removed
But -- but -- that order was a lawful order, given by a superior court with proper jurisdiction, and Moore was bound by his oath as an officer of the court to obey it. An oath, by the way, invoking the same God he claims to defend!
November 14, 2003
But Mumia Is a Martyr
Aaron McGruder, who draws the "Boondocks" comic strip, considers Condoleezza Rice a "murderer", and apparently the NAACP agrees: NAACP Chairman Julian Bond said over the weekend that he agreed with political cartoonist Aaron McGruder's characterization of National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice as "a murderer." ... "I don't like her because she's a murderer," the cartoonist announced. The charged drew immediate condemnation from Armstrong Williams, who complained, "That is totally out of line to say she's a murderer." Unfazed, McGruder repeated the accusation, stretching out his words, "S-h-e'-s a m-u-r-d-e-r-e-r." What did Julian Bond, longtime civil rights activist and now the chairman of the NAACP, have to say about McGruder's accusation? Certainly not words of temperance or support for a successful African-American woman in high government office: "I generally agree with his politics 100 percent and I think he explained himself well," the NAACP chief said. The NAACP's message is clear...
Lileks Is On Fire
Today's Bleat is unbelievably good; go read it now. Need convincing? Then Ted Rall wrote a column called “Why We Fight” in the voice of an Iraqi “resistance” fighter. I suppose it’s intended to help us understand the mindset of the enemy. Eh. The French have a saying: his head, it is filled with urine. Or they should have such a saying; I’m sure it would sound elegant and dismissive. These people aren’t the loyal opposition anymore; they’re just the opposition. They may say they love America, but they love some idealized nonexistent America that can never exist as long as there’s individuality and free will. They’re like people who say they love women and beat their wife because she doesn’t look like the Playboy centerfold. I’m sick of the lot of them. As for Rall, who cares about him? He’ll get his reward: the great yawning indifference of history....
And You Thought a 40-Hour Talk Marathon Was Stupid
Do you want to know how ridiculous this Senate nomination debate has become? Then check out the flap over the comments made by Sen. Zell Miller regarding Justice Janice Rogers Brown: "The Democrats in this chamber refuse to stand and let her do it. They're standing in the doorway, and they've got a sign: Conservative African-American women need not apply. And if you have the temerity to do so your reputation will be shattered and your dignity will be shredded. Gal, you will be lynched," Miller said. Well, Zell's fellow Democrats were aghast at Zell's choice of analogies, as you might imagine, and all of the rhetorical cannons were fired: "I was offended. I think it was unfortunate," Daschle said. "I think those within the civil rights leadership who have commented and have asked for an apology are right." ... "Either Senator Miller has conveniently forgotten a frightening period of...
November 16, 2003
Dixie Democrats and States Rights
The Washington Times published an analysis of Southern Democrat attitudes rolling into this election cycle, and just the number of Democrats talking on the record should be discouraging for the Dean campaign's desire to reach out to Southerners: Interviews with Democratic chairmen throughout the Southern and border states elicit a range of surprisingly frank emotions about the party's feisty, Northeastern front-runner — from impressive to wait-and-see discomfort to fear that his liberal views on Iraq, tax cuts and social issues once again would allow Mr. Bush to sweep the region, as he did in 2000 against Al Gore. Most acknowledge the growing conservatism that dominates their region, and some concede it will be difficult, if not impossible, to carry many Southern states if the nominee is out of step with mainstream Southern values. What struck me was the number of people in Democratic leadership posts that were willing to be...
November 17, 2003
India & Syria: The New Laurel & Hardy
Who knew that when India and Syria decided to get together that it would produce such comedic possibilities: India and Syria want the United Nations (news - web sites) to play a major role in Iraq (news - web sites) where the priority must be to restore security, said a joint statement to mark the departure of Indian premier Atal Behari Vajpayee. The two countries said it was "vital that the Iraqi people take charge of their own destiny", and for the United Nations to "play a large role in the economic and political reconstruction of Iraq". Wow, wouldn't that be great! Oh, wait a moment -- the UN buggered out of Iraq when their security forces allowed terrorists to bomb their facility. Their security forces, of course, were their former Iraqi Intelligence Services minders under the Saddam Hussein regime. So we should allow the UN to use Saddam's Gestapo...
He Still Doesn't Get It
Gray Davis, who is out of a job as of today, apparently still entertains notions of apolitical domeback, despite his recent recall: After five years in office, Gray Davis leaves the Capitol today on an ignominious note, the only California governor ever recalled by voters. But far from being chastened, the 60-year-old Democrat has surprised longtime associates with a reaction that some characterize as deep denial of his fate. He has hinted at a political comeback — sometimes in a joking fashion, at other times seriously — noting that his removal from office so early in his second term means he still could serve another term as governor, said people close to Davis, all speaking on the condition of anonymity. Nothing is impossible in politics -- after all, who would have thought that Gore could have screwed up a "gimme" Presidential election in 2000, partly by losing his own home...
QandO Fisks the Latest E-Mail Trash
Jon at QandO does a terrific job of fisking the latest e-mail blitz: George W. Bush's "resume". A sample: We garnered the most sympathy for the U.S. after the World Trade Center attacks and less than a year later I made the U.S. the most hated country in the world, the largest failure of diplomacy in world history. Losing sympathy was the largest diplomatic failure in world history? Gosh, I'd have thought it was, you know, the tiff that started WW1, or something. Do tell.....what did we plan to do with that sympathy? Was there some sort of bank account in which it would have gathered interest and paid for our funeral after we'd ignored the threat for a bit longer? And could the US possibly be the most hated, because of government controlled media propaganda like this? The United States wasn't "loved" even in the halcyon days of the...
Promises Kept, But Miles To Go Before He Sleeps
Arnold Schwarzenegger was sworn into office today after a historic recall election, and immediately kept a key campaign promise: Newly inaugurated California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed an order rolling back a 300 percent increase in state vehicle registration fees Monday, just hours after taking the oath of office. Executive Order No. 1 repealed the $4 billion increase in the "car tax," imposed earlier this year to help shrink a massive budget shortfall from $38 million to $8 million. Analysts believe the fee hike contributed heavily to his predecessor's defeat. Reversing the car tax was one of actor Schwarzenegger's leading campaign promises. The revenue loss will complicate his goals of balancing the budget, but perhaps at this stage it is more important to keep promises and build trust with an electorate whose trust has been badly bruised the past few years. His first legislative target appears to be the enormous workers-compensation...
Let's Keep the British Protests in Perspective
All we're hearing in our newspapers is that Britain's about to erupt with anti-American hatred in response to a visit from President Bush. Well, it's a bit overblown, as the Guardian reports in a new poll taken amongst the British electorate: The survey shows that public opinion in Britain is overwhelmingly pro-American with 62% of voters believing that the US is "generally speaking a force for good, not evil, in the world". It explodes the conventional political wisdom at Westminster that Mr Bush's visit will prove damaging to Tony Blair. Only 15% of British voters agree with the idea that America is the "evil empire" in the world. Just as here, the UK has a large, diverse population, and it's not difficult to come up with a few thousand mouthbreathers that would be happy to loudly protest damn near anything, especially a representative of capitalism and military strength. Supposedly, Tony...
November 18, 2003
Mass. Court Strikes Down Gay-Marriage Ban
I'm sure this news will fan the flames of the blogosphere and talk radio for the next few days: Massachusetts' highest court ruled 4-3 Tuesday that the state's ban on same- sex marriage is unconstitutional and gave lawmakers 180 days to come up with a solution that would allow gay couples to wed. ... "Whether and whom to marry, how to express sexual intimacy, and whether and how to establish a family — these are among the most basic of every individual's liberty and due process rights," the majority opinion said. "And central to personal freedom and security is the assurance that the laws will apply equally to persons in similar situations." "Barred access to the protections, benefits and obligations of civil marriage, a person who enters into an intimate, exclusive union with another of the same sex is arbitrarily deprived of membership in one of our community's most rewarding...
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November 19, 2003
Great Security at Buckingham Palace
Security breaches like this happen here in America, too, but with all of the protests going on over President Bush's visit, you'd think a little bit of double-checking would be in order: The Daily Mirror newspaper, claiming to have exposed a security breach at Buckingham Palace, said its reporter had been given full access to Queen Elizabeth II's residence on his first day on the job two months ago. The Mirror said reporter Ryan Parry had been due to serve breakfast Wednesday morning to key Bush aides. It said Parry quit his job as a royal footman at midnight Tuesday. It's not unusual for new hires to begin working ahead of receiving their security clearances, but very unusual to be given complete access to the most sensitive areas, regardless of where you work: Parry said he gave one real reference and one fake reference when he applied for work at...
Don't We Look Peachy?
I know every media outlet in the nation is covering the Michael Jackson/Neverland Ranch search story, instead of something a bit more useful, but our national shame has reached international status. Merde in France has posted about this, linking to a Canadian story, with this lovely little quote from The King of Pop: Jackson denounced media coverage of the search in a statement released by Backerman to The Associated Press. "I've seen lawyers who don't represent me and spokespeople who do not know me speaking for me. These characters always seem to surface with dreadful allegations just as another project, an album, a video is being released," the Jackson statement said. Yes, it's not enough that this well-known creep manages to embarrass us internationally, he also manages to plug his latest project along with it. Hey, I guess there's no such thing as bad publicity, is there? Also, Merde in...
Nolan Myers' Family Speaks Out
Some of you may remember this post regarding the death of a Minnesota teen in North Carolina, who was hit by a drunk driver while being a Good Samaritan and trying to assist stranded motorists on Route 54. Nolan was one of six people killed by Larry Robert Veeder, whose blood alcohol level was .18, which is over twice the legal threshold in most states, including North Carolina. Veeder was charged with six counts of involuntary manslaughter. This was the story as I excerpted it from the Star Tribune (links no longer valid): When Nolan Myers saw somebody was in need he was always willing to lend a helping hand, his family and friends said. ... He and three friends came upon the accident and stopped to be good samaritans. As Myers, 18, of Carver, Minn., reached one of the injured motorists, the driver of a speeding van plowed into...
November 20, 2003
Update on Miss Afghanistan
For all of you fans of beauty in the cause of freedom, the Los Angeles Times has an update to the story of Miss Afghanistan, who made headlines around the world when she competed in the Miss Earth pageant in Manila: Miss Afghanistan knew she was taking a risk when she strutted across a Manila catwalk in a bright red bikini. ... But she did not know she would be denounced by the government of her native land, criticized by fellow Afghans — even in the U.S. — and at the same time hailed by others as a role model for girls and women in the "new Afghanistan." All because of a bikini — and a modest one at that. Where is Vida Samadzai now? She's at Cal State Fullerton, my alma mater, where I managed to avoid graduating by avoiding classes. She's studying international business and communications, and is...
They Don't Just Eat Donuts in Eagan
In Eagan, Minnesota, the police chief isn't a desk jockey, at least not full time: A teenager who allegedly burglarized eight Eagan homes in less than three hours Tuesday didn't realize who was waiting for him when he headed for the street. ... Out of the unmarked squad stepped Eagan Police Chief Kent Therkelsen. Therkelsen drew his gun and ordered the 16-year-old boy to the ground. The youth complied, going face down. Less than a minute later, officer Paul Maier pulled up to assist his boss. Chief Therkelsen has an engaging sense of humor about the incident: Therkelsen said he doesn't want to turn Tuesday's arrest into "the Kent show." He credits the hard work of his officers and the quick action of citizens. He just happened to be in the right place at the right time, he said. "My theory is this guy was looking for the oldest cop...
All Your Foreign Policies Are Belong To Us
Thousands of British protestors are storming the streets ... well, sort of, as David Carr lets us know at Samizdata:
Behind The Protests ... Same Old Crowd
Hindrocket returns from Britain with perspective on President Bush's visit and the protests that have ensued. Power Line posts Hindrocket's extensive post, which is definitely worth a read: What was most striking to me was the utter lack of substance in most coverage of the visit. The focus was almost exclusively on the security precautions attending the trip, which were pretty universally frowned upon, and the demonstrations against President Bush, which were hoped-for, salivated over, and covered with gusto. No one spoiled the mood by reminding readers that these were the same tired demonstrations (and largely the same tired demonstrators) who have greeted past American presidents. The BBC, for the most part, disdained to cover the visit at all. Hindrocket spent quite a bit of time in England and had a chance to look into the guiding spirits behind these tired, and oddly absent, demonstrators. Not surprisingly, some familiar faces...
News You'll Never See
I'm trying to avoid the whole Creepy Jacko thing, but certain odd points just seem to beg for a bit of blogging. Take this, for instance, from his brother Jermaine: Jackson's brother Jermaine denounced the allegations in a CNN interview as "nothing but a modern-day lynching." "This is what they want to see: him in handcuffs. You got it. But it won't be for long, I promise you," Jermaine Jackson said. Modern-day lynching? Tom Daschle had this to say about Jermaine's choice of words: "I was offended. I think it was unfortunate," Daschle said. "I think those within the civil rights leadership who have commented and have asked for an apology are right." And this from the LCCR: "Either [he] has conveniently forgotten a frightening period of American history, or he is willfully demeaning all those African-Americans who were hung from trees throughout the period of racial segregation in the...
November 21, 2003
Lileks: Brilliant as Always
James Lileks is a Minnesota treasure, and his take on Nightline's decision to bump coverage of the President's bellwether speech at Whitehall to cover, of all things, Michael Jackson is a terrific example: You know what? Michael Moore is right. There are many Americans who are ignorant of the world around them. And they’re all TV news producers. Two big bombs in Istanbul, and what’s the big story of the day? Following around a pervy slab of albino Play-Doh as he turns himself into the police. I was stunned to discover last night that Nightline not only covered the Jackson case in detail, but bumped coverage of the Whitehall speech, which was the most important speech since the Iraq campaign began and arguably the most important speech of the war, period. You would expect that a major commercial media outlet like ABC, with a supposedly top-notch news program like Nightline,...
November 26, 2003
Positive Medicare Coverage from the Strib!
Imagine my surprise when I read this article, entitled "Medicare drug plan helps poorest most," featured on the Minneapolis Star-Tribune's web site: The poorest and the sickest older Americans will benefit most from the Medicare legislation passed Tuesday by the Senate and sent to President Bush for his anticipated signature. ... "This bill, we know it is not good enough," said Michele Kimball, Minnesota director of AARP, which supported the legislation. "The perfect plan would have cost $1 trillion. This is the best we could do. But, bottom line, it will help millions who have no help." There has been a lot of heat and smoke about this proposition, and not just from Democrats, either. Plenty of Republican conservatives are scratching their heads wondering what happened to the party of fiscal responsibility when it just expanded an entitlement program widely believed to be marching towards bankruptcy. But what good is...
November 28, 2003
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
Although this is not well known in many areas, it is popular in Minnesota to deep-fry turkeys for Thanksgiving; the process seals in moisture and cooks the bird rather quickly. However, it is not without its dangers, and it seems that every year brings stories like this: Bill Fickett wanted to give his wife a break from the kitchen on Thanksgiving, so he offered to cook the turkey. His gesture ended up setting their garage on fire and causing about $14,000 in damage. ... Fickett was heating up about 3 gallons of oil for the turkey right before the fire started. He adjusted the temperature to the recommended 350 degrees, then stepped into the house to get the bird. Smoke was pouring out of the garage when they came back. When St. Cloud firefighters arrived about 2:15 p.m., the garage was in flames, said Gene Kostreba, acting assistant fire chief....
Dana Milbank Spouts Off Again
Dana Milbank, whose reporting leaves no doubt about his feelings for the Bush administration, attempts an in-depth analysis and only manages to state that Bush is "indelibly" tied to results in Iraq -- as if that's breaking news: Iraqis may be reassured that the United States will put down the insurgency and restore order in their country. Or they may take the image of Bush landing unannounced at night without lights and not venturing from a heavily fortified military installation as confirmation that the security situation in Iraq is dire indeed. But one thing is certain. Bush's Thanksgiving Day surprise ties him, for better or worse, ever more tightly to the outcome of the Iraq struggle. Well, excuse me for stating the obvious, but duh. "Insurgents" -- otherwise known as unreconstructed Ba'athists who would like nothing better than to re-install Saddamism/Stalinism -- have access to SAMs and explosives and relatively...
November 29, 2003
Flying Home, with France On My Mind
Today we're flying back to Minneapolis, after a great vacation with the family. These times are never long enough, but it will be great to sleep in our own beds again. No other posting today, as I will be too danged busy, but you should check out this post at Jennifer's History and Stuff about France. I spent my blogging time today writing an extensive comment on why and how the French irritate the livin' snot out of me. (If you read this, Jennifer, sorry about the length.) Tomorrow, we'll have the 500th post at Captain's Quarters!...
December 1, 2003
Dru Sjodin Breaking News
This wasn't the kind of news we were hoping was coming when the media announced a break in the Dru Sjodin case: A Crookston, Minn., man has been arrested and is facing a kidnapping charge in the disappearance of Dru Sjodin, police said. Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., 50, was arrested on Monday at 7:20 p.m. in Crookston, Grand Forks police said. What's most disturbing is the last paragraph in the necessarily terse statement: Police said a search for Sjodin is ongoing. Police said no further information will be released until a press briefing on Tuesday morning. Unfortunately for the Sjodin family, an arrest without recovering Dru alive looks like we're not going to get good news in tomorrow's briefing. I'm trying to keep my hopes up, but this is tough to hear. I'm not sure why this case resonates with me so much. I suppose it could be that Dru is...
December 2, 2003
When Ideology Trumps Common Sense
You can file this one under "What Are These People Smoking?" In fact, that would make a good category here: Fired for walking into his office drunk, toting a loaded, sawed-off shotgun and saying he was looking for his bosses, a Canadian man wants his union to help him get his job back. ... The city of Moncton dismissed him, but a week later Pavlovsky went to his union to protest the firing and members agreed the union should help him try to get his job back once he finishes his prison term [emphasis mine]. Someone tell me this is satire, because this is something I'd expect in a fevered-nightmare hypothetical from the fringe right wing. The union is going to fight to get this guy back in the office, after showing up for work with a loaded illegal weapon, intending to kill people? Cases like these are why non-idiotarians...
Gun Control: A Consistent Failure
According to the Fraser Institute, restrictive firearms laws and gun confiscation programs have been expensive failures in various Commonwealth countries (via Instapundit). In England and Wales: Both Conservative and Labour governments have introduced restrictive firearms laws over the past 20 years; all handguns were banned in 1997. Yet in the 1990s alone, the homicide rate jumped 50 percent, going from 10 per million in 1990 to 15 per million in 2000. While not yet as high as the US, in 2002 gun crime in England and Wales increased by 35 percent. This is the fourth consecutive year that gun crime has increased. In Australia: While violent crime is decreasing in the United States, it is increasing in Australia. Over the past six years, the overall rate of violent crime in Australia has been on the rise – for example, armed robberies have jumped 166 percent nationwide. The confiscation and destruction...
December 3, 2003
LA Faces An Election Scandal
The LA Times breaks a story today about alleged election fraud in mayoral and City Council elections: [John] Archibald and 13 of the Casden firm's subcontractors were indicted last month on charges of conspiring to illegally funnel more than $200,000 in campaign contributions during 2000 and 2001 to Los Angeles City Council members Jack Weiss and Wendy Greuel, City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo and Kathleen Connell, who was a candidate for mayor. Archibald and the subcontractors have pleaded not guilty to the felony charges and are free on their own recognizance. Prosecutors said the Casden firm, which has a $100-million Westwood development pending before the city, had sought to buy influence with the contributions. Larry J. Higgins, owner of a Sun Valley termite-control company, testified that he had the impression that he needed to make the political donations as a condition for getting a contract from the Casden firm. He has...
QandO Firing on All Cylinders
I don't have a Blog of the Day type of category, but if I did, Jon at QandO would get the prize today. Check out his takes on the following: * Washington, DC government offices are now installing dispensers for free condoms * Jon gives the best explanation of rational libertarianism I've heard. * The economy is expanding even faster than we thought -- it's looking like a boom. * Jon doesn't believe that Hillary will run for president in '04. I'm not sure I agree, but he makes a good argument about her strategy of late. If you haven't blogrolled QandO, be sure to do so now!...
That Valerie Plame -- She Sure Knows How to Stay Concealed
This has been going around the blogosphere all day, but I figured I'd throw in my two cents, and then post a few links to other reactions. Here, from the original Washington Post story by Howard Kurtz, is the covert agent's current top-secret project: Former ambassador Joseph Wilson has been quite protective of his wife, Valerie Plame, in the weeks since her cover as a CIA operative was blown. "My wife has made it very clear that -- she has authorized me to say this -- she would rather chop off her right arm than say anything to the press and she will not allow herself to be photographed," he declared in October on "Meet the Press." Here's the woman who will not allow herself to be photographed in the Vanity Fair issue that went on sale today: It's not that Plame has dropped out of sight. In October, as...
December 4, 2003
We're So Desperate We Make Stuff Up
Mike Allen at the Washington Post wrote an article questioning Bush's integrity, but wound up damaging his own (via Instapundit): In the most widely published image from his Thanksgiving day trip to Baghdad, the beaming president is wearing an Army workout jacket and surrounded by soldiers as he cradles a huge platter laden with a golden-brown turkey. ... But as a small sign of the many ways the White House maximized the impact of the 21/2-hour stop at the Baghdad airport, administration officials said yesterday that Bush picked up a decoration, not a serving plate. ... Some of the reporters left behind at Crawford Middle School, where they work when Bush is staying at his Texas ranch, felt they had been deceived by White House accounts of what Bush would be doing on Thanksgiving. Correspondent Mark Knoller said Sunday on "CBS Evening News" that the misleading information and deception were...
Fraters Libertas Weighs In on the "Liberal Radio Network"
Now that the Al Gore/Al Franken Liberal Radio Network has new investors with some experience in the entertainment world, the buzz has increased on a possible launch, including the news that the consortium may purchase five radio stations for their programming. The guys over at Fraters Libertas do an excellent job of deconstructing the various reports, referencing a Byron York column at NRO, but applying some local knowledge of the people involved: Liberal radio hasn't been entertaining for a non partisan audience. But it's hard to appreciate Walsh's insight through his condescension. Notice how he's subtly blaming the listeners for not appreciating the substance of the “progressive side,” because it has an “air of education to it.” And in their minds that doesn't work with the talk radio crowd. (Which is why all I want for Christmas is a drool cup, for when I'm listening to the education-free mumblings of...
I Am Angry
I look at my beautiful 18-month-old granddaughter, who has so much spirit and joy at life, and I am saddened to think that soon, I will have to say to her, Sweetheart, let me explain something to you. You are developing into God's most beautiful creation: a young woman. That means you will need to live the rest of your life in fear. Stop smiling, honey. Don't make eye contact with anyone. Stop walking through parks and admiring the flowers and the trees, or someone will grab you by your beautiful strawberry-blonde hair and do things to you that are unspeakable. And if you're lucky enough to survive, we'll all tell you what you did wrong to deserve it.
December 5, 2003
More Bad News about Dru
Evidence of Alfonso Rodriguez' involvement in the Dru Sjodin case has, unfortunately, taken a grim turn: Bloodstains matching Dru Sjodin's blood type were found in the car of Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., the repeat sex offender charged with abducting her outside a Grand Forks mall, sources close to the investigation said Thursday. That evidence is perhaps the most revealing detail in the case that North Dakota authorities are building against the 50-year-old Rodriguez, who has been charged with kidnapping in the University of North Dakota student's disappearance two weeks ago. Detectives have remained tight-lipped about their investigation, even having many of the facts in court records sealed from public view. A blood type match is not the same as a DNA analysis; that will take much longer to determine. However, this explains why the police were eager to arrest Rodriguez....
Power Line's Favorite Democrat
Don't put off reading this, if only to remember that there are patriots to be found in both parties, and that courage in defense of freedom and liberty is not dead, no matter how passé it may be thought in certain circles. Go through Power Line's archives and read more about Zell Miller. I'm thinking about writing him this weekend and asking him not to retire, but to run for one more term, even as a Democrat. He'd be one I would be delighted to support, although he represents another state.
Zero Tolerance = Zero Sense
Another bit of zero-tolerance nonsense, this time at a Louisiana high school: A student expelled from Parkway High for a year for having Advil, an over-the-counter pain reliever, will not be allowed to return to the school. Kelly Herpin and daughter Amanda Stiles, a sophomore, appealed the one-year expulsion to a Bossier Parish School Board committee Thursday night, spending about 10 minutes with the board's administrative committee behind closed doors. The committee and the full board voted unanimously to uphold an administrative decision that Stiles be expelled to the alternative school. I understand the necessity of rules regarding medications for students on school grounds. The schools want to dispense the medications themselves so that they are not passed around. This makes perfect sense for prescription medication; it makes less sense for over-the-counter medication like Advil, which do not easily lend themselves to abuse. Even so, rules are rules, and Ms....
It Must Be Official: Even the Strib Printed It
A new AP-Ipsos poll has Bush's numbers rebounding, significantly enough that even the Minneapolis Star-Tribune is carrying the report: People are increasingly comfortable about job security for themselves and for those they know -- 44 percent now, compared with 35 percent in early October. And more approve of the way Bush is handling the economy -- 50 percent compared with 45 percent earlier, according to the poll conducted for the AP by Ipsos-Public Affairs. Support for his handling of other domestic issues such as education, health care and the economy, at 47 percent, has not shifted significantly. However, the Strib being the Strib, it just can't print this story without this editorializing in the middle of it: The economy is showing mixed signs of recovery: rapid growth that surprised most economists last quarter, indications the job market could be turning around, a rebound in the stock market over the past...
December 6, 2003
Another Argument for School Vouchers
I am not much of a fan of lawsuits. I tend to think that civil litigation has morphed into a version of Legal Lottery in too many cases, where people wildly exaggerate their damages in order to redistribute wealth, rather than recover reasonable damages. News stories about lawsuits raise my suspicion, for two reasons. First, I look at whether the alleged action actually caused damage and to what extent; second, why does a particular lawsuit get press coverage? In this case, the suit itself has some legal curiousity, but I suspect that the depth of reporting is intended to cast doubt on the idea of school vouchers. Otherwise, I'm not sure why this educational malpractice lawsuit, which has dubious odds of succeeding, would get so much attention from the Star Tribune: But when one mom discovered a couple of years ago that her fifth-grade daughter at the school was doing...
December 7, 2003
A Day That Might Live in Infamy
Today is the 62nd anniversary of Pearl Harbor, and I was curious to see how it would be addressed by the media, especially now that we're a couple of years past 9/11, this generation's Day of Infamy. So far, it's pretty difficult to find anything without using site search engines. Not many papers are featuring Pearl Harbor stories on their main web pages. In our area, we have two major dailies. The Star Tribune has four paragraphs -- four! -- on the anniversary. (Don't strain yourselves, folks.) They also reprint a superficial AP article by Matt Sedensky . This is the Sunday edition; there's plenty of room for more insight than this. The Pioneer Press does a better job; they have a few articles on Pearl Harbor. Unfortunately, one of them is an opinion piece by David Broder that uses Pearl Harbor to excoriate President Bush for not getting an...
Opus: A Bad Idea?
A while back, I posted about the return of Berke Breathed to the comics page with Opus, an extension of the popular character from the seminal and brilliant Bloom County comic strip of the 80s and early 90s. So far, I haven't had a chance to see any of the new stuff from Breathed, but if you read this review from uBlog, I haven't been missing much: The bad news: it's terrible. Somebody said "witty" and Breathed heard "brittle." They beamed "This is a landmark opportunity" and Breathed came away with "Make it ham-handed flummery." I keep thinking about the Sex Pistols' late-90s "reunification" tour, the first of several nostalgia-reapings: Q. Mr. Lydon, why are you and the other sexagenarian Pistols on the stage again, performing full-throated anthems about fatalist nihilism to fans one-third your age? A. Eh, what's this about rebellion? We're here to nick the last bob out...
December 8, 2003
DNA Evidence in Dru Sjodin Case: PD Sources
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reports in tomorrow's edition that the police have matched the DNA of the blood in the suspect's car to Dru Sjodin: A preliminary DNA analysis of blood found in Alfonso Rodriguez's car matches DNA taken from a toothbrush belonging to missing North Dakota college student Dru Sjodin, two sources close to the investigation told the Star Tribune on Monday. They and a third source close to the investigation confirmed Monday that investigators had found a knife in Rodriguez's car in a search conducted on Nov. 28, the day after Thanksgiving. Someone close to the investigation wants to let people know that they have the right man, although the evidence is sealed at the moment. That may change later this week after a judge reviews a motion to vacate the seal order. The leaks may complicate efforts to bring Rodriguez to trial, but that's not what everyone is...
December 9, 2003
Grand Forks Sheriff: Dru Sjodin Not Likely Alive
Following the release of the affadavit unsealed by the court in the disappearence of Dru Sjodin and the arrest of Alfonso Rodriguez, the sheriff's office appeared to have given up hope of finding the young woman alive: Hopes of finding a missing college student alive faded Tuesday, as authorities confirmed a finding of her blood in a suspect's car and revealed that they had found one of her shoes near the Red Lake River. .... Grand Forks County Sheriff Dan Hill said he thinks it unlikely that she is alive. "I certainly hate to be discouraging to the family or anyone, but it looks to me now that it's more of a recovery mission than a rescue,'' Hill said, in an interview with The Associated Press. Sjodin's mother, Linda Walker, said family members were "outraged'' by Hill's assessment. Maybe it's just me, but I hardly think it helpful to tell...
December 10, 2003
Burn All the Flags You Want -- Just Don't Speak
Conservatives profess a love for literal interpretation of the Constitution; liberals call for a conceptual interpretation; but I don't know who came up with the idea that the Constitution means everything except what it explicitly says. However, the Supreme Court has upheld major provisions of the McCain-Feingold Campaign Reform act: A divided Supreme Court upheld the broadest restrictions on campaign donations in nearly 30 years Wednesday, ruling the nation is better off with limits on the financial influence of deep-pocket donors even if money never can be divorced from politics. Rooting out corruption, or even the appearance of it, justifies limitations on the free speech and free spending of contributors, candidates and political parties, the court said in a 5-4 decision. After decades of unusual behavior being recognized as "speech" and freed of all reasonable restrictions -- like nude dancing or burning flags, for example -- the Supreme Court has...
You Wouldn't Read This in the Strib
Joe Soucheray writes an excellent article about the odd way we handle sexual predators, both specifically in Minnesota and in general: Ever since Rodriguez was arrested for his possible involvement in Sjodin's disappearance, we have all learned a great deal about Level 3 sex offenders. That's what Rodriguez is. When you reach his level, it means you are likely to commit another sex crime. Imagine that. No other criminals get their own levels. There are no Level 1 ticket scalpers as opposed to Level 3 ticket scalpers. There are no Level 3 bank robbers, or Level 1 purse snatchers. And yet, when it comes to sex offenders, we give them levels. We do attach levels to criminal actions; there are different classes of felonies, for example, although I couldn't tell you what the thresholds are. Felons themselves are not given levels, as Soucheray states, except sex offenders. Why do we...
Leaving The Kids With Dad Is An Improvement?
When I first heard this story, I thought that the police had handled it properly, but then I read it a bit closer: Four young children and the teenage baby sitters who reportedly took them were found safe inside a South Minneapolis apartment building Tuesday afternoon. Police returned the children to their joyous father around 10:45 p.m. The teenagers, however, faced possible kidnap charges, police said. The children were returned to their father, and the teenagers have been arrested. A happy ending, you say? Ah, but then you missed this, like I did at first: Addison had last seen his children Sunday morning as he headed off to church. He left them in the care of longtime baby sitter Benetta Daidii and her friend, Elisha Harris, both 13. The girls lived doors apart in their South Minneapolis neighborhood. He maintains he made the right decision to leave his children with...
December 11, 2003
Volokh Conspiracy Posts on SCOTUS Campaign Reform Decision
The Volokh Conspiracy, one of the best lawblogs in the blogosphere, has a series of interesting posts about yesterday's decision to uphold major sections of the McCain-Feingold reform laws. Eugene Volokh supported the restrictions on soft-money contributions, but not the free-speech restrictions on corporations and labor unions: Rehnquist and O'Connor switching sides: I tentatively think the Court's decision on soft money contributions was probably correct, or at least quite plausible. As I've argued before, I do think that contributions (as opposed to independent expenditures), should be more subject to restriction. I think the Court was wrong, though, to uphold restrictions on business corporations' (and some nonprofit corporations') and labor unions' right to express their support or opposition to candidates. There's a precedent for this -- Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce (1990) -- but I think that it was mistaken, largely for the reasons Justice Scalia mentioned in that case,...
France Settles Executive Life Claims - Again
France has agreed in principle to yet another settlement in the Executive Life criminal lawsuit, one sore point among many between France and the US: Negotiators from France and the United States have reached a $760 million settlement in principle with United States prosecutors over charges related to the failed California insurer Executive Life, French officials and lawyers involved in the negotiations said today. The settlement, which both sides hope to complete by Monday, involves both a federal criminal investigation as well as a civil lawsuit filed by the California insurance commissioner, who is seeking damages to compensate policyholders of Executive Life. As I posted earlier on this topic, I lost a small sum of money in the Executive Life collapse. At the time, Honeywell (my employer) had invested a significant amount of its retirement and 401k accounts in this company, and when it went under, we all felt the...
December 12, 2003
The Definition of Insanity, Part II
This community still has learned nothing about violent repeat offenders: A 25-year-old Anoka man was sentenced to 27 years in prison this morning for murdering a Minneapolis cab driver last August. Salvador Anthony Pacheco had pleaded guilty to second-degree intentional murder for shooting Mohamed Ahmed Salah in his Red & White cab early in the morning of Aug. 8. 27 years for shooting Salah in the back of the head while Salah was driving his cab. Even if Pacheco serves his entire sentence behind bars, he will get out at age 52, shockingly similar to another violent offender who just reoffended: Alfonso Rodriguez. And if you think I'm stretching the point, what do you think Pacheco was doing a couple of months before blowing Salah's brains out? Two months prior to the shooting, Pacheco was released from prison after completing a sentence for a gun-related offense in Washington County. Why...
December 16, 2003
A Class Act All The Way
Singer Lauryn Hill, after being invited to perform at a Christmas concert at the Vatican, paid back their hospitality by insulting her hosts and their religion: American singer Lauryn Hill, from a stage used by the Pope, shocked Catholic officials at a concert by telling them to "repent" and alluding to sexual abuse of children by U.S. priests. The broadside came during the recording Saturday night of a Christmas concert attended by top Vatican (news - web sites) cardinals, bishops and many elite of Italian society, witnesses said. Pardon me, but having a hip-hop artist telling anyone to repent is somewhat akin to having a drunk lecture you on the evils of cocaine. While I am aware that the Amrican Catholic Church has a big problem with sexual-abuse scandals -- and should be a lot more cooperative with investigators, especially in Los Angeles -- what Lauryn Hill said and did...
A Visit to Srebrenica
Tim Pawlenty, Governor of Minnesota, and his wife Mary are in Srebrenica visiting Minnesota National Guard troops standing guard as part of the NATO effort to keep Muslims safe in Bosnia: The weather turned suddenly ominous on Monday as Gov. Tim Pawlenty and First Lady Mary Pawlenty were finishing their tour of the memorial site of the worst massacre in Europe since World War II, walking somberly past gravesite after gravesite of newly buried victims. Gray clouds enveloped the small valley where 7,000 Muslim men and boys were rounded up to be executed later by Serb forces in July 1995. Thunder rumbled in the distance as the Pawlentys, finishing the second day of a two-day tour of Bosnia, looked at photographs in a small basement museum. Governor Pawlenty's trip has been chronicled for the past few days, as he performs the happy task of visiting Minnesota reservists and reviewing their...
December 17, 2003
Chirac: Let's Blame the Victims
France's Jacques Chirac, under pressure to respond to exploding religious violence, has come up with the novel approach of blaming the victims for the assaults: Despite protests from Muslim leaders, France must outlaw Islamic head coverings, Jewish skullcaps and other obvious religious signs in schools and regulate them in the workplace, President Jacques Chirac announced Wednesday. Such action (news - web sites), the French president said in a televised national address, is needed to reaffirm France's secular foundations. "It is not negotiable," he asserted. Islamic head scarves, Jewish yarmulkes or outsized Christian crosses "have no place" in public schools, Chirac said, and called on parliament, where his conservative government has a majority, to pass a law banning them ahead of the school year that starts in September 2004. So rather than doing something to stop the thugs that beat, rob, and rape people based on their religion, Chirac and France...
December 18, 2003
Minnesota Legislature Finally Addresses Sex-Offender Sentencing
Republicans in the Minnesota Legislature next year will address the woeful sex-offender sentencing failures that led to Dru Sjodin's disappearance last month. Democrats offered an intial willingness to consider the proposal: Minnesota House Republicans on Tuesday proposed legislation to ensure the worst sex offenders would never get out of jail. Under the plan, "convicted violent sexual predators and sex offenders who target children and vulnerable adults" would be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release. Currently, that's a sentence reserved for the worst murders. ... Senate Majority Leader John Hottinger and House Minority Leader Matt Entenza, both DFLers, said they could support something similar to the GOP proposal. Sen. Don Betzold, DFL-Fridley, chairman of the Senate's Judiciary Committee, said new sex offender sentences would have be put in the perspective of all criminal sentences. Life sentences without parole will protect society from these violent sexual predators, who...
December 23, 2003
California Earthquake Kills Two
As many of you already know, California earthquakes are rarely deadly; construction standards have been so successful that only the strongest earthquakes cause much damage at all. Unfortunately, throughout Central California there are a number of picturesque older communities that have structures that were built well before the newer standards (mostly implemented after the devastating 1933 Long Beach earthquake) were put into place. One of the most quaint of these is Paso Robles, a small town where my mother lived for a short period of time, and where she still has friends, and a community where at least two people have died from yesterday's quake: A deadly magnitude 6.5 earthquake shuddered through California's Central Coast on Monday morning, crumpling a historic building here and killing two people. The temblor — the strongest in the region's modern history — smashed shop windows, set off house fires and interrupted power service through...
December 24, 2003
Oh, Well, As Long As It's Her First Time
Here's a disturbing story from Indiana -- a 13-year-old girl has been arrested for a DUI (via Drudge Report). She managed to hit a utility pole and knock out power to a few hundred houses: The driver also had a blood-alcohol level of .089, slightly above the legal limit, police said. The girl's older sister said she had never driven before. It's her first time driving? Well, that's certainly a relief....
Support American Servicepeople!
Tom Bevan at RealClearPolitics has asked the Northern Alliance to promote several ways in which our readers can support American fighting men and women this holiday season. I'll ask you all to read his post, which contains a number of links to sites designed to do just that. If you have any others that RCP left out, please feel free to post them in the Comments section (it's HTML-enabled!), and that way we can spread the joy as widely as possible. Remember, folks, regardless of your political views, these fine young men and women are putting their lives on the line for us. Let's remind them why....
Why Not Just Improve Your Food?
Silly lawsuits with astronomical asking figures seem to be more and more the norm than the exception. This, then, should come as no surprise: The owners of Lucky Cheng's, a cabaret-restaurant with cross-dressing male waiters and entertainers, have filed a $10 million lawsuit accusing the Zagat Survey of libel for giving the restaurant a low rating for its food. The suit said Lucky Cheng's has lost about $30,000 a week since Oct. 14, 2003, when the 2004 Zagat guide was published with the low food rating — 9 out of a possible 30. Zagat's calculates its ratings by compiling feedback from patrons of the restaurant, and then publishes the results in a popular guide. Low ratings means bad business, no matter how many cross-dressing entertainers and waitstaff you hire, as Lucky Cheng's has found out. Normally, when businesses get low ratings from its patrons, they work to improve the product...
December 26, 2003
US Among International Donors to Iran Aid
Iran suffered a devastating earthquake yesterday, and the death toll is expected to rise above 10,000: Most of the historic Iranian city of Bam was destroyed in an early morning earthquake Friday, and government sources said more than 20,000 people were killed. Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency put the death toll at 5,000-6,000, and officials said they were worried that the number could climb. News service reports quoted government officials as saying more than 20,000 died. Several blogs have demanded US involvement in emergency aid to Iran in order to support the pro-US younger generation in Iran as well as for humanitarian reasons. Hugh Hewitt and Blog Iran are two amongst many who point out that our assistance will underscore our insistence that we are at war with terrorists and not Muslims. I doubt that our assistance will convince anyone who already thinks that we are at war with...
December 30, 2003
Hugh Hewitt's Predictions for 2004
National Review Online asked several of its contributors for their predictions of 2004, and the Commish, Hugh Hewitt, has a few provocative choices. There are a couple I disagree with: * Evan Bayh as Dean's VP candidate: I can't see Bayh jumping onto a rolling train wreck, even for the sake of the party. Edwards has less to lose and more to gain, and a stronger connection to the South. That change gives Bush Indiana and Maryland, loses him at least South Carolina, but overall makes no difference in Bush's landslide victory. * I don't think Cheney stays on the ticket in 2004. I think Bush thanks Cheney for his service, but Cheney bows out due to "health issues", and Bush picks either Rudy Giuliani or possibly Condoleeza Rice or Olympia Snowe to round out the ticket. Bush likes bold, historical moves, and any of these three could help him...
December 31, 2003
Brazilian Judge: Fingerprinting = Genocide
A Brazilian judge, angry at the new US policy of photographing and fingerprinting incoming immigrants and visitors with visas, retaliated yesterday by requiring US visitors to Brazil to be photographed and fingerprinted as well. It's the kind of tit-for-tat petty revenge that often occurs in diplmatic relations, although rarely does the judiciary figure into it. However, the judge's comments were shocking: "I consider the act absolutely brutal, threatening human rights, violating human dignity, xenophobic and worthy of the worst horrors committed by the Nazis," said Federal Judge Julier Sebastiao da Silva in the court order released on Tuesday. Photographing and fingerprinting are "worthy" of gassing millions of people to death? "Worthy" of cruel and medical experiments on helpless prisoners, including and especially children? I guess the Brazilians should know, seeing as they harbored the Nazis for decades after the end of World War II, especially the Angel of Death himself,...
January 2, 2004
Visit North Korea -- See Our Lovely Bombs
North Korea has invited the US to inspect its nuclear facilities prior to the next round of nonproliferation negotiations: North Korea has agreed to allow a U.S. delegation to visit its main nuclear complex next week, the first such inspection since the isolated communist country expelled United Nations monitors more than a year ago. The visit appeared to be an effort by North Korea to prove that it has built a nuclear bomb - or capable of doing so - and strengthen its negotiating position ahead of planned talks with the United States and four other nations on ending the nuclear standoff. Pyonyang could also be signaling its willingness to allow more extensive inspections in the future - if Washington meets its demands for humanitarian aid and a promise not to attack the North. While the notion that Pyongyang can prove it has a bomb sounds unsettling, it would merely...
Damned If You Do ...
It didn't take long for Iranian expressions of gratitude for the 150,000 pounds of relief materials given by the US to quake victims in Bam to turn into this: Hardliners in Iran's government criticized U.S. relief efforts after the devastating earthquake that killed more than 30,000 people and flattened the ancient city of Bam, accusing Washington of trying to meddle in Tehran's affairs. ... Khatami has thanked Washington for its support but hardline clerics within the government expressed suspicion about the motives behind U.S. aid: State radio, a mouthpiece for Iran's clerics, on Friday charged that Bush had "once again demonstrated that America's interfering and hostile policy against Iran has not altered at all." And if we hadn't sent aid, we'd be vilified as demons who won't share our wealth to save unfortunate victims of disasters. The issue? President Bush reaffirmed his commitment to ensuring Iranian nuclear programs be brought...
The Race Education of a White Guy
Howard Dean inserted his foot yet again, this time on the subject of race, and Mickey Kaus is all over it: "Dealing with race is about educating white folks." Howard Dean seems to have said this. That'll bring in those Southern pickup guys! They love being singled out for 'education'! ... Is there really nothing in "dealing with race" that involves changing African-American attitudes along with white attitudes? Dean's comment would be more depressing if weren't also the sort of cluelessly pre-Clinton utterance that virtually guarantees he will never be president. It's the sort of mindless pandering that has become emblematic of the Dean campaign. He wants to bolster his standing among African-Americans, but in his greed, he steps on his tongue again. Dean wants to return to the demonization that has characterized race politics for decades, something that Clinton tried to change. The problem with race relations and civil...
January 3, 2004
Look For The Union Parable
Los Angeles has been struggling through a weeks-long grocery strike and lockout, which was in full swing when I visited family at Thanksgiving. I've avoided writing on the subject of the strike because it only affects the people of Southern California and I'm too far away to know all of the issues involved, most of which appears to be centered around management's refusal to keep paying 100% of the union's medical insurance. Apparently, union tracts being handed out to shoppers defying the picket lines -- when strikers aren't screaming harassment at shoppers, that is -- features a parable about a man and a goat. (No, I'm not making this up, and get your mind out of the gutter.) The parable tells the cautionary tale of "a man who is granted his wish for a goat and another man who is jealous and is granted his wish to kill the goat....
January 6, 2004
Power Line: CLE Test Case Continues
The Big Trunk at Power Line continues his excellent series on the continuing legal education requirement for Minnesota lawyers on "elimination of bias" today with a recap of Eliot Rothenberg's hearing before the state Supreme Court: My day-job colleague and Power Line reader Peter Swanson attended the Minnesota Supreme Court hearing in the Elliot Rothenberg case yesterday. ... Peter has kindly forwarded us his notes on the hearing, in bullet point form organized by topic. Swanson's notes make for fascinating reading. It becomes apparent that Rothenberg cuts an impressive figure before the bar, and the justices are loath to revoke or suspend his license for his principled stand. Nevertheless, they interrogate him and opposing counsel Assistant Attorney General Ruth Flynn thoroughly, if professionally and politely. Read all of Swanson's bullet-point notes, but the conclusion is certainly a bit breathtaking, considering Rothenberg's livelihood is on the line: · The final question...
January 8, 2004
Did Angelina Jolie Get Duped By Adoption Scam?
This story is disturbing: HOLLYWOOD actor Angelina Jolie may be forced to hand her adopted son back to Cambodian authorities if claims he is not an orphan are true, it was reported today. The Sydney Morning Herald reported Cambodian child welfare workers as claiming that Maddox, the son Jolie and her former husband the actor-director Billy Bob Thornton adopted two years ago, was sold by his poverty-stricken mother. The agent that arranged the adoption, Lauryn Galindo, is facing charges in the United States of visa fraud and money laundering amid claims that Maddox's mother sold him for $US100 ($130). Jolie has said that she would never rob a mother of her child. There's more details at this link. It doesn't appear that Jolie was aware of the scams allegedly run by Galindo, which will make this case doubly tragic if the child is removed from her custody. On the other...
January 11, 2004
It's Not Difficult At All
The Star Tribune asks the wrong question in a featured article today about the disposition of released, high-risk sex offenders, titled "Is it too hard to commit dangerous sex offenders?" The case of Alfonso Rodriguez, who allegedly kidnapped the still-missing Dru Sjodin last year, has made the question of civil commitment for high-risk sex offenders a hot topic in Minnesota: The Rodriguez case has horrified the public, putting the commitment process under the spotlight and making it an explosive political issue. The public attention prompted the Corrections Department to send 145 new commitment cases to county attorneys for review. If, as expected, that review increases the number of sex offenders who are committed, taxpayers will have to pay millions more every year for their treatment in secure psychiatric facilities. There are now some 200 sex offenders held at secure psychiatric facilities in Moose Lake and St. Peter. Each costs state...
Stiff Sentences for Hardened Criminals?
Okay, if I am a firm believer in tough sentencing laws for sex offenders (see my previous post), then these guys need to be given some stiff penalities for smuggling: A federal grand jury on Friday indicted a Los Angeles man on charges of trafficking in counterfeit tablets of the anti-impotence drug Viagra that he purportedly obtained from a drug company in China, a U.S. Attorney's Office spokesman said. ... Agents seized about 10,000 blue pills stamped with the same markings as Viagra tablets, including the name of Pfizer Inc., the world's largest pharmaceutical company and the maker of Viagra. ... The charges of conspiracy, trafficking in counterfeit goods and selling a counterfeit drug carry a potential maximum penalty of up to 18 years in federal prison and a $2 million fine. Please feel free to come up with your own puns and drop them in my comments section. However,...
January 15, 2004
Kinsley: O'Neill A Lame Man In Room Full Of Heavyweights
While I am not normally a fan of Michael Kinsley, today's review of Paul O'Neill's book at Slate made me laugh out loud: O'Neill, according to O'Neill, is a man on whom praise and compliments fall thick as a winter snowstorm. "Paul, you have the balls of a daylight burglar," he quotes a subordinate as telling him years ago. He also quotes himself telling the story to another subordinate. Elsewhere he recounts, with prim disapproval, watching George W. Bush call on White House Chief of Staff Andy Card to rustle up some cheeseburgers. O'Neill believes, he says, that a CEO should be judged by how he treats "whoever is at the very bottom," a remark Card may find somewhat more insulting than the cheeseburgers that inspired it. Later, with characteristic subtlety, O'Neill quotes himself offering to get his secretary a cup of coffee. Very nice. But she might be thinking...
January 16, 2004
Bush Appoints Pickering To Court, Bypasses Senate
George Bush took the long-overdue step of bypassing the obstructionist minority in the Senate and gave federal Judge Charles Pickering a spot on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals: Bush installed Pickering by a recess appointment, which avoids the confirmation process. Such appointments are valid until the next Congress takes office, in this case in January 2005. … Pushing for Pickering's confirmation last year, Bush said, "He is a good, fair-minded man, and the treatment he has received by a handful of senators is a disgrace. He has wide bipartisan support from those who know him best." Pickering has been a target in the Democratic campaign to curtail Bush’s prerogative in appointing federal judges and appellate justices, and Pickering may have been the most ill-treated of them all. Democrats accused Pickering of being a racist – a characteristic hotly disputed by colleagues of all backgrounds, including James Charles Evers, the...
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January 17, 2004
Just Because He's Crazy Doesn't Make Him Stupid
... but it does make the Missouri legislature look foolish: A convicted sex offender says he broke out of a sexual-predator unit in 2001 knowing that a legal loophole would prevent Missouri authorities from charging him with escape. ... Under the civil commitment programs in Missouri and 15 other states, sex offenders who complete their prison sentences can be held indefinitely in a mental hospital if they are deemed likely to commit new sex crimes. But when Missouri enacted the program in 1998, it did not specify that escaping from a civil facility was a crime. As a result, authorities could pursue Ingrassia only on a charge of felony property damage, for cutting the fence. The crime carries up to seven years in prison. Thomas Ingrassia had been convicted of four sexual attacks in the 70s and was released from prison in 1997. He had to be committed because he...
January 20, 2004
State of the Union Address Tonight
President Bush delivers his State of the Union address to Congress tonight, starting at 9 pm EST. I'll be watching tonight on C-SPAN and intend on posting stream-of-consciousness commentary during the speech and a wrap-up at the end. I hope you'll drop by and check it out. Assuming, of course, that I can stay awake ... it's been a long day....
January 24, 2004
Aussies Want Republic, Not Monarch
A poll by the Australian newspaper Daily Telegraph finds that a 2-1 majority favors eliminating the British monarch as head of state and officially becoming a republic: Fewer than one in three (30 per cent) believe the Queen should remain as head of state while 64 per cent favour an Australian in the position. The national poll of 1200 people shows that support for removing the Queen has grown significantly since the referendum on the Republic in 1999, which was defeated 55 to 45 per cent, and a Newspoll in December 1995, when 56 per cent supported the change. Most Americans may not even be aware that Queen Elizabeth is the official head of state for Australia as well as the UK. Five years ago, Australia held a referendum on the continuance of this tradition, which was approved by 10 points. The public mood has shifted considerably in the past...
January 26, 2004
Union Leaders Paid Like CEOs
The Southern California region has suffered through a 15-week-long grocery worker's strike/lockout which has damaged everyone concerned -- the workers, the stores, and the customers. Michael Hiltzik at the Los Angeles Times notes that the group shouldering the most blame for the current stalemate receives eye-popping compensation for their recent mediocrity: Take Rick Icaza, the head of Los Angeles-based Local 770, which has 30,000 members. Icaza earned $273,404 in 2002, the latest period for which the figure is available. That was nearly a 10% raise over the prior year. Icaza, 69, out-earned even John Sweeney, the national president of the AFL-CIO, the nation's largest labor organization. Sweeney earned a salary of $247,500 that year. ... The phenomenon of overripe compensation at the UFCW starts with International President Douglas Dority, whose $329,792 made him the best-paid president among the AFL-CIO's 64 member unions in 2002. That's the case even though the...
January 27, 2004
Al Franken, Free-Speech Thug?
Al Franken thinks of himself as a free-speech advocate. In fact, he's so determined to allow candidates the right to speak that he'll assault anyone who pipes up around them: Wise-cracking funnyman Al Franken yesterday body-slammed a demonstrator to the ground after the man tried to shout down Gov. Howard Dean. ... Franken emerged from the crowd and charged one male protester, grabbing him with a bear hug from behind and slamming him onto the floor. Why has the normally pacifist, anti-war Franken suddenly taken to unilateral attacks? "I'm neutral in this race but I'm for freedom of speech, which means people should be able to assemble and speak without being shouted down." Oh, so Franken is for freedom of some speech, and also for vigilantism. I certainly hope Al's available to work security for the protest area during the Republican convention. Oh, wait, he'll probably be one of the...
January 28, 2004
Blair Cleared In Scientist's Suicide
UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, under fire and accused of releasing the name of the scientist that was the source of a discredited BBC report, has been cleared of any wrongdoing according to a leaked copy of the investigation's final report: A judge's probe into an Iraq weapons expert's suicide has cleared Prime Minister Tony Blair of blame, according to the Sun which has published what it says is a leak of the report. ... The Sun said the BBC, which had asserted in a report that Blair's government "sexed up" intelligence about Iraqi weapons to make its case for war last year, was accused of being "at fault" over a story that should have been checked more closely. "The document...is a devastating indictment of the BBC and its defence correspondent Andrew Gilligan," wrote the Sun's political editor Trevor Kavanagh. "Tony Blair is sensationally cleared of any 'dishonourable or underhand'...
The French Exodus
French Jews no longer have confidence in France to protect them, and immigration to Israel has almost tripled: Growing anti-Semitism in France has prompted a big rise in the number of French Jews emigrating to Israel. Figures released in Israel yesterday showed that 2,380 moved last year and 2,556 the year before. In the 1990s only about 800 French Jews emigrated to Israel each year. One suspects that this presents a bit of a mixed bag to the Muslims responsible for attacks on Jews in France. On one hand, forcing Jews to leave must delight them, but I doubt they're happy to see them go to Israel. What exactly is driving France's Jews out of Europe? Natan Sharansky, an Israeli minister, said on Sunday: "Last year the number of anti-Semitic incidents in France doubled and 47 per cent of all anti-Semitic attacks in western Europe occurred there." ... He said...
January 29, 2004
Arts Funding Increase? Why?
The New York Times reported yesterday that President Bush will request a substantial increase in funding for the National Endowment of the Arts: President Bush will seek a big increase in the budget of the National Endowment for the Arts, the largest single source of support for the arts in the United States, administration officials said on Wednesday. The proposal is part of a turnaround for the agency, which was once fighting for its life, attacked by some Republicans as a threat to the nation's moral standards. I don't think it's a threat to the nation's moral standards; daytime soap operas present more of a threat than art-house displays of Robert Mapplethorpe's rear end ever could. It's a nonproductive waste of money and it's completely unnecessary. Artists sell their wares in a free market here in the US. Artists who can't make a living out of it on their own...
January 30, 2004
French Corruption Scandals Grow
The French just capped off a glorious week of scandal and corruption with the conviction of former PM Alain Juppé, a crony of Jacques Chirac: In a stinging reverse for President Jacques Chirac, the former French prime minister Alain Juppé was banned from office for a decade yesterday after being found guilty of corrupt party financing. ... A court in Nanterre in the Paris suburbs found him guilty yesterday of "taking illegal advantage" of public funds. He was given an 18-month suspended sentence and ordered to serve the mandatory 10-year suspension from elected office. More than a score of other serving or former party colleagues or associates of M. Juppé and M. Chirac were given suspended prison terms. ... The legal conviction of M. Juppé also amounts to a political indictment of M. Chirac. The offences of which M. Juppé was convicted - embezzling the money of Paris taxpayers by...
February 4, 2004
Chase-Related Crash Wasn't
My local police department has discovered that a state-patrol crash just before Christmas that supposedly resulted from a perp chase was actually caused by a speeding trooper giving another trooper a lift to a hockey game: A state trooper intent on getting an off-duty colleague to a hockey game allegedly used her squad car's lights and siren and reached speeds of up to 126 mph before crashing into a civilian car in Eagan in December. The trooper then told investigators she had been pursuing a violator when the accident took place, and told an Explorer Scout riding with her to lie about what happened, according to a criminal complaint filed Tuesday. ... According to the complaint: [Jennifer Lee] Schneider initially told a trooper investigating the accident that she was on her way to the Eagan Civic Arena to watch her husband — also a state trooper — play in a...
Massachussets Supreme Court: Gay-Marriage Ban Unconstitutional
The Massachussets Supreme Court has ruled that civil unions are not adequate substitutes for marriage and has ordered the Commonwealth to recognize marriage for same-sex couples: The Massachusetts high court ruled Wednesday that only full, equal marriage rights for gay couples -- rather than civil unions -- would be constitutional, erasing any doubts that the nation's first same-sex marriages could take place in the state beginning in mid-May. The court issued the opinion in response to a request from the state Senate about whether Vermont-style civil unions, which convey the state benefits of marriage -- but not the title -- would meet constitutional muster. ... The much-anticipated opinion sets the stage for next Wednesday's constitutional convention, where the Legislature will consider an amendment that would legally define marriage as a union between one man and one woman. Without the opinion, Senate President Robert Travaglini had said the vote would be...
February 6, 2004
Sauce For The Goose
In the midst of the outrage du jour -- outsourcing -- India responds with a big "so what": Most jobs going to India are in the high-technology and professional-services sector. Data released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show, however, that U.S. job losses are taking place mainly in manufacturing and retail services. In the professional and business sectors, U.S. employers added workers in the last quarter. Although jobs did shrink — for many reasons, including a burst stock market bubble — employment in computer and mathematical occupations has grown since June last year by more than 150,000. According to the Information Technologies Assn. of America, only about 2% of 10 million computer-related jobs have gone abroad. In U.S. manufacturing, jobs have been declining, but they have been gradually doing so over two decades. Investments by U.S. companies in India's manufacturing are still quite modest. In India's fast-growing automobile...
Reverberations From A Rack
Variety writes at length today about the continuing aftershocks in the entertainment industry from the Janet Jackson/Justin Timberlake breast-baring incident: The rehabilitation of Jackson has begun in earnest, and taking the lead is MTV sister network BET. The vehicle: a series of 10 30-second vignettes featuring a subdued, furrowed-brow Jackson, dressed almost dowdily in conservative black, speaking directly to cable viewers about dignified African-American personages ranging from Sidney Poitier and Harriet Tubman to Marion Anderson and Paul Robeson. Forget about what BET calls Jackson's "edgy and sexy persona," which exploded during the halftime of last week's Super Bowl game when Justin Timberlake ripped her costume, baring her right breast live before an estimated audience of 90 million people. In the BET spots, Jackson comes off like the mother superior of a nunnery. "Her tone is serious and focused," says a BET statement, and she takes on the "air and diction...
Blair May Be Headed For Trouble
Tony Blair, America's staunch ally in the war on terror, may be heading for some electoral problems according to a story in tomorrow's Independent: Our poll puts the Conservatives, with 36 per cent, one point ahead of Labour, on 35 per cent. This is the first non-internet poll to put the Conservatives ahead since Michael Howard became leader last November. When NOP themselves last polled at the end of September, the Tories were on 29 per cent, nine points behind Labour. In contrast to his two predecessors, William Hague and Iain Duncan Smith, the new leader has made a favourable first impression on the electorate. As many as 47 per cent say he is doing a good job; only 15 per cent think he is doing a bad job. Perhaps just as importantly, only 13 per cent do not have a view about him. Mr Howard is evidently no "quiet...
February 8, 2004
We're American Airlines, Proselytizing As We Do Best
You know your flight is about to turn weird when the pilot asks you to raise your hand if you're sure ... that you're a Christian: American Airlines is investigating reports that a pilot asked passengers to identify themselves as Christians so non-Christians on board could talk to them about their faith, a spokesman said Sunday. ... Kincaid said the pilot, whose name was not released, reportedly asked Christian passengers to raise their hands before suggesting that the other passengers should discuss Christianity with those passengers. The pilot, who had just returned from a mission to Costa Rica, reportedly said he would be available at the end of the flight for further discussion, Kincaid said. You would think that a pilot might have other things on his mind than a religion check -- like actually flying the plane. Next, he'll be asking to change the boarding classes from first class,...
February 10, 2004
First, They Came For The Smokers ...
The forces of those who know what's best for you are gathering again to strip more personal choice from you -- this time aiming at your diet: "Clearly, the obesity epidemic over the last 20 years is driven by something in our environment," says Robert Jeffery, professor and interim chairman of the division of epidemiology at the University of Minnesota. He also researches public policy for the Minnesota Obesity Center. "Our basic biology has not changed." ... "To get the most bang for your buck, if we want people to change, then we should change the price structure of food," Jeffery says. Higher costs for unhealthful foods are one way, as is done elsewhere through taxes on alcohol and cigarettes. But the public resists those costs, Jeffery notes. The Minneapolis Star Tribune has pushed this issue over the past year or so, quoting liberally from those who want to either...
February 13, 2004
Greenspan: Make Tax Cuts Permanent
Alan Greenspan yesterday testified before the Senate Budget Committee in favor of President Bush's plan to make the Bush tax cuts permanent: Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said Thursday that Congress should make President Bush's tax cuts permanent and cover the $1 trillion price by trimming future benefits in Social Security and other entitlement programs. Greenspan told the Senate Budget Committee that Congress, "as a first order of business," should restore budget rules that cap discretionary government spending and require increases in entitlement benefits or cuts in taxes to be offset by other program cuts or other tax increases. Greenspan was asked how he would come up with the decade-long cost of $1 trillion to pay for extending the 2001 and 2003 individual tax cuts. "I would argue strenuously that it should be taken out on the expenditure side," he answered. Greenspan delivered the traditionally conservative position of smaller government,...
February 14, 2004
Mr. Bush Can Play Hard-to-Get Too, M. Chirac
Jacques Chirac, who reneged on promised support to George Bush and Colin Powell, now waits by the phone and can't understand why they don't call: The official invitation has been lying in his in-tray for several months, but President George W. Bush has failed to let the French know whether he will attend the 60th anniversary of the D-Day landings in June. France's president, Jacques Chirac, is expecting at least 15 heads of state to be present at the commemorations marking the decisive Allied offensive against the Germans in Normandy on June 5, 6 and 7. 15 heads of state will be on hand to celebrate, huh? Won't it be embarrassing for Chirac if the US president has something better to do the first week of June, even more so since this will be the first time a German Chancellor has been invited to attend. On the other hand, it's...
February 18, 2004
Jealousy Is Such An Ugly Emotion
Jacques Chirac -- the jealous type? Apparently, Tony Blair has been makin' time with Jacques' main diplomatic squeeze, and he's not happy about it: Tony Blair put himself squarely at the heart of European decision-making last night by breaking into the Franco-German axis and persuading it to speed up economic reform. He brushed aside criticisms from Italy and other countries which have been left out in the cold by the decision of the EU's three most influential powers to join forces and give a lead to the rest. ... But he was publicly rebuked by Jacques Chirac, the French president, who showed his unease at Mr Blair's intrusion into what he said was the EU's most "intense" relationship. France fears that Germany is edging closer to Britain, a shift underlined by Joschka Fischer in an interview with The Telegraph three weeks ago. Chirac and Schroeder famously exchanged places at a...
February 19, 2004
Economic Expansion Continues
The Bush economic plan continues to expand the economy and points to strong growth for the year: A key economic forecasting gauge advanced a strong 0.5 percent in January, suggesting that the nation's economy will expand further in coming months. The business-funded Conference Board said Thursday its Composite Index of Leading Economic Indicators rose to 115.0 last month following gains of 0.2 percent in December and 0.3 percent in November. Analysts had expected a rise of about 0.3 percent for January. Ken Goldstein, the business group's economist, noted that the index has been gaining since last spring. The rise points to "sustained economic growth, perhaps through the first half of this year," he said. And guess what's fueling the strong growth in the economy? Tax breaks, which are enabling increases in both exports and business infrastructure investment. Jobless claims dropped in the past week as well, demonstrating that job growth...
February 22, 2004
Minnesota Finally Gets Tough With Sexual Predators
A bipartisan panel recommended a long-overdue get-tough policy for sexual predators in Minnesota on Friday, proposing a mandatory life sentence without parole for first-degree sexual assaults and a discretionary LWOP sentencing option for other sexual offenses: All other felony sex offenders could be imprisoned for life as well, at a review board's discretion, under the plan, the most sweeping response yet to the arrest last fall of a released convict in the disappearance of University of North Dakota student Dru Sjodin. Just to refresh everyone's memory about the Dru Sjodin case, Dru disappeared late last year after work at the mall. Alfonso Rodgriguez, Jr. was eventually arrested for her disappearance and a search of Rodriguez's car revealed Dru's blood inside. Rodriguez had been released from prison less than six months before Dru's disappearance after serving 23 years for kidnapping and sexual assault, and it turned out that it was the...
February 23, 2004
Inappropriate
Cathy Young, contributing editor to Reason magazine, writes an op-ed in today's Boston Globe about the stunning decision of Amherst Regional High School to stage The Vagina Monologues, a sexually explicit and controversial play that's gained recent status as a feminist icon: The idea of teenage girls performing Ensler's monologues -- complete with graphic sexual descriptions, in-your-face vulgar language, and reenactments of orgasmic moans -- in front of an adult audience is rather freaky. ... One particularly questionable monologue deals with a 16-year-old girl who learns to love her genitals and, by extension, herself after a sexual encounter with a 24-year-old woman. In the original version of the play, the girl was 13 and the monologue included the statement, "If it was rape, it was a good rape." This segment has repeatedly caused controversy, and Ensler has toned it down in response to criticism. Yet even with the changes, we...
BIA Officials Attempt to Cash In
The Washington Post reports that dozens of Bureau of Indian Affairs officials and their relatives have made themselves members of a tribe under their jurisdiction and now want to establish a casino on new land: A once-tiny, nearly destitute American Indian tribe is pushing hard to build a $100 million casino, but traditional tribal members are not the ones seeking the riches. Hundreds of people have been newly added to the Ione Band of Miwok Indians' membership rolls, which were opened by regional Bureau of Indian Affairs officials. Among the new members are several BIA employees and dozens of their relatives. ... Amy Dutschke, a member of another Indian group whose family has roots in the Ione area, was the BIA's acting regional director in June 2002 when she authorized the Ione Band's last leadership election, documents show. Now Dutschke and 68 of her relatives are on the tribe's official...
February 24, 2004
No One to Blame But Themselves
As I have often predicted, the radical activism of the judiciary in imposing changes in the basic social unit in opposition to the will of the electorate has resulted in an equally radical reaction -- a full-fledged mainstream constitutional amendment process to permanently define marriage: President Bush said Tuesday that he supports a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage to "prevent the meaning of marriage from being changed forever." ... "On a matter of such importance, the voice of the people must be heard. Activist courts have left the people with one recourse. If we're to prevent the meaning of marriage from being changed forever, our nation must enact a constitutional amendment to protect marriage in America. Decisive and democratic action is needed because attempts to redefine marriage in a single state or city could have serious consequences throughout the country." He called on Congress to "promptly pass and send to...
February 25, 2004
Count TNR Among the Clueless
While I don't have a subscription to The New Republic, the short blurb on their headline article on gay marriage is enough to demonstrate TNR's complete cluelessness on the issues involved in the amendment proposal: Opponents of gay marriage have sought to frame the debate over their proposed constitutional amendment as a matter of shielding voters and their elected representatives--that is, state politicians and local officials--from the whims of allegedly activist judges. But by allowing city officials to issue wedding permits to same-sex couples, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has thrown a major wrench into this strategy. Newsom, after all, is an elected official, and he is therefore part of the very group gay marriage opponents have long claimed they are trying to protect. All Joseph Landau proves in this statement is that he has never read the Constitution and has no familiarity with the law-making process in the United...
February 26, 2004
Blast From The Past
Just when you thought it was safe to go to Orange County, he's back: Now, eight years out of office and with a stint as a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host under his belt, the 70-year-old [Robert] Dornan attempts a return to the political stage by seeking the GOP nomination in next week's primary for the 46th Congressional District, which stretches from Palos Verdes Estates to Newport Beach. His opponent: veteran incumbent Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach), a former friend whose views on defense, the economy and social issues are very similar to his own. B-1 Bob, as he once insisted on calling himself during his nine terms in the House, spent 18 years as an embarassment to Orange County Republicans. Dornan's schtick was wearing mortally thin when Loretta Sanchez challenged him in 1994. While it's true that his district had morphed demographically over the years, Dornan still could have...
Broadcast Channels, Government Monopolies, and Responsibility
After updating my original post on Howard Stern's suspension from Clear Channel stations this morning about a dozen times and staying abreast of the feedback from Jeff Jarvis' diatribe from yesterday, I want to restate my entire perspective on broadcast responsibilities, just to eliminate some gaps caused by what I thought were basic assumptions regarding their nature. In 1934, after commercial radio expanded rapidly as a medium, Congress passed the Telecommunications Act which created the FCC to control commercial broadcast stations. Control was necessary because up to then, radio stations could step on each others' signals, creating an environment where the most watts won. Instead, Congress gave the FCC the authority to require commercial broadcast licenses, which were government-granted local monopolies on the broadcast frequency and protection from any potential interference from nearby frequencies. In return for the monopoly and its enforcement from the FCC, private-enterprise broadcasters agreed to air...
February 29, 2004
Brilliant Stewards of Money
In yesterday's Los Angeles Times, David Pierson wrote about the re-election campaign of Assemblyman Ron Calderon, a first-term Democrat representing southeast Los Angeles County, including some of my old stomping grounds. Calderon apparently has interesting notions on how to spend his campaign money, something my fellow Angelenos should consider at the voting booth: California Assemblyman Ron Calderon has obliterated his campaign war chest months before he faces an opponent in November, spending the money on Las Vegas hotels, restaurants and cigars, according to campaign spending reports. Calderon, whose 58th Assembly District encompasses southeast Los Angeles County communities, including Whittier, Downey and East L.A., raised $342,600 last year in contributions and spent $427,300, according to financial records filed with the California secretary of state. Having been born, raised, and lived most of my life in that general area, I'm not too sure about how relevant Las Vegas hotels are to East...
LA Times Endorses Schwarzenegger's Referenda
In an unusual twist, today's Los Angeles Times endorsed both Propositions 57 and 58, the twin budget-rescuing referenda pushed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Times still thinks that tax increases will be necessary, but at least agrees with Arnold that the road to fiscal sanity starts on the March ballot: Even with Proposition 57 and Schwarzenegger's proposed cuts, the state still faces a deficit of $6 billion or so in its next budget. Schwarzenegger, unlike most of the Legislature's Republicans, has never said "never" to taxes. His next campaign may be inside the Capitol, persuading members that more cuts and a modest temporary tax are unavoidable. But Proposition 57 and its companion, Proposition 58, must pass first to clear the decks. Schwarzenegger clearly said to Tim Russert on last week's Meet the Press that he would only consider new taxes in an emergency, and ticked off a few that the...
March 1, 2004
Economy Continues to Improve
The Commerce Department reports today that consumer spending continues to increase, growing at a rate of 0.4% in January, in line with investor expectations and continuing to demonstrate the strength of the economic recovery: The over-the-month increase reported by the Commerce Department on Monday matched analysts' expectations. The advance came after a bigger 0.5 percent rise in December, which was slightly stronger than first estimated a month ago. Disposable incomes what's left after taxes rose by 0.8 percent in January, up from a 0.3 percent increase the month before. January's sizable increase was helped out by a number of factors, including a reduction in federal incomes taxes and pay raises for government workers and those in the military. The news gets even better when you look at non-durable spending, like food and clothing, and services, both of which grew faster than the overall rate. Personal savings is up...
The Strib Endorses Blackmail
The Star Tribune predictably shrieks with hysteria today about the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Firearms Act, which the Senate is about to pass after the House has already done so. For those not in the know, the PLCFA protects gun manufacturers from the same sort of tort extortion that the tobacco industry has endured over the past several years. Trial lawyers love these class-action lawsuits because they have the potential of nine-figure legal fees; Micheal Ceresi's firm received over $400 million from the eventual multi-billion settlement for Minnesota in the tobacco lawsuits. However, unlike true liability cases where a defective product was knowingly sold to consumers, causing injury, these lawsuits are intended on extorting huge sums of money from gun manufacturers for producing their legal products at all. The lawyers intend on banning guns by bankrupting their manufacturers -- while stuffing their own pockets -- and they're not even...
March 2, 2004
Someone's Confused
Warren Grantham, executive director of the Minnesota Education League, has resigned his position from both the MEL and apparently the Taxpayers' League due to an inflammatory e-mail he sent to various state legislators: The executive director of the Minnesota Education League and an advocate of the No Child Left Behind law, resigned last Friday in a dispute over an e-mail he wrote that attacked several legislators for their opposition to the law. ... Grantham said the e-mail to legislators, which he characterized as "very, very critical, using some inflammatory images," led to a disagreement between him and his boss, Taxpayers League of Minnesota president David Strom. That led to Grantham's resignation. The basics of this story are fairly straightforward so far -- Grantham wrote an e-mail that somehow offended its recipients, among them current Minnesota legislators opposed to the No Child Left Behind federal law, including some Republicans. His boss...
March 3, 2004
Same-Sex Solutions That Make Sense
In the middle of all the heat and noise about same-sex marriage, the Bush administration is quietly pushing a same-sex solution for education that may wind up enraging some on the Left, but will make educating our daughters more effective: The Education Department plans to change its enforcement of Title IX, the landmark anti-discrimination law, to make it easier for districts to create single-sex classes and schools. The move would give local school leaders discretion to expand choices for parents, whether that means a math class, a grade level or an entire school designed for one gender. U.S. research on single-sex schooling is limited, but advocates say it shows better student achievement and attendance and fewer discipline problems. Critics say there is no clear evidence, and that single-sex learning doesn't get students ready for an integrated world. At least 91 of 91,000 public schools offer a form of same-sex education...
March 4, 2004
Nighthorse Won't Run
Colorado Republican Ben Nighthorse Campbell, one of the more colorful members of the Senate and a strong favorite for re-election this year, has abruptly left the race, citing health concerns: Campbell, 70, made the surprise announcement Wednesday, citing declining health. He was treated for prostate cancer last year. His Washington office also faces allegations that a longtime aide had taken kickbacks. Campbell's decision gave Democrats another open Senate seat to target in November and threw the Colorado Senate race wide open. Pollsters suggested heavyweights like GOP Gov. Bill Owens and former Democratic Sen. Gary Hart might get into the race, but there was no immediate word from them. Hart earlier declined to seek the seat. Obviously, this sets back Republican hopes of expanding its control of the upper chamber. This creates a vacuum and a relatively short campaign where name recognition may be the deciding factor. Pollsters are already looking...
March 5, 2004
Wrong on Many Levels
The Washington Post tells about a teacher in the DC area who somehow got a copy of The Passion of the Christ and showed it to his students in class -- at an elementary school: As a teacher showed sixth-graders at the District's Malcolm X Elementary School parts of the movie "The Passion of the Christ," 11-year-old Cutairra Ransom was growing upset by the violence unfolding in front of her. ... After about 15 minutes of watching the R-rated film about the final hours of Jesus's life, Cutairra said she walked out of the room. She was one of the 16 to 20 students who were shown the movie Tuesday at the public school, which is in the Congress Park neighborhood of Southeast Washington. D.C. school officials, who said sixth-graders should not be shown R-rated movies at school, have placed the teacher, Ronald Anthony, on leave with pay pending an...
March 6, 2004
Barbra Streisand, Deadbeat
Barbra Streisand's $10 million lawsuit against software developer and environmentalist Kenneth Adelman backfired on her recently, with a judgment against her for over $200,000 in legal fees and court costs to be paid to Adelman. So far, the reclusive entertainer has yet to comply with the court order: A man sued by singer Barbra Streisand for posting photos of her Malibu mansion on the Internet claims she is refusing to pay his $220,000 legal bill after he won the case. A judge in December dismissed Streisand's $10 million invasion of privacy suit against retired software entrepreneur Kenneth Adelman, his Internet service provider and a photo agency that distributes his work. The singer was ordered to pay his legal fees and costs. Adelman filed papers Thursday in Superior Court seeking another court order that Streisand pay an estimated $204,000 in legal fees from the original case, along with $15,000 in fees...
March 8, 2004
Sea Change in Europe?
The Greeks have resoundingly endorsed their conservatives and have sent Socialists to defeat, reversing twenty-three years of governing: With nearly 98 percent of votes counted, the New Democracy party led the Socialists 45.4 percent to 40.6 percent in Sunday's vote as part of a deep reshuffling of Greece's political order. Papandreou conceded defeat after exit polls showed New Democracy with a strong lead. New Democracy was poised to take an overwhelming majority in the 300-seat parliament. Under the Greek system, the winning party takes the lion's share of seats for a four-year term. Although the Greek economy is expanding at a rate of 4.7% -- the best in the EU -- most of that production involves the upcoming Athens Olympics, which played a large role in the election, especially regarding security. Even with that robust growth, unemployment has remained at 9%. The New Democracy movement promises to cut taxes and...
Here's A Novel Idea!
Who says an old Democrat can't learn new tricks? Not the LA Times, who reports that the party strategy in California has changed somewhat after their pet proposition to make raising taxes easier got stomped 2-1 last week: Democrats recognize that tactics of the past simply advocating tax increases to protect the needy won't work, and they are trying to take a page out of Schwarzenegger's playbook, embracing a strategy that looks for waste first and relies heavily on economic arguments. "We're not saying tax first," said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Wes Chesbro (D-Arcata). "We have an obligation before we ask people for taxes or cut any services to people to reduce state government spending in every way we can." What a novel concept -- rather than running the tab up further on California taxpayers, the Democrats propose to actually look at the budget first to get rid...
Labor Fading?
Tomorrow's New York Times looks at the decline of the modern labor movement and its associated political power, especially focusing on a few recent events: As the nation's labor leaders gathered at a luxury seaside hotel here, they were struggling on Monday to find ways to keep the union movement from sinking further after it suffered several recent setbacks. In the biggest confrontation in years, a 138-day dispute involving 59,000 California supermarket workers, the companies trounced the union, obtaining a two-tier contract that means lower wages and fewer health benefits for new employees. Organized labor also appeared badly disorganized as unions split over endorsing Representative Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri or Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor, for the Democratic presidential nomination and then appeared woefully ineffective when both of the preferred candidates flopped. And labor was embarrassed by a January government report showing that union membership fell by nearly...
March 9, 2004
Domestic Terrorist Arrested
The FBI captured an alleged domestic terrorist this afternoon in Southern California, a Caltech student suspected of torching dozens of SUVs in attacks on car dealerships last year: A Caltech graduate student allegedly affiliated with an eco-terrorist group was arrested today in connection with last summer's arson attacks aimed at Hummers and other sports utility vehicles at four dealerships in the San Gabriel Valley. Agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested William Jensen Cottrell, 23, on federal charges of arson and vandalism, said FBI Assistant Director Richard T. Garcia. ... Cottrell, using the alias Tony Marsden, sent several e-mails to the Los Angeles Times claiming responsibility for the arson attacks and confirming his affiliation with the Earth Liberation Front, according to the FBI. In the messages, which were sent one month after the fire bombings, Cottrell gave specific details of the attacks to prove his involvement. The Earth Liberation...
March 11, 2004
California Supreme Court Enforces the Law -- Finally
This afternoon, the California Supreme Court finally called a halt to the flouting of state law going on in San Francisco, ruling that same-gender couples cannot be married pending review of a court challenge to the applicable law approved 2-1 by referendum: The California Supreme Court today ordered San Francisco officials to stop issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples until the court can hold a hearing on gay marriages. The hearing would be held later this spring. The question of whether same-sex couples can legally marry exploded into Americans' consciousness in the month since San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom ordered gender-neutral marriage licenses to be issued. He argued that to prohibit same-sex marriages violated the equal protection clause of the state Constitution. ... More than 3,800 licenses have been issued to same-sex couples in San Francisco. And from city halls to the streets to the capitols in several states, there...
March 12, 2004
The Folly of Minimum-Wage Increases
The Minnesota Senate will begin consideration of a series of increases to the state's minimum wage, currently set at the federal level of $5.15 per hour, the Star-Tribune reports: Minnesota's minimum wage, frozen at the federal rate of $5.15 an hour for the past seven years, would rise to $6.65 over the next 16 months under a bill sent to the Senate floor Wednesday. A party-line vote of eight DFLers in favor and six Republicans opposed in the Jobs, Energy and Community Development Committee produced one of the rare legislative movements on the state's wage floor since it was increased from $4.75 per hour in 1997. Proposals to increase minimum wage provide an opportunity for Democrats to throw some red meat to their base and normally appear, as this bill does, in election years. The Strib takes its normally biased approach, accepting the statements of the bill's proponents without rebuttal...
Minnesota Manufacturing Sector '03 Q4 Strong, '04 Stronger
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune, usually a Chicken Little on economics during Republican administrations, contradicts the Democratic party line on jobs and manufacturing -- at least in Minnesota: Minnesota's factories are starting to hum, and so are some of the people who run them. Two state government reports released Friday showed the sector finishing 2003 with a crescendo, and expecting 2004 to start out strong, too. The state said manufacturing export growth hit a record pace in the last three months of 2003, showing a gain of 17.3 percent compared with the same period of 2002 -- more than double the comparable 8.6 percent rise in U.S. exports. Separately, a survey of Minnesota manufacturers showed a surge in optimism about this year, with a rising number expecting more sales and hiring against a background of improving economic conditions. Both reports come on the heels of recent declines in initial unemployment claims and...
March 16, 2004
Pawlenty Helps Poor, Unions and NGOs Thwart Attempt
Love him or hate him, you have to tip your hat to the political skills and nerve of Minnesota's first-term Governor, Tim Pawlenty. During the first ten days of the bus strike, all of the media coverage has focused on the poor, the homeless, and the handicapped who have been left in the cold -- literally, with pictures -- by the lack of bus service. Yesterday, Pawlenty turned the tables on the unions by offering to use the $200K per day that the Transit District is saving during the strike to fund non-profit groups that offer ride services in assisting these poor unfortunates -- and the unions and Council of Nonprofits have had to take the position of opposing relief for them: Gov. Tim Pawlenty's plan to provide rides for poor people stranded by the bus strike turned into a political hot potato that some social service agencies found too...
March 17, 2004
The Balkan Quagmire Arises Again
While MoveOn.org and its political mouthpieces like Howard Dean have been loudly proclaiming the Bush-led liberation of Iraq a quagmire, the real quagmire in the Balkans may be exploding yet again, as it has a number of times over the last ten or twelve years: Ethnic Albanians rose against the Serb minority across Kosovo yesterday in co-ordinated attacks on them in the worst bloodletting in the province since the 1999 war. A French peacekeeper was one of at least 11 people killed in grenade attacks and gun battles. About 250 were injured as the five-year peace in Kosovo was shattered. The trouble started in the ethnically divided town of Kosovska Mitrovica, in northern Kosovo, where thousands of Albanians armed with heavy automatic weapons and hand grenades clashed with Serbs. The explosion of ethnic violence apparently was provoked by reports that two ethnic Albanian children had drowned in the Ibar River...
March 18, 2004
Minnesota DFL Reeks of Desperation -- And Stupidity
In all of my running around yesterday, I managed to miss this story, but it shouldn't go without comment. Yesterday, Minnesota Democrats (called DFL up here) unveiled an ad attacking Governor Tim Pawlenty over the issue of sex offenders, accusing him of doing nothing to stop their release from prison. They got the ads on the air just in time, too -- considering that the gubernatorial election is only 32 months away: Accompanied by menacing music, the 30-second spot zeroes in on Pawlenty's face as a narrator says, "These eyes just watched as administrative bungling and the wrong budget priorities let rapists and sexual predators back on our streets." It goes on to accuse the Republican governor of distracting the public from that issue by "playing death penalty politics" in his proposal to restore capital punishment for particularly heinous murders. Pawlenty lashed back at several public appearances Tuesday, calling the...
Justice Kennedy Endorses Judicial Disregard of Congress
In an era where a sitting state Supreme Court justice had to be impeached from office because he refused to remove a three-ton monument to the Ten Commandments -- a decision with which I heartily agreed -- SCOTUS Justice Anthony Kennedy's remarks yesterday seem jarringly at odds with respect for the law: Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy yesterday praised federal judges who are willing to buck sentencing rules that were enacted for what the justice suggested were political motives. ... "I do think federal judges who depart downward are courageous," Kennedy told the House Appropriations Committee during a hearing on the court's budget. Judges should not have to "follow, blindly, these unjust guidelines," he said. ... "The mandatory minimums enacted by the Congress are in my view unfair, unjust, unwise," Kennedy said. When determining sentencing guidelines, "there are two different philosophies. One was the tough-on-crime argument, the other was...
March 19, 2004
Assassination Attempt on Taiwan President, VP
CNN reports that the president and VP of Taiwan were both wounded in an assassination attempt during a motorcade campaign appearance just before midnight CT: Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian and Vice President Annette Lu have been rushed to hospital after an assassination attempt while campaigning for Saturday's election. Chen was shot in the stomach at 1:45 p.m. (0545 GMT) Friday but his condition was not critical, the Presidential Office said. Lu's leg was grazed by a bullet. The office said both Chen and Lu were in a stable condition and that the president had urged calm. So far, there is no word on suspects, and the Taiwan authorities have made no arrests. Initially, no one knew Chen had been shot; the Chinese traditionally celebrate with firecrackers, and the sounds of the gunshots must have been lost in all the other noise. (Taiwan's security forces should reconsider the wisdom of allowing...
Even DFL Standardbearer Hates New Ads
Yesterday, I posted about the new DFL ads targeting Tim Pawlenty on the early release of sexual offenders, a problem that has been decades in the making and on which the DFL has proposed no solutions on their own. The new ads are so stupid, even uberliberal Doug Grow initially thought that they were satires of political advertisement before DFL officials said, "No, we're serious." Now, former DFL gubernatorial candidate and current state Senator John Marty has called for the ads to be pulled from the air and an apology issued to Minnesotans, invoking a bogeyman from the Democrats' past: "I am ashamed to see my party produce a mean-spirited attack ad that is no better than the infamous Willie Horton ad," Sen. John Marty, Roseville, wrote to state DFL Chair Mike Erlandson. "Political consultants may think such an ad is clever. I think it is sick." ... "It cheapens...
March 20, 2004
Gun Control Still Failing in UK - Murder Rates Skyrocketing
The London Telegraph runs a story in its Sunday edition that reports murder rates skyrocketing in London, primarily fueled by firearms, even though guns have been banned in the UK: The murder rate in London has doubled in 12 months to reach one of its highest levels ever, according to the most recent Home Office statistics, which have been leaked to the Telegraph. In the final three months of last year there were 61 murders in the capital, compared with just 31 in the same quarter, the previous year. The figure is the highest total for the last three months of any year, according to the Metropolitan Police's published figures. In the final three months of 2000, for example, there were only 40 murders, while in the same period of 2001 and 2002 there were 43 and 31 respectively. Police blame drive-by shootings between gangs fighting turf wars over drug...
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March 22, 2004
The Left Tastes MoveOn's Meddling
MoveOn.org, a thorn in the side to Republicans and the Bush Administration and the group most involved in the rise of Howard Dean, has branched out from presidential politics to involve itself in environmentalism. However, not all of the environmentalists are happy about this turn of events at the Sierra Club -- and MoveOn isn't the only outside group agitating there: The Southern Poverty Law Center is known for fighting hate groups but is not usually a player in environmental politics. Neither is the neo-Nazi group White Politics Inc. But in the Sierra Club's current board elections, they are just two of a potpourri of groups seeking to influence the outcome of a contest that could radically reshape the 112-year-old organization. ... The controversy centers on three insurgent candidates, including former Colorado governor Richard Lamm (D), who are intent on curbing immigration to the United States in the name of...
March 23, 2004
Russian Nuclear Fleet Collapsing?
A Russian admiral ordered a nuclear cruiser back to port today, warning that the Northern Fleet was on the verge of collapse and that this cruiser might suffer a nuclear explosion: The flagship of Russia's northern fleet has been ordered back to port as it is too dangerous to be at sea, says Russia's naval commander-in-chief. Admiral Vladimir Kuroyedov said the nuclear cruiser Peter the Great "could go sky high at any minute". ... "In those places on board where the admirals actually go, everything's fine, but where they don't go, everything's in such a state it could go sky high at any minute," he said. "And by that I also mean the state of the nuclear reactor. "It is this attitude to the upkeep of their ships on the part of commanders that is leading to the collapse of the fleet." While the BBC speculates that this could just...
Five-Year-Old Boy Brings Marijuana to School
The AP reports on a new low in child care -- Miami police report that a kindergartener brought a bag of marijuana to school and sprinkled some over another student's lasagna at lunchtime: A 5-year-old boy took a bag of marijuana to school and was sprinkling it over a friend's lasagna like oregano when a monitor intervened, police said. The lasagna was confiscated before the other boy had a chance to eat it Monday in the cafeteria at Gratigny Elementary School. ... Police and child welfare authorities were investigating the boy's family. "The focus is on the child's environment and what issues could have led to a child having a bag of marijuana in school,'' Villafana said. Police also were looking into whether an older friend may have asked the boy to hold the bag. Also on Monday, authorities in Indianapolis said a 4-year-old boy took crack cocaine that police...
March 24, 2004
Scientologists Get Special Tax Breaks?
A lawsuit resulting from an IRS audit has revealed that the IRS reached a secret agreement with the Church of Scientology to allow tax breaks for religious education that it denies to all other religions, the New York Times reports in today's paper: A trial is to begin here on Wednesday morning to determine whether a Jewish couple can deduct the cost of religious education for their five children, a tax benefit they say the federal government has granted to members of just one religion, the Church of Scientology. The potential ramifications are huge, for a ruling in favor of the couple could affect the millions of Americans who send their children to religious schools of all types. At stake is whether people of all religions can deduct the cost of religious education as a charitable gift, as Scientologists are allowed to do under an officially secret 1993 agreement with...
Bad Fiction, Worse Reality
If someone wrote this as a detective novel, it would never sell -- but unfortunately, this one's a true story: A French policewoman who led a double life as a prostitute appears in court tomorrow as police investigate suspicions that she conspired to murder her rich elderly husband. ... Since arresting Mlle Louis, the police have found that before her marriage, while she worked as a police officer, she led a second life as a call girl under the name of Maud, specialising in rich old men. Mlle Louis, who denies the conspiracy accusations and will apply for bail tomorrow, says she heard a strange noise in a wheel of their car as they drove in Spain. Her husband got out to investigate and was run over by a white 4 x 4, which then sped off. I suppose if a woman wanted to make a living as a call...
Georgia Sinking Towards Civil War
No, I'm not talking about Zell Miller's endorsement of George Bush and his leadership of Democrats for Bush, although he's certainly making news today. The other Georgia -- the former Soviet 'republic' -- may be on the verge of civil war, after a breakaway region's leader had his passport revoked in response for barring Georgia's president from entering: Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili has annulled the diplomatic passports of the leader of the breakaway region of Ajaria and 500 other officials. He also accused Ajaria's authorities of planning to bring in mercenaries to fight in a possible conflict. The latest move is part of a continuing war of words between Tbilisi and Ajaria's leader, Aslan Abashidze. The two sides stood on the brink of war after Mr Saakashvili was denied entry into the region earlier this month. Ajaria borders Turkey to its north, sharing the Black Sea shoreline, and not too...
March 25, 2004
Ukrainian Missiles Missing?
The BBC has a disturbing report from the Ukraine about their inability to account for several hundred ballistic missiles that were decommissioned after the collapse of the Soviet Union: Ukrainian Defence Minister Yevhen Marchuk has said that several hundred of his country's missiles are unaccounted for. The weapons were supposed to have been decommissioned in the years that followed the break-up of the USSR. But it is now being claimed that there is no record of them being destroyed. ... "Each of the missiles contained gold, silver, platinum. But where are the results of their recycling?" he asked. Call me a worry-wart if you will, but I hardly think that the most pressing issue of losing several hundred ballistic missiles is their potential recycling revenue. I'm a bit more concerned about the warheads and the fuel that those missiles carried, either or both of which may have wound up in...
Minnesota Soft Money Goes to Democrats
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune notes that the amount of "soft" money spent in 2002 put Minnesota fourth nationwide, coming in behind only Florida, New Jersey, and California, despite being ranked 21st in population in the US: The Minnesota DFL and Republican parties and affiliated organizations pulled in just under $40 million, the Washington-based Center for Public Integrity found. Only Florida, New Jersey and California state parties pulled in more. The report's author, Derek Willis, noted that Minnesota had two prominent statewide races in 2002 - for governor and the U.S. Senate. ... The study found that DFL and affiliated groups raised $22.7 million in the 2001-02 election cycle, while the state Republican Party and affiliated groups pulled in $17 million. The money went toward things like voter registration efforts and advertisements. Most of the state party money came from national parties in the form of ``soft money,'' the large, unregulated contributions...
Minn. Supreme Court Rules For CLE Bias Courses
The Minnesota Supreme Court ruled, as expected, to uphold the state Continuing Legal Education requirement for anti-bias classes. Eliot Rothenberg had refused to comply with this requirement, as the state had certified a number of unusual courses for the CLE requirement, including a panel on the merits of Islam and a rally for Lynne Stewart, an attorney currently under indictment for supporting terrorist activities. The high court noted, however, that there were a number of other courses that would satisfy the requirement, bypassing altogether the issues of the flawed study that initiated the CLE for bias in the first place. Power Line has blogged extensively on this issue. Start here and work your way forward through their excellent series....
Congress Passes Organ-Donation Funding
In a rare moment of bipartisanship, the Senate passed a funding bill for live organ donors on a voice vote, after the House passed it 414-2: The legislation would authorize the Department of Health and Human Services to spend $5 million a year, beginning October 1, to reimburse qualified donors. It authorizes an additional $15 million in 2005 for grants to states, public awareness efforts and studies on how to increase recovery and donation rates. It also would finance new programs at hospitals and organ procurement organizations to coordinate organ donations. The Minnesota Legislature is considering a similar bill, but using tax deductions rather than direct reimbursement for donors. Either way, it represents an important and substantive support for people who selflessly give of themselves -- quite literally -- to save lives. Typically, a live donor has to undergo rigorous medical testing before surgery, and then the surgery and recovery...
March 28, 2004
French Voters Rejecting EU?
French voters sent a message to the center-right government of Jacques Chirac, who tried to rein in government spending in order to comply with EU budget restrictions. The electorate doesn't approve of Chirac's cutbacks in social spending, and the Socialists are poised to take control: President Jacques Chirac's government suffered humiliating defeats Sunday in the second round of regional elections in what was seen as a backlash against his painful economic reforms. The results, which breathed life back into France's left-wing opposition, will increase pressure on Chirac to reshuffle his conservative government and perhaps even ditch his prime minister, the unpopular Jean-Pierre Raffarin. The French, who already had reneged on their EU obligations for debt reduction, now wants to continue adding to their budget deficits by either maintaining or expanding their social services as their population continues to skew older. Chirac once had designs on controlling the EU by partnering...
March 29, 2004
How To Win Friends and Influence People
Imagine that a group of people would like to win your support for their cause, or at least try to convince you to listen to their side of an issue. Do you think that this is the most effective way to make the case? Several hundred people stormed the small yard of President Bush's chief political strategist, Karl Rove, yesterday afternoon, pounding on his windows, shoving signs at others and challenging Rove to talk to them about a bill that deals with educational opportunities for immigrants. Protesters poured out of one school bus after another, piercing an otherwise quiet, peaceful Sunday in Rove's Palisades neighborhood in Northwest, chanting, "Karl, Karl, come on out! See what the DREAM Act is all about!" ... The protest was organized by National People's Action, a coalition of neighborhood advocacy groups based in Chicago. Leaders said they want Bush to advocate for the Development, Relief...
Pickering, Revisited
60 Minutes reviewed the recess appointment of Charles Pickering, the Mississippi federal judge that ran into the partisan buzzsaw of the Senate Democrats, and strangely enough came up with a much different picture of Pickering than that painted by Daschle, Kennedy, and Company. Needless to say, this has disappointed the Commissar at the Politburo Diktat, who counted on CBS to stick to the party line: Comrades, get out hatchets. Hack away at Ms. Gambrell. Give her the full "Justice Thomas, Colin Powell, Condi Rice" job. Maybe she is Pickering's lover, da? Maybe she is lesbian. ... No, need 21st Century slur ... Maybe she "accused someone else of being lesbian." Is more up-to-date smear, da? Perhaps she opposes gay marriage. Comrades, if you find nothing, do not worry. Follow Comrade Schumer's example: Just make it up. Be sure to read the Commissar's revealing look at the interview with Deborah Gambrell,...
March 31, 2004
World Court Not Political?
President Bush received a storm of criticism when he withdrew the US from the International Criminal Court, claiming that its mandate was much too broad and checks on its power too few, which would lead it to pursuing political ends through bogus criminal prosecutions. Well, if it the World Court is any guideline, it looks like Bush's critics may owe him an apology: The International Court of Justice on Wednesday ruled that the United States violated the rights of 47 Mexicans on death row and ordered their cases be reviewed. The United Nations' highest judiciary, also known as the world court, was considering whether 52 convicted murderers had received their right to assistance from their government in a case filed by Mexico. ... In hearings in December, lawyers for Mexico argued that any U.S. citizen accused of a serious crime abroad would want the same right, and the only fair...
April 1, 2004
Economy Still Steaming Forward
Two stories in today's USA Today demonstrate the strength of the economic expansion. Manufacturing, which the Democrats have used to beat George Bush over the head, turns out to be expanding even faster than the overall economy: The Institute for Supply Management said its manufacturing index registered 62.5 in March compared with 61.4 in February. The new reading beat the expectations of most analysts, who had forecast a figure of 59.5. ... It was the 10th consecutive month of expansion in the sector, which makes up less than a fifth of the U.S. economy. The ISM said its monthly employment index climbed to 57.0 versus February's 56.3. February's reading was its highest level since December 1987 [emph mine]. The ISM measures 20 manufacturing industries and reports expansion in all twenty. That may account for the dropping numbers of jobless claims, which indicate that companies have stopped trimming payrolls in the...
April 2, 2004
Michael Moore: The Jerry Lewis of Germany?
The Boston Globe informs us this morning of a disturbing phenomenon in Germanny: the balooning of Michael Moore's popularity. In an article today about a visit made by Colin Powell to a group of high-school students, Glenn Kessler provides background on the source of German anti-Americanism: When you want to send a message to a nation that gobbles up the anti-Bush ideas of Michael Moore, whom do you call to deliver it? Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, of course. ... Most were two or three years old when the Berlin Wall fell in 1989; their parents had grown up under communism. Many told reporters they detested President Bush, and several said they learned a lot about foreign policy by reading Moore's books. Even those who hadn't said one of the school's music teachers manages to talk at length about Moore's condemnations of the Bush administration while kids are tuning...
Job Growth Soars in March
Job growth may finally be catching up to the roaring economy, as 308,000 jobs were added in March: U.S. payrolls grew at the fastest pace in nearly four years in March, the government said Friday, in a report that soared past Wall Street's expectations and could play a pivotal role in Fed policy and the presidential election. ... Payrolls outside the farm sector grew by 308,000 jobs in March, the Labor Department reported, compared with a revised gain of 46,000 in February. When these numbers were released, stock prices jumped and the bond market dropped, indicating that Wall Street was surprised at the strength of the new job creation. It's hard to understand why. Capital investment jumped upward the past few months, indicating that businesses were gearing up for higher production that would require higher employment. Now that the economic recovery is an undisputable fact and job growth seems to...
April 3, 2004
Is Germany Awakening From Its Socialist Coma?
The London Telegraph profiles a new German book that is flying off the shelves in Berlin and around the country, arguing that Germany may be in a fatal economic decline. The book, Germany: Decline of a Superstar, points out the crippling effect the nanny state has had not only on German productivity but also on its inventiveness and its self-sufficiency: The book argues with a brutal frankness that Germany needs to be completely restructured and that it has been poorly run since 1945. The result, according to Mr Steingart, is a country where industry is on its knees, where the welfare state is deep in debt, whose inventive minds have been forced into exile, and whose citizens largely hate work. ... "It is simply not profitable or viable to have German workers, who cost considerably more than they produce," Mr Steingart says. "Our productive core is melting away and Germany...
European Parliamentarians Committing Fraud: MEP
The UK Independent reports that a Member of the European Parliament has secretly been tracking the attendance and participation of other MEPs, and has discovered that many of them falsify their records in order to collect the large per-diem fees paid when the EP is in session: A senior member of the European parliament yesterday exposed what he claimed was widespread corruption at the Strasbourg assembly by revealing that nearly 200 of his fellow Euro MPs had faked attendance at parliamentary sessions in order to pick up generous daily allowances. Hans-Peter Martin, an Austrian Social Democrat MEP, said he had seen scores of colleagues signing on for parliamentary sessions which they had missed, to claim a daily attendance allowance of 262 (175). "I have witnessed almost 200 MEPs hurrying to the central register to sign on for a session and then watched them drive to the nearest airport or station,"...
April 7, 2004
Jeb Paints Himself Gray
Florida Governor Jeb Bush may need new glasses. Apparently, when he read about former California Governor Gray Davis' decision to approve a bill authorizing illegal immigrants to receive state drivers' licenses, Jeb must have thought that made Gray more popular with his constituents: Gov. Jeb Bush endorsed a bill on Monday to allow illegal immigrants to get driver's licenses. Under the bill, illegal immigrants seeking licenses would be fingerprinted and required to show identification like an employee card, said Senator Rudolfo Garcia Jr., a Hialeah Republican and a sponsor of the bill. The brief article goes on to assure people that illegals would have to also prove they own or lease a car, and get a background check from their consulate proving that they have no criminal record -- even though their status in Florida gives them a de facto criminal status. Anyway, if they could do all that, why...
And You Thought US Schools Were Tough
The London Telegraph reports on two teachers who have been given pensions due to abuse they suffered at the hands of their elementary-school students and, in one case, the parents: Jo Redmond, a mother of five children, said she struggled on for as long as she could "as a matter of professional pride" despite being spat on, kicked, punched and cut by a makeshift weapon of glass strapped to two pencils. Mrs Redmond, 51, said she was "devastated" to be forced to give up her job through ill health after being diagnosed as suffering from psychological as well as physical injury which had destroyed her confidence. Redmond finally left her job after being hit in the face with a carton of orange juice and losing a tooth, being spat and urinated on, and getting hit with a fire extinguisher, breaking her wrist. Another man left teaching for much the same...
April 8, 2004
Power Line Live-Blogging Rice Testimony
My colleague Hindrocket at Power Line will be live-blogging today's Condoleezza Rice testimony before the 9/11 Commission. I'll be listening but unable to blog until lunchtime (since I do have to work). Be sure to keep up with Rocket Man's excellent commentary as the news unfolds, both for his opinion and his ability to put it into the broader context. (Updated with proper link)...
Rice's 9/11 Testimony
I just finished listening to Dr. Condi Rice's testimony to the 9/11 Commission -- as much as I could catch at my office -- and I'm equal parts disappointed and ticked off. First, I can't tell you how irritating it is to have a live audience at these hearings, and even over the radio you could tell which commissioner was playing to them -- Richard Ben-Veniste. This shouldn't be the forum for one-liners and zingers, but certain members of this commission have decided that it's suddenly appropriate to deliver them, along with long speeches, to witnesses. Further, the questioning seemed to go far afield when former Senator Bob Kerrey started his "questioning" by blasting the military strategy being used currently in Iraq. What?? When did the 9/11 Commission suddenly become the Joint Armed Services Committee? It was a political cheap shot, in a morning full of them, all designed (despite...
April 9, 2004
Poll: What's Your Opinion of the 9/11 Commission?
You know my opinion of the 9/11 Commission -- now I'd like to know yours. Below is a poll that I believe gives four fair options on how people view their performance. Please vote -- I'll keep this open for at least several days to get a fair view of CQ readers. What do you think of the 9/11 Commission so far? They're doing a great job, treating everyone the same and asking the tough questions we want answered Their balance has worked well and they are on the right track They lean to the left but the work may be salvageable The public testimony has revealed a fatal bias and it's nothing but a political hack job Free polls from Pollhost.com Keep checking back! Note: Sorry about the funky spacing -- I can't figure out why the poll does that ......
April 10, 2004
The Spectre of Alar Returns
The US has issued an advisory on a specific type of tuna and its higher-than-desired mercury levels, and as usual, the American public moves towards full panic mode: When Joseph Ugalde, 38, a San Francisco marketing executive, goes out for lunch, he orders the Chinese chicken salad, the turkey avocado sandwich or sometimes the chicken pesto melt. But as of last month, one thing he will not order is tuna fish. No tuna salads. No tuna sandwiches. No tuna melts. "I loved tuna melts," Mr. Ugalde said somewhat wistfully. "Or I did." Now, however, Mr. Ugalde is boycotting tuna, which he used to eat once or twice a week, because of federal advisories about mercury in it. ... Consumers like Mr. Ugalde are the tuna industry's nightmare as they react to a federal warning about the mercury content in albacore tuna. More than $1.5 billion worth of canned tuna is...
April 12, 2004
Guardian: Labour Rolls "Plummet"
According to the London Guardian, Tony Blair's political party has bled subscribing members since the Iraq war began last year and has now dropped below that of the Tories: A collapse in the number of Labour party members is jeopardising the party's election prospects, amid claims that the total has hit a 70-year low. The latest published figure of 248,294 is equivalent to fewer than 390 members per parliamentary constituency but Save the Labour Party, a party group formed by activists concerned at plummeting numbers, argues that that figure has been inflated by including lapsed members, and does not take account of many who left in the wake of the Iraq war. A shortage of volunteers to put up posters, stuff envelopes, deliver leaflets, canvass and knock on doors to get people to vote threatens to undermine the campaign in June's local and European contests as well as next year's...
April 13, 2004
Capital Punishment, la Francaise
French authorities have repeatedly refused to extradite murder suspects to the United States due to the possibility of defendants being sentenced to death. The most notorious of these cases was Ira Einhorn, the aging hippie who was convicted of murdering his girlfriend, in absentia after fleeing the trial just before the conviction came in. Once he was discovered in France, Pennsylvania prosecutors and the State Department tried for years to get the French to deport him, but were met with Gallic obstinacy and disdain while Einhorn continued to live with his girlfriend in a country villa. The French refused to allow Einhorn to return to the US not only because of the death penalty but also because it believed his rights had been violated by his conviction in absentia. Finally, after signing a pledge not to seek the death penalty and granting Einhorn a new trial 20 years after his...
Autistic Man Possessed Ricin: FBI
The FBI arrested a man Friday for possession of ricin, one of the most deadly poisons known to man and one considered to be a likely agent for use in terrorist attacks: Robert M. Alberg of Kirkland, Wash., was arrested at his apartment Friday and charged with one count of possession of a biological agent or toxin. "It is enough that it could cause concern that it could harm someone -- could kill someone," FBI spokeswoman Roberta Burroughs told KING-TV on Monday. Alberg was held pending a hearing Thursday in U.S. District Court. He is described in court documents as having autism, a developmental disorder featuring a spectrum of symptoms including impairments in communication and repetitive behaviors such as finger tapping or head banging. Federal criminal justice sources told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer they do not believe Alberg had political motivations for making the ricin and had no plans to use...
More Evidence of Economic Boom
Retail sales rose to a level that exceeded expectations by about 200% in March, demonstrating the strength of the economic expansion: Shoppers turned out in force in March, a Commerce Department report Tuesday showed, pushing retail sales to their strongest gain in a year. The Commerce Department said retail sales rose an unexpectedly sharp 1.8% in March to a seasonally adjusted $333.01 billion, the biggest gain since March 2003. Excluding cars and trucks, sales gained 1.7%, that category's best performance since March 2000. Wall Street analysts had expected both figures to advance 0.6%. February sales were also revised upward, to a 1.0% increase from the previously reported 0.7% gain. February ex-auto sales were revised to a 0.6% increase from a previously reported flat reading. In a further indication of consumer confidence, home-improvement spending rose over 10%, demonstrating homeowner security in the overall economy. Wall Street expected to see only moderate...
Prayers for Cindy McCain
I've had my differences with Senator John McCain this year, but politics is politics -- this is reality: Cindy McCain, wife of Sen. John McCain, suffered a small stroke and was hospitalized in stable condition Tuesday. "According to her physician, the prognosis is cautiously excellent," McCain said in a statement Tuesday. Cindy McCain, 49, had a small bleed in her brain and her speech is mildly affected, said Robert Spetzler, director of the Barrow Neurological Institute at St. Joseph's Hospital. Senator, just know that you have the prayers of all your fellow citizens for your wife's quick and complete recovery, and for your and your children....
April 15, 2004
New York Times: 9/11 Commission Talks Too Much
Jim Rutenberg wrote an analysis for today's New York Times that questions the relentless public-relations efforts by members of the 9/11 Commission, who have appeared on talk shows and written numerous opinion pieces during their work on evaluating America's failure to predict and defend against the al-Qada suicide hijackings. Rutenberg notes growing discontent from Republicans and Democrats alike over their open discussions of the evidence and voicing their preliminary conclusions before all of the evidence and testimony has been received: Democrats and Republicans alike have raised concerns about the degree to which commission members are discussing their deliberations on television and, even, in newspaper columns to the point that they are spinning their views like the politicians that many of them are. Americans can hardly turn on a television or pick up a newspaper these days without seeing or reading about a member of the commission. From the Fox...
April 17, 2004
Russia Says "Nyet" To Oil-For-Food Investigation
The New York Times reports this morning that the oft-stalled investigation into bribery and corruption allegations surrounding the United Nations' Iraq oil-for-food program has hit another roadblock. Although UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has nominated Paul Volcker to lead the committee and the other members are ready to start, Russia has refused to approve rules that would enhance the independence of the investigation: United Nations officials said Friday that Mr. Volcker, 76, had been selected for the panel along with Mark Pieth, 50, a Swiss law professor with expertise in investigating money laundering and economic crime, and Richard J. Goldstone, 65, a South African judge who was chief prosecutor for the international criminal tribunals for the former Yugoslavia. But the nominations stalled Friday when Russia said it would not agree to a Security Council resolution that Mr. Volcker said he needed to give him the authority to conduct the wide-ranging...
The Governator Wins Another One
Arnold Schwarzenegger, California's new celebrity governor, continues to score big victories in California politics, this time by pushing through long-overdue reforms to the state's workers-comp program: Despite enthusiasm from labor and business circles that was only muted, the final product was a significant political achievement, just the latest in what has become a growing list for Mr. Schwarzenegger. In the six months since ousting Gov. Gray Davis from office in a historic recall election, he has broken gridlock in Sacramento and delivered on a string of campaign promises, from rescinding drivers' licenses for illegal immigrants to reversing $4 billion in car tax increases to winning public approval of a state bond issue addressing the state's vast fiscal problems. "Of course the first thing I heard when I came to Sacramento in November is that it can't be done, that it is impossible," Mr. Schwarzenegger said at the Capitol after both...
April 19, 2004
Mother of Drunk Driver Sues Everyone In Sight
I have decided that I have no more sympathy left for people who take personal tragedies in their lives and attempt to cash in on them in every single way they can. Today's case in point is the Nevada mother of a 19-year-old drunk driver who got himself killed by wrapping his car around a light pole at 90 MPH. Jodie Pisco retaliate by filing lawsuits against everyone except the light pole: Jodie Pisco, of Reno, contends Coors has failed in its duty to protect the country's youth from drinking. Her son, Ryan, was killed in 2002 after he drank Coors at a party and drove his girlfriend's car into a light pole at 90 mph, the lawsuit says. The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Washoe County District Court, seeks unspecified damages. It accused Coors of "glorifying a culture of youth, sex and glamour while hiding the dangers of alcohol abuse...
April 20, 2004
Italy: 1000s of Automatic Weapons Bound for US
Italy announced that they have seized a ship with thousands of Kalishnikov rifles, apparently illegal, bound for the US -- raising the question of their intended use: Police in southern Italy say they have seized a large illegal arms shipment from Romania destined for the US. Customs officers in the port of Gioia Tauro, in Calabria, discovered 7,000 Kalashnikov assault rifles after noting irregularities in the documentation. The cargo, estimated to be worth some 6m euros (3.9m, $7.15m), was declared as arms for civilian, not military, use. Italian authorities stopped the shipment when they discovered "discrepancies" between the goods and the customs declaration by the shipper. The cargo included such accessories as reloading devices and bayonets. While the so-called assault rifles are legal for collectors, 7,000 of them seem to be a bit much for that market niche, and the Italians became very suspicious of their intended use. The receiver...
California May Regulate Porn Shoots
In a move that underscores the nanny state and the hypocrisy of big-government California, lawmakers are now proposing to require the use of condoms in all productions of pornography: Health officials in California have said the recent infection of two porn actors with the HIV virus means they may force performers to wear condoms. Los Angeles County officials said they believed existing regulations gave them the authority to require condom use. And the state Division of Occupational Health and Safety is also planning to carry out inspections of productions next week, the LA Times reported. First, let me state that I have no dog in the fight regarding pornography per se; it's rather silly stuff and a complete waste of time, but as long as everyone involved is a consenting adult and no one gets physically injured, I don't see any reason to ban it. My opinion on this is...
April 22, 2004
Quagmire Alert (Again)
Do you want to talk quagmire? Then you must mean the Balkans, the real six-century quagmire, into which we injected ourselves nine years ago and have yet to bring the situation to a conclusion. In yet another indication that American and other international forces will be tied down for much longer than the government indicated when they were first deployed, the BBC reports today that the foreign minister of Serbia emphatically ruled out the possibility of independence for Kosovo, even though the ethnic Albanian majority eventually expect to rule their own nation: The new foreign minister of Serbia and Montenegro, Vuk Draskovic, has said an independent Kosovo is "impossible". Any attempt to form such a state would go against the wishes and rights of Serbs living there and would be very dangerous, he told the BBC. Kosovo's majority ethnic Albanian population want independence, but the Serbs are against it. ......
April 23, 2004
Gorelick: More Calls For Her Testimony
Eleven Republican Senators have now publicly called for 9/11 Commissioner Jamie Gorelick to resign her position on the panel and instead provide sworn testimony to the commission: Eleven Senate Republicans fired off a letter Thursday to the 9/11 commission demanding that Jamie Gorelick, a Democratic member of the panel, be forced to testify. The senators want Gorelick to testify about her role in strengthening the so-called "wall" between the FBI and CIA that some say hampered government efforts to prevent terrorist attacks. The letter, which was spearheaded by Sen. Kit Bond, R-Missouri, asserts that the commission's final report "will be incomplete without public testimony by Ms. Gorelick about her activities while serving as deputy attorney general" in the Clinton administration. "It is imperative the committee explore with Ms. Gorelick these many initiatives and procedures pursued at her direction and any analysis leading to their formulation," the letter said. Gorelick wrote...
April 24, 2004
Frist and Daschle: Splitsville?
It must be a slow day at the New York Times political desk. This morning's edition features a breathless story on how Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist's campaigning in South Dakota on behalf of the Republican challenger to Minority Leader Tom Daschle breaks a long-held precedent of which everyone else is unaware: In a sharp break with political nicety and past practice, Dr. Frist, the majority leader from Tennessee, is planning to venture into the backyard of Mr. Daschle, the minority leader, in May on behalf of John Thune, a Republican hoping to unseat Mr. Daschle in what is expected to be a highly competitive race. It is an unusual move, especially given the extent to which the leaders must consult each other in a closely divided Senate. Experts in the Senate historical office could find no recent comparable example of one leader trying so aggressively to oust the other....
April 25, 2004
Britain to Reject EU Sovereignty?
Earlier this month, British Prime Minister Tony Blair announced that the question of ratifying the proposed EU constitution, which would transfer limited sovereignty to the massive political organization, would be put directly to the voters through a referendum. Blair warned that a rejection of the referendum would isolate Britain from the Continent. According to polls, however, his argument has not made much of an impact: A majority of Britons would vote "no" in a referendum on a European Union constitution, seen as a political gamble for pro-European Prime Minister Tony Blair, according to polls published Sunday. An ICM poll for The Sunday Telegraph newspaper found that the proposed EU constitution would be rejected by 68 percent of voters. Only 21 percent would back the treaty, it said. ... A second ICM poll, for the News of the World newspaper, reported that 55 percent of respondents would vote "no" on the...
California Health Department Asleep At The Switch
My hometown newspaper, the Orange County Register in California, has uncovered an embarassing scandal that will surely result in a few heads rolling in California. Health Services apparently knew for years that candy manufactured in Mexico and primarily marketed at Latino children had high enough levels of lead to cause poisoning, but did nothing about it: The poison arrives in an ice cream truck, "Happy Birthday to You" crackling from a single speaker wired to the roof. ... The ice cream man rests his elbows on the counter. Lopez's daughter Diana, a pigtailed 2-year-old, scans the bright pictures of treats. She doesn't want Drumsticks, Fudgsicles or Bomb Pops. Diana wants Mexican candy. Lopez has no idea that some of the imported candy on this truck is so laced with lead it can cause memory loss, behavioral problems and kidney damage if her daughter eats it regularly. The California Department of...
April 27, 2004
Making Market Sense of Wages and Prices As A System
When I want to read sensible explanations of a market economy, I turn to many sources, but one blogger in particular: Jon Henke at QandO. Jon posted a long essay today explaining why free-market mechanics work, using Wal-Mart as an example. One money graf -- quite literally -- is the most concise argument I've yet read regarding the pointlessness of artificial minimum-wage increases: We're a wage-earning society, but not we are not exclusively a wage-earning society. We are also a price-paying society, and if we pay attention to the income end of that fiscal balancing act, at the expense of our spending power, then we are simply engaging in a modern sort of mercantilism, wherein we think the consumer is wealthier if he has more money....even if that means he can't buy as much. Jon explains in detail why Wal-Mart is not the devil and why its continued success isn't...
More Good Economic News
Consumer confidence and home sales continue to rise as more people find jobs, contributing to an undeniably growing economy: Home sales rose a strong 5.7% in March, according to the National Association of Realtors, and a second report said consumer confidence rose in April, driven primarily by increased faith in an employment recovery. The reports are more good news for an economy showing increasing signs of strength. The Conference Board, a private research firm, said its index of consumer confidence rose to 92.9 in April from a revised 88.5 in March. Economists surveyed by Reuters had forecast the index to slip to 88.0. "The job market, which has a major impact on confidence, appears to be gaining strength," said Lynn Franco, director of research at the Conference Board's Consumer Research Center. "The percentage of consumers claiming jobs are hard to get is now at its lowest level since November 2002,...
April 28, 2004
Be Careful What You Wish For
George Bush must be pleased to see the results from Pennsylvania's primary election last night, which saw the candidate he personally endorsed, incumbent moderate Arlen Specter, narrowly edge out conservative challenger and current Congressman Pat Toomey by two points, which amounted to less than 17,000 votes. Bush went to Pennsylvania to campaign for Specter's re-election and threw the weight of the state and national GOP behind Specter's run. After all, Specter represents so many of the things that Bush wants: He supports abortion rights, voted against limiting medical malpractice awards and successfully pushed for a reduction in the size of Bush's tax cut package back in 2001, though he voted for the tax cuts in the end. ... He has also questioned provisions in the Patriot Act, which Bush has been pushing to renew. Well, then, Toomey represented a real threat to Bush's legislative initiatives after re-election ... right? A...
Patriot Forum Tonight
Well, we're trying this again ... the First Mate and I will be at the Patriot Forum (sponsored by our radio station, AM 1280 The Patriot) in Bloomington, MN to see Michael Medved! The Northern Alliance will be represented by Mitch Berg, The Elder, Saint Paul, and myself, and perhaps a few others as we provide "security" for the event. (Translation: we stand at the door and tell everyone to wait until the dining room is open.) I'm taking my camera and hope to post a few pictures when I get back. In the meantime, I want to thank everyone who's helped Captain's Quarters get past the 200,000 visitor mark, as of yesterday. Thank you and keep coming back! UPDATE: No pictures (sorry), but Michael Medved was fabulous! Both The Patriot and Michael himself went way out of their way to mention the Northern Alliance, and we got a nice...
April 30, 2004
Teamsters Anti-Corruption Team Resigns, Blames Hoffa
In a move that threatens to delay the end of federal control of the largest American union, 20 investigators and lawyers assigned to fight corruption in the Teamsters followed the example of their leader, Edwin H. Stier, and walked off the job. The New York Times reports that union president James Hoffa, Jr frustrated investigators who got too close to high-ranking members of the union: The former prosecutor, Edwin H. Stier, sent a sharply worded letter that accused James P. Hoffa, the Teamsters president, of blocking a broad investigation into possible union corruption in Chicago and of dragging his feet in a case of alleged embezzlement by a Teamsters leader in Houston. "In spite of our efforts to convince General President Jim Hoffa to remain committed to fighting corruption," Mr. Stier wrote, "I have concluded that he has backed away from the Teamsters' anticorruption plan in the face of pressure...
May 3, 2004
Kerrey's Lame Excuse
Bob Kerrey ignited a firestorm of controversy when he walked out of the 9/11 Commission's meeting with President Bush in order to speak with Senator Pete Domenici. Now he tells National Review Online that he regrets leaving and considers it a mistake: Kerrey had scheduled a meeting at noon Thursday with New Mexico Republican Sen. Pete Domenici, a member of the Appropriations Committee, at Domenici's office in the Hart Senate Office Building (the two were to discuss an issue related to the New School, of which Kerrey is president). To make the meeting, Kerry left the White House at about 11:40 A.M., missing the last hour of the commission's questioning of Bush and Cheney. But when Kerrey arrived at the Hart Building, he was told that Domenici was busy on the Senate floor, voting on a series of amendments. Noon came and went. Instead of meeting in the office, Kerrey...
May 6, 2004
Smoking Ban for Saint Paul?
The Saint Paul City Council has proposed a ban on smoking in public places, such as bars and restaurants, and it appears to have significant support. Three of seven Council members have committed to "aye" votes, while only one publicly opposes it so far, the St. Paul Pioneer Press reports in today's paper: The measure, unveiled Wednesday, appears to have substantial support in the early going, with three members in favor, one against and three undecided. But it is uncertain at this point whether Mayor Randy Kelly will support the ban, which would affect about 845 licensed restaurants and 190 on-sale liquor establishments. The Star-Tribune weighs in with negative reaction from restaurant patrons, who claim that smokers have rights too. The owner of Mickey's Diner, a landmark in Saint Paul, declared that a smoking ban would be an "infringement on my personal freedom," a sentiment shared by his patrons in...
May 7, 2004
Strong Job Growth Adds To 2004 Gains
Job-growth numbers released this morning surprised analysts for a second straight month, and even last month's spectacular job growth was underestimated, reports USA Today: Employers added 288,000 jobs to their payrolls in April as the nation's unemployment rate slipped to 5.6%, reinforcing hopes for a sustained turnaround in the jobs market that had lagged for so long. Payrolls have risen now for eight months, with 867,000 new jobs created so far this year, the Labor Department reported Friday. March's blockbuster job numbers, meanwhile, were updated from 308,000 to 337,000 new jobs created, emphasizing the explosion in job growth. Ever since the last of Bush's economic plan was implemented in Q1 2003, the economy has turned around and now significant job growth has returned. Even the much-maligned manufacturing sector has grown, adding 21,000 jobs in April. Kerry will shift focus from the economy to the war from this point forward as...
May 8, 2004
And You Thought Americans Were Ignorant About Geography
The Guardian reports today that the Irish postal service, An Post, issued a stamp which confuses Cyprus with Crete and failed to include its own border with Northern Ireland, which belongs to the UK: The 65 cent stamp - 330,000 of which were issued on May 1 to commemorate the EU's expansion and for use to mail letters to all 25 member states - places Cyprus off the south-east coast of Greece, much closer to the location of Crete than Cyprus. The horizontal sliver bears scant resemblance to the chubby, rhino-horned shape of Cyprus but comes uncannily close to the long and slim Crete, Greece's largest island. ... In Northern Ireland, a part of the United Kingdom, symbol-sensitive Protestants also found fault with the stamp, which has erased the staunchly defended border between Irish south and British north. "The stamp manages to get every single European border right on the...
May 11, 2004
Economic Expansion Continues ... Quietly
Jon at QandO notes the AFP report on the economic expansion, indicating that we can continue to expect expansion into 2005: A robust recovery driven by productivity and tax cuts puts the US economy on track for growth of 4.7 percent this year and 3.7 percent next, the OECD reported. The figure for this year shows a significant 0.5-point increase from the growth being forecast by the OECD six months ago in November when it pencilled in growth of 4.2 percent. And what gets the credit for this good news? "The expansion is now firmly established across most sectors of the economy, helped by continued stimulus from fiscal and monetary policies," the OECD reported. Jon reminds us that our expansion continues despite a lack of growth in the European economy. Read QandO for excellent economic analysis. It's definitely on my daily-read list, for all three bloggers there -- Jon, McQ,...
A Sad Epilogue to Political Correctness Insanity
In a sad coda to a story we just discussed on the radio last Saturday, the subject of a socio-medical experiment in the supposed irrelevance of biology in gender has committed suicide at age 38: David Reimer, a man who was born a boy but raised as a girl in a famous medical experiment, only to reassert his male identity in the last 20 years of his life, died on May 4. He was 38. His family says he committed suicide. ... After a botched circumcision operation when he was a toddler, David Reimer became the subject of a study that became known as the John/Joan case in the 60's and 70's. His mother said she was still angry with the Baltimore doctor who persuaded her and her husband, Ron, to give female hormones to their son and raise him as a daughter. After removing his genitalia, the doctors gave...
May 13, 2004
The Governator Delivers
It seems that Arnold Schwarzenegger has made substantial progress in breaking through the trench warfare of California politics and will do the impossible this year -- deliver a state budget on time, with no new taxes: Today's proposal will mark a milestone on the way to the June 30 constitutional deadline for obtaining a budget agreement from the Legislature. It is built largely on a series of deals privately negotiated by the governor, the latest of which was announced Wednesday: an agreement between the administration and local government officials that would save the state $1.3 billion in the coming fiscal year. Despite the state's persistent multibillion-dollar budget gap, despite a Legislature controlled by Democrats who want new revenue, and despite the governor's resistance to cutting programs more deeply, he is on his way to delivering on his pledge. When Arnold began his run for California's top spot, he received a...
Power Corrupts, UN Corrupts Absolutely
Instapundit links to a breaking story regarding an important international organization that may have lost $100 billion or more to corruption. No, it's not the UN per se, but the UN subsidiary World Bank, which supposedly exists to combat poverty and provide development support for third-world countries. Senator Richard Lugar set off warning bells at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this afternoon: Corrupt use of World Bank funds may exceed $100 billion and while the institution has moved to combat the problem, more must be done, the chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee said on Thursday. Sen. Richard Lugar, an Indiana Republican, charged that "in its starkest terms, corruption has cost the lives of uncounted individuals contending with poverty and disease." ... He cited experts who calculated that between $26 billion and $130 billion of the money lent by the World Bank for development projects since 1946 has...
May 17, 2004
Brown v Board of Education: Declining Legacy?
This month marks the 50th anniversary of what some consider the most influential Supreme Court decision of the 20th century: Brown v. Board of Education, which ruled legal structures for the "separate but equal" doctrine for public schools to be unconstitutional and helped to set in motion the Civil Rights Movement. However, as CNN notes, city public schools such as the celebrated Central High School in Little Rock have seen a progressive trend towards resegregation as white students move to the suburbs or into private schools: But while Central High students sound upbeat about harmony in the hallways, legal and social activists warn that a problem from the past may return to the classrooms in Little Rock and the rest of the nation. The percentage of white children enrolled in America's public schools -- 60 percent in 2001-2002 -- is 7 percentage points less than a decade before, according to...
May 18, 2004
Abu Ghraib: The Latest Judicial-Nominee Excuse
The Washington Post reports this morning that the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal has become the latest, sexiest excuse for Senate Democrats in holding up judicial nominees. The latest victim in the judicial wars is William J. Haynes, who had already passed the Senate Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote -- but Ted Kennedy wants him recalled to committee before the full Senate takes up the vote to answer questions about Abu Ghraib: Key Senate Democrats are pushing -- so far without success -- to reopen hearings on a top Pentagon official whose judicial nomination has become entangled in the scandal over abuses of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. forces. The nomination of Defense Department general counsel William J. Haynes II for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee two months ago -- well before the Abu Ghraib prison scandal broke into the...
Democrats Target Janklow's Congressional Seat in SD
South Dakota will hold a special election to fill the seat vacated by the resignation of Rep. Bill Janklow (R) from Congress. Democrats have targeted this seat for conversion and will be launching a major get-out-the-vote effort to try to capture the seat for Stephanie Herseth, an Emily's List beneficiary. The NRCC needs Minnesota volunteers to spend a few days in South Dakota to counter these efforts, as Marcus Esmay, spokesman for Minnesota Republican candidate John Kline, informed me by e-mail today: Congressman John Kline (R-MN) will be leading a bus-load of hard-working Minnesotans to help South Dakota counter this effort [by Democrats], and he has asked me to e-mail the administrators of all of his favorite blogs to request assistance in filling up our bus. Those who join us will not only have 4+ hours to quiz Congressman Kline, but they will also have the satisfaction of helping lay...
May 19, 2004
The Commons Takes A Powder
The London Telegraph has a disturbing story in this morning's breaking news about a protest in the House of Commons which culminated in a stupid and frightening attack on Tony Blair: The House of Commons has been suspended after protesters threw missiles containing purple powder at Tony Blair during Prime Minister's question time. Mr Blair was hit on the back by the powder which spread a cloud of dust over MPs on the Labour benches. The Prime Minister continued to answer a question from Michael Howard, the Tory leader, before the session was suspended by Speaker Michael Martin. The protest was staged by two men who were sitting in an area of the public gallery normally reserved for distinguished guests. They were dragged from the gallery by security staff as MPs began to leave the chamber. That's all of the information known at this point. British leftists seem to have...
Daschle, Thune In Dead Heat
South Dakota television station KELO and the Argus-Leader, the state's largest daily newspaper, announced that their polling shows that John Thune has pulled into a virtual dead heat with Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle -- without having spent a cent on advertising (via Hugh Hewitt and Power Line): We polled 800 registered voters last week who say they regularly vote. Here's who they'd choose as senator if today were Election Day. Our KELOLAND-TV/Argus Leader scientific poll shows 49% of voters would support democrat Tom Daschle. 47% would vote for republican John Thune. And just 4 percent are undecided. There's a three and a half percent margin of error. ... At this point, the Senate race is a tale of two campaigns. Daschle's camp has been on the air for months, and spent millions of dollars doing it. His supporters argue it's been more effective than our numbers suggest. Thune's camp...
May 21, 2004
The Ivory Tower
Stanley Fish, retiring dean of Liberal Arts at the University of Illinois-Chicago, argues in a New York Times op-ed that academia dilutes and warps its raison d'etre when it attempts to play active roles in partisan politics. Instead, Fish exhorts his colleagues to focus on the truly academic roles of analysis and scholarship: Marx famously said that our job is not to interpret the world, but to change it. In the academy, however, it is exactly the reverse: our job is not to change the world, but to interpret it. While academic labors might in some instances play a role in real-world politics if, say, the Supreme Court cites your book on the way to a decision it should not be the design or aim of academics to play that role. While academics in general will agree that a university should not dance to the tune of external...
May 22, 2004
New York State Gov't Misdirected 9/11 Rebuilding Funds: WaPo
In the aftermath of the destruction in Lower Manhattan on 9/11, Congress acted on the will of the American people to defiantly rebuild what had been destroyed by the Islamofascists within the space of a few hours. Congress created, and President Bush approved, the Liberty Bond program and funded it to the tune of $8 billion. They intended the money to rescue the financial condition of the areas damaged at and around Ground Zero and gave New York state and city officials unprecedented leeway to manage the funds in order to reduce bottlenecks and promote maximum efficiency and speed for the rebuilding effort. Unfortunately, state and city officials have spent the money on an ever-widening radius of projects, both in geography and scope, according to the Washington Post: Six months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Congress approved an $8 billion program to repair this city's damaged office towers,...
May 25, 2004
UN Implements Sex-For-Food Program In The Congo
The London Independent reports this morning that the UN, which has been so critical of the abuses by American troops at Abu Ghraib, faces its own scandal. In a hideous twist, UN "peacekeeping" troops stationed in the Congo and supposedly assisting refugees of the war there have forced women, many barely teenagers and some already rape victims, to prostitute themselves for food: Teenage rape victims fleeing war in the Democratic Republic of Congo are being sexually exploited by the United Nations peace-keeping troops sent to the stop their suffering. The Independent has found that mothers as young as 13 - the victims of multiple rape by militiamen - can only secure enough food to survive in the sprawling refugee camp by routinely sleeping with UN peace-keepers. Testimony from girls and aid workers in the Internally Displaced People (IDP) camp in Bunia, in the north-east corner of Congo, claims that every...
May 26, 2004
Peace Comes To Sudan?
The longest current war may be coming to a close. The London Telegraph reports that the Bush and Blair administrations scored a foreign-policy victory by pushing the warring factions to the bargaining table in the Sudan, resulting in a tentative peace agreement: A peace deal to end Africa's longest civil war was finally signed last night. The fighting in Sudan, which has raged intermittently for nearly 50 years, has claimed two million lives. ... The conclusion of the fraught negotiations - in which the two sides have come under intense pressure from the United States - hands President George W Bush a rare foreign-policy boost in a Muslim country. ... A transitional government headed by President Omar alBashir will take charge later this year. His fiercest enemy, John Garang, commander of the Sudan People's Liberation Army, will become vice-president. North and south will split oil revenues equally and both sides...
May 27, 2004
Hey, Juice, It's All Going To Fred Anyway
Apparently upset that he no longer gets wall-to-wall TV coverage, O.J. Simpson has his lawyer shopping him around for TV and print interviews for the upcoming 10th anniversary of his wife's brutal murder (via The Corner): "It will be expensive," [Star Magazine] quotes [attorney Yale]Galanter. "TV rights are going for $100,000. For print rights, between $20,000 and $25,000." Nothing if not classy, Galanter adds that O.J. might even be willing to do a photo shoot at the Brentwood crime scene and at Nicole's grave site - if the price is right. "It would have to be a multimillion-type deal," Galanter says. A grave site photo would be "worth $500,000 ... Our preference is a standard interview ... but it's just money." Simpson, of course, has a $33 million judgement against him from Fred Goldman, the father of the other victim of the slaying that mesmerized a nation and made Geraldo...
May 31, 2004
Remembering Our Brave Soldiers
I want to send out my appreciation, admiration, and gratitude for our nation's men and women of the military, active duty and veteran alike. You make it possible for a man to sit down at his computer and talk about how he sees the world, complete with criticism of our nation's leaders, without fear of retribution or imprisonment -- or worse. While I have never served in the military, my family has served in several conflicts. My father served in combat during the Korean War, and like most men with those experiences, he chooses not to speak of it. When he recalls his service to his country, he tells soldier's stories of grizzled non-coms, young and foolish junior officers, and commanders of either stripe. His oldest brother, who recently passed away, served in World War II in the Seabees, seeing action in the Pacific Theater. Two other brothers served in...
June 2, 2004
Herseth Wins In South Dakota
In a special election that both parties maintain holds special significance for the November contests, Democrat Stephanie Herseth narrowly held off Republican Larry Diedrich to take over the remainder of Bill Janklow's term in Congress. Herseth's narrow margin, however, means the two will meet again in November: With 96 percent of precincts reporting, Herseth had 124,647 votes, or 51 percent, to Larry Diedrich's 121,719 votes, or 49 percent. ... Her victory gave the Democrats two straight triumphs this year in special elections waged for GOP-held seats, and coincided with Democratic claims that a national tide is running their way ahead of the fall campaign. Jay Reding live-blogged the election, which shows you what a dedicated blogger Jay is; would anyone else in the blogosphere live-blog an election in South Dakota? His conclusion: At the same time, it's a Pyrrhic victory for the Democrats. Stephanie Herseth may give the Democrats a...
Want To Feel Old?
How's this for a slap in the face? Jessica McClure, who held the attention of the nation as a toddler when she fell into an abandoned well 17 years ago, is now a high school graduate. In October 1987, when she was 18 months old, Jessica slipped into an uncovered eight-inch-wide pipe in her aunt's yard. Crews struggled for two and a half days to rescue her, digging a deep parallel shaft and then a 63-inch horizontal tunnel through bedrock to join the two shafts. They finally brought her to the surface in a moment covered on live television. For those of us old enough to remember, the Baby Jessica story riveted the nation, one of the first moment-to-moment crisis not involving war or an assassination attempt that kept people glued to the 24-hour news sources for constant updates. And it sure doesn't seem like 17 years have gone by,...
Young Girls: We Don't Need No Exploitation
In a society gone skin-mad, voices of reason seem few and far between. Surprisingly, though, retailers and designers have started to heed calls for more modest choices in clothing aimed at young girls -- from the target market itself: During a recent shopping trip to Nordstrom, 11-year-old Ella Gunderson became frustrated with all the low-cut hip-huggers and skintight tops. So she wrote to the Seattle-based chain's executives to complain. The industry has been getting the message: A more modest look is in, fashion experts say. ... The Web sites ModestApparelUSA.com and ModestByDesign.com where the slogan is "Clothing your father would be proud of" report that sales have skyrocketed over the past 18 months. Many youngsters are frustrated by the profusion of racy teenage clothing, according to Buzz Marketing, a New Jersey-based firm that compiles feedback from teen advisers. "There is just sensory overload. Kids are going to say...
June 3, 2004
This Sounds Depressingly Familiar
When I lived in California, the Democrat-controlled Legislature could never produce a budget on time. The situation got so bad that Californians debated referenda cutting off salaries and per-diem payments to the state Assembly and Senate from the start of the new fiscal year (July 1) until a bugget was passed and signed into law. Their continuing failure to pass budgets brought the state Democratic party much-deserved scorn, inasmuch as they controlled both houses of the Legislature. Now, however, the shoe resides firmly on the other foot at the federal level, and Republicans not only don't think they can pass a budget on time, they're debating on whether to pass one at all: They have tried sweet-talk and dire warnings, insults and bluffing tactics. None of it has worked, which is why a growing number of Republicans are beginning to despair about agreeing on a budget plan for next year....
June 4, 2004
The Jobful Recovery
After much hew and cry regarding the so-called "jobless recovery" -- as if job growth had ever been anything but a lagging indicator in the past -- the economy has created almost a million jobs in the past three months, as 248,000 were added last month and the April estimate was revised sharply upward: The Labor Department report showed 248,000 new jobs in May, compared with the revised 346,000 increase reported in April. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com forecast the May report would show a 225,000-job gain. The April job gain was revised up from a previous reading of 288,000 new jobs. The March jobs gain was also revised higher to 353,000 from a previous reading of 337,000 additional jobs. That puts the three-month job increase at 947,000, the best gain since 1.03 million jobs were added during the same three months of 2000. The job increase was broad-based, with only...
June 5, 2004
Farewell, Ronald Reagan
Only minutes after our radio show ended, I found out that President Ronald Reagan had passed away after a long struggle with Alzheimer's disease. While not unexpected, the news of his passing stunned me in a way I had not thought possible. For me and millions of other conservatives, Ronald Reagan was our touchstone, even after his debilitating disease struck, and I found myself thinking about all of the ways in which Reagan influenced and molded my own philosophy. Although Reagan had been the governor of California for two terms, I was too young to remember much about him in that role. I first recall his political impact in 1976, when I was 13, as he ran against the incumbent President, Gerald Ford, in an election Jimmy Carter eventually won. He challenged Ford that year as a representative of the so-called Goldwater wing of the GOP, preaching a strong defense,...
Where Were You When Reagan Was Shot? When He Changed The World?
Every generation has one or two seminal events that sear into our memories, so much that we can always recall exactly where we were and what we were doing at the moment we heard or saw it. Ronald Reagan's death reminds me of the assassination attempt on March 30, 1981, that almost killed him just as he started his term in office. A 17-year-old college student at the time, I worked as a clerk for the local Sears store in the Los Cerritos Mall, and decided to come in to work on my day off to work as a floater. Normally I worked in the men's clothing department, but instead the office assigned me to the toy department, a choice assignment for a weekday, since the kids would all be in school and I could spend most of my time watching the televisions in the adjacent department. When I first...
June 6, 2004
D-Day Memories at NRO
National Review Online reprints an article written by William McGurn 10 years ago for the 50th anniversary of D-Day, a remembrance sparked by his visit to the first town liberated by the Allies, St. Mere-Eglise. I found it to be oddly satisfying in that it not only honors the memories of all those who died to free Western Europe, as well as those who lived through it, but points out that political cluelessness may always surround D-Day anniversaries: Smack-dab in the middle of the little town that bears its name stands the thirteenth-century church of Ste-Me`re-Eglise, as proud and sturdy as the people who built it. As such there is little to distinguish it from the many other stone churches that crowd the Norman landscape. Except for this: a special, stained-glass Madonna and Child that I have always found more engaging than all the glories of Chartres. For the Madonna...
Reason: He Was Right
In honor of Ronald Reagan's passing, Reason made available Glenn Garvin's review of Peter Schweizer's book, Reagan's War, which takes a narrow look at Reagan's career as an anti-communist. I have not read the book, but the review is outstanding. It explains what I wrote earlier about Reagan -- how he used defense spending as a weapon in the Cold War, and in fact as the ultimate weapon he knew would end it: As early as 1963, Reagan argued that the arms race should be not reined in but accelerated. "If we truly believe that our way of life is best, arent the Russians more likely to recognize that fact and modify their stand if we let their economy come unhinged, so the contrast is apparent?" he asked in a speech that year. "In an all-out race our system is strong," said Reagan, "and eventually the enemy gives up the...
Bush: June 11 To Be Day Of Mourning
Below is President George Bush's proclamation of Friday, June 11 as a national day of mourning for the death of President Ronald Reagan. TO THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES: It is my sad duty to announce officially the death of Ronald Reagan, the fortieth President of the United States, on June 5, 2004. We are blessed to live in a Nation, and a world, that have been shaped by the will, the leadership, and the vision of Ronald Reagan. With an unshakable faith in the values of our country and the character of our people, Ronald Reagan renewed America's confidence and restored our Nation. His optimism, strength, and humility epitomized the American spirit. He always told us that for America the best was yet to come. Ronald Reagan believed that God takes the side of justice and that America has a special calling to oppose tyranny and defend freedom....
Gore Continues His Self-Immolation
Al Gore lashed out at a fellow Democrat earlier today for not enthusiastically supporting his attempt to steal the Florida election. Gore, campaigning for Senate candidate and current Congressman Peter Deutsch in Florida, told the Miami Herald that Deutsch's opponent in the primary was the "single most treacherous and dishonest person" involved in the 2000 campaign: Al Gore harshly criticized U.S. Senate candidate Alex Penelas, saying his fellow Democrat was "the single most treacherous and dishonest person" he dealt with during the disputed 2000 presidential campaign. ... "One of the other candidates in this race became in 2000 the single most treacherous and dishonest person I dealt with during the campaign anywhere in America," Gore told the newspaper after praising Penelas' opponent, U.S. Rep. Peter Deutsch. Penelas is not mentioned by name in the statement. But a Gore aide confirmed Sunday he was not referring to former state education commissioner...
June 7, 2004
The Gore Fire Spreads
Al Gore's comments over the weekend, calling the Florida Democratic candidate for Senate Alex Panelas "the single most treacherous and dishonest person I dealt with" during the 2000 election, has resulted in a strong riposte from current Florida Senators Bill Nelson and Bob Graham. Both Democrats scold Gore for injecting "slash-and-burn" politics, possibly damaging the candidate Gore endorsed: Sen. Bill Nelson questioned Gore's decision to inject himself into the race, saying it hurts the party's ability to keep retiring Sen. Bob Graham's seat and threatens a key state for presidential candidate John Kerry. Graham called Penelas, the mayor of Miami-Dade County, "a good Democrat." Both Graham and Nelson have said they will not endorse a candidate in the Democratic primary but that they felt compelled to come to Penelas' defense in light of Gore's remarks. "This slash-and-burn politics has gotten us to the point that it is causing gridlock in...
June 10, 2004
UK To Throw Out Viable Transplant Organs?
With the First Mate receiving her new kidney this week, organ-transplantation stories catch my eye rather easily. Unfortunately, this disturbing story from today's London Telegraph clashes with the buoyant joy we've all felt from the FM's success: Shortages of consultants are threatening a crisis in transplant surgery with the possibility of donated organs having to be discarded. Senior consultants met officials from the Department of Health and the NHS yesterday to call for changes to working conditions to encourage more young doctors to go into transplantation. The problem is particularly acute in renal medicine, and there are fears that it is only a matter of time before viable donated kidneys have to be discarded because no-one can be found to perform an operation. While to Americans the notion of throwing away life-saving organs seems utterly ludricrous, especially after years of public-service announcements supporting organ donation, the crisis in the UK...
A Big NoKo Hello To Juneau
You can file this under the 'Well, this can't be good' category -- the London Telegraph reports that the North Koreans have testing a new ICBM with a range that includes Alaska: North Korea has tested an intercontinental ballistic missile engine capable of hitting the United States, according to a South Korean report. The potential range of the missile was established by American intelligence from scorch marks and other traces of the engine test, the newspaper Joongang Ilbo said, citing diplomatic sources. It could reach up to 3,700 miles, enough to hit Alaska. The Telegraph concludes their report with the laughable notion that the US had ignored the Korean Peninsula because of the war in Iraq -- as if Washington DC consists of a few guys hanging around a fax machine who can only work on one problem at a time. Not only that, but missiles don't just get designed...
June 11, 2004
New York Continues Slide Towards Autocracy
A judge in New York has dismissed charges against a mayor who performed same-sex marriages, ruling that the state didn't show that the underlying law he violated was constitutional: A judge dismissed criminal charges Thursday against a small-town mayor for marrying gay couples, saying the state failed to show it has a legitimate interest in banning same-sex weddings. New Paltz Town Court Justice Jonathan Katz also ruled that prosecutors failed to prove the law New Paltz Mayor Jason West was charged with violating was constitutional. While I tend to take a more libertarian point of view of gay marriage -- I don't think it will cause the collapse of civilization that my friends do -- I am adamantly opposed to the rise of autocratic rule that this issue has promoted. Gavin Newsom also took the law into his own hands in San Francisco, overruling the state Legislature and effectively passing...
Reagan Remembered: Antidotes For Saccharine Gloss
While I have always been interested in politics and current affairs -- I avidly read newspapers even in grade school -- I came of political age during the Reagan Administration. I remember how thrilled I was when he decisively beat Jimmy Carter and had the opportunity to put his philosophy of limited government to work. I also remember the bruising political wars that Reagan's election inspired, and while I think that the bitter partisanship that erupted ultimately finds its roots in Watergate, there is no doubt that the Reagan Era gave us a battle of philosophies unmatched since FDR. In that regard, most of the eulogies presented in the media this week at the passing of Ronald Reagan have been unsatisfying. They recall a Reagan transcendent who somehow won his triumphs without much battle at all. Daniel Henninger today writes more of an effective remembrance of the Reagan Era rather...
Lech Walesa: Two Kinds Of Politicians
Lech Walesa, the former President of Poland and most famously the leader of Solidarity, an underground movement that helped free Poland, eulogizes Ronald Reagan in today's OpinionJournal.com. While his essay highlights the best of Ronald Reagan's fight for freedom, Walesa makes a stunning point in the middle of the article that describes not only Reagan in the 1980s but highlights a crucial difference in today's politics: I distinguish between two kinds of politicians. There are those who view politics as a tactical game, a game in which they do not reveal any individuality, in which they lose their own face. There are, however, leaders for whom politics is a means of defending and furthering values. For them, it is a moral pursuit. They do so because the values they cherish are endangered. They're convinced that there are values worth living for, and even values worth dying for. Otherwise they would...
June 12, 2004
Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go
One of the undying memes of this election cycle has been the supposedly Trojan-horse Democratic campaign for John Kerry, which is designed to lose so that Hillary Clinton can run in 2008 without running against an incumbent in either party. Such a notion is ludicrous, not the least because neither national party would consider passing up a chance for the White House. No doubt, though, Senator Clinton would normally make a formidable opponent in any national campaign, especially with all of the energy she brings to her public life, and her husband's legendary motivation: On second thought, perhaps she's just too tired to run for national office. I doubt this picture of her and her husband at Reagan's funeral will convince too many centrists to support her. (via Michelle Malkin's new blog and Power Line)...
June 13, 2004
European Union A Flop?
The European Union held an election this weekend, the first since ten former Eastern Bloc nations have been added to the confederation. However, Europeans sent a message to the EU, as even those in the new countries could hardly be bothered to vote: Europe's voters have delivered a massive vote of no confidence in their governments in European Parliament elections, both by hammering ruling parties and by staying away in record numbers. The biggest transnational election in history, staged just six weeks after the European Union expanded from 15 to 25 states with 450 million citizens, highlighted public indifference toward remote EU institutions. ... Only the recently elected Spanish and Greek governments escaped the voters' wrath, amplifying their national victories. A mere 44.2 percent of nearly 350 million eligible voters bothered to cast ballots in the four-day exercise, the lowest turnout since direct elections for the Strasbourg-based assembly began in...
June 14, 2004
Common Sense Prevails, For Now
The Supreme Court has given a narrow and temporary victory to the advocates of common sense over shrill absolutism by turning back an attempt by Michael Newdow to strip "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance: The Supreme Court at least temporarily preserved the phrase "one nation, under God," in the Pledge of Allegiance, ruling Monday that a California atheist could not challenge the patriotic oath while sidestepping the broader question of separation of church and state. The decision leaves untouched the practice in which millions of schoolchildren around the country begin the day by reciting the pledge. The court said the atheist could not sue to ban the pledge from his daughter's school and others because he did not have legal authority to speak for her. The justices have left the door open for further challenges to the Pledge, making it clear that the majority rested its decision on...
June 16, 2004
WaPo Shills For Kerry, Supports Forced Abortion In China
Today's Washington Post editorializes against President Bush's decision to withhold federal funding to organizations promoting abortion overseas, one of Bush's original election promises. The Post claims that Bush's position violates his 2000 election "moderate stance on social issues": IN THE 2000 campaign, George W. Bush maintained a studiously moderate stance on social issues. Once he assumed office in January 2001, he betrayed that position and delighted his right-wing base by attaching antiabortion conditions to foreign assistance. These conditions laid down that family planning groups accepting federal money must not perform abortions, or even provide information about them to their patients. As we said at the time, forcing an organization to censor its views as a condition of receiving government money would be unconstitutional on free-speech grounds in this country. Really? Perhaps, although I rather doubt they'd be claiming that if a university failed to support equal-opportunity practices. Besides, the Post...
June 21, 2004
The Failure Of European Socialism
If anyone in the United States points out the relative stagnation of the European economy in relation to ours, that person would be castigated as a closed-minded Americacentric demagogue. Fortunately, as yesterday's OpinionJournal article informs us, the Europeans have reached much the same conclusion. A new study by Sweden -- a bastion of cradle-to-grave nanny-statism -- shows that the European standard of living has fallen far off the pace of American life: The study, "The EU vs. USA," was done by a pair of economists--Fredrik Bergstrom and Robert Gidehag--for the Swedish think tank Timbro. It found that if Europe were part of the U.S., only tiny Luxembourg could rival the richest of the 50 American states in gross domestic product per capita. Most European countries would rank below the U.S. average, as the chart below shows. ... U.S. GDP per capita was a whopping 32% higher than the EU average...
June 22, 2004
Republican Senate Candidate Aims For Libertarian Vote
GOP hopeful Jack Ryan, currently slated to run against Democrat Barack Obama for the Senate seat being vacated by retiring Republican Peter Fiztgerald, has seen his candidacy blow up with the unsealing of his divorce records from TV star Jeri Lynn Ryan of "Star Trek: Voyager" and "Boston Public". Jack Ryan apparently did not sufficiently prepare GOP party leaders for the revelations contained in his ex-wife's filings: Before Republican U.S. Senate candidate Jack Ryan finished a news conference in which he discussed allegations by his former wife that he pressured her to have sex in clubs while others watched, calls for him to get out of the race began. ... Jeri Lynn Ryan charged during a custody hearing that Ryan took her on surprise trips to New Orleans, New York and Paris in 1998, and that he insisted she go to sex clubs with him on each trip. She said...
Wanted: Fawning Strangers, No Experience Necessary
Glenn Reynolds points out a want ad in the New York Times Job Market section that may explain the enthusiastic crowds lining up to buy My Life, the new autobiography by Bill Clinton: Job title: Part Time/Temporary Employer: Confidential Date Posted: 06-20-2004 Description: P/T CLINTON BOOK TOUR People needed immed Tu 6/22 & Wed 6/ 23, to work at book signing. Cash paid. No word in the ad as to how many positions were open, but it certainly appears to be a very short job. Do you suppose the job paid a "living wage," or do you think they cheaped out and paid minimum?...
June 24, 2004
McCain-Feingold's First (Really) Big Victim?
The DC newspaper The Hill reports that the FEC may decide that Michael Moore's new film, Fahrenheit 9/11, qualifies as a political advertisement on behalf of John Kerry and is therefore subject to the same restrictions on advertising as any political commercial (via Drudge): In a draft advisory opinion placed on the FECs agenda for todays meeting, the agencys general counsel states that political documentary filmmakers may not air television or radio ads referring to federal candidates within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election. The opinion is generated under the new McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law, which prohibits corporate-funded ads that identify a federal candidate before a primary or general election. The proscription is broadly defined. Section 100.29 of the federal election regulations defines restricted corporate-funded ads as those that identify a candidate by his name, nickname, photograph or drawing or make it otherwise apparent...
June 25, 2004
You're The Vice-President. Act Like It. That Is All.
Dick Cheney attempted to dress down Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy on the floor of the Senate Tuesday by suggesting a new form of entertainment and self-actualization for the partisan hack: On Tuesday, Cheney, serving in his role as president of the Senate, appeared in the chamber for a photo session. A chance meeting with Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, became an argument about Cheney's ties to Halliburton Co., an international energy services corporation, and President Bush's judicial nominees. The exchange ended when Cheney offered some crass advice. "Fuck yourself," said the man who is a heartbeat from the presidency. Forget, for the moment, the breathless reporting from the Washington Post. Forget the fact that just about everyone I know says this word from time to time. We are talking about one of our nation's leaders speaking to a representative from Vermont on the...
June 26, 2004
Oh, And You're Fat, Too
Speaking of Ralph Nader, he sent a message to Michael Moore on his campaign blog accusing him of selling out his progressive credentials to the Establishment, in the form of the Democrats (via Instapundit): Once upon a time, there was Michael Moore the First. He never forgot his friends. Come time for the Washington, DC premiere of Bowling for Columbine a while back, he invited his old buddies in Washingtongave them good seats and spent the rest of the evening with them. During his other movie's premiere, he affectionately recognized how much those old friends helped him and supported him after he was mistreated and let go by Mother Jones. He was generous with his words and time. Now there is Michael Moore the Second. Last night he hosted the Washington, DC premiere of Fahrenheit 9/11, and who was there? The Democratic political establishment, the same people whom he took...
June 27, 2004
Brownshirts?
The echoes of Al Gore's comments have barely faded when he seems to have been proved right by the wrong side, according to Las Vegas' KLAS-TV. Chris Saldana reports that a moviegoer attending Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 was assaulted when he expressed a differing opinion (via Drudge): The highly anticipated film, Fahrenheit 9/11, came with more than just controversy at one Las Vegas movie theatre. Moviegoer, Richard Streeter, was one of the many who made his way to a theatre to see what the hype was about. After viewing the film, he was greeted outside the theatre by members of the Las Vegas MoveOn.org. The group was handing out leaflets on the importance of the film. Streeter voiced his view on the movie, "I made the comment, apples and oranges -- Kerry, Bush -- one's no better than the other. You really ain't got much of a choice. This guy...
June 28, 2004
More Good News In South Asia
Despite predictions of a continent-wide conflagration sparked by the war on Islamofascist terror, prospects for peace in the region have become strengthened with renewed vigor in Pakistani-Indian diplomatic efforts. Today, both countries announced new agreements on missile testing and expansion of diplomatic ties: India and Pakistan made progress toward ending five decades of enmity by agreeing Monday to notify each other before missile tests, open new consulates and try to end a deadly dispute over the Himalayan enclave of Kashmir. "Both sides are committed, both sides are determined, both sides have the goodwill," Pakistani Foreign Secretary Riaz Khokhar told New Delhi TV after six hours of talks with his Indian counterpart, Foreign Secretary Shashank, who uses only one name. ... The agreements by Khokhar and Shashank were part of a process begun last year with the goal of a summit this year by the leaders of India and Pakistan to...
June 29, 2004
Hillary, The Truth-Teller
It appears that the Clintons have worked their magic once again -- bringing the fractious Right together with just a few unusually honest words from Senator Hillary Clinton while appearing in California, promoting Bill's new book: Headlining an appearance with other Democratic women senators on behalf of Sen. Barbara Boxer, who is up for re-election this year, Hillary Clinton told several hundred supporters some of whom had ponied up as much as $10,000 to attend to expect to lose some of the tax cuts passed by President Bush if Democrats win the White House and control of Congress. "Many of you are well enough off that ... the tax cuts may have helped you," Sen. Clinton said. "We're saying that for America to get back on track, we're probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We're going to take things away from you...
Brazilian Berserkers
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reports that Brazilian protestors assaulted Minnesota lawmakers visiting Rio de Janeiro last week to discuss and debate the upcoming American presidential election: Anti-American protesters throwing eggs, water and flour chased Minnesota House Majority Leader Erik Paulsen and another U.S. legislator from a Rio de Janeiro university campus last week, according to the two lawmakers and Brazilian news accounts. ... An account in the Brazilian newspaper, O Dia, reported that a crowd of 100 surrounded the two U.S. dignitaries in a school auditorium, chanted anti-American slogans and pelted them as they tried to leave. According to O Dia, some of the protesters threatened to hold the two legislators hostage and decapitate them in the manner of prisoners in Iraq. Mendoza said Monday that she and Paulsen also were threatened with envelopes addressed to them and marked "anthrax." I propose a boycott of all Brazilian imports until their government...
June 30, 2004
Philly Corruption Investigation Nets Mayor's Crony
A Philadelphia federal grand jury delivered an indictment yesterday from an ongoing investigation into corruption in city government, charging Philly's former treasurer, a powerful attorney allied with Mayor John Street, and ten others with graft: A federal grand jury in Philadelphia on Tuesday indicted the city's former treasurer and a powerful lawyer with close connections to Mayor John Street as part of a wide-ranging investigation into municipal corruption. The indictment, which names 12 defendants, charges the former treasurer, Corey Kemp, with accepting payments, gifts and other benefits from the lawyer, Ronald A. White, in exchange for directing city business worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to Mr. White's law firm and other companies linked to him. ... Mr. Street, who was elected to a second term in November, was not charged. But the indictment asserts that he instructed his staff to award city business to Mr. White or any firms...
Kosovo, The True Quagmire
While the Left continues to carp about the supposed "quagmire" of Iraq, where the US toppled a dictator and then set up the framework for an independent and representative government in less than 15 months, Alissa Rubin writes in today's Los Angeles Times that Kosovo continues to exist in limbo after five years of UN administration: Svinjare was one of 30 towns and villages in Kosovo swept by violence March 17 and 18. Mobs, some armed with heavy weapons, damaged 730 houses in Kosovo the vast majority owned by Serbs and 35 religious sites, mostly Serbian Orthodox churches. It was the worst violence since 1999, when hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians were displaced by Serbian security forces. Kosovo has been under United Nations control since North Atlantic Treaty Organization airstrikes drove out the Serbian forces. But the province remains part of Serbia and Montenegro, the successor state...
They Just Keep Rolling In
In a boost for the Bush administration and the President's re-election bid, Reuters reports that economists estimate that the US has added another quarter-million jobs in June, pushing the total for the year past 1.4 million: U.S. employment likely surged again in June, taking gains this year to some 1.4 million jobs and bolstering President George W. Bush's economic record ahead of the November election, analysts said onWednesday. Economists believe 250,000 jobs were created this month, virtually matching May's jump of 248,000, though the unemployment rate probably will not budge from 5.6 percent because newly hopeful job-seekers are returning to the job market. Not only is the economy producing new jobs at a fast clip, the newer jobs tend to be higher-paying as well, as they were in April and May according to analysts. The new jobs have also bolstered consumer confidence as the news seems to have finally sunk...
July 2, 2004
Chinese Continue Their Espionage
The government announced yesterday that it had arrested seven people for the illegal transfer of sensitive military technology and material to the People's Republic of China through contacts in Hong Kong. The Washington Post reports that the suspects sent systems like smart bombs and electronic warfare equipment to what the suspects had tried to pass off as an American-owned company: Federal agents arrested seven people yesterday in two suburban New Jersey towns and charged them with exporting millions of dollars' worth of sensitive military technology and components to China. The arrests were the latest in a crackdown on what authorities believe is a clandestine network purchasing weapons technology across the United States for the communist power. The men and women arrested yesterday are connected to two companies and are accused of sending the Chinese military several shipments of weapons systems, including radar, smart bombs, electronic warfare and communications equipment. According...
The Kiss Of Death?
Kofi Annan's travels in the Sudan took him to a couple of interesting places yesterday, including a camp that disappeared and another where he gave promises that the world has heard before from UN mouthpieces: There were only donkeys milling around in a soggy, trash-strewn lot on Thursday afternoon when the United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan, and his entourage arrived at what was supposed to be a crowded squatter camp here in the troubled Darfur region of Sudan. Gone were the more than 1,000 residents of the Meshtel settlement. Gone as well were their makeshift dwellings. Hours before Mr. Annan's arrival, the local authorities had loaded the camp's inhabitants aboard trucks and moved them. ... "Where are the people?" Mr. Annan was overheard asking a Sudanese official who was accompanying his tour of Darfur, the region in western Sudan where the government has been accused of unleashing armed militias...
July 3, 2004
There's No One Here To Take Your Call Right Now
Kathryn Jean Lopez at the Corner links to an article on the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute that seems to be an object lesson in pointlessness. The Friday Fax reports that "radical feminists" in the pro-abortion group Catholics for Free Choice prayed to the Virgin Mary for legalized abortion: Many participants at the meeting now taking place in Puerto Rico, called the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) Ad Hoc Committee on Population and Development, were stunned on Monday when "Catholics" for a Free Choice (CFFC) and its Latin American counterpart, "Catolicas" por el Derecho a Decidir, released a prayer card of the Virgin Mary, with the words "The love of God and of Mary of Guadalupe is greater..For women's lives, safe and legal abortion" superimposed over the image of the Virgin Mary. The back of the card says, "Dear Mary of Guadalupe, we thank you...
July 4, 2004
Remembering on Independence Day
I was going to write something inspirational for Independence Day, but instead, I found this at Auterrific, a great blog run by Linda, a CQ reader who often disagrees with me here. However, her post today reminds us that even though we may all disagree with each other on politics, we are all still Americans, and we stand together in the last instance. Thoughts For The 4th I could have posted something profound. I could have posted something fun. What I am posting, is a request that when you are enjoying all of your barbeques and swim parties today, that you take a moment to remember those who can't. The recently beheaded...they won't be with their families today. The people in the twin towers...they won't be with theirs either. The people in the flights that went down in the Pentagon and PA...nope, not theirs either. The countless soldiers who have...
July 5, 2004
My Position On Abortion
In order to clarify my post above on John Kerry's eye-popping statment in the Dubuque Telegraph-Herald yesterday, I will explain my position on abortion so you know where I sit. I believe that life begins within minutes of conception, and that belief is based on science, not faith, although they intersect. Eggs and sperm carry 23 chromosomes, half of the genetic blueprint for human life. Even if other primates have the same chromosome count, the DNA encoding on human eggs and sperm is uniquely human. When the sperm fertilizes the egg, the separate DNA strands combine into 23 pairs of chromosomes and a unique blueprint for a unique human being. Once the cell divides on its own -- usually within a half-hour -- that being is alive, unique, and separate from, though dependent on, its mother. Some have argued this point for decades. Phil Donahue, years ago, once said on...
July 6, 2004
Economy Poised To Be Best In 20 Years: AP
In a major boost to George Bush's re-election bid, the AP's Martin Crutsinger reports that the economic expansion may be the best since 1984: The economy appears headed for a banner year despite a springtime spike in energy prices and a recent increase in interest rates. In fact, many analysts are forecasting that the overall economy, as measured by the gross domestic product, will grow by 4.6 percent or better this year, the fastest in two decades. There were strong 4.5 percent growth rates in 1997 and 1999, when Bill Clinton was president and the country was in the midst of a record 10-year expansion. But if this year's growth ends up a bit faster than that, it will be the best since the economy roared ahead at a 7.2 percent rate in 1984, a year when another Republican president Ronald Reagan was running for re-election. Kerry and...
July 8, 2004
How Much Does This Add To Kerry's Tuition "Burden"?
College admissions offices have begun courting high-school counselors in new -- and expensive -- outreach programs that appear to border on corruption, if they don't cross the line entirely. The New York Times looks at some of the efforts made by more obscure universities to attract the "best" candidates: Though the image of the admissions process is often one of high school guidance counselors sidling up to colleges in hopes of gaining an advantage for their students, the reality is sometimes the other way around. Colleges are so intent on getting not just enough applicants, but the best ones, that some are lavishing perks on guidance counselors, raising questions about the difference between merely promoting a university and currying favor with those who speak directly into the ear of students and parents trying to evaluate it. ... When Centre College in Danville, Ky., invites counselors to visit, for example, it...
No Genocide For Oil
During the run-up to the Iraq phase of the war on terror, while France actively undermined US efforts to create a unified coalition of Western nations, people throughout Europe and the US protested against the war, chanting, "No War For Oil". The BBC now reports that the Sudan, like Saddam's Iraq, is experiencing genocide while the global community dithers. The US and British are working the UNSC for a resolution that would try to stop the Sudan from becoming another Rwanda, but have run into a familiar stumbling block: France says it does not support US plans for international sanctions on Sudan if violence continues in Darfur. The UN Security Council is debating a US draft resolution imposing sanctions on militias accused of "ethnic cleansing" against non-Arabs. ... Some one million people have fled their homes and at least 10,000 have been killed in what the UN calls "the world's...
Riordan Embarrasses California, Dymally Embarrasses Everyone
While partisan politics occasionally inspires some raw remarks from elected officials, such as the Cheney-Leahy contretemps last month, the venom stays between the principals and usually avoids outsiders. Former Los Angeles mayor and current California Education Secretary Richard Riordan scored some collateral damage last week, insulting a schoolgirl over her name and giving Governor Schwarzenegger a headache he didn't need: The conversation, videotaped by KEYT-TV, took place Thursday at a promotional event for summer reading at Santa Barbara's central library. The unidentified girl, who appeared to be a preschooler, asked Riordan if he knew that her name meant "Egyptian goddess." Riordan replied, "It means stupid dirty girl." After nervous laughter in the room, the girl again told Riordan the meaning of her name. "Hey, that's nifty," he said. Not as nifty as sticking his foot squarely in his mouth on television, and not surprisingly, Riordan and Schwarzenegger are taking some...
July 16, 2004
Because They've Been So Helpful Before
Germany has apparently been lobbying to have their country receive a permanent set on the UN Security Council since earlier this year, but have struggled to get enough support. First China gave them only a tepid response, and now the US has privately told them to pound sand: The United States opposes Germany becoming a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, a German newspaper Friday quoted a U.S. diplomat as saying. "Now is not the time that Germany should apply for a permanent seat," the unnamed diplomat was quoted as telling the Financial Times Deutschland. Germany's stints as a non-permanent member of the Security Council had been "very problematic," indeed there were "more problems than ever," the diplomat said. Germany's push to remove immunity from prosecution in the International Criminal Court for U.S. peacekeepers was cited as an example. The Pentagon said earlier this month it was pulling...
Finding Bobby Fischer
Bobby Fischer, who wowed the world as a teenage Grand Master of chess and who beat Boris Spassky in one of the lamer Cold War cultural confrontations, has been arrested in Japan and will soon return to the US to face charges: Former world chess champion Bobby Fischer, wanted since 1992 for playing a tournament in Yugoslavia despite U.N. sanctions, has been detained in Japan, clearing the way for his extradition to the United States. ... Fischer became a Cold War hero in 1972 when he defeated Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union to become the first American world chess champion. But the chess prodigy, long know for his eccentric ways, stunned the chess world by refusing to play again, and had slipped mysteriously in and out of public view in the years since. "Mysteriously" is certainly one way of putting it. In 1972, when Fischer beat Spassky in 1972,...
July 19, 2004
Linda Rondstadt Discovers Free-Market Economics
My friend and Northern Alliance colleague Big Trunk at Power Line relates the economic education of yet another radical entertainer, this one Linda Ronstadt, who was relevant as late as 1987. Ronstadt misjudged her Las Vegas audience and tried to inject politics into her act during an encore, but the audience -- which paid to hear her sing, not talk -- gave her a rousing rendition of the Tremeloes' "Silence Is Golden": Singer Linda Ronstadt not only got booed, she got the boot after lauding filmmaker Michael Moore and his new movie "Fahrenheit 9/11" during a performance at the Aladdin hotel-casino. Before singing "Desperado" for an encore Saturday night, the 58-year-old rocker called Moore a "great American patriot" and "someone who is spreading the truth." She also encouraged everybody to see the documentary about President Bush. Ronstadt's comments drew loud boos and some of the 4,500 people in attendance stormed...
Democrats Self-Destruct In Georgia
The Republicans who hope to take over retiring Senator Zell Miller's Georgia seat have to feel a bit more confident after watching the debacle of the Democrats' primary debate: In a freewheeling debate televised statewide Sunday night, the candidates mostly bickered among themselves. One even lashed out at the reporters asking the questions, and another was accused of threatening to hire a hit man to kill his ex-wife. That candidate, millionaire entrepreneur Cliff Oxford, laughed off the assertion and the moderator called it "over the line." ... Emory University political scientist Merle Black called the Democrats' chances grim for holding on to Miller's seat. About their Sunday debate, Black said, "Pathetic. That was amateur hour." So far, the best candidate for the seat appears to be current Rep. Denise Majette, best known for unseating one of the notorious nutcases of the last session of Congress, former Rep. Cynthia McKinney, who...
July 21, 2004
Keep Linda Happy -- Refund Your Tickets Now!
In keeping with Linda Ronstadt's assertion that she can't enjoy her concerts whenever Republicans or "fundamentalist Christians" are in her audience, I've launched Operation Thrill Linda -- a service to keep Ronstadt's job satisfaction high as she goes through the twilight of her career. How can you help? If you have tickets to a Linda Ronstadt concert in any of these cities in the next week, be sure to cancel them and get your money refunded: 7/22 - Livermore, CA (Wente Vineyards) 7/23 - Saratoga, CA (Montalvo) 7/24 - San Rafael, CA (Marin Center) 7/27 - Seattle, WA (Summer Nights At The Pier) Don't forget, you're not just avoiding an evening of lackluster performance and forgettable music, you're helping make a less fortunate, aging, scatterbrained entertainer happy. 100 people in Los Angeles made the sacrifice for Linda -- won't you do your part, too? (Brought to you in coordination with...
July 24, 2004
Genocide, Genocide, Who's Got The Genocide?
Two stories at CNN this morning make it clear that we have a real problem defining genocide in our world today, and that the word itself has become little more than a political tool -- a shameful legacy that demeans the millions of victims that died at the hands of true genocidal maniacs. First off, Mexico wants to prosecute its former president for genocide stemming from a single incident, where troops shot and killed eleven student protestors: A special prosecutor has requested the arrest of former President Luis Echeverria and other senior officials accused of genocide for allegedly ordering the killing of student demonstrators in 1971, Echeverria's attorney said Friday. ... In the June 10, 1971, attack a government-organized group attacked student protesters and 11 people died. I am not minimizing the mass murder of eleven students, but unless the eleven were a significant percentage of an ethnic enclave or...
North Korea: We're Not Libya
North Korea rejected an informal proposal by senior US officials that Pyongyang could enjoy economic aid and better relations if it gave up its nuclear ambitions as did Libya: Senior US officials have urged North Korea to follow the example of Libya, which has seen most sanctions against it lifted after it gave up its weapons of mass destruction. But Pyongyang dismissed the US proposal as "a sham offer not worthy of further discussion". "The US is foolish enough to calculate that such mode imposed upon Libya would be accepted by [North Korea] too," a spokesman was quoted as saying. Pyongyang has said it will freeze its nuclear facilities, perhaps leading to their eventual dismantling, but only after the US provides energy aid, lifts economic sanctions and stops accusing it of sponsoring terrorism. In other words, Kim Jong-Il is determined to play chicken right down to the inevitable crash. Faced...
July 26, 2004
PETA-Endorsed Speaker Urges Murder Of Scientists
The British newspaper The Observer reported yesterday that a prominent animal-rights activist called for the murder of scientists as a means to end scientific research using animal test subjects: To the fury of groups working with animals, Jerry Vlasak, a trauma surgeon and prominent figure in the anti-vivisection movement, told The Observer: 'I think violence is part of the struggle against oppression. If something bad happens to these people [animal researchers], it will discourage others. It is inevitable that violence will be used in the struggle and that it will be effective.' Vlasak, who likens animal experimentation to the Nazis' treatment of the Jews, said he stood by his claim that: 'I don't think you'd have to kill too many [researchers]. I think for five lives, 10 lives, 15 human lives, we could save a million, 2 million, 10 million non-human lives. Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (Shac), which campaigns for...
Say It Loud, I Aborted And I'm Proud
Bill at INDC Journal rescues this notable web page from the depths of Google that demonstrates the political idiocy of Planned Parenthood leadership. Until earlier today, the fine folks at PP promoted this t-shirt ($15) with the slogan "I Had An Abortion": They have finally arrived! Planned Parenthood is proud to offer yet another t-shirt in our new social fashion line: "I Had an Abortion" fitted T-shirts are now available. These soft and comfortable fitted tees assert a powerful message in support of women's rights. I understand that some people do not consider an embryo to be human life, although any understanding of science leads to that conclusion. I know people who honestly believe that an embryo does not become human until viability or birth. While I disagree with them, I respect their integrity. However, this sloganeering does nothing but repulse me, as it celebrates the destruction of embryos as...
His Uncle Would Have Been Proud
Tom Burnett, Jr died on 9/11, fighting to regain control of a jet from lunatic terrorists, and his efforts and that of the heroic passengers on Flight 93 saved the lives of many more Americans. The patriots on 93 made the ultimate sacrifice in order to foil al-Qaeda's plans, even though they were unarmed civilians and didn't even know the nature of the enemy they faced so bravely. Now, Burnett's nephew is about to pay homage to his uncle by entering public service, right here in the Twin Cities: A family tragedy means a call to action for one young Minnesota man. Devin Burnett O'Brien is Tom Burnett Jr.'s nephew. Tom Burnett Jr. grew up in Bloomington and died when United Airlines Flight 93 went down in Pennsylvania on Sept. 11 Nearly three years later, Devin O'Brien is running for the Minnesota Legislature. He says his sense of civic duty...
August 3, 2004
NoKo Suspends Talks Due To Sudden Population Drop
North Korea suspended its participation in inter-Korean negotiations across a broad front of issues due to the defections of several hundred Northerners to the South, enraging the Dear Leader, Kim Jong-Il, and his communist government. Despite its pleas to North Korea to rejoin talks, Seoul refuses to budge on its position of granting refuge to North Korean refugees abroad: North Korea has boycotted scheduled cabinet-level talks with South Korea, angry over the defection of hundreds of North Koreans to the South last week. Pyongyang described the mass defection as an act of "kidnapping and terrorism committed by South Korean authorities in broad daylight." ... The two Koreas have been at odds over the defection and Seoul's earlier refusal to let pro-unification activists visit Pyongyang for the 10th anniversary of the death of the North's founding leader, Kim Il-Sung on July 8. North Korea also scrapped maritime and military talks with...
August 8, 2004
"Hellfighter" Goes On To Main Event
Paul "Red" Adair, the flamboyantly named oil-fire expert whose dash far outstripped his name, died last night of natural causes in a Houston hospital. Adair spent most of the 20th century fighting -- and beating -- the largest oil fires in the world, capping his career with an audacious and tremendously successful effort to avert the environmental and economic catastrophe that Saddm set off in Kuwait: Red Adair gained global fame in 1962, when he tackled a fire at a gas field in the Sahara - a feat later retold in the John Wayne film Hellfighters. He also grabbed headlines quenching blazing Kuwaiti oil wells in 1991. And in 1988 he fought the explosion of the Piper Alpha platform in the North Sea which killed 167 men. ... [H]is expertise in 1991 putting out the blazing oil wells in Kuwait that had been set alight by retreating Iraqi forces was...
August 9, 2004
Immigrants Want The Vote Without The Work
The New York Times runs a story today on efforts by immigration activists to allow non-citizens to vote in American elections -- local elections to start: For months, the would-be revolutionaries plotted strategy and lobbied local politicians here with the age-old plea, "No taxation without representation!" Last month, some of the unlikely insurgents - Ethiopian-born restaurateurs, travel agents and real estate developers in sober business suits - declared that victory finally seemed within reach. Five City Council members announced their support for a bill that would allow thousands of immigrants to vote in local elections here, placing the nation's capital among a handful of cities across the country in the forefront of efforts to offer voting rights to noncitizens. "It will happen,'' said Tamrat Medhin, a civic activist from Ethiopia who lives here. "Don't you believe that if people are working in the community and paying taxes, don't you agree...
Maybe This Is Why They Think They Should Vote
Fox News reports that several states have cracked down on a chain of schools that assists immigrants to America in getting a GED, the equivalent of a high-school diploma. That sounds like a worthy goal, no? Well, apparently they took the equivalency issue a bit too seriously, as their source materials are so riddled with errors that it almost sounds like a parody of American education: California has joined other states in acting against a private school that claimed to award high school diplomas while teaching its immigrant students a curriculum riddled with errors, including the wrong years for World War II and the wrong number of states. The California Alternative High School in Los Angeles targeted Hispanic immigrants, charging $450 to $1,450 for a 10-week course it said would lead to a valid diploma and help them get into college, find better jobs and get financial aid, California Attorney...
August 13, 2004
Even The Gray Lady Isn't Fooled By McGreevey's Martyr Complex
New Jersey Governor James McGreevey resigned yesterday, announcing that despite his marriage and two children, he is a "gay American" who had an affair with another man. Rather than withstand the notoriety, he claimed to resign in order to give his family some peace and allow New Jersey to move forward, even without him at the helm. Gay rights activists immediately proclaimed McGreevy a martyr, and bloggers like Kos felt free to insult the straights: This is a shame. F**k the people who force people like McGreevey to hide in a closet. It didn't take long for the larger story to come out and make Kos look like an idiot. Even the New York Times editorial page knew better, and today they explain that McGreevey's resignation had little to do with his sexual orientation: Yesterday, New Jersey's governor, James McGreevey, described his coming to grips with his sexual orientation with...
August 19, 2004
Ted Kennedy -- A Danger In The Air?
Drudge caught this Agence France-Presse report about Ted Kennedy making the high-risk list for the Transportation Security Agency, and he's not happy about it: At a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee (news - web sites) Thursday, the Massachusetts Democratic senator described having endured weeks of inconvenience after his name ended up on a watch list barring persons deemed to pose a threat to civil aviation or national security from air travel. Kennedy said that on several occasions last March, he was nearly denied permission to board a US Airways shuttle from Washington to Boston because his name landed on a no-fly list in error. ... But the misunderstanding persisted for weeks -- even after US Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge personally intervened. "It happened even after he called to apologize," Kennedy said at the hearing "because my name was on the list at the airports and with the airlines....
August 27, 2004
McCain-Feingold Finance Reform An Abject Failure
The current presidential election provides the first real-time test of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reforms signed into law during this term of office. Its advocates lauded the bill's restrictions on so-called "soft money" -- a designation from previous and unsuccessful campaign finance reform efforts -- from flowing into political parties which used it to support their candidates indirectly through issue advertising. They promised it would keep floods of money from influencing voter choice. Its critics decried the potential for the law to be used as a club to curtail political speech. It's apparent that the critics were correct. Today's editorial in the Washington Post notes that despite the new McCain-Feingold laws, money has poured into this election like never before, both in soft money to outside interest groups and hard money donated directly to candidates. The numbers stagger the imagination; in just four years, both parties doubled their hard-money donations...
September 8, 2004
Canada To Allow Shari'a?
Fox reports that Canada's obsession with political correctness may wind up endorsing Shari'a law for the nation's Muslim residents: Two parties in a Canadian civil dispute, like a divorce, can opt to use a religious leader as a mediator, and the mediator's decision is binding. Canadian native tribes, Christians and Jews use this system. ... But some Canadian Muslim women fear that Muslim law, or Sharia, will be imposed on them in these civil mediations. Critics say Sharia has been used, or abused, to discriminate against women. And some Canadian Muslim women say they will be badgered into accepting decisions from conservative imams acting as mediators. "They will be oppressed in a sense because they'll be coerced into feeling they need to follow this process of binding arbitration, implementing Sharia. Otherwise they're deemed as blasphemous and labeled by the community and then where else is she to go?" said Iman...
September 9, 2004
Jobless Claims Fall To Lowest Point In Three Years
The Labor Department delivered more good news on the economic front today, announcing that the level of new unemployment claims fell last week to 319,000 -- the lowest level since December 2001: For the week ending Sept. 4, new applications for unemployment insurance dropped by a seasonally adjusted 44,000 from the previous week to 319,000, the lowest level since July 3, the Labor Department reported Thursday. The decline of 44,000 was the largest decrease since the week ending Dec. 8, 2001. ... The latest snapshot of the layoffs climate was better than analysts were expecting. They were forecasting a smaller drop of around 17,000 for last week. "We're getting there. When you look at the underlying trend, the jobs picture is improving," said Richard Yamarone, economist at Argus Research Corp. Bill Clinton's advice to Kerry to focus on the economy looks more and more like a losing proposition. The economy...
September 10, 2004
Taking Penal Privatization A Bit Too Far?
The head of the US Interests Section in Havana has decided to build a replica of a Cuban jail in his back yard as a publicity event to highlight the human-rights abuses of Fidel Castro, apparently sparing no expense for authenticity: The chief U.S. diplomat in Havana built a model of a Cuban prison cell in his backyard to draw attention to the island's human rights record, drawing fierce criticism from the speaker of Cuba's parliament. James Cason, head of the U.S. Interests Section here, presented the structure, a model of what he said is a typical solitary holding cell in a Cuban prison, during a small diplomatic reception at his home Wednesday night. ... A little over six feet high and three feet wide, the holding cell of wood and metal features a drain on the floor for a toilet, a plastic bowl of food, a sheet for a...
September 13, 2004
Shooting Par For Pam
Yesterday I had the pleasure to spend the afternoon with the terrific folks behind Pam Wolf's run for the Minnesota state House in District 51B, playing golf at her fundraiser. Despite my golf handicap -- which is my complete lack of talent for the game -- I even managed to make par. (On one hole.) Pam, I found out, is not just a schoolteacher but also a golf instructor. I asked her for a few tips and she said, "Vote Republican." Great advice, especially this year! You couldn't ask for a nicer day to play golf or a nicer group of people to walk a course. Pam's campaign manager, Brian, was my partner for the tournament, and fortunately both of us had the same attitude towards winning. Afterwards, everyone had hamburgers and hotdogs, and chatted about Pam's district, the issues involved, the seeming disappearance of her opponent (Connie Bernardi), and...
September 16, 2004
Are The Taiwanese Running A Spy Ring In US?
The possibility that the Taiwanese may have an espionage system in the United States has increased, as a career officer in the State Department faces up to five years in prison for illegal travel and contact in Taiwan: A former top-level State Department official illegally took a secret, unauthorized trip to Taiwan last year and met with Taiwanese intelligence officers, according to a criminal complaint. Donald W. Keyser, a 30-year veteran at the State Department, was charged Wednesday with deliberately concealing from his superiors that he took a four-day trip to Taiwan last September. Federal law requires an individual with Keyser's security clearances to report all foreign travel. Keyser would not have been permitted to travel to Taiwan on official business because the United States and Taiwan do not have formal diplomatic relations, according to court papers. ... FBI agents monitoring Keyser's activity in recent months found that he frequently...
September 26, 2004
The Tyrolean Tiff
Evidently, the Italians feel the same way I do about German ambitions for a permanent UN Security Council seat. Germans expressed surprise that Italian FM Franco Frattini objected yesterday to the German initiative: Germany and Italy locked horns yesterday after the government of Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, opposed Berlin's bid for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. Italy's foreign minister, Franco Frattini, accused Germany, supposedly one of the country's closest allies, of trying to divide Europe with its request for a seat by putting its national interests first. "I will not accept competition based around national interests. That risks dividing Europe," he told the Italian newspapers Corriere della Sera and La Repubblica. Of course, that is one good point -- why does Germany deserve a veto on the UNSC when Italy doesn't? Joschka Fischer told Italy that they should also campaign for a permanent seat...
September 28, 2004
The New Old Hometown
Julian Sanchez laments the loss of freedom in his hometown of New York City and the transformation of Manhattan into, in Sanchez' words, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Disney corporation. Sanchez writes a strong defense of the libertarian philosophy and why he thinks New York needs a little more of it applied to its current government: With the approval of [Mayor Michael] Bloomberg who is quoted in the Times story as telling participants in a community meeting, "I wouldn't want a porn shop in my neighborhood and you shouldn't have one in yours" building inspectors have singled out adult businesses for special attention, issuing a barrage of citations for such picayune violations as improper lighting on exit signs, cigarette butts on shop floors, or insufficient soap in bathrooms. The city's inexhaustible cache of micromanagerial regulations all but insures that each business can be found guilty of something,...
September 29, 2004
If They Can't Figure Out A Butterfly Ballot ...
San Franciso will try a new form of voting that reformers have touted for years as a replacement for traditional, majority-based elections that America has used almost exclusively up to now. The New York Times reports that Frisco residents will use instant-runoff voting for its County Board of Supervisors, allowing voters to rank their choices in order to eliminate the need for a second run-off election: The cooperation is in response to a new election system, instant-runoff voting. The system, which voters approved in 2002 and is having its first run, is viewed by critics of winner-take-all elections as the start of a long-overdue overhaul of the way Americans choose elected officials. Under this system, voters can choose three candidates for each office, ranking them in order of preference. If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the first-choice votes, the lowest-placing finishers are eliminated, and the second and,...
October 4, 2004
Polygamy Rights Under Lawrence?
For those who argued that the Supreme Court decision striking down the stupid sodomy laws with Lawrence v. Texas would not lead to challenges for gay marriage and polygamy, Jonathan Turley's column today defending polygamist Tom Green should disabuse us of that illusion: Tom Green is an American polygamist. This month, he will appeal his conviction in Utah for that offense to the United States Supreme Court, in a case that could redefine the limits of marriage, privacy and religious freedom. If the court agrees to take the case, it would be forced to confront a 126-year-old decision allowing states to criminalize polygamy that few would find credible today, even as they reject the practice. And it could be forced to address glaring contradictions created in recent decisions of constitutional law. For polygamists, it is simply a matter of unequal treatment under the law. Turley launches into a defense of...
October 6, 2004
Hillary Under FBI Investigation (Update)
The Washington Post reports that Senator Hillary Clinton is under investigation by the FBI for campaign irregularities involving fundraising for her 2000 Senate bid and her husband's use of the Presidential pardon. If you didn't see it in the paper, it's buried at A11 of the Post: The Justice Department is trying to secure the cooperation of an indicted businessman as it pursues Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's 2000 Senate campaign for possible fundraising violations, according to interviews and documents. The FBI told a U.S. magistrate in Los Angeles two years ago that it has evidence Clinton's campaign deliberately understated its fundraising costs so it would have more money to spend on elections. Prosecutors contend that businessman Peter Paul made donations because he wanted a pardon from President Bill Clinton. ... Paul is a three-time convicted felon who hosted a Hollywood fundraising event for Mrs. Clinton in 2000. He alleges he...
October 7, 2004
When Government Runs Health Care, They Tell You When Your Child Should Die
The Manchester Guardian reports on a family's struggle against Britain's National Health Service to keep their daughter alive. The NHS has decided that Charlotte Wyatt, an eleven-month-old preemie, will never be able to recover from the complications of her birth and want to force a do-not-resuscitate order onto her parents: The parents of baby Charlotte Wyatt are expected to hear this afternoon whether a high court judge has supported their case for their daughter's right to life. Darren and Debbie Wyatt from Portsmouth tried to convince Mr Justice Hedley that their 11-month-old child has a right to life. They argued their daughter should be provided with every aspect of medical care available. Charlotte was born three months premature, weighing only 1lb and measuring five inches. She has already stopped breathing three times due to serious heart and lung problems; she is fed through a tube because she cannot suck from...
October 11, 2004
More Scarf Stupidity
The London Telegraph reports that a German initiative banning headscarves for Muslim teachers has backfired in Baden Wuerttemberg, where a federal judge ruled the ban must also apply to Roman Catholic nuns who teach: Nuns who teach in state schools in the Black Forest region of Germany are to be banned from wearing their habits in the classroom in line with a judgment on Muslim headscarves, a federal court has ruled. The federal administrative court decreed that it would be unjust if a law passed this year in the southern state of Baden Wrttemberg prohibiting Muslim women teachers from wearing headscarves did not also apply to Christian symbols. "There can be no exception. Any form of religiously motivated clothing in certain regions is not in question," said the written ruling from the court in Leipzig, eastern Germany. I wrote earlier this year, regarding the broader French ban, that such laws...
October 18, 2004
Californians Go Crazy Over Mentally Ill
Californians have put a new ballot initiative in front of voters this November asking for a new tax "on the rich" to fund increased spending on the mentally ill. Datelined out of San Francisco, which should surprise no one in California, the proponents of this new tax want to continue expanding the Golden State's welfare system: As pressures increase on California's mental health system, its workers and advocates say they are forced to do more with a supply of money that seems to shrink each year. "The number of people who need services is growing. The cost of the services is growing. The revenue source is not growing," said Patricia Ryan, executive director of the California Mental Health Directors Association. Note that the AP reports that the money "seems" to shrink every year. That's an important qualification for a ballot initiative. Had the money actually shrunk, the AP and the...
October 22, 2004
Republicans Push Norm Coleman For Leadership Post
A group of Republican Senators have sent a letter to their colleagues urging them to support Minnesota's GOP Senator Norm Coleman for the chair of their Senatorial Committee, an important leadership post: A group of Republican senators wrote to colleagues Friday urging them to support Sen. Norm Coleman in his bid to become chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. The letter, obtained by The Associated Press, cites Coleman's fund-raising and political abilities as reasons he should be chairman. Republican senators will vote Nov. 17 to choose either Coleman, R-Minn., or Sen. Elizabeth Dole, R-N.C. ... The letter was signed by seven senators: former Majority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi, Susan Collins of Maine, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Mike DeWine of Ohio, Larry Craig of Idaho, Jim Talent of Missouri and Saxby Chambliss of Georgia. Coleman gets their support because of his fundraising ability as well as his leadership...
November 3, 2004
Pelosi Skips Calls For Unity, Melts Down
In the aftermath of the 2004 election debacle that saw the Democrats lose even more ground in Congress than two years ago, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi might have heeded John Kerry's call for unity and bipartisanship, putting aside the campaign rhetoric and divisiveness in order to find middle ground. After her reaction to the losses, it's clear that she didn't listen to Kerry's concession speech: A day after strengthening the Republican Party's majority in the House, Speaker Dennis Hastert called on Democrats to assist GOP efforts to fight the war on terror, create jobs and expand health insurance to more Americans. "I pledge to work with those Democrats who want to work with me to get good things done for the American people," Hastert said Wednesday. But House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California, stung by her party's losses on Election Day, seemed unlikely to accept the offer. "The Republicans...
November 4, 2004
Look Who Wants To Chat Now
The re-election of George Bush has resonated around the globe as a message of American determination in our current foreign policy. That message has apparently been heard quite clearly in Pyongyang and may push North Korea back to the multilateral negotiations it disdained during the campaign: North Korea is likely to return to six-party talks on its nuclear programs now that the U.S. presidential election is over, Yonhap news agency quoted South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon as saying on Thursday. ... "With the U.S. election over, if the United States pursues an early resumption of the six-party talks, there is a chance that North Korea will respond to a resumption, considering it now has to continue dealing with the Bush administration," Ban reportedly told a closed-door meeting of parliament's foreign affairs committee. This confirms the handicap that the election placed on the Bush administration's attempts to force North Korea...
EU's Lisbon Strategy A Failure
Four years ago, under the prevailing winds of a booming global economy and the optimism generated by the collapse of the Iron Curtain, the European Union embarked on the Lisbon Strategy -- a plan to transform Europe into a single economy that would rival the US for global dominance. The Lisbon Strategy called for major reforms and investment into the EU's economic infrastructure, considered at the time to be ambitious but achievable. However, a new study conducted by a former Dutch premier has determined the Lisbon Strategy to be a failure, mostly due to the refusal of the EU's most prominent members to discipline themselves: Commissioned by EU leaders in March, the study is a mid-term review of the Lisbon Strategy -- the ambitious set of social and economic reforms agreed by European heads of state four years ago. Then, with the dot-com boom in full-swing, unemployment falling and growth...
Gulf War Syndrome Caused By Sarin Exposure: Researchers
The BBC reports that researchers working for the VA have determined that Gulf War veterans complaining of unexplained chronic illness have neural damage that indicates chronic, low-level exposure to sarin -- a possible explanation for Gulf War Syndrome: The New Scientist journal has reported a leak of a US inquiry into the ill-health of veterans of the 1991 war. The US Department of Veterans Affairs' Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illnesses is due to publish its findings next week. But the magazine said researchers have found neural damage consistent with the nerve agent used by Saddam Hussein. The link is said to have been "crucial" to a change of heart by the US authorities over Gulf war syndrome. After over a decade of denying a single root cause, and a lack of evidence of such, the US government will finally concur that the Gulf War vets have a...
Oil Prices Begin To Drop
CNBC reports this evening that oil prices, which drove up inflation and dampened consumer confidence in the third quarter, has suddenly begun to drop significantly: Oil futures prices plunged by more than $2 a barrel Thursday, continuing a selloff that began last week amid rising U.S. supplies of crude and expectations of a surge in heating oil production before winter arrives. ... Light crude for December delivery fell by $2.06 to settle at $48.82 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was the first time prices settled below $49 a barrel since Sept. 24. Oil prices have fallen $6.35, or 11.5 percent, since last Tuesday, when Nymex futures settled at $55.17 per barrel, matching the record settlement price first set Oct. 22. Does anyone else see something fishy here? After crude prices skyrocketed in the summer, we heard all sorts of explanations as to why. Most of them...
November 9, 2004
Zapatero: We Don't Need No Stinkin' Americans
The Sun (UK) reports in its typically urgent prose that Spanish PM Jose Zapatero has declared that the EU will become the dominant power in the world within 20 years, and pledged Spanish partnership with France and Germany to create the new hyperpower: Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero brazenly declared the ultimate aim was to challenge America. He declared: Europe must believe that it can be in 20 years the most important world power. We want to arrange the European future at the side of France and Germany. Spain sees itself with France and Germany as never before. ... Zapatero was quizzed by German magazine Der Spiegel about the EUs continuing need for US troops to deal with crises in the Balkans under the Nato umbrella. He said: Naturally it will still last some time, until we develop a closed defence policy. That can happen only after the agreement on a...
Misunderestimated No More
CNN's Carlos Watson takes an unusual tack for the mainstream media, analyzing George Bush and his history and determining him to be a political genius: Whether you are a Democrat, a Republican or an independent, it is hard not to look at President Bush's re-election victory last week and conclude that he is probably one of the three or four most talented politicians of the last half of a century. Why do I write that? Think about it. In 10 short years, George Walker Bush has won not just one but three high-profile political races that most able politicians would have lost. In 1994, with no real previous political experience, he beat a popular incumbent governor in the nation's second most populous state. Six years later, he beat a sitting vice president during a time of peace and prosperity. And last week, with a mediocre economy, an unpopular war and...
You Know Aero Mexico Laughed At This One
This isn't the most pleasant article to read the day after flying in from Southern California, but it's good to keep in mind for future travel plans. Just make sure you take your own bottled water on your next flight while traveling domestically: New water quality inspections on airliners were initiated Tuesday by the Environmental Protection Agency in response to the discovery of coliform bacteria in the drinking water of one in every eight planes it tested. ... In August and September, the EPA tested drinking water aboard 158 randomly selected domestic and international passenger aircraft and found that 12.6 percent did not meet federal standards. Twenty of the planes that were tested which ranged from small commuter aircraft and jumbo jets tested positive for total coliform bacteria, signaling the possible presence of other harmful bacteria. Two planes tested positive for E. coli bacteria, which can cause gastrointestinal...
Ashcroft Resigns, Presents Bush With Golden Opportunity
Attorney General John Ashcroft and Commerce Secretary Don Evans resigned today, the first cabinet-level departures after George Bush's re-election. Ashcroft plans on staying until a successor is named, while the plans of longtime Bush confidante Evans were less clear. CNN has the details: In the first signs of a second-term shakeup for the Bush administration, Attorney General John Ashcroft and Commerce Secretary Don Evans have resigned, the White House announced Tuesday evening. Ashcroft's resignation will become effective upon confirmation of a successor, Justice Department officials said. There were no immediate details on when Evans' resignation would take effect. Ashcroft, a former senator and two-term governor of Missouri, has garnered criticism during his nearly four years as attorney general on issues like the Patriot Act, which backers say helps the government in its fight against terrorism and critics say infringes on civil liberties. I probably have a different view of Ashcroft's...
November 10, 2004
Happy Birthday, USMC!
Today is the 229th birthday of the United States Marine Corps. Our brave men and women have guarded this nation since before it officially existed and have been the vanguard of American power and service to the world. Few are foolish enough to doubt their courage, their intrepidity, and their determination, and for those a quick introduction to any Marine past or present suffices to educate them. I am honored to have Marines as friends and family, including one uncle on my mother's side who fought in Viet Nam, and my father-in-law, a Marine pilot in WWII and Korea who is now deceased -- but still a Marine. Through the centuries, the Coprs (and all of our armed forces) have distinguished themselves with their honor, courage, and dedication to this nation and the pursuit of freedom and liberty nationwide. Congratulations, Marines! In your honor, I'm posting the Marines' Hymn, which...
November 11, 2004
Blackwill Abused Female Staffer: WaPo
You can scratch recently retired diplomat Robert Blackwill from the list of potential Cabinet appointees in the second Bush term. Condoleezza Rice herself scolded the architect of Bush's Iraq policy after he verbally and physically abused a female staffer, according to the Washington Post: Robert D. Blackwill, who resigned last week as the White House's top official on Iraq policy, was recently scolded by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell told her that Blackwill appeared to have verbally abused and physically hurt a female embassy staffer during a visit to Kuwait in September, administration officials said. The incident took place as Blackwill was rushing to return home after a visit to Baghdad to join a campaign swing planned by President Bush. As six officials describe the incident, he arrived at the Air France counter at the Kuwait airport and learned he was not on...
November 13, 2004
VP Sent To Hospital
Vice President Dick Cheney experienced "shortness of breath" and was taken to a hospital this morning, the AP reports: "On the recommendation of his doctors, the vice president is going to George Washington University Hospital for some tests," spokesman Ken Lisaius said. "He experienced some shortness of breath Saturday morning and has had a bad cold, which could be the cause for the shortness of breath." President Bush was notified, Lisaius said. Besides wishing the best for Dick Cheney and his family on a personal level, the incapacitation of the VP would be a tough blow for the Bush Administration. Cheney provides a philosophical focus and operational expertise to the war on terror, and losing those talents even for a short time will be tough to overcome....
November 15, 2004
NYT Says Republican Gains In South Erode Political Center
The New York Times's Robin Toner analyzes the political realignment taking place in the South and concludes that the nation has become more polarized since Democrats have lost ground in their traditional center of power. However, Toner uses contradictory racial arguments and ironically engages in a bigoted fallacy about Republicans to reach her conclusion: In the new Congress, only 4 of the 22 senators from the 11 states of the old Confederacy will be Democrats, the lowest number since Reconstruction; as recently as 1990, 15 of those Southern senators were Democrats. In the House, the Democrats suffered smaller but still significant losses in Texas, where a Republican redistricting plan took down a group of veteran lawmakers, including the paradigmatic Southern conservative: Representative Charles W. Stenholm, a 13-term deficit hawk and longtime leader of the Blue Dog Democrats, a group of centrists in the House. This moment has been a long...
Powell Resigns
As expected, Secretary of State Colin Powell has submitted his resignation and will leave the Bush Administration in January, CNN reports this morning. No one seriously expected Powell to stick around through a second Bush term, and some speculation has him taking over the World Bank. Now, Washington and the media have already begun the guessing game surrounding the open position. The AP offers John Danforth as the leading candidate: Most of the speculation on a successor has centered on U.N. Ambassador John Danforth, a Republican and former U.S. senator from Missouri, and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice. I'd expect Rice to get the nod over Powell, but Danforth is an intriguing selection. He probably would sail through the confirmation process, while a Rice nomination might provide yet another platform for Democrats to demagogue on Iraq. Of course, now that the election is over, denying them that platform is less...
Rice Gets the Nod
ABC reports President Bush will nominate Condoleezza Rice to replace Colin Powell as secretary of state. I think most of us expected this announcement, and I believe it's a good move, overall. Addendum from Ed: Whiskey and I agree on the selection of Dr. Rice, which is also being reported by the AP. She's up to speed, she knows the players, and will provide powerful representation for George Bush overseas -- more so than Powell, who was assumed to be at odds with Bush's policies on the use of American power in Southwest Asia. One of the big tasks ahead of Dr. Rice mirrors that of Porter Goss at CIA: cleaning out the partisan career bureaucrats that have acted to defeat Bush's foreign policy. Bush has apparently decided not to simply acquiesce to the inevitability of only middling control of State, which has been the reality for both Democratic and...
November 17, 2004
Hillary Will Run For Re-Election Before Presidential Bid
Hillary Clinton told aides that she will run for re-election to the Senate in 2006 even if she plans a run for the Presidency in 2008, according to the New York Times: Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has decided to run for a second term in the Senate in 2006, despite arguments by some Democrats that such a move could complicate her potential bid for the presidency in 2008, her advisers said on Tuesday. ... The disclosure of her re-election plans seemed intended to stanch what aides said was rising speculation among Democrats, particularly since Senator John Kerry's loss two weeks ago, that she might need to forgo the Senate race to focus entirely on running for the White House. "It's not an issue," said Howard Wolfson, an adviser to Mrs. Clinton. "Senator Clinton has said she is running for re-election. She is raising money and moving forward." Mandy Grunwald, her...
Powell vs Hillary: A Tactical Mistake
My friends at the New York Sun report that the Empire State GOP is pressing Colin Powell to run against Hillary Clinton for her Senate seat in 2006. Republicans like Rep. Peter King wax enthusiastic about having a high-profile candidate like General Powell to stand up to the Clinton machine, especially one who has benefitted from relatively positive press coverage during most of his career. Rep. Vito Fossella has started a "draft Powell" movement to entice the retired Secretary of State to join the fight against the odds-on favorite for the 2008 Democratic Presidential nomination. I agree that Powell makes an impressive candidate for any office, but in this case, the GOP may be walking into a trap. To paraphrase John Kerry, the 2006 Senate race is the wrong fight at the wrong time, and for the national GOP, Powell is the wrong man. In running for re-election in 2006...
November 18, 2004
Bipartisanship On Ag Secretary?
CNN reported last night that Karl Rove has had conversations with Senator Ben Nelson (D-Nebraska) about replacing Ann Veneman as Secretary of Agriculture. Nelson, a centrist in one of the reddest states in America (Bush +33), might join Norman Mineta as the other Democrat in George Bush's second-term Cabinet: President Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, spoke to Nelson about the possibility in a telephone conversation last Friday, according to the two sources familiar with their conversation. Nelson has thus far declined to accept what the sources described as an offer or solicitation. Nelson told CNN he could not confirm or deny that an offer from Rove was made, adding that he is "happy" in his current job. But when pressed as to whether he would consider the job if Bush offered it, Nelson said, "Any time the president talks, you listen." Nelson will be pressured by Democrats to decline...
November 19, 2004
Common Sense From An Uncommon Source
In a surprising development, the Illinois Supreme Court has smacked down an attempt to use the tort system to put gun manufacturers out of business. In an unanimous ruling, the seven justices told lawyers that gun manufacturers have no responsibility for the crime committed by others with their products: The Illinois Supreme Court threw out two lawsuits accusing gunmakers of knowingly letting weapons fall into the hands of gang members and other criminals, in a ruling Thursday that the manufacturers cannot legally be blamed for street violence. ... "The mere fact that defendants' conduct in their plants, offices and stores puts guns into the stream of commerce does not state a claim for public nuisance," the court said. "It is the presence and use of the guns within the city of Chicago that constitutes the alleged nuisance." The city sought $433 million, the amount it claims it paid in law...
November 21, 2004
Congress Acts To Protect Private Act Of Conscience
Congress passed its $388 billion spending authorization last night, adding in a provision that Democrats in both the House and Senate could not strip from the bill. The amendment punishes government agencies at all levels that act against doctors and insurers who refuse to provide or cover abortions: Congress made it a little easier for hospitals, insurers and others to refuse to provide or cover abortions. A provision in a $388 billion spending bill passed by the House and Senate on Saturday would block any of the measure's money from going to federal, state or local agencies that act against health care providers and insurers because they don't provide abortions, make abortion referrals or cover them. "This policy simply states that health care entities should not be forced to provide elective abortions, a practice to which a majority of health care providers object and which they will not perform as...
French Troops Open Fire At Ivory Coast Demonstration
Charles at LGF points his readers to a long video (in two parts) that shows a number of people being shot at a rally in the Ivory Coast. As rallies go, this one looked rather unremarkable until the shooting starts -- and then all you see is chaos for a few minutes. After the shooting stops, you see the carnage, including several extremely graphic scenes of dead people. (I'm not kidding -- one person has his head blown completely apart in the ninth minute of the second part. Don't watch it unless you really think you can handle it.) From what I've seen thus far, it appears to show French troops shooting indiscriminately at African civilians. A number of deaths appear to have occurred at this incident, including several women. In fact, it seems like most of the dead were women, but that may have been because the cameraman focused...
Where Have We Heard This Before?
The Ukraine has adopted American-style democracy in more ways than one. The Associated Press reports that their presidential election results have a mismatch between the vote count and the exit polling done, in part, by the US: Ukraine's prime minister was leading the nation's run-off presidential election, according to partial vote tallies released Monday, but his Western-leaning challenger held the advantage in an exit poll funded partly by the United States. ... With 69 percent of precincts counted following Sunday's election, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych had 48.58 percent of the vote, compared with Viktor Yushchenko's 47.78 percent, the Central Election Commission said. About 2 percent voted against both candidates. But an exit poll conducted by anonymous questionnaires under a program funded by several Western governments said Yushchenko had received 54 percent of the vote compared with the Kremlin-praised Yanukovych's 43 percent. A second exit poll, however, showed Yushchenko's margin was...
November 22, 2004
No Need For 28th Amendment
William Safire picks up on the Amend for Arnold enthusiasm coming from California and writes an impassioned argument for allowing foreign-born naturalized citizens to run for President. He makes the only argument that carries any water whatsoever -- that the Constitutional bar effectively creates two classes of citizens with unequal standing: Article II of the Constitution directed that in the future only "natural born" citizens would be eligible for the nation's highest office. There may have been reason for suspicion of the foreign-born as the nation was in formation, but that nativist bias has no place in a nation proud of its "golden door." When an immigrant is naturalized, his or her citizenship becomes as natural as "natural born." The oath taken and the pledge of allegiance given make the immigrant 100 percent American, with all the rights, privileges and obligations appertaining thereto. All except one - the right to...
Twisted To The End
Brazil has discovered the papers of the notorious Nazi doctor, Josef Mengele, in a Sao Paulo police station. Apparently unknown to the police for the past quarter-century, the collection of letters and diaries by the sadistic monster of Auschwitz will be displayed for public viewing at the National Police Academy in Brasilia. They reveal Menegele as a committed Nazi and an unapologetic monster whose work in exterminating Jews and conducting bizarre and horrible medical experiments captured his complete enthusiasm. Even at that, however, Mengele indulged in some measure of self-delusion: Of his own actions in "selecting" whether victims at Auschwitz were to live to work or to be experimented upon, or to be dispatched in the gas chambers, he wrote: "I gave life in Auschwitz, I did not take it." Mengele also continued to cast Jews as his personal bogeyman, even while giving them grudging respect for having survived the...
Paging Michael Moore! Mr. Moore To Moonbat Central!
Today's New York Sun reports that a significant part of the funding for the new Bill Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock came from a source more associated with conspiracy theories about the Bush Administration: President Clinton's new $165 million library here was funded in part by gifts of $1 million or more each from the Saudi royal family and three Saudi businessmen. The governments of Dubai, Kuwait, and Qatar and the deputy prime minister of Lebanon all also appear to have donated $1 million or more for the archive and museum that opened last week. Democrats spent much of the presidential campaign this year accusing President Bush of improperly close ties to Saudi Arabia. The case was made in Michael Moore's film "Fahrenheit 9/11," in a bestselling book by Craig Unger titled "House of Bush, House of Saud," and by the Democratic presidential candidate, Senator Kerry. Why do the...
NIMBY (Doesn't) Come Home To Roost
The New York Times editorial board takes aim at the practices of the US Census Bureau when it comes to counting prisoners. The census takers count prisoners as residents of the city/county where the prison is located rather than in their home towns and states which, according to the NYT, shortchanges the urban areas from which the criminals come: The citizens of large cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles have helped to pay the cost of building and maintaining state prisons, which provide much-needed jobs in many rural districts. They did not, however, count on also giving these generally underpopulated areas extra political influence as well. The nonvoting inmates - sometimes called "imported constituents'' - are often counted in rural districts where legislators vote against the interest of their home cities. Their presence in the census count of prison neighborhoods distorts population statistics and creates legislative districts that...
Faithophobia Dumbs Down Maryland Education
Fox News reports that Maryland educators have such a fear of anything religious that they have begun rewriting history to remove any references to faith in the classroom -- beginning with Thanksgiving: Young students across the state read stories about the Pilgrims (search) and Native Americans, simulate Mayflower (search) voyages, hold mock feasts and learn about the famous meal that temporarily allied two very different groups. But what teachers don't mention when they describe the feast is that the Pilgrims not only thanked the Native Americans for their peaceful three-day indulgence, but repeatedly thanked God. "We teach about Thanksgiving from a purely historical perspective, not from a religious perspective," said Charles Ridgell, St. Mary's County Public Schools curriculum and instruction director. School administrators statewide agree, saying religion never coincides with how they teach Thanksgiving to students. Every time I think I've heard the dumbest education excuse, along comes another one...
November 23, 2004
Earle Doth Protest Too Much
Ronnie Earle took his fight against Tom DeLay to the pages of the New York Times today, excoriating the House GOP for a rule change which would allow DeLay to keep his leadership position even if indicted by Earle on corruption charges. Earle, the district attorney for Travis County, complains that the Republicans have unfairly tarred him as a political hack and used that excuse to change the rules: The thinly veiled personal attacks on me by Mr. DeLay's supporters in this case are no different from those in the cases of any of the 15 elected officials this office has prosecuted in my 27-year tenure. Most of these officials - 12 Democrats and three Republicans - have accused me of having political motives. What else are they going to say? For most of my tenure the Democrats held the power in state government. Now Republicans do. Most crimes by...
UN Seraglio In The Congo Getting Little Attention
Michelle Malkin points her readers this morning to a Reuters report that frankly makes Abu Ghraib look like a tea party. The UN peacekeepers in the Congo have abused and raped scores of refugees while supposedly protecting them from Islamofascist terrorists, in some cases extorting sexual favors for basic necessities: The United Nations is investigating about 150 allegations of sexual abuse by U.N. civilian staff and soldiers in the Congo, some of them recorded on videotape, a senior U.N. official said on Monday. The accusations include pedophilia, rape and prostitution, said Jane Holl Lute, an assistant secretary-general in the peacekeeping department. Lute, an American, said there was photographic and video evidence for some of the allegations and most of the charges came to light since the spring. Photographs? Videos? It sounds like Abu Ghraib, from which the media and the UN took the sick actions of a few low-ranking soldiers...
Ukraine Convulses
The botched election in the Ukraine appears to have touched off a popular uprising, threatening the pro-Russian existing government with a pro-Western putsch. Both sides have appealed to the police and army to weigh in on their side in order to get their grip on power: Ukraine's pro-western opposition leader called last night on army and police units to join his revolution as thousands of supporters braved sub-zero temperatures and driving snow to confront riot police outside the presidential palace. In scenes reminiscent of the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, more than 200,000 anti-government demonstrators cheered on Viktor Yushchenko and called for his pro-Kremlin rival to accept electoral defeat. Many later broke away from the main protest in a sea of orange opposition flags to surround the presidential building in Kiev, the capital, where they were met by the police line. The demonstrators chanted "Police, join the people!"...
November 24, 2004
Danforth: Why Have The UN?
America's UN ambassador John Danforth expressed his frustration and that of many in the US after watching the UN again bravely decide to dither while the Sudan burns: John C. Danforth, the United States ambassador, assailed the General Assembly on Tuesday, saying its decision to avoid voting on a resolution denouncing human rights violations in Sudan called into question the purpose of the Assembly. "One wonders about the utility of the General Assembly on days like this," he said. "One wonders if there can't be a clear and direct statement on matters of basic principle, why have this building? What is it all about?" Mr. Danforth's blunt-spoken exasperation was prompted by a ruling earlier Tuesday in the General Assembly's committee on social, humanitarian and cultural affairs to take no action on a measure citing human rights violations in Sudan, which the United States has called genocide. The purpose of the...
Ukrainian Election Results Certified; US Rejects Them
The Ukraine certified its presidential election results, naming Russia's handpicked successor to the outgoing administration the winner. Meanwhile, the US pushed its Russian relationship further by rejecting the results and calling for a review of the election: Ukraine's election commission declared the Kremlin-backed prime minister, Viktor Yanukovych, the winner of the country's bitterly disputed presidential election, sharpening a crisis sparked by the opposition candidate's allegations that the vote was fraudulent. ... Prime Minister Yanukovych got 49.61 percent of Sunday's vote, against Yushchenko's 46.61 percent, the commission said in giving its final results. Secretary of State Colin Powell announced afterwards that the United States would not accept the results of the election: Secretary of State Colin Powell said Wednesday the United States cannot accept the results of elections in Ukraine, which the opposition says was marred by fraud. Powell warned "there will be consequences" for the United States' relationship with Ukraine...
November 26, 2004
Ukrainian Protests Escalate Into Blockade
Several reports from the Ukraine describe an escalation of the political crisis that resulted from the former Soviet republic's presidential election, with protestors now blockading government buildings and forcing the existing government to negotiate with the pro-Western challenger and former prime minister. The Guardian (UK) tells its readers that the five-day protest continues to grow in power and scope: Thousands of Ukrainian opposition supporters today blockaded government buildings in protest at the outcome of the disputed presidential elections, as European envoys arrived in the ex-Soviet republic to seek a solution to the impasse. ... Today, the protests intensified as demonstrators linked arms to prevent Mr Yanukovich and his staff from entering the cabinet building where he carries out his duties as prime minister. "The prime minister could not get into his office in the government building and so could not hold his planned meetings," a government official said. The development...
November 27, 2004
UN Admits It Can't Protect Refugees
The United Nations issued a report yesterday that confirms its inability to protect the refugees it shelters, leading to sexual abuse, slavery, and worse, according to the AP. As many of us in the blogosphere have written, the UN lacks the political will and influence to do more than open camps willy-nilly and stand around hoping for the best: The United Nations is failing to protect millions of people displaced by conflict in Sudan's Darfur region and violence in other hotspots around the world, a U.N. report said Friday. The world body's approach to the problem of people who have fled their homes but not crossed any international borders "is still largely ad hoc and driven more by the personalities and convictions of individuals on the ground than by an institutional, systemwide agenda," the report said. Of particular concern in this report is the situation in Darfur, where government-back Arab...
Ukraine Executive Loses The Parliament
Reuters just reported that the Ukrainian parliament just issued a no-confidence vote for the Central Election Commission which declared Viktor Yanukovych the winner last week in their presidential election: Ukraine's parliament on Saturday expressed no confidence in the Central Election Commission overseeing a disputed presidential election run-off. The assembly, by a large majority, said the commission had failed to fulfil its duties under Ukraine's constitution and laws. In an emergency session, deputies cited many irregularities during the Nov. 21 ballot. The executive appears to have become almost completely politically isolated now, with its sympathetic Supreme Court ruling against it, the people in the streets blockading governmentg buildings, television stations refusing to broadcast their "lies", and now Parliament rejecting the election results. Outgoing President Kuchma and Yanukovych will be lucky to get a chance to re-run the election at this rate. They may soon regret not jumping on that offer by...
Era Of Cheap Chinese Labor Coming To A Close
The abundance of impoverished rural Chinese formed the basis of China's economic boom over the past two decades, as the Communist regime brought cheap labor in trainloads from the boondocks to the cities, paying them pittances for exportable goods. Due to the extreme poverty of their home villages and the traditional respect for authority in Chinese culture, the workers dutifully and docilely produced tremendous amounts of material for sale all over the world, especially in America. The resultant economic expansion meant greater prosperity for China and a gradual relaxation of its tightly-controlled economy into more Westernlike, capital-based economy. Now, the Washington Post reports that China may wind up a victim of its own success. The workers who once stoically endured any conditions for the hope of a reliable salary have suddenly begun conducting work stoppages and riots, turning the "worker's paradise" into a nightmare for the Communists: Heralded by an...
Bush Administration Champions Democracy Over Expediency
CQ reader Peter Ingemi points out an important perspective on the American reaction to the Ukrainian political crisis. In their election, the Kuchma government candidate, Viktor Yanukovych, actually represents the closest partner we would have in the war on terror. Yanukovych has pledged to increase troop strength in Iraq and mirrors Putin's resolve to conduct a forward strategy in the fight against Islamist terror. Viktor Yuschenko speaks of pulling Ukrainian troops from Iraq, where they comprise the sixth-largest segment of the Coalition. One would expect the Bush Administration, therefore, to have sat quietly and hoped for Yanukovych to come to power regardless of the means. That focus on expediency has been an unfortunate hallmark of American foreign policy for decades, a leftover of our Cold War-style binary approach to the world. Instead, both Colin Powell and George Bush spoke strongly about their rejection of the election's results and the need...
November 28, 2004
Memo To Hysterical American Leftists: This Is What Vote Fraud Looks Like
The London Telegraph reports today on the details of the fraud perpetrated by those at least supporting Viktor Yanukovych in the Ukrainian presidential elections last weekend, and possibly even sanctioned by the Kuchma government. For those Americans who think that voter fraud consists of long lines at polling precincts, this story should provide a revelation: It was 5.30pm on election day in Ukraine when the thugs in masks arrived armed with rubber truncheons. Vitaly Kizima, an election monitor at Zhovtneve in Ukraine's Sumy region, watched in horror as 30 men in tracksuits stormed into the village polling station. "They started to beat voters and election officials, trying to push through towards the ballot boxes," he told The Telegraph. "People's faces were cut from blows to the head. There was blood all over." The thugs - believed to be loyal to the pro-Russian presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovich from his stronghold, Donetsk...
Ukraine May Impose Martial Law
Ukraine's outgoing Kuchma executive may declare martial law in an attempt to end the massive rallies and protests springing from the electoral fraud of last weekend, the Ukrainian news service Ukrayinska Pravda announced: Yushchenko warns of a possible attempt to break up the rallies and declare emergency law about 20:00. Victor Yushchenko has warned that the authorities are considering declaring emergency law and moving to break up the rallies in Kiev. "Already for two days there has been talk about introducing emergency law which would allow them to break up this demonstration and raze the tent city around 20:00" - Yushchenko said at the rally in Kiev's Independence Square. According to my friend and colleague King Banaian, this may already have come to pass. He's posted links to Tulip Girl on the ground there, and Yuschenko's news service reports further that police have gathered for unknown reasons at the local...
November 29, 2004
College Diversity Programs Target The Symptom, Not The Disease
Today's Washington Post editorial decries the sudden dropoff in enrollment for African-Americans at the University of Michigan after a long legal battle upheld the college's affirmative-action programs. The Post tries to blame the publicity surrounding the lawsuit for the stark decline, but in the next breath notes that the falling enrollments belong to a national trend: Post staff writer Michael Dobbs reports that numerous other large universities are reporting declining black enrollments; these include many campuses in the University of California system, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the private University of Pennsylvania. The University of Georgia experienced a 26 percent drop in African American freshmen this year, Ohio State University a 29 percent drop and the Urbana-Champaign campus of the University of Illinois a 32 percent drop. The Post correctly deduces the problem -- a failing public-school system -- but then continues to advocate the same...
Kuchma Wants Elections
The French news agency AFP reports that outgoing Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma has embraced the idea of re-running the last round of the elections in order to resolve the political crisis gripping Ukraine: "If we really want to preserve peace and agreement, and really want to build a legitimate democratic society that we so often talk about... then let's hold new elections," the Interfax news agency quoted Kuchma as telling reporters on Monday. If true, this represents a major victory for Viktor Yushchenko and the pro-Western opposition to Kuchma and his hand-picked successor, Viktor Yanukovych. Much depends on the conditions for a new election -- whether the discredited Central Election Commission runs it again after the disastrous results from its last outing eight days ago. More international observers will be needed, and I suspect that more Western media will attend to the election anyway. Yuschenko and his Orange Movement appear...
November 30, 2004
Momentum Builds For New Ukrainian Election
The major players in the Ukrainian political crisis all seem to be moving towards the same solution to defuse the massive rejection of the fraud-ridden polling last weekend. Yesterday, both current President Leonid Kuchma and his protege and nominal winner of the discredited election, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, agreed in principle to a new election. Today, Germany reports that Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to "respect" a new election in Ukraine: Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed in a telephone conversation with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder on Tuesday to respect the results of any new election in Ukraine, the German government said. The three-sentence statement from the government suggested a softening of Moscow's position and appeared to increase the likelihood of a new poll to resolve a week-old crisis triggered by the country's disputed presidential election on Nov. 21. ... "The chancellor and the Russian president were in agreement that the...
Negotiations Collapse In Kyiv
Negotiations that appeared to promise an end to the Ukrainian political crisis, or at least a means to that end, collapsed today as the opposition led by Viktor Yashchenko pulled out of the talks. Yushchenko's allies claim that the Kuchma government used the negotiations to "cheat": Ukraine's opposition on Tuesday pulled out of talks to try to end a confrontation over last week's disputed presidential election and vowed to use "people power" to secure victory. "The authorities, Kuchma and Yanukovich, used the talks to cheat," opposition leader Taras Stetskyv told thousands of supporters of losing presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko in central Kiev. "That is why the Committee for National Salvation (opposition group) has decided to pull out of the talks. We are stopping talks with the authorities. We will talk with them only from the position of people power." The Reuters report does not make clear what Stetskyv meant by...
December 1, 2004
Ukrainian Rada Tosses Out Yanukovych Government
Ukraine's Parliament, called the Rada, has voted to oust the government of Prime Minister and nominal winner of the presidential election Viktor Yanukovych in a secret ballot, attempting to force an end to the political crisis that has gripped the former Soviet republic for ten days: Ukraine's parliament Wednesday voted to sack the government of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich to help end a political crisis triggered by his contested election last month as president. In parliament, 229 deputies, three more than required, voted in favor of sacking Yanukovich, declared winner in the Nov. 21 election, denounced by opposition rival Viktor Yushchenko as being tainted by fraud. Deputies also voted to create an interim "government of national trust. This resolution may prove to be of little value; as I've mentioned before, Ukraine's PM is appointed by the executive, not the legislature as in other parliamentary democracies. However, what essentially amounts to...
Schroeder Goes Out On A Creaky Limb With Russia
CQ reader Ken Powell directs us to a new English-language version of the German news magazine Der Spiegel, which reports in its latest edition on the diplomatic razor-dance Gerhardt Schroeder has performed lately between the United States, Russia, and the rest of Europe. According to DS, Europeans have become increasingly disenchanted with Schroeder's apologism for Vladimir Putin and accuse him of sacrificing the democratic ideals over which he scolded George Bush for a pocketful of Russian Euros: Worldwide criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin is mounting -- leaders increasingly doubt his democratic credentials. Except Gerhard Schroeder that is. The German Chancellor continues to stand by his friend and business partner. It may soon get him into trouble. ... The most-recent questions surrounding the Schroeder-Putin courtship surfaced last week. Following energetic attempts by Putin to influence the elections in Ukraine -- including massive financial support and campaign appearances supporting government candidate...
Compromise In Ukraine?
The French press service AFP and Postmodern Clog both report that an agreement has been reached between the Ukrainian government of Leonid Kuchma and opposition candidate Viktor Yushchenko to bring the standoff in Kyiv to an end: Outgoing President Leonid Kuchma said the two rivals agreed with the help of foreign mediators to let the court pass judgment on the November 21 vote and then jointly figure out how to resolve independent Ukraine's worst political crisis. But most agreed that another poll was inevitable and the European Union's troubleshooter Javier Solana said that a month would be needed to set a date for another election -- the third since November 30. According to AFP, Kuchma finally acknowledged that the election suffered from massive fraud but doesn't quote him on that admission. The agreement supercedes the Rada vote dissolving the Yanukovych government and lays the groundwork for constitutional changes diluting the...
December 2, 2004
Giving Conservatives A Bad Name
An Alabama lawmaker apparently wants to confirm every stereotype available of conservatives, Christians, and the South by proposing a sweeping ban of books that contain gay characters. Rep. Gerald Allen wants such literary materials pulled from public libraries and universities that use public funds: An Alabama lawmaker who sought to ban gay marriages now wants to ban novels with gay characters from public libraries, including university libraries. A bill by Rep. Gerald Allen, R-Cottondale, would prohibit the use of public funds for "the purchase of textbooks or library materials that recognize or promote homosexuality as an acceptable lifestyle." Allen said he filed the bill to protect children from the "homosexual agenda." ... Allen said that if his bill passes, novels with gay protagonists and college textbooks that suggest homosexuality is natural would have to be removed from library shelves and destroyed. "I guess we dig a big hole and dump...
December 3, 2004
Who Hired Cornelia Spinner?
Washington DC often complains about its Constitutional status as a protectorate of the federal government and its inability to produce representation to Congress. The city has long campaigned for statehood, a move resisted by a Congress loathe to go through an amendment process and blocked by Republicans who see no need to give Democrats two easy seats in the Senate. Washingtonians don't make their case any easier with their inept management of their city government, either; they notoriously continued to elect Marion Barry to leadership positions despite the repeated embarrassment he caused in office. The Washington Times reports this morning on another scandal to hit DC. The former director of their education office, who resigned in scandal after an audit found fraudulent travel reimbursements and misuse of federal funds, managed to get another job in education with the city at a six-figure salary -- and no one can figure out...
Ukrainian Supreme Court Invalidates Election
The Ukrainian Supreme Court has invalidated the second round of the presidential election that has led to a ten-day political crisis in the former Soviet republic. Its ruling also dealt a blow to recent political machinations by the outgoing Leonid Kuchma government by setting a new runoff election between Viktor Yanukovych and Viktor Yushchenko for December 26th: The Supreme Court declared the results of Ukraine's disputed presidential run-off election invalid and ruled Friday that a repeat vote should be held by Dec. 26, bringing cheers from tens of thousands of opposition supported massed in Kiev's main square. The short timeframe set for a new vote appeared to rule out the possibility of holding an entirely new election, as sought by outgoing President Leonid Kuchma. Unless Kuchma can get the Rada to overrule the Supreme Court on the election timing, this decision essentially checkmates Kuchma and Yanukovych. No one believes that...
December 4, 2004
The Chinese Indulge In Self-Delusion
In contradiction to earlier reports, China will not allow foreign newspapers to circulate in the Communist nation, which has long tried to close itself off from Western influences. However, they will permit foreign publications to take advantage of cheap Chinese labor and print their newspapers strictly for export: Foreign newspapers have been given the green light to print in China but they will not be allowed to circulate on the domestic market. "Foreign newspapers can be printed in China, but all should be exported," Zhu Weifeng, an official with the State Press and Publication Administration (SPPA) told the China Business Weekly. This "means they are made for export for an international market, so not one copy should be left to enter the Chinese market ... the circulation of overseas newspapers will remain forbidden in China, in the near future." Beijing has to be in full-blown denial if they really think...
December 6, 2004
LA Times Blows Roof Off Of MLK Hospital And Its Supposed Underfunding
As a native and former resident of the Los Angeles area, one of the continuing issues in the local media was the operation and budget at LA's Martin Luther King Hospital and Drew Medical Center. Its location and its patient base ensure that the hospital requires plenty of government funding, but it has long been an element of faith in the area that MLK/Drew suffers from underfunding due to racism and neglect. Without a doubt, the services there routinely rank as the poorest in the state (if not the nation), and until now, underfunding and racism seemed to be the easiest answers. Today, however, the Los Angeles Times publishes an expos of MLK/Drew, and the truth not only disputes all of those allegations but also provides a microcosm of all that ails California's public and private sector: For years it has been a heartfelt cry: "This hospital desperately needs more...
Mr. Bean Speaks Out Against Hate-Crime Legislation
Rowan Atkinson, the British comedian best known for his antics on television shows like Mr. Bean and Blackadder, intends on speaking out against a British effort to pass hate-crime legislation that will make it illegal to create a hostile environment for religions: Rowan Atkinson, the Blackadder comic, is to warn MPs that a Bill outlawing the incitement of racial hatred could undermine free speech and stop comedians making fun of religion. Atkinson will head a coalition of comedians, writers and academics at the launch of a campaign against elements of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill tonight. The Bill, due for its second reading this week, will create a new offence of incitement to religious hatred to protect faith groups - particularly Muslims - from hate attacks. This is not much different than the myriad of free-speech restrictions enacted by universities and colleges in America, and Atkinson rightly opposes...
December 7, 2004
Domestic Terrorism?
The Washington Post reports on a series of arsons in a controversial Maryland development that destroyed a dozen houses and damaged a number of others in a single day. While law-enforcement officials and the builder showed reluctance to attribute the sophisticated arsons to anyone in particular, the development had been the subject of a bitter fight with environmental groups: A preliminary investigation found traces of a fire-starting accelerant in four houses that were the first to be examined by investigators, officials said. Damage was estimated at $10 million, and William E. Barnard, the state fire marshal, said it was the biggest arson in state history. In addition to the 12 homes destroyed, about 30 were damaged, authorities said. Investigators said more than 20 fires were set. Some houses were burned to the ground, and the second floors and roofs of others were burned out. The structures seemed to have been...
December 8, 2004
Ukraine's Orange Movement Keeps Rolling
The Orange Revolution of Viktor Yushchenko continues unabated, as the Ukrainian Rada passed a compromise electoral-reform measure that outgoing president Leonid Kuchma signed. The agreement puts into place a new run-off election between Yushchenko and Kuchma's hand-picked successor, Viktor Yanukovych, for a watered-down presidency: Ukraine's parliament adopted a package of electoral and constitutional changes Wednesday in a compromise aimed at defusing the nation's political crisis less than three weeks before a rerun of the disputed presidential vote. The vote came as a surprise after days of political maneuvering and massive street protests. It suggested that opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko's camp had determined that the prolonged unrest could ultimately weaken the country and his own position ahead of the Dec. 26 repeat vote. The package was approved in a 402-21 vote with 19 abstentions, drawing a lukewarm endorsement from Yushchenko's supporters. Lawmakers stood and cheered as President Leonid Kuchma signed the...
December 9, 2004
South America To Try An EU Strategy?
The Washington Post reports this morning that South America intends on forming a political and economic union between its nations, emulating the EU model in order to compete with Europe and the United States. The notion of unification aside, economic alliances already abound, point out some critics of this latest effort: Twelve South American countries signed a declaration Wednesday creating a political and economic bloc they hope will put them on a more equal footing with the United States and Europe. The pact was signed at a two-day summit beginning Wednesday in the ancient Incan capital of Cuzco. But the absence of three presidents - Ecuador's Lucio Gutierrez, Uruguay's Jorge Batlle and Argentina's Nestor Kirchner - raised questions about the strength of their commitment to forming a powerful regional alliance. ... "In the last 30 years we have sought a Latin America with the capacity for effective international action and...
December 11, 2004
A Little Dioxin In His Borscht
Doctors treating Ukrainian presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko have determined that Yushchenko was poisoned by a powerful chemical known to Americans as the deadliest part of a notorious Vietnam War defoliant -- ironically called Agent Orange: Ukrainian presidential hopeful Viktor Yushchenko was a victim of dioxin poisoning, but it remains unclear if it was the result of a deliberate act, Austrian doctors treating him said on Saturday. "There is no doubt," Dr Michael Zimpfer, president of the Rudolfinerhaus clinic where Yushchenko is undergoing treatment, told a news conference."There were high concentrations of dioxin, most likely orally administered. The disfigurement is a classic symptom of dioxin poisoning called chloracne. It will probably permanently disfigure Yushchenko, a constant reminder of the brutal practice of politics in Ukraine. It is all but impossible to have ingested the poison by accident, and although the hospital refused to characterize it as an attempt at murder, the...
December 13, 2004
Everything Not Regulated Will Be Banned
The Guardian (UK) reports today that British victims groups have called for tougher weapons laws. Of course, Britain already has strict gun-control laws, but now the effort is to regulate knives: Families of stabbing victims will today call on the government to make carrying a knife as serious an offence as carrying a gun. The group, which includes Damilola Taylor's father, will demand that ministers introduce a five-year minimum jail term for carrying an object with a blade longer than three inches, which would equalise the penalties for knives and guns. They also want to see a six-month minimum jail term for carrying a blade shorter than three inches, or three months for juveniles. Once again, we see a push for criminalizing the use of a tool that can just as easily be used for defensive as well as offensive purposes -- and unlike guns, has practical uses as well....
December 14, 2004
Washington State Supreme Court Affirms Electoral Law
In a late decision today, the Washington state Supreme Court unanimously rejected a lawsuit from Democrats to review previously rejected ballots in the race for governor. The justices agreed that state law defines recount as only the retabulation of already-approved ballots and does not give any opportunity to review those rejected: The state Supreme Court on Tuesday unanimously rejected the Democratic Party's request that previously rejected absentee and provisional ballots be included in the hand recount of Washington state's contested governor's race. ... In a brief written opinion, the high court said that under Washington law, "ballots are to be 'retabulated' only if they have been previously counted or tallied" excluding those that had been disqualified by canvassing boards. Democrats had estimated in their lawsuit that an additional 3,000 ballots should be reconsidered during the recounts -- in other words, changing the rules for voting after the fact. The...
December 17, 2004
Washington's Electoral Meltdown
The ongoing soap opera of Washington's gubernatorial election continues today with two new developments. The AP reports now that King County, a Democratic stronghold, has discovered yet another batch of supposedly uncounted, valid absentee ballots, bringing the total to over 700 that are in dispute. This follows a suggestion from the state GOP that only another election will restore confidence in the results: With Washington state in the middle of a recount of its amazingly close governor's race, election officials in Seattle's King County entered a warehouse Friday and found a plastic tray containing 150 misplaced ballots. The discovery brings the number of belatedly discovered ballots to 723 in the heavily Democratic county potentially enough to swing the election to Democrat Christine Gregoire. Republican Dino Rossi won the Nov. 2 election over Gregoire by 261 votes in the first count and by 42 after a machine recount of the...
Controversial Ruling Stops King County Ballot Mining
A Washington state judge has stopped King County from counting any of the 723 ballots it discovered during the hand recount, ruling that state law prevents previously rejected ballots from reconsideration regardless of the circumstances of the rejection: A judge Friday granted a state Republican Party request to block the counting of hundreds of recently discovered King County ballots in the governor's race, which the GOP's candidate is winning by just a few dozen votes. Even if the election workers wrongly rejected the ballots 150 of which were discovered Friday it is too late for King County to reconsider them now, Pierce County Superior Court Judge Stephanie Arend said. The ruling matches an earlier state Supreme Court decision that prevented reconsideration of other rejected ballots in the hand recount. It seems likely that the Supreme Court will get another chance to revisit its earlier decision next week, as...
December 18, 2004
Interviews For Inspectors Begin At The Cash Bar
The city of San Antonio has decided on a high-tech way to attack strip-club prostitution and ordinance violations -- starting on January 1, exotic dancers will be required to wear ID badges while performing: The City Council on Friday approved a measure requiring exotic dancers to apply for permits and wear them while performing. Law enforcement authorities said the rule, which was unanimously approved by the 11-member council and goes into effect in 10 days, will allow them to quickly identify dancers who are breaking nudity ordinances. (Among other things, full nudity and contact with customers are not allowed in San Antonio strip clubs.) Thanks to a series of rather stupid Supreme Court rulings, cities are unable to protect themselves from the deleterious effects of strip clubs on their communities after having ruled nude dancing a form of speech. In fact, nude dancing currently enjoys more legal protections than political...
December 22, 2004
Gregoire By Eight: Dems
Democrats in the state of Washington claimed victory late last night, telling reporters that the recount totals from King County had given Christine Gregoire an eight-vote margin over Dino Rossi: The stunning turnaround was reported late Tuesday by the head of the state Democratic Party, who said party officials' analysis of hand-counted returns from King County the last county to finish the grueling process showed that Gregoire had eclipsed the dwindling margin that Republican Dino Rossi has held since Election Day. "We're confident Christine Gregoire has been elected the governor of the state of Washington," Democratic Chairman Paul Berendt said. "I believe Dino Rossi should concede." Neither King County nor the state Republican Party could confirm the recount results that led to the Democrats' analysis. GOP officials have said they were likely to take the matter to court in the event of a Gregoire win. This sounds rather...
Washington Supreme Court OK's Ballot Mining
Washington's state Supreme Court ordered King County officials to count the 723 ballots that they claimed to have discovered after the second machine recount, which presumably would give Democrat Christine Gregoire enough of a margin to edge out Republican Dino Rossi for the governorship: Washington state's Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that more than 700 belatedly discovered ballots from Seattle's King County should be counted in the extraordinarily close governor's race potentially enough to tip the balance in favor of Democrat Christine Gregoire. This appears to reverse their earlier ruling that previously-disqualified ballots could not be used in a recount. It looks like Washington's justices have succumbed to the Florida syndrome, in which judges substitute their own ideas of fair play for the regulations established by the state legislature. At this point, it hardly makes a difference; the mess that Washington created with its election could hardly be made much...
December 23, 2004
The Cross Shines Through
Los Angeles recently caved in to an ACLU demand to change its city seal, which had a cross in one small sector commemmorating LA's missionary history. At the time, the county board of supervisors estimated that the cost to replace the city seal in all locations and in all correspondence would total around $700,000, which they felt was cheaper than actually defending the historical nature of the seal in court. The move attracted wide derision as political cowardice, especially when people like Hugh Hewitt noted that the ACLU had not expressed any misgivings about the highly prominent rendition of the goddess Pomona. Many people also questioned the low estimate of the county's cost for the change. Now we find out why the estimate was so low. The LA Daily News reports that the county cheaped out and used adhesive stickers to cover the old seals instead of replacing them --...
December 24, 2004
Freakin' At The Freaker's Ball
Incompetence met intolerance at a Chicago-area YMCA last weekend, resulting in the dismissal of two YMCA executives and the revelation of some curious event scheduling at the ostensibly Christian organization: YMCA director has been fired and overnight facility rentals banned after the parents of young children arriving for a morning swim meet clashed with participants in an overnight transgender fashion show and ball. ... Authorities said a YMCA member had reserved the entire facility from 11 p.m. Saturday to 8 a.m. Sunday for the fashion show and ball. The YMCA rented out the rooms, although families were scheduled to arrive at 7 a.m to use some of the same rooms for a swim meet. When I read this, I shook my head and wondered what the hell happened to the YMCA I used to know. Their overt Christianity has mellowed over the years, but I cannot fathom how an organization...
The Shifting Standards Of Christine Gregoire
Perspective is a funny thing. When one trails in an election by 261 votes, one views the result as a "virtual tie." If the margin narrows to 42, then it becomes a flat-out tie. But when the count reverses in one's favor and amounts to 130, all of a sudden the race is over. Such are the vagaries of Christine Gregoire, the apparent governor-elect of Washington despite having lost two of three vote counts: Gregoire said at a news conference in the Capitol last night she would not declare victory until the election is certified next week. "A lot of heated words have been said during this recount," Gregoire said. "But with the election coming to a close, I am confident that we can begin to move forward as one state." Gregoire did not call on Rossi to concede, but said she would have conceded if she were the one...
December 27, 2004
Tsunami Toll Tops 21,000, Disease Threatens Survivors
The death toll from the massive earthquake and the killer tidal waves it unleashed continues to climb. Estimates now number the dead at more than 21,000 and the bodies left in the water have health experts worried about a potential second tsunami of disease: The death toll in a tsunami that slammed into coasts from India to Indonesia topped 21,000 on Monday as rescuers scoured the sea for missing tourists and soldiers raced to recover bodies amid growing fears of disease. Sri Lankan military spokesman Daya Ratnayaka said 10,029 people had been killed in Sri Lanka alone. The addition of more than 5,000 dead in the Indian Ocean island nation brought the total number of people reported dead from the waves unleashed from the world's biggest earthquake in 40 years to 21,559, with some 5,200 injured. The bodies have not all been recovered, and crisis workers now warn that the...
Boston Globe Scoop: Crime Still Exists
Murder has declined nationwide, and New York City has reversed the growth rate for violent crime over the past thirteen years. The Boston Globe covers this -- but as a sideline to a story about a family that has seen three of its sons murdered in New York City during that same period. The Boston Globe titles its article "Murders Drop, Fear Continues": When one of her sons was gunned down, Louise Brown found the body on a street, streaked with rain and blood. Rather than offer comfort, police officers there ''asked me for his Social Security number," she said, staring blankly and shaking her head. ''I'll never forget that." More suffering was to come: Two more of Brown's five sons have died in shootings in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, the latest three months ago. That opening misses some important context. The first murder occurred in 1991...
December 28, 2004
Republicans Demand Voter Rolls In King County
Republicans in the state of Washington refuse to go gently into that good night for the moment, demanding to see the complete voter rolls for King County to determine if any fraud caused the shifting voting totals for Washington's biggest county and Christine Gregoire's margin of victory (hat tip: The Anchoress): Washington Republicans, girding for a possible court challenge of Democrat Christine Gregoire's razor-thin victory for governor, on Monday demanded a list of the 900,000 who cast ballots in vote-rich, problem-plagued King County. Democrats accused the Republicans of being on "a fishing expedition" and urged them to concede or face the public's wrath for dragging out an election already eight weeks old. Republican state Chairman Chris Vance said his party and other backers of GOP candidate Dino Rossi have nagging questions about the vote count in the county that tipped the race to Gregoire by a scant 130 votes last...
Tsunami Toll Now Above 55,000, Expected To Rise "Sharply"
The death toll from the Asian tsunamis has risen sharply today as aid agencies now say that 55,000 deaths have been confirmed -- and that number is expected to get a lot larger soon: Logistical problems hampered a massive humanitarian relief operation along Asia's devastated shores as the death toll from a huge earthquake and killer tidal waves surged past 55,000. With the scale of the catastrophe rapidly unfolding, the confirmed number of dead in 10 countries shot up to 55,175, with Indonesia's Aceh province accounting for half of those killed, or 27,174. In Sri Lanka, 17,640 are dead. The fear that outbreaks of disease could unleash a second wave of tragedy on a region struggling to cope with the first also loomed large with decomposing bodies and sewerage contaminating water sources. Short of war, the world has not seen such an immediate catastrophe as the Indian Ocean nations are...
Goodbye, Ms. Sontag, And Good Riddance
The execrable Susan Sontag died today at the age of 71 of an undisclosed illness. Perhaps I should be more charitable in my assessment of her now that she has passed away, but she and her ilk represent the worst of the hypocritical Left, especially in the wake of 9/11: Susan Sontag, the author, activist and self-defined "zealot of seriousness" whose voracious mind and provocative prose made her a leading intellectual of the past half century, died Tuesday. She was 71. ... Sontag called herself a "besotted aesthete," an "obsessed moralist" and a "zealot of seriousness." Here's what the obsessed moralist had to say about the 9/11 attacks: "Where is the acknowledgment that this was not a `cowardly' attack on `civilization' or `liberty' or `humanity' or `the free world' but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed superpower, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions?" she wrote in...
December 29, 2004
Democrats Opt For New Election In Disputed Tally
At the end of the election, the recount discovered anomalies in the ballot totals -- leading to a large number of uncounted votes for the statewide office. As a result, Democrats have pushed to dump the election altogether and order a new special election to settle the matter. Washington? We wish. Try North Carolina instead: Following nearly two months of court fights and wrangling over lost votes, the North Carolina Board of Elections on Wednesday ordered a new statewide election for the closely contested race for agriculture commissioner. Republican Steve Troxler leads Democratic incumbent Britt Cobb by 2,287 votes in final results from the Nov. 2 election. However, that figure was left in doubt by the discovery that an electronic voting machine error in Carteret County eliminated 4,438 votes that were cast early. Democrats challenged the election, on reasonable grounds, it appears to me. The error came from the machine...
December 30, 2004
Gregoire Hits Out At NC Democrats? Only If Democrats Had Capability Of Consistency
In an amazing turn of events, Washington gubernatorial candidate Christine Gregoire lashed out at her fellow party members in North Carolina, calling a revote wasteful and counterproductive: "This ain't golf. No mulligans allowed here, folks," said Gregoire's spokesman, Morton Brilliant. "It's irresponsible to spend $4 million in taxpayer money on a new election just because you don't like losing this one." Of course, I'm writing with tongue firmly in cheek. Gregoire made these comments in response to GOP candidate Dino Rossi's request for a revote after a series of irregularities in ballot handling, especially in King County, switched an original 230-vote GOP victory to a 130-vote loss. In North Carolina, the margin of GOP victory in the agricultural commissioner race was about half of the disputed ballots lost in a predominantly Republican county. In Washington, the disputed votes come up to at least five times the new margin of victory....
AP: Tsunami Toll Now Over 114,000
The AP now reports that new estimates of deaths in Sumatra has pushed the aggregate death toll from the massive Asian tsunamis to over 114,000, expanding one of the worst natural disasters of all time: The death toll from last weekend's earthquake-tsunami catastrophe rose to more than 114,000 on Thursday as Indonesia uncovered more and more dead from ravaged Sumatra island, where pilots dropped food to remote villages still unreachable by rescue workers. A false alarm that new killer waves were about to hit sparked panic in India, Sri Lanka and Thailand. The increase came after Indonesia reported nearly 28,000 newly confirmed dead in Sumatra, which was closest to the epicenter of last weekend's massive earthquake and was overwhelmed by the tsunami that followed. Some 60 percent of Banda Aceh, the main city in northern Sumatra was destroyed, the U.N. children's agency estimated, and 115 miles of the island's northwest...
Even In Tsunamis, The Scum Rises To The Top; Let's Beat Them To The Money
Sometimes it seems that human avarice and maliciousness know no bounds. The New York Sun reports today on a number of websites that have sprung up for fundraising in connection to tsunami relief, but these show no connection to known and trusted charitable organizations: On eBay, sellers are hawking Pez dispensers, a gold necklace, a stuffed mouse, and a "hand-carved" Buddha statue with the promise that proceeds from the auctions will go directly to charities assisting the victims of the tsunami in Asia. Visitors to tsunamireliefaid.com are directed to a crudely constructed Web site with photographs of those who appear to be tsunami victims and instructions urging users to send relief packages and $10 checks to a P.O. box in Germantown, Md. As major aid agencies around the globe undertake what could be the costliest and most complex relief effort ever, the catastrophe in South Asia has also given rise...
British Minister: UN Only Body With "Moral Authority" For Relief
This statement by British minister Clare Short has stunned me into near-speechlessness: The president has announced that the US, Japan, India and Australia would coordinate the worlds response. But former International Development Secretary Clare Short said that role should be left to the UN. I think this initiative from America to set up four countries claiming to coordinate sounds like yet another attempt to undermine the UN when it is the best system we have got and the one that needs building up, she said. Only really the UN can do that job, she told BBC Radio Fours PM programme. It is the only body that has the moral authority. But it can only do it well if it is backed up by the authority of the great powers. Short's anti-American bias shines through in this ludicrous and blatantly stupid assertion. The notion that the UN has any moral authority,...
December 31, 2004
More Washington Follies
Michelle Malkin and Stefan Sharansky cover some highly irregular developments in the Washington governor's race recounts -- so much so that the Seattle Times even credits Stefan with rattling Christine Gregoire's credibility. Be sure to read up on the shenanigans that explains why extended recounts can never yield credible results....
January 3, 2005
US Helicopters Bring Hope, But Children Increasingly At Risk
US helicopters flew missions into Aceh yesterday, airlifting the badly wounded they found and distributing crucial water and food supplies to the survivors they found in the tsunami-devastated region: U.S. helicopters shuttled the injured and the homeless, many of them children, out of some of the worst-hit parts of tsunami-devastated Aceh province on Monday, as reports surfaced of trafficking in orphans from the disaster. Pilots skimmed low over flattened villages and jungles on the west coast of Sumatra island looking for signs of life, touching down briefly to collect the badly injured and fling out packages of food and water. "They were ecstatic as we flew in. They were blowing us kisses. I think they were really amazed to see us, although some of the children seemed a bit spooked," U.S. Seahawk pilot Lt. Cmdr. Joel Moss told Reuters after his second mission. "Yesterday was the best day of flying...
January 4, 2005
Mystery Voters Grow In Washington
The uncertainty surrounding the gubernatorial election in Washington continues to grow, as even the Seattle Post-Intelligencer now reports wide discrepancies between ballot counts and voter rolls: Thousands of "mystery voters" in the counties of King, Pierce, Snohomish, Clark and Kitsap appear to be Republican Dino Rossi's best prospect for challenging the legitimacy of the closest and most contentious gubernatorial election in the state's history. The state Republican Party yesterday called on county election officials to explain what the GOP says is a nearly 8,500-vote discrepancy between county vote tallies and the number of people credited with actually voting in the election. Democrats claim that the GOP used preliminary lists and that the discrepancies will narrow once counties update their voter rolls. However, no one now disputes that the election will have little credibility if the margin does not significantly decrease. The difference gives the appearance that several thousand more ballots...
January 5, 2005
As If Things Weren't Bad Enough
Human nature dictates a particular need for order in the midst of chaos. It's one of the driving forces behind our capacity to believe in conspiracy theories to explain random, tragic events. That being said, this still surprises me: Just 11 days after Asia's tsunami catastrophe, conspiracy theorists are out in force, accusing governments of a cover-up, blaming the military for testing top-secret eco-weapons or aliens trying to correct the Earth's "wobbly" rotation. In bars and Internet chatrooms around the world questions are being asked, with knowing nods and winks, about who caused the submarine earthquake off Sumatra on December 26, and why governments were so slow to act in the minutes and hours before tsunamis slammed into their shores, killing almost 150,000. "There's a lot more to this. Why is the US sending a warship? Why is a senior commander who was in Iraq going there?" whispered designer Mark...
January 6, 2005
Will Virginia Become The Next Washington?
Not according to blogger James Behan, self-proclaimed as the first elected blogger. He predicts a healthy margin of victory for the GOP nominee for Virginia's governor in 2005, and he's picking James Kilgore to be that standardbearer. Behan gives a great look at Virginia state politics. Don't miss it....
January 7, 2005
Digging Up The Vote In King County
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports today that Christine Gregoire can credit her disputed victory in Washington's gubernatorial election to an aggresive get-out-the-vote campaign. In fact, Democrats succeeded so well at motivating their base that they managed a few resurrections: At least eight people who died well before the November general election were credited with voting in King County, raising new questions about the integrity of the vote total in the narrow governor's race, a Seattle Post-Intelligencer review has found. The evidence of votes from dead people is the latest example of flaws in an election already rocked by misplaced votes and allegations that there were thousands more votes counted than actual voters. County officials say they are investigating the cases pointed out by the P-I. "These are not indications of fraud," said Bill Huennekens, King County's elections supervisor. "Fraud is a concerted effort to change an election." Who is Huennekens kidding?...
Paying It Forward
Thirteen years ago, a natural disaster in the South Pacific killed hundreds and left thousands more homeless. The eruption of Mount Pinatubo created an emergency for Filipinos and the American dependents of the servicemen and servicewomen station in the Philippines. George Bush (41) sent the US Navy to provide disaster relief and to evacuate Americans from the area, in a manner similar to what we are doing with tsunami relief today. One of the people sailing to the relief of the tsunami victims understands exactly what they have experienced -- because she was rescued from Pinatubo by the same ship she serves now: Standing in the hangar bay of this mammoth aircraft carrier, Seaman Joviena Kay looks across the waves toward the devastated coast of Sumatra, remembering a time 13 years ago when she huddled on the same deck with evacuees from another great Asian disaster. Joviena was 6 years...
January 8, 2005
Absentee Shenanigans In Florida Exposed
Florida has granted immunity to a well-traveled political consultant that has implicated politicians of both parties in illegal absentee brokering: A campaign consultant said he was hired by several Florida politicians over the past seven years to gather absentee ballots during their elections, a violation of state law. Ezzie Thomas, who has been granted immunity, told prosecutors that he was paid numerous times since 1998 to gather absentee ballots, most recently by Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer's campaign last year, his attorney said Friday. Thomas told prosecutors four months ago that he was hired to do similar work for U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez when he ran for Orange County chairman in 1998, Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood's 2000 campaign for Orlando mayor, and two other minor campaigns. Florida made it illegal in 1998 to pay or accept money "for distributing, ordering, requesting, collecting, delivering or otherwise physically possessing absentee ballots."...
January 9, 2005
California Democrats On The Ropes?
The New York Times reports on the travails of Kevin Shelley, one of the most prominent Democratic officeholders in California, who now faces numerous investigations for corruption and malfeasance. Nor is Shelley the only Democratic leader that finds himself on the defensive on the legal front: Six months ago, Kevin Shelley, the California secretary of state, was generating national attention for his efforts to ensure the integrity of the voting process and was considered a promising candidate for governor or the Senate. Now Mr. Shelley, from a well-known San Francisco Democratic family, finds his political career in tatters because of scandals involving fund-raising and the way he has spent tens of millions of dollars of federal election money to carry out the voting overhaul he trumpeted. He is facing investigations by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and a federal grand jury, a state personnel board, the California Legislature and the...
January 11, 2005
World Relief Day Tomorrow!
Tomorrow is the day we picked for the blogosphere to donate one day's take-home pay for World Vision's relief fund for tsunami survivors. I originally set a goal of $5,000. You broke that in about two days. I reset the goal for tomorrow's fundraiser to $25,000. Y'all broke that yesterday, and the total is now $27,145! So now, thanks to my friend King, we have a new goal for tomorrow: Our many donors have already raised $25,000; I am hopeful that a concerted push tomorrow can double that number. Sounds absurd? Let's prove 'em wrong, shall we? That may be quite a stretch, but it's a goal worth shooting for! One of the many who have signed on to help is Chris Lynch from A Large Regular, who writes: I want to help make your World Relief Day tomorrow a success in my own small way. I have already donated...
January 12, 2005
CQ's World Relief Day Set For January 12 (Today!!)
Today's the day, folks! You've all done a wonderful job getting funds to tsunami survivors and their communities, and we've already blown past the $25,000 goal we set earlier. Let's see if we can't push that past $50,000 by the end of today. Thank you all so much! CQ readers, fellow bloggers, and friends, We have before us one of the world's greatest natural disasters in terms of lost human life. Over 120,000 now (12/31) have perished, and unless we get immediate and effective assistance to the survivors, many more will die. (1/2: CNN now reports 141,000 dead, and tens of thousands missing.) Our friends around the world have given of themselves through their governments, and the US has also risen to the challenge. Our government has pledged $35 million to date, as well as ordering thousands of our military personnel and two US Navy task forces to the Indian...
Continue reading "CQ's World Relief Day Set For January 12 (Today!!)" »
January 20, 2005
ACLU Silences Its Internal Critics
In a move that normally would have the ACLU filing lawsuits on behalf of whistleblowers in any other organization, the whistleblowers find themselves at war with the ACLU's Board of Directors, according to the New York Times: The American Civil Liberties Union, which since its inception has fought to protect free speech rights, is scheduled to begin a debate today over whether to discipline - or potentially move to oust - two board members for speaking to reporters. The executive committee of the A.C.L.U. board will discuss whether Wendy Kaminer and Michael Meyers have acted inappropriately as board members. The two have criticized some actions by the executive director, Anthony D. Romero, and the executive committee for what they said was a failure to provide proper oversight. Nadine Strossen, president of the A.C.L.U., wrote in an e-mail message responding to a reporter's questions that the subject was added to the...
January 27, 2005
When Corporations Go Insane, Government Will Follow
Normally I don't have a tremendous amount of sympathy for smokers. I used to smoke cigarettes for several years and gave it up when I got engaged to the First Mate (although I wasn't much of a nicotine addict -- I'd go through one or two packs a month on average). I still smoke an occasional cigar. Even when I smoked, I considered it a silly, self-destructive habit. However, it remains a fully legal self-destructive habit, and as long as people smoke in their own space and don't toss their refuse all over the place, I have no issue with silly choices. The BBC reports that a Michigan health-care company feels otherwise and wants to not only ban smoking from its premises, but require that its employees do not smoke anywhere else either: Four workers in the United States have been sacked after refusing to take a test to determine...
February 16, 2005
Michael Jackson Gets Close To Children Again
Normally I wouldn't comment on singer Michael Jackson, but this post at La Shawn Barber's has me mystified. Apparently Jackson took ill this morning on his way to court and had to be hospitalized -- and Marian Medical Center had just the spot for him: I just got off the telephone with WMAL anchor Michelle Basch, who confirms that Jackson is staying on the same floor as the Pediatrics Unit. Hes staying their supposedly because its the most isolated area at Marian Medical Center. Oh, the irony is disgusting! Whose bright idea is storing Jackson in isolation with children? Why not just lock up Courtney Love at the Pfizer Laboratories while we're at it?...
February 24, 2005
Swann Running Toward New Goal: Penn Governor
Former Pittsburgh Steeler receiver and Hall of Famer Lynn Swann has decided to enter politics, and as typical of Swann, he isn't aiming low. Swann announced the formation of a campaign committee for the Pennsylvania governorship in 2006, hoping to unseat incumbent Democrat Ed Rendell: Former Pittsburgh Steelers star Lynn Swann has formed a campaign committee to raise money for a potential run for governor in 2006. Swann named his committee Team 88, the number he wore as a wide receiver for the Steelers from 1974 to 1982, when the team won four Super Bowls. "I will spend time introducing myself to communities across the commonwealth," the NFL Hall of Famer said in a statement Wednesday. "We will also explore the potential political and financial support for my candidacy." Swann hardly needs an introduction to Pennsylvanians. As a member of the Steelers dynasty, Swann helped Pittsburgh win an unprecedented four...
March 9, 2005
No Echoes Of Lynne Stewart Here
Matthew Hale, the imprisoned white supremacist who the FBI believes may have had some role in ordering the murder of a federal judge's family, attempted to pass coded messages to his followers, according to his attorney: An attorney for jailed white supremacist Matthew Hale said he was asked to give an encoded message to one of Hale's supporters, according to a published report. Hale has been a focus of the investigation into the shooting deaths of a federal judge's husband and mother. Lawyer Glenn Greenwald said Hale's mother asked him a few months ago to pass the message to a Hale supporter. "She said she didn't know what the message meant, but she was going to read it to me verbatim because Matt made her write it down when she visited him," Greenwald told The New York Times in Wednesday's editions. "It was two or three sentences that were very...
March 10, 2005
Lefkow Case Solved?
In a strange twist to a tragic story, a suicide on a Milwaukee street may explain why a federal judge's family was brutally murdered -- a reason that has no apparent connection to white supremacists, as first feared: A suicide note claiming responsibility for the killings of a federal judge's husband and mother was found with the body of a Chicago man who shot himself to death after being pulled over for a traffic violation in a Milwaukee suburb Wednesday night, Chicago's police superintendent said this morning. Supt. Phil Cline identified the North Side man as Bart Ross, 58. In his note, Ross said he killed U.S. District Judge Joan Lefkow's husband and mother at the family's North Side home because the judge had ruled against him in a medical-malpractice case, authorities said. Ross has no known ties to white-supremacist groups, Cline said. Authorities had been pursuing possible white-supremacist links...
March 11, 2005
DNA Confirms Suicide As Lefkow Killer
The bigot didn't do it after all: A DNA match from a cigarette butt convinced police that a Chicago electrician was the killer of a federal judge's husband and mother, authorities said. The cigarette butt found in Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow's house was matched to the electrician, Bart Ross, who killed himself during a traffic stop in Wisconsin this week, and the evidence points to him as the lone killer, police spokesman David Bayless said. Ross, whose rambling lawsuit over his cancer treatment was dismissed by Lefkow, had claimed responsibility for the killings in a suicide note found in his minivan. "The DNA match, with all the other evidence, certainly convinces us that Ross is the offender in the Lefkow family homicide," Bayless said Thursday night. Like many others, I thought Matthew Hale or his supporters to be the likeliest suspects in this heinous and brutal murder. They fit all...
March 17, 2005
More Highlights Of High School Politics
CQ reader Angry TO points out yet another fiasco of outsiders coming into a high school to raise consciousness among the student body. After a speech by New Jersey's Secretary of State on racism, students walked out of classes yesterday at a South Jersey Catholic school to protest the accusatory tone of her appearance: Some white students at a South Jersey Catholic school walked out of classes Tuesday in protest over a speech by the New Jersey Secretary of State Regina Thomas. Tensions have been building up at Paul VI High School since Thomas' speech on racial justice last week. Many students and faculty members walked out of the speech offended. They said that she lambasted one student for not knowing his black history and that she insinuated that the students were racist. "It's, like, really crazy right now. Teachers are just standing by the doors. Kids are trying to...
March 24, 2005
Soros Conviction Upheld In France
George Soros, the multi-billionaire financier and one of the primary source of funds behind the far Left in the US, has had a conviction for insider trading upheld in France today. The case originated when Soros received a tip on a buyout of Societe Generale and started scooping up its stock ahead of the announcement. Soros, of course, proclaims his innocence (hat tip: CQ reader M. DuFresne): Billionaire investor George Soros failed to erase the only legal blemish on a long financial career Thursday, when a French appeals court upheld his three-year-old conviction for insider trading. Rejecting Soros' bid to clear his name, the Paris Court of Appeal maintained the guilty verdict and 2.2 million euros fine handed down by a lower court the same amount that Soros made buying and selling Societe Generale shares in 1988 after receiving information about a planned corporate raid on the bank. Amusingly,...
March 30, 2005
Curiouser and curiouser
Eric Pfeiffer of NRO has an interesting piece on Michael Schiavos attorney, George Felos. Apparently he can do more than move juries with his advocacy skills, but he believes he has the ability to mentally control aircraft as well. Pfeiffer checked out Mr. Felos book (Litigation as Spiritual Practice) and observed the following passage: Felos claims to have used his mental powers to cause a plane he was passenger on to nearly crash. By simply asking himself, "I wonder what it would be like to die right now?" the plane's autopilot program mysteriously ceased to function and the plane descended into free fall. Felos then observed, "At that instant a clear, distinctly independent and slightly stern voice said to me, 'Be careful what you think. You are more powerful than you realize.' In quick succession I was startled, humbled and blessed by God's admonishment." Mr. Felos also claimed to use...
April 12, 2005
Looming Tax Deadline Still Can't Convince Americans To Simplify
According to an AP-Ipsos poll, a majority of Americans agree that taxes contain too many complications -- but they also won't agree to eliminate the deduction maze that creates them: Most Americans think federal income taxes are too complicated, but they're not eager to simplify tax preparation by getting rid of some deductions and tax credits, according to an AP-Ipsos poll. Forty-five percent of those polled support eliminating them, while 51 percent oppose that approach. ... Seven in 10 said their federal taxes are too complicated, according to a poll conducted for The Associated Press by Ipsos-Public Affairs. The survey found 49 percent would prefer a trip to the dentist while 48 percent would rather prepare their taxes. This points out an unfortunate dichotomy among Americans who want reform without incurring a cost. Tax simplification makes enormous sense on many levels, even if it doesn't mean going to a complete...
April 22, 2005
That Fickle Finger Of Fate
Anna Ayala set off a nationwide hunt for an answer to whose finger ended up in her Wendy's chili bowl in San Jose last month. After sales dropped all over Northern California when Wendy's customers became rather reluctant to find the rest of the body, Ayala filed suit for emotional distress against the fast-food giant. Now, however, Ayala finds herself in a different arena in the justice system as Las Vegas police have arrested her in connection to the claim: The woman who claimed she found a finger in her bowl of Wendy's chili last month has been arrested, the latest twist in a bizarre case about how the 1 1/2-inch finger tip ended up in a bowl of fast food. Anna Ayala was taken into custody late Thursday at her Las Vegas home, police said. Authorities would not provide details until a news conference Friday in San Jose, Calif....
April 30, 2005
Abduction Faked In Georgia Bride Case
The attention-grabbing case of the missing Georgia bride, Jennifer Wilbanks of Duluth, came to a grubby end this morning when she turned up safe in Albuquerque. At first she told police that she'd been kidnapped by a couple who got scared off by the national attention of her disappearance. However, after more questioning, she finally admitted that she'd run off and hadn't bothered to tell anyone: A Georgia bride-to-be who vanished just days before her wedding turned up in New Mexico and fabricated a tale of abduction before admitting Saturday that she had gotten cold feet and "needed some time alone," police said. ... Wilbanks, whose disappearance set off a nationwide hunt, called her fiance, John Mason, from a pay phone late Friday and told him that she had been kidnapped while jogging three days before, authorities said. Her family rejoiced that she was safe, telling reporters that the media...
May 3, 2005
Why Would Medarex Say No?
Hugh Hewitt noted the case of Amanda Twellman-Dieppa, a young woman facing a terminal cancer diagnosis after suffering since her teen years through extensive chemotherapy and radiation. She has tried everything to beat the cancer but has not been lucky enough to be successful. Her family has discovered that a New Jersey pharmaceutical company, Medarex, is developing a new drug (MDX-060) that targets lymphoma receptor CD30, which might help Amanda survive her cancer and take up her active lifestyle once again. Medarex, however, initially refused to provide MDX-060 to Amanda, as it still is going through trials and is considered experimental. The company has made it through Phase II FDA trials, however, and the FDA would allow emergency use for the drug as long as Medarex agreed to its use. The drug was between trials, and told Amanda to wait for the next trial, which was supposedly a few weeks...
May 26, 2005
New York Allowed Sex Offender To Be Foster Parent
The care of foster children remains a nightmare in American society. The majority of people who open their homes to these children do so for the best of reasons, but we expect the state that controls this system to do at least basic investigative checks before dumping their wards into the homes of strangers. New York apparently can't be bothered: Authorities are investigating how a convicted rapist was allowed to serve as a foster parent to as many as 50 children before his past was discovered. State laws prohibit all convicted felons, particularly those convicted of sex crimes or crimes of violence, from being foster parents or adopting children, except in rare instances. But Nicholas Chaney told WWNY-TV in Watertown Tuesday that he may have cared for as many as 50 foster children since late 2001 and even adopted a child while living in upstate New York. Chaney said he...
Tennessee Legislators Arrested In Corruption Scheme
Several Tennessee state legislators have been arrested by federal investigators after a two-year undercover operation that identified massive corruption in bribes and kickbacks. Most of those arrested have been Democrats, including two leaders of the party, one an uncle to rising Democratic moderate Rep. Harold Ford, Jr: Four Tennessee lawmakers, a former lawmaker and two others were indicted Thursday amid a federal investigation into the business dealings of a state senator from Memphis from a powerful political family, officials said. Those charged included the senator, John Ford; fellow Sens. Kathryn Bowers and Ward Crutchfield; state Rep. Chris Newton; and former state Sen. Roscoe Dixon. Newton is a Republican and the others are Democrats. Federal authorities said during a news conference Thursday that the charges were extortion and accepting bribes following a two-year undercover operation dubbed "Tennessee Waltz." The grand jury returned the indictments in Memphis. Ford has been under investigation...
May 28, 2005
Haste Makes Waste, Even In Florida
Remember the hue and cry that ensued from the use of punch-card ballots in Florida for the 2000 election? After decades of use across the nation, we were led to believe that Florida voters suddenly became completely inept at punching ballots. New voting systems had to be bought, now, in order to save the poor incompetent dears from themselves. Anyone who balked or asked questions hated democracy, of course. Unfortunately, millions of dollars later, those questions have not disappeared. Miami-Dade's new voting machines are heading for the scrap heap, a $25 million testament to impulse buying and a lack of proper time and effort for researching needs and requirements: Miami-Dade County's elections chief has recommended ditching its ATM-style voting machines, just three years after buying them for $24.5 million to avoid a repeat of the hanging and dimpled chads from the 2000 election. Elections supervisor Lester Sola said in a...
June 2, 2005
More Clinton Cluelessness On Larry King
Larry King had Bill Clinton on as his guest for last night's show, and the talk-show host asked Bill Clinton about his assessment of Mark Felt in his role as Deep Throat. Clinton delivered a jaw-dropping response that dripped with irony: KING: ... What do you make of the Mark Felt story? Is he an American hero? CLINTON: I think he did a good thing. And I think it's -- it was an unusual circumstance. I think Felt believed that there was the chance that this whole thing would be covered up. Ordinarily, I think a law enforcement official shouldn't be leaking to the press because you should let criminal action take its course. When he did that, he obviously believed there was a chance that the thing would be covered up. And there was some evidence -- we now know that there was also a problem with trying to...
June 3, 2005
Arrests Made In McCartney Case
Two Belfast men have been arrested in the murder of Robert McCartney, the man whom suspected IRA terrorists killed in a pub brawl and then covered up through threats and initimidation. The killings threw the Northern Ireland peace process into a crisis and badly tarnished the Sinn Fein (NI) party: Two Belfast men were charged Friday in the IRA-linked knife slaying of a Catholic man and the injury of his friend outside a pub earlier this year, the first breakthrough in a case that has overshadowed Northern Ireland's peace process for months. A 49-year-old man will face a charge of murdering Robert McCartney, while a 36-year-old man will be charged with the attempted murder of Brendan Devine, police said. The arraignment was set for Saturday in Belfast Crown Court. McCartney's sisters who have taken their campaign to the White House and the European Parliament said they were stunned...
June 9, 2005
Boston Union Corruption Exposed As Child's Play
Massachusetts has launched an investigation into corruption in a Boston longshoreman's union as investigators discovered falsified records of employment, listing children as young as two years old as dock workers. Union officials apparently issued worker cards to their children and grandchildren in order to build up their seniority and increase their wages and access to jobs when they became old enough to work: The state is investigating allegations that longshoremens union locals in Boston have placed children as young as 2 on the payroll in a scheme to give them higher wages as adult dockworkers. Massachusetts Port Authority officials have turned their records over to Attorney General Thomas Reillys office and the State Police, said Kurt Schwartz, chief of the attorney general offices criminal bureau. Reillys office has launched a grand jury probe. Because seniority is determined by when a union member first receives a union card, regardless of the...
June 13, 2005
Quick Links For The Morning
I stayed up late last night to get the morning posts in, as my schedule will be erratic today. I hope to have new posts later on, but in the meantime be sure to catch up on a few stories that should get your attention. Arthur Chrenkoff gives us the Step By Step on Iraq in Opinionjournal today. Chrenkoff reminds us that we can't expect to fix in six months something that has been broken for almost two generations. Find out why two-thirds of Iraqis now feel that their country is heading in the right direction. Red State Rant has the first part of their interview with Newt Gingrich posted. They also had a terrific interview with Zell Miller earlier. In the next part, Lance will get to my question for Newt. RSR has made quite a splash for a new blog -- congratulate Lance for the splendid job he's...
June 27, 2005
And On The Seventh Day, We Prosecuted 'Em
The Washington Post posts an AP report this afternoon about boot-camp abuse that carries the breathless headline, "Army Recruits Quickly Abused in Training". The opening paragraphs describe the abuse given to recruits at Fort Knox, right from the time they climbed down off the bus -- or in this case, thrown off of it: The recruits of Echo Company stumbled off the bus for basic training at Fort Knox to the screams of red-faced drill instructors. That much was expected. But it got worse from there. Echo Company's top drill instructor seized a recruit by the back of the neck and threw him to the ground. Other soldiers were poked, grabbed or cursed. Once inside the barracks, Pvt. Jason Steenberger says, he was struck in the chest by the top D.I. and kicked "like a football." Andrew Soper, who has since left the Army, says he was slapped and punched...
July 2, 2005
Brother, Can You Spare Your Personal Carbon Allowance?
The British government has started to research ways to ration energy use, not just for commercial ventures and government facilities but for each and every person in the UK. The Telegraph reports that Tony Blair's ministers have started thinking about imposing a system of "personal carbon allowances" that residents can barter or trade as they see fit, but which would restrict access to all forms of energy for consumers: Every individual in Britain could be issued with a "personal carbon allowance" - a form of energy rationing - within a decade, under proposals being considered seriously by the Government. Ministers say that increasingly clear evidence that climate change is happening more quickly than expected has made it necessary to "think the unthinkable". ... Under the scheme for "domestic tradeable quotas" (DTQs), or personal carbon allowances, presented to the Treasury this week, everyone - from the Queen to the poorest people...
August 6, 2005
Prayers Answered For Russian Submariners
Seven trapped Russian submariners have been rescued -- alive -- after three days of being trapped 625 feet below the surface: A Russian submarine that had been trapped nearly 190 meters (625 feet) below the surface of the Pacific Ocean was raised Sunday, and all seven crew members are alive, a spokesman for the U.S. Pacific Fleet has confirmed. The sub was raised about 4:20 p.m. (3:20 a.m. GMT). A U.S. Navy doctor on board a Russian ship was evaluating the conditions of the Russian crew, John Yoshishige said. The rescue mission involved the navies of three countries: Russia, Britain, and some support from the US. A British Scorpio cleared the debris that had entangled its screws, causing the mini-sub to sink to the bottom near the Kamchatka peninsula. Once the Scorpio cleared the debris, described in varying news reports as either fishing nets or an observational attenna, Russian surface...
August 24, 2005
Seattle -- Help Find Men Cowards Who Beat Two Soldiers
Seattle CQ readers should keep an eye out for these three men who severely beat two US soldiers who had just returned from Iraq and went out for a night on the town: KOMO-TV reports that these three mouthbreathers started the festivities by molesting women accompanying the soldiers at the dance club where the beating took place. The TV station has also posted the disturbing videotape of the attack on its website: The brutality of it all was captured on tape outside of Larry's Nightclub on First and Yesler on July 31. Police say the victims were with two women who'd been groped by the suspects. One of the women threw a hot dog at the suspects and walked away. They didn't get very far. The three suspects ran after them and began attacking the two men -- two soldiers who'd come home from the war. The graphic videotape shows...
August 29, 2005
Katrina Weakening?
Katrina has shifted in the last hours before complete landfall and weakened slightly, perhaps giving New Orleans enough respite to survive its fury, according to the latest dispatches from the National Hurricane Center: Hurricane Katrina edged slightly to the east early Monday as it bore down on the Gulf Coast, providing some hope that the worst of the storm's 150 mph winds might not directly strike this low-lying city. Katrina, which weakened slightly overnight to a strong Category 4 storm, turned slightly eastward as it closed in on land, which would put the western eyewall the weaker side of the strongest winds over New Orleans. "It's not as bad as the eastern side. It'll be plenty bad enough," said Eric Blake of the National Hurricane Center in Miami. Mayor Ray Nagin said he believed 80 percent of the city's 480,000 residents had heeded an unprecedented mandatory evacuation as...
August 30, 2005
Adding Insult To Death
Leave it to the current German government and their knee-jerk anti-Americanism to try to score political points off of the natural catastrophe occuring in New Orleans. As many of the blogosphere have already pointed out, German environmental minister Juergen Tritten blamed George Bush for Hurricane Katrina and the deadly devestation it inflicted on New Orleans and Gulfport this week. Der Spiegel also reports that Tritten is hardly alone among Germans in believing that George Bush controls the weather: The toughest commentary of the day comes from Germany's Environmental Minister, Jrgen Trittin, a Green Party member, who takes space in the Frankfurter Rundschau, a paper owned by the Social Democrats, to bash US President George W. Bush's environmental laxity. He begins by likening the photos and videos of the hurricane stricken areas to scenes from a Roland Emmerich sci-fi film and insists that global warming and climate change are making it...
September 1, 2005
Katrina: Will We See A New New Orleans?
Today's Washington Post looks at the catastrophe that Katrina has created in New Orleans and the prognosis for its recovery -- and the message appears relentlessly negative. It bolsters the President's warning yesterday that the recovery will take years and a great deal of national effort to accomplish, and calls for a debate on exactly how to rebuild New Orleans: First they have to pump the flooded city dry, and that will take a minimum of 30 days. Then they will have to flush the drinking water system, making sure they don't recycle the contaminants. Figure another month for that. The electricians will have to watch out for snakes in the water, wild animals and feral dogs. It will be a good idea to wear hip boots and take care of cuts and scrapes before the toxic slush turns them into festering sores. The power grid might be up in...
Katrina Aid: CQ Chooses Catholic Charities (Updates!)
The blogosphere will spend its efforts tomorrow on promoting disaster relief for the victims of Hurricane Katrina, an idea first floated by Hugh Hewitt and getting promoted by Instapundit and NZ Bear today. Instapundit lists plenty of fine charities for your donation efforts, and selecting one to sponsor makes for a difficult decision. I chose Catholic Charities for a couple of reasons. First, the Catholic Church has many connections to the local communities in that region and can get the funds and material to the victims that much quicker. Second, I believe they do good work at a minimum of overhead, allowing for a better rate of donations to relief than possible with some other agencies. Lastly, as a Catholic, I believe that this kind of effort needs encouragement from its congregation in order to ensure that the Church fulfills its mission to the world. Regardless of where you decide...
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Katrina Aid: More Ways The Blogs Have Stepped Up
I will be on the Hugh Hewitt show in a few minutes to discuss the blogosphere's efforts to get relief to the victims of Hurricane Katrina... I hope you had a chance to listen to the segment. I wound up paired with James Lileks and Michael Medved, both of whom I much admire, and Michael had a lot of encouragement and praise for the blogosphere. Hugh made sure we all had a chance to talk, except uncharacteristically for James Lileks, who gave the phone to Michael. During the day, many reports of perfectly awful news stories, but I'm not going to focus on that now. We need to focus on getting help to the victims as fast as possible. I understand the media impulse of "if it bleeds, it leads," but we don't need to follow that impulse here. I got a couple of e-mails today showing how the blogosphere...
September 2, 2005
Failed Levee Recently Upgraded
Several stories about supposed failures of the Bush administration to foresee the catastrophic failure of the New Orleans levee system have gotten published in the last two days, but one in the New York Times buries an uncomfortable fact midway through its report. Despite not getting the full federal budget money requested for levee engineering Louisiana requested, it turns out that the levees had indeed been improved and strengthened in targeted portions -- and that the main failure occurred in an upgraded section: The 17th Street levee that gave way and led to the flooding of New Orleans was part of an intricate, aging system of barriers and pumps that was so chronically underfinanced that senior regional officials of the Army Corps of Engineers complained about it publicly for years. Often leading the chorus was Alfred C. Naomi, a senior project manager for the corps and a 30-year veteran of...
Katrina: Rebuilding On An Unimaginable Scale
Hugh Hewitt reminds us in his column at the Weekly Standard that we may not yet realize the scope of the task that faces us in New Orleans. We have rebuilt parts of cities after natural disasters in the past, but Hurricane Katrina has created a singular event, one which moves far past the task of simply recreating housing and commercial buildings. How does one re-create a living community? Before long, however, the extreme needs will be met and the long-term rebuilding will get underway. At that point it will become much less obvious how ordinary Americans can help. When terrorists struck on September 11, the carnage was huge and the loss of life staggering, but an entire community was not wiped out. With this disaster, America confronts for the first time the daunting reconstruction of complex social and political organizations. It is a task which may be beyond the...
Katrina: Focus (Update)
I will have plenty to say later on about the madness of the coverage and the political debate surrounding Hurricane Katrina and flood aid, but I won't be drawn into it now, not by ridiculous rappers who spew garbage on prime-time network TV nor by the asinine and biased reporting that presumes that the federal government has all responsibility for the citizens of a city, rather than the city itself or the state in which it resides. For now, we need to focus on the task at hand, which is to get food, water, and shelter for the victims of Katrina and start planning on how to pull New Orleans out of the muck, literally and figuratively. Donate to Catholic Charities or another worthy organization. Volunteer your time and labor. Pray, pray, pray. Those activities provide positive and constructive methods of coping with the catastrophe and result in actual benefit...
September 3, 2005
Congress Takes Five Days To Act, Criticizes 'Bureaucracy'
In what would be seen as irony under less-deadly circumstances, Congress took the opportunity to carp at the federal response to Hurricane Katrina after passing a $10.5B funding bill five days after the destruction of New Orleans. The New York Times reports that members of both parties criticized the relief efforts while promising hearings into supposed bureaucratic inertia: Members of Congress from both parties acknowledged on Friday that the federal response to Hurricane Katrina had fallen far short and promised hearings into what had gone wrong. ... Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the majority leader, who plans to go to the New Orleans area this weekend, said he had asked the committee that oversees the Federal Emergency Management Agency to convene hearings so that "any lessons learned during this experience are brought to the forefront so that we may continue to be more effective in responding to any future disaster."...
WaPo On Katrina: It Starts Locally
Not all media outlets have forgotten about the responsibility of local governments to take care of its citizens. Today's editorial in the Washington Post not only reminds its readers that local authorities provide the first line of defense for its most vulnerable citizens: But if blame is to be laid and lessons are to be drawn, one point stands out as irrefutable: Emergency planners must focus much more on the fate of that part of the population that -- for reasons of poverty, infirmity, distrust of officialdom, lack of transportation or lack of information -- cannot be counted on to leave their homes after an evacuation order. Tragically, authorities in New Orleans were aware of this problem. Certainly the numbers were known. Shirley Laska, an environmental and disaster sociologist at the University of New Orleans, had only recently calculated that some 57,000 New Orleans Parish households, or approximately 125,000 people,...
September 4, 2005
Katrina: Why Didn't Nagin Follow His Own Plan?
Mark Tapscott, one of the best crossover bloggers and a fierce researcher, turned up an interesting document yesterday: the New Orleans comprehensive hurricane disaster plan. The plan exists on line and has a high level of detail, and yet the Exempt Media has given no coverage of its contents. The most obvious reason is that it shows that New Orleans and the state of Louisiana didn't follow their own plan. For example, the plan has this to say about the responsibility for evacuations: The safe evacuation of threatened populations when endangered by a major catastrophic event is one of the principle reasons for developing a Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan. The thorough identification of at-risk populations, transportation and sheltering resources, evacuation routes and potential bottlenecks and choke points, and the establishment of the management team that will coordinate not only the evacuation but which will monitor and direct the sheltering and...
Katrina: Not Just New Orleans
Mississippians have largely fallen off the media's radar screens as the unfolding tragedy in New Orleans holds the nation's attention. However, the scale of Katrina's devastation goes much farther than the jewel of the Delta, and its victims have heard enough about the specific tragedies of New Orleans: Mississippi hurricane survivors looked around Saturday and wondered just how long it would take to get food, clean water and shelter. And they were more than angry at the federal government and the national news media. Richard Gibbs was disgusted by reports of looting in New Orleans and upset at the lack of attention hurricane victims in his state were getting. "I say burn the bridges and let 'em all rot there," he said. "We're suffering over here too, but we're not killing each other. We've got to help each other. We need gas and food and water and medical supplies." The...
Katrina: More Race, No Class
Jason DeParle gives his assessment of the true story of the destruction of the Gulf coast -- the race card. His editorial in the New York Times doesn't wait for any scholarly analysis or dispassionate research for his conclusions to meet the Paper of Record's standards for publication, either: THE white people got out. Most of them, anyway. If television and newspaper images can be deemed a statistical sample, it was mostly black people who were left behind. Poor black people, growing more hungry, sick and frightened by the hour as faraway officials counseled patience and warned that rescues take time. What a shocked world saw exposed in New Orleans last week wasn't just a broken levee. It was a cleavage of race and class, at once familiar and startlingly new, laid bare in a setting where they suddenly amounted to matters of life and death. Hydrology joined sociology throughout...
Katrina: Dry Run Taught New Orleans Nothing
Marc from Cranial Cavity notes that the issues of evacuation had come to light before in New Orleans, almost exactly a year ago, in the advance of Hurrican Ivan through the Gulf. This report demonstrates that the problem experienced this week in The Big Easy did not arise from ignorance or a failure of imagination, but directly from incompetence in the city administration and specifically by Mayor Ray Nagin: Those who had the money to flee Hurricane Ivan ran into hours-long traffic jams. Those too poor to leave the city had to find their own shelter - a policy that was eventually reversed, but only a few hours before the deadly storm struck land. New Orleans dodged the knockout punch many feared from the hurricane, but the storm exposed what some say are significant flaws in the Big Easy's civil disaster plans. Much of New Orleans is below sea level,...
September 6, 2005
Katrina: The Memes Die Last
The notion that the federal government has primary authority over cities and states, an error that any high-school graduate should recognize, has slowly begun to fade from media coverage of Hurricane Katrina. In its place comes dawning realization of the massive failure of Louisiana and New Orleans to initiate their own disaster plans and to use their available assets to maintain control in New Orleans. On CNN yesterday, even Mayor Ray Nagin now recalls his civics classes, although he still hasn't done much to take responsibility for his own failures to follow his own detailed emergency response plan: S. O'BRIEN: What has Secretary Chertoff promised you? What has Donald Rumsfeld given you and promised you? NAGIN: Look, I've gotten promises to -- I can't stand anymore promises. I don't want to hear anymore promises. I want to see stuff done. And that's why I'm so happy that the president came...
California Legislature Confirms Its Lack Of Connection To Voters
The California legislature became the first elected body in the US to approve gay marriage, passing the bill in the Assembly 41-35 and setting up a conundrum for Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. The bill defies a vote from five years ago, when Californians overwhelmingly voted to approve a measure which specified that marriage should remain between one man and one woman: The bill's supporters compared the legislation to earlier civil rights campaigns, including efforts to eradicate slavery and give women the right to vote. "Do what we know is in our hearts," said the bill's sponsor, San Francisco Democrat Mark Leno. "Make sure all California families will have the same protection under the law." ... But opponents repeatedly cited the public's vote five years ago to approve Proposition 22, an initiative put on the ballot by gay marriage opponents to keep California from recognizing same-sex marriages performed in other states or...
September 7, 2005
Katrina Rescuer Finds Himself In The Doghouse
One would think that a commander of a military helicopter crew that showed the compassion and quick thinking to use their supply run to New Orleans to rescue a handful of people would have received a commendation for his quick thinking. If so, one does not know the military, as the New York Times proves this morning. When they give orders, the military expects its officers to obey them: Two Navy helicopter pilots and their crews returned from New Orleans on Aug. 30 expecting to be greeted as lifesavers after ferrying more than 100 hurricane victims to safety. Instead, their superiors chided the pilots, Lt. David Shand and Lt. Matt Udkow, at a meeting the next morning for rescuing civilians when their assignment that day had been to deliver food and water to military installations along the Gulf Coast. "I felt it was a great day because we resupplied the...
Katrina: ABC Notices The New Orleans Emergency Plan
At least one major media outlet has finally noticed that New Orleans had an emergency response plan for hurricances and evacuations that somehow never got implemented. ABC News yesterday asked why Mayor Ray Nagin not only did not follow the plan, but actively sent non-evacuees to a site that had no preparations to handle them: New Orleans' own comprehensive emergency plan raises the specter of "having large numbers of people stranded" and promises "the city will utilize all available resources to quickly and safely evacuate threatened areas." "Special arrangements will be made to evacuate persons unable to transport themselves," the plan states. When Hurricane Katrina hit, however, that plan was not followed completely. Instead of sending city buses to evacuate those who could not make it out on their own, people in New Orleans were told to go to the Superdome and the Convention Center, where no one...
New Orleans And Louisiana Blocking Aid To Refugees In City
Hugh Hewitt had Fox News reporter Major Garrett on his show tonight (transcript at Radioblogger) to explain his breaking story that Governor Kathleen Blanco and Mayor Ray Nagin have blocked aid from reaching the victims of Hurricane Katrina and the flooding that buried New Orleans. Blanco and Nagin apparently did not want to encourage people to stay in New Orleans, even though neither one did anything to assist them to leave during the mandatory evacuation: HH: You just broke a pretty big story. I was watching up on the corner television in my studio, and it's headlined that the Red Cross was blocked from delivering supplies to the Superdome, Major Garrett. Tell us what you found out. MG: Well, the Red Cross, Hugh, had pre-positioned a literal vanguard of trucks with water, food, blankets and hygiene items. They're not really big into medical response items, but those are the three...
September 8, 2005
Salvation Army Confirms Louisiana Gov't Kept Them Out Of New Orleans
Hugh Hewitt and Duane "Generalissimo" Patterson follow up with Fox's Major Garrett this evening on Garrett's blockbuster report last night that the Louisiana DHS ordered the Red Cross not to enter New Orleans. Tonight the story expands, as Garrett now reports that the Salvation Army confirmed that the state officials kept them away from the victims as well: HH: And what did the Salvation Army tell you? MG: The Salvation Army basically said look. We...first of all, both agencies also want to let people know that they've served the needs of thousands of people who got out, and who got out just a little bit to high ground, north of New Orleans. But they couldn't get in to meet those needs. They asked to get in. They were prepared with their...the Salvation Army has these ever-familiar portable kitchen canteens, is what they call them. They can actually make food, produce...
September 10, 2005
Exempt Media Begins To Understand Federalism
The Washington Post has started to ask the same questions as Fox News and ABC did earlier this week in an analysis of the response to Hurricane Katrina. Robert Pierre reports in a piece titled in part, "Assessing Leadership", that Mayor Ray Nagin now faces many questions about his role in the fumbled disaster response -- and that his own underlings say that the answers will expose him as an incompetent: Mayor C. Ray Nagin created many new friends and probably as many enemies for his decision to pointedly chastise both Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D) and the Bush administration for talking too much and working too little. Now, however, difficult questions are being directed at the mayor. ... Around the world, particularly in places where Bush is unpopular, Nagin is now recognized for refusing to back down against Bush. But with federal forces providing security in a largely...
Katrina: Incompetence Distilled
The New York Times has a feature story in its Sunday edition that supposedly looks at the frustration of coordinating the local, state, and federal responses to Hurricane Katrina. However, the article by a crew of Times writers instead inadvertently encapsulates the incompetence of Louisiana's governor Kathleen Blanco and New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin, in a single anecdote that also calls into question the ability of the four reporters to properly investigate their subject matter. The scene: three days after Katrina's landfall, and a day after the levees broke. The place: Baton Rouge. The setting: the state's command center for emergency response. The governor of Louisiana was "blistering mad." It was the third night after Hurricane Katrina drowned New Orleans, and Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco needed buses to rescue thousands of people from the fetid Superdome and convention center. But only a fraction of the 500 vehicles promised by federal...
September 11, 2005
Louisiana Failed To Follow A Flawed Plan: Florida
Today's Palm Beach Post takes a look at the Katrina response from a Floridian point of view, one that has plenty of experience with hurricane devastation and response. The verdict of Florida's emergency response officials is that not only did Louisiana fail to properly plan and train for an eminently forseeable disaster, but it also failed to follow the flawed plan it had (h/t: CQ reader Barnestormer): One thing Florida knows is hurricanes. Florida emergency planners criticized and even rebuked their counterparts -- or what passes for emergency planners -- in those states for their handling of Hurricane Katrina. Gov. Jeb Bush, the head of Florida AHCA and the head of Florida wildlife (which is responsible for all search and rescue) all said they made offers of aid to Mississippi and Louisiana the day before Katrina hit but were rebuffed. After the storm, they said they've had to not only...
FEMA Response Not The Issue
Jack Kelly writes about the widely-reviled FEMA response to Hurricane Katrina in today's Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and wonders why people consider it so poor. Looking at the historic response to disaster from the federal government, FEMA actually improved its rate of transferring assets to the affected area, he argues -- especially when one considers that the disaster area comprises an area the size of Great Britain: Journalists who are long on opinions and short on knowledge have no idea what is involved in moving hundreds of tons of relief supplies into an area the size of England in which power lines are down, telecommunications are out, no gasoline is available, bridges are damaged, roads and airports are covered with debris, and apparently have little interest in finding out. So they libel as a "national disgrace" the most monumental and successful disaster relief operation in world history. I write this column a...
September 12, 2005
No Great Surprise
To no one's great surprise, Michael Brown resigned as head of FEMA this afternoon. Brown, who got publicly rebuked by his recall to Washington last week, apparently knows how to take a hint: The White House picked a top FEMA official with three decades of firefighting experience to be FEMA's new director, senior administration sources said Monday. R. David Paulison, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agencys emergency preparedness force, will lead the beleaguered agency, according to three administration sources who spoke on condition of anonymity because the announcement had not yet been made. Bush's decision followed FEMA Director Mike Brown's announcement that he was resigning in the best interest of the agency and best interest of the president, three days after losing his on-site command of the Hurricane Katrina relief effort. No one seriously thought that Brown would continue as head of FEMA after the past two weeks. No...
A Sad Coda
Last month, we cheered as a comatose Susan Rollin Torres gave birth to Susan Anne Catherine Torres, the child that she would never see with living eyes as cancer doomed her. Unfortunately, little Susan Anne could not overcome her premature birth, and died today while undergoing emergency surgery for a perforated intestine. The Torres family could use our prayers tonight....
September 13, 2005
Will New Orleans Death Toll Escalate?
CQ reader Pajamaguy points to this Washington Post report about the gruesome discovery of 45 bodies found at a New Orleans hospital that appear to have been abandoned patients that drowned in the flood. While that story may well wind up as one of the most disturbing -- who would have left 45 helpless people to die? -- the Post buries the lead past the jump. Only 279 deaths have been confirmed, and it doesn't appear at this point that the toll will escalate much further: The city braced for more grim discoveries as the receding waters allowed search parties to reach isolated buildings. But the death toll -- 279 for Louisiana -- was still far below the initial prediction of the city's mayor that 10,000 perished. "It's hot. It smells. But most of the houses we are looking at are empty," Oregon National Guard Staff Sgt. James Lindseth, 33,...
LA Congressman Hires Starving Guardsman Movers
While thouands of New Orleans residents waited for rescue from Hurricane Katrina's devastation and the rising flood waters from the levee breaks, a Louisiana Congressman tied up National Guard resources for over an hour so he could retrieve his belongings from his house in the beleaguered city. ABC News reports tonight that Guardsman tell them of the use of their time and resources on September 2nd to work as personal movers for Rep. William Jefferson (via The Anchoress and CQ reader Alicia G): Military sources tells ABC News that Jefferson, an eight-term Democratic congressman, asked the National Guard that night to take him on a tour of the flooded portions of his congressional district. A 5-ton military truck and a half dozen military police were dispatched. Lt. Col. Pete Schneider of the Louisiana National Guard tells ABC News that during the tour, Jefferson asked that the truck take him to...
September 16, 2005
Will Only Saints Come Marching Back?
George Bush's uplifting speech, designed to inspire the confidence of the people most affected by the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, may have less effect than he hopes. He delivered it well and introduced intelligent plans for renewal, but half of the New Orleans evacuees appear to have decided not to go back regardless of the circumstances, according to the Washington Post: Fewer than half of all New Orleans evacuees living in emergency shelters here said they will move back home, while two-thirds of those who want to relocate planned to settle permanently in the Houston area, according to a survey by The Washington Post, the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and the Harvard School of Public Health. The wide-ranging poll found that these survivors of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath remain physically and emotionally battered but unbroken. They praised God and the U.S. Coast Guard for saving them, but two...
September 17, 2005
Louisiana DHS Officials Under Indictment As Levees Broke
One of the events that any inquest into Hurricane Katrina and its devastation must explain why the state and local agencies did not follow their own emergency plans or put all their assets in the field. The response appeared sluggish and confused, and the emergency operations plans approved by the state and on which the federal government relied never got implemented. Now the Los Angeles Times reports that several officials of the Louisiana state Department of Homeland Security had already been indicted on charges of misappropriation of government funds, waste, and mismanagement. FEMA had sent millions of dollars to Louisiana to help them prepare for an event like Katrina, but no one knows what happened to the cash: Senior officials in Louisiana's emergency planning agency already were awaiting trial over allegations stemming from a federal investigation into waste, mismanagement and missing funds when Hurricane Katrina struck. And federal auditors are...
September 21, 2005
Levee Failure Unexpected: Louisiana Engineers
Contrary to the media narrative of the past several weeks, the levee failure that flooded New Orleans should not have occurred with the storm surge that accompanied Hurricane Katrina. In fact, the debris pattern shows that the waters never overtopped the levees but that the levees collapsed before they met the thresholds of stress for which they were designed, according to state experts who have inspected the gaps: Louisiana's top hurricane experts have rejected the official explanations for the floodwall collapses that inundated much of New Orleans, concluding that Hurricane Katrina's storm surges were much smaller than authorities have suggested and that the city's flood- protection system should have kept most of the city dry. The Army Corps of Engineers has said that Katrina was just too massive for a system that was not intended to protect the city from a storm greater than a Category 3 hurricane, and that...
September 22, 2005
Rita Weakens To A 4, Galveston Emptied, Houston Braces For Impact
The Duke of DeLand has family fleeing the Galveston area; his daughter, son-in-law, and two beautiful grandchildren (as a grandparent, I know they're all beautiful) have taken to secondary roads to get out of the storm path. Pray for them and keep up with their progress at his website.
September 26, 2005
Broussard's Holy Grail Moment
Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussard has apparently decided that the best defense is to be really offensive. Tim Russert and Meet the Press invited Broussard back on the NBC show yesterday to get an update on the status of its recovery from Hurricane Katrina. Russert also wanted to get Broussard's explanation for his earlier contention that the federal government allowed an associate's mother to drown rather than rescue her from a nursing home when it turned out that she had drowned a week earlier -- and that Broussard had lied about what his associate told him. Russert played his words back to him: Mr. Broussard: Sir, they were told, like me, every single day, "The cavalry is coming." On the federal level, "The cavalry is coming. The cavalry's coming. The cavalry's coming." The guy who runs this building I'm in, emergency management, he's responsible for everything. His mother was trapped...
October 8, 2005
Levees Didn't Overflow, Second Study Concludes
The failure of the levees in New Orleans did not come from the overflowing of Lake Pontchartrain over the tops of the walls, but rather from soil failures under the levees, the Los Angeles Times reports today. This is the second study that refutes the claims made in the days after Hurricane Katrina's destruction that the government should have foreseen the levee failure given the intensity of the storm: The levee breaches along two major canals that flooded New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina resulted from massive soil failures under concrete storm walls, not from hurricane surges that sent water over the tops of the walls as Army officials initially said, according to teams of investigators who have examined evidence in the last week. The findings appear to chip away at the simple story that the storm surge was much larger and higher than the walls were designed to handle, though...
October 13, 2005
The Poor Bureaucrats Of Washington DC
The Washington DC Dept of Human Services tasked with assisting the poor of the nation's capital have apparently found an easy way to identify them -- they all work for the DHS. The Washington Times reports this morning that DHS employees account for half of all bonus money paid out by the city administration, where almost 400 employees took home a half-million in extra cash: The D.C. government employees tasked with providing care to the city's poor have taken home nearly half of the more than $1 million in bonus money awarded by the District during the first half of fiscal 2005. Nearly 400 employees in the D.C. Department of Human Services (DHS) received approximately $479,000 in extra money in their paychecks from Oct. 1, 2004, to March 31, 2005, according to D.C. Office of Personnel records. ... During the past year, however, department officials have noted several improvements, including...
October 24, 2005
Levee Design Fatally Flawed, Teams Agree
Three teams of engineers studying the collapse of the New Orleans levee system agree that the design and construction of the protective girdle around Lake Pontchartrain caused the catastrophic flooding after Katrina passed through the city, and not the storm itself. Katrina only had Category-3 status when it hit the city, and the Army Corps of Engineers reported that the levees could withstand a hit of that magnitude, leading state and federal workers stunned when the walls collapsed anyway: Investigators in recent days have assembled evidence implicating design flaws in the failures of two floodwalls near Lake Pontchartrain that collapsed when weakened soils beneath them became saturated and began to slide. They also have confirmed that a little-used navigation canal helped amplify and intensify Katrina's initial surge, contributing to a third floodwall collapse on the east side of town. The walls and navigation canal were built by the U.S. Army...
November 3, 2005
Did Corruption Kill New Orleans?
New testimony suggests that the flawed levees holding back Lake Pontchartrain from the New Orleans basin may have failed not only due to design defects, but also from decades-old corner cutting during their construction. The New York Times reports that interviews with the workers themselves that built the levees suggest that the construction crews failed to build the levees even to the faulty design specifications, leaving them inadequately anchored for resistance to large storms: "These levees should have been expected to perform adequately at these levels if they had been designed and constructed properly," said the expert, Raymond Seed, a professor of civil engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. "Not just human error was involved," Professor Seed said. "There may have been malfeasance." Professor Seed, whose team was financed by the National Science Foundation, did not offer hard evidence to back up his accusation. But he said after the...
November 23, 2005
The Innocence Project's Single Guilty Secret
The Innocence Project has a number of groups that use DNA and cold-case techniques to prove the innocence of death-row inmates and lifers. They have freed scores of prisoners over the years through the use of scientific re-examination of the physical evidence of the crimes. Most of the people freed won compensation from the states which wrongfully convicted them of their charges, allowing the released to come back into society. Of 163 people released because of the Innocence Project, only two have faced new charges of serious felonious behavior after his release, and one cost a young woman her life. Consider the strange case of Steve Avery: Two years ago, Mr. Avery emerged from prison after lawyers from one of those organizations, the Wisconsin Innocence Project at the University of Wisconsin Law School, proved that Mr. Avery had spent 18 years in prison for a sexual assault he did not...
January 4, 2006
One Final Cruelty In The Mines Of West Virginia
The story of the thirteen trapped miners ended in cruelty and tragedy this morning, after a mistaken announcement left family and friends celebrating what they thought had been a miraculous rescue of twelve miners. Instead, rescuers only found one man barely alive, and the others all dead: Great joy turned suddenly to deep sorrow Wednesday morning when stunned family members were told that 12 of the 13 miners trapped 13,000 feet into a mountainside since early Monday were dead rather than alive, as they, and the world, had been told hours earlier. The first announcement, of a "miracle," was the result of a "miscommunication," a company official said. The new announcement came at roughly 3 a.m., interrupting and then silencing celebratory church bells in this small town and leaving relatives of the miners in shock, grief and anger. The new announcement, officially made by Ben Hatfield, CEO of the International...
January 31, 2006
Louisiana Turned Down Katrina Help For Evacuations
A new memo has surfaced from the investigation into the response to Hurricane Katrina which shows that state and local officials turned down federal help in evacuating hospitals and nursing homes until it was too late: A ranking Louisiana health official turned down federal offers to help move or evacuate patients as Hurricane Katrina bore down on New Orleans, a newly released document shows. But the state's top medical officer said Louisiana coordinated with the federal Health and Human Services Department in evacuating hospitals and nursing homes after Katrina hit. Two days before the Aug. 29 storm, HHS was told by the state's health emergency preparedness director that the help was not needed, according to an e-mail released Monday by a Senate panel investigating the government's response to Katrina. The state official, identified in the Aug. 27 e-mail as Dr. Roseanne Pratts, "responded no, that they do not require anything...
February 10, 2006
Freedom's Just Another Word At Yahoo!
Internet giant Yahoo! joins Microsoft and Google in bending to the Chinese autocracy, only this time they helped jail an activist for freedom in the nominally Communist nation. The London Times reports that Yahoo! coughed up records used to send a dissident to prison for ten years: THE American internet company Yahoo! provided evidence to Chinese police that enabled them to imprison one of its users, according to allegations that came to light yesterday. The disclosure marked the second time in months that the company had been accused of helping China to put someone in jail. Li Zhi, a civil servant, was imprisoned on charges of trying to subvert state power after he criticised corruption and tried to join the dissident China Democracy Party. ... Yahoo! said that it could not comment on an individual case. However, it said that it turned over to governments only legally required information. Mary...
February 15, 2006
Cheney Owns Up
One of the advantages of having satellite radio is the ability to tune in network news broadcasts when they have a noteworthy event. Tonight, Fox's Brit Hume interviewed Dick Cheney about the hunting accident that wounded his friend and hunting partner, Harry Whittington, and the raging controversy over the method the news was released. First, however, Hume asked Cheney to talk about the accident itself: HUME: There was just two of you then? CHENEY: Just two of us at that point. The guide or outrider between us, and of course, there's this entourage behind us, all the cars and so forth that follow me around when I'm out there -- but bird flushed and went to my right, off to the west. I turned and shot at the bird, and at that second, saw Harry standing there. Didn't know he was there -- HUME: You had pulled the trigger and...
February 20, 2006
UMTC Cuts Conservative Group Funding Even Further (Updated!)
Last week, I posted about the funding decisions made by the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities regarding the division of student fees. UMTC defunded the most active conservative groups on campus while increasing funding for politically active groups with liberal political agendas. Bill Gilles reports that the second round of recommendations has come through the Student Activities Office, and that the results have changed the picture somewhat -- it's actually gotten worse. CFACT and SFV still have received an unprecedented defunding by UMTC, and now the allocations that were to go to the Minnesota Republic, a newspaper with a conservative outlook, and the Conservative Club have been cut by almost 30% from the initial funding announcement. The Minnesota Daily, which Gilles lists as a liberal newspaper, reports on the process without ever mentioning the cessation of funding for conservative voices: While the Student Organizations Committee recommended funding more than...
February 22, 2006
And On Review, There Is No Story
NBC has breaking news on Quailgate, and it won't please the members of the Fourth Estate. It turns out that all of the witnesses to the shooting have a consistent story -- and it matches what Dick Cheney said all along about the accidental shooting of Harry Whittington: NBC News has obtained new documents regarding the shooting accident involving Vice President Dick Cheney. NBC News filed an Open Records Act request with the sheriff's office in Kenedy County, Texas, which investigated the shooting. Late Wednesday, NBC received two dozen pages of documents, including hand-written affidavits on the shooting never before made public. ... In this case, all the accounts are similar and consistent with how Vice President Cheney has already described the incident. The statements say Cheney and his friend were about 30 yards apart when the vice president shot, aiming for a single bird. The statements all agree this...
March 2, 2006
Katrina Tape Half-Story
Most news agencies have reported on the AP's tape of a meeting involving President Bush, Michael Brown, and a number of other FEMA officials and local and state politicians during Hurricane Katrina. In the tape, most of the reports claim, Bush specifically heard warnings about levees being breached. However, that's not what the tape shows, at least the portion aired by the AP and NBC on their broadcast last night (available at MS-NBC at the above link). What is does show is an expert saying to the group, "At this point, we don't know whether the levees will be overtopped or not." As Dafydd ab Hugh at Big Lizards points out, breaching and overtopping are two very different events. Neither are particularly desirable, of course, but overtopping would result in the release of excess water from Lake Pontchatrain, while the breaches released an exponentially larger volume, resulting in far more...
Katrina Tape Transcripts Show Media Hack Job
For those who want to see the transcripts themselves of the video conferences, the New York Times has them for the August 28th and August 29th briefings. The transcript for the 29th makes one garbled mention of the levees around New Orleans (page 6). After making the point that the storm surge would cause the greatest devastation in the Gulfport area of Mississippi, going as high as 21 feet, Max Mayfield then turns to New Orleans: MAX MAYFIELD: ... The rest of the track we have 10 to 15 feet, in a few areas up to 16 feet. At least glimpsed it out, and Louisiana can talk a little bit more about this than I can, but it looks like the Federal levies [sic] around the City of New Orleans will not have been (incomprehensible) any breaches to. That certainly doesn't sound like a warning -- and this was on...
March 3, 2006
Domestic Terrorists Find Out Times Have Changed
Six animal-rights activists that ran a front group for pipe-bombers discovered that the nation has lost patience with violent protests, and now face as much as 23 years behind bars for their connections to vandalism, bombings, and death threats against medical researchers. The verdict is the first conviction under a law passed fourteen years ago to stop attacks on research facilities and their staffs: An animal rights group and six of its members were convicted of terrorism and Internet stalking yesterday by a federal jury that found them guilty of using their Web site to incite attacks on those who did business with or worked for a British company that runs an animal testing laboratory in New Jersey. The case was the first test of the Animal Enterprise Terror Act, enacted in 1992 to curb the most aggressive tactics used by activists. The verdict, which came after 14 hours of...
March 9, 2006
Murder Indictment Of FBI Agent Could Jeopardize Mob Convictions
The New York Sun reports the stunning news that an FBI agent whose investigations led to the convictions of several key Mafia figures may be indicted on murder charges. R. Lindley DeVecchio faces prosecution for passing information along to his contacts in the mob that fingered other informants, leading to their execution, including one woman: In a case with stunning implications for both law enforcement and some convicted gangsters, prosecutors have decided to seek murder charges against a former mob-busting FBI agent for involvement in at least three Brooklyn Mafia hits between 1984 and 1992, Gang Land has learned. The Brooklyn district attorney's office has concluded a six-month probe of the scandalous allegations against R. Lindley DeVecchio and will soon ask a grand jury to vote on murder charges against the retired agent, sources said. The move could come as early as today. According to evidence before the panel, Mr....
March 17, 2006
Lá Fhéile Phádraig Sona Dhaoibh!
That's original Irish for Happy St. Patrick's Day! Some of you will celebrate with green beer, others with green milkshakes from that ubiquitous Irish-named restaurant, while others will just wear the green in happy solidarity. For my part, I intend on relying on Bishop Flynn's dispensation tonight and enjoying an artery-plugging helping of corned beef. (Fellow Catholics should note that I intend on forgoing the cabbage as my substitute sacrifice.) For a story about a St. Patrick's Day celebration to remember, check out Mitch Berg and his cautionary tale of starting a wee bit too early. Don't forget to have a designated driver or a taxi on hand when the beers get you a little too green....
May 21, 2006
It's Nagin In New Orleans
Ray Nagin managed to win re-election as mayor of New Orleans despite his record of incompetent decisions in the immediate run-up and aftermath of Hurricane Katrina after one of the most polite campaigns the city has ever seen. Nagin, who described himself as "humbled" often in his campaigning, will lead the city in its rebuilding efforts after the worst American natural disaster in decades: C. Ray Nagin, the unpredictable mayor who charted a sometimes erratic course for his city through Hurricane Katrina and after, won a narrow re-election victory here Saturday. Mr. Nagin, who will now lead the city through four crucial rebuilding years, fended off a strong challenge from Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu, the scion of one of Louisiana's leading political families, in a vote that see-sawed all night. With all of the city's 442 precincts reporting, Mr. Nagin had 52 percent of the vote, while Mr. Landrieu received...
May 23, 2006
Veterans Victimized By Bureaucrats
After risking their lives and health to defend their nation, one would expect that the Department of Veterans Affairs would take care of the records of our fighting men and women. However, one would have to acquire a Pollyanna-ish faith in bureaucracies to be shocked to learn that an analyst had the sensitive indentity information of over 26 million veterans in his home -- and that burglars inadvertently stole it: The federal government is warning every living veteran discharged since 1975 to watch banking and credit card statements closely after sensitive personal data on all 26.5 million of them was stolen this month. Monday, Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson acknowledged the information was stolen from the home of a department analyst who wasn't authorized to remove it from the office. Privacy experts say the theft is one of the largest breaches of identity security ever. The stolen data include Social...
May 25, 2006
California Bests France, Again
Thirty years ago, a blind taste test horrified French wine aficionadoes when they selected California wines as the superior varieties. The Times of London reports that the French finally got their rematch yesterday -- and still selected California wines as the victor: The nose-off began in 1976, when Steven Spurrier, an Englishman who owned a wine shop in the French capital, invited a panel of French experts to a blind tasting of some of their own classic vintages against some Californian reds. To the horror of the entire French wine industry, the Americans won hands down. Last night Mr Spurrier and a group of British, French and American tasters took part in the 30th anniversary re-enactment to discover whether the shocking defeat for what was then the undisputed world leader in viticulture could be reversed. A simultaneous sampling of the same wines was staged in the Napa Valley, California’s main...
June 19, 2006
Owning Both Ends Of An Economic Cycle
This seems almost unfair: In a twist in corporate synergy, chocolate-maker Nestle AG said Monday it will fatten up its weight-loss business by buying Jenny Craig Inc. for $600 million. The acquisition follows Nestle's purchase for around $670 million last month of Uncle Tobys, an Australian maker of nutritional cereals and snacks, and is part of the company's "continuing commitment to nutrition, health and wellness," the Swiss company said in a statement. While best known for its namesake chocolates, Nestle is the world's largest food and drinks company, making baby formulas, nutrition foods such as PowerBar, drinks to aid weight loss and the Lean Cuisine line. The company's purchase of Jenny Craig follows the lead of consumer products company Unilever, which bought both Ben & Jerry's ice cream and Slim Fast in 2000. So Nestle will sell you enough of their original product line until you need Jenny Craig --...
Nifong Now Faces Republican Challenger
Mike Nifong's pursuit of the Duke rape charges regardless of the evident collapse of the case has generated at least one reaction -- he now will face a Republican challenger in the general election. La Shawn Barber has followed the case closely and has more on this development. Jeralynn at TalkLeft has also covered this story with precision and excellence. Be sure to visit both sites to catch up on the story. UPDATE: I had Nifong's first name incorrectly as Matt instead of Mike. Thanks to CQ reader and Duke student Mike J for the correction....
June 22, 2006
Guest Post: Senator John Sununu On Net Neutrality
CQ welcomes Senator John Sununu, a member of both the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation as well as the Senate Republican High Tech Task Force. Senator Sununu posts the following statement on the issue of "net neutrality", a topic that has not received coverage at CQ. Government’s role in supporting the development of emerging technologies is to get out of the way. Imposing unnecessary regulations on the Internet is a sure way to discourage investment, limiting the deployment of new products. The marketplace has powerful incentives for private industry to continue the development of existing technologies, while at the same time providing safeguards to protect consumers. Furthermore, the most recent version of the Commerce Committee’s legislation includes an ‘Internet Consumer Bill of Rights,’ along with authority for the FCC to adjudicate complaints against providers. These provisions will help ensure that Internet users have unfettered access without stifling technological...
July 5, 2006
Ken Lay Can't Cheat Death
Former Enron chief Ken Lay died suddenly today of a massive coronary at age 64. Lay had been scheduled for sentencing in October, but the convicted fraudster found out that cheating death takes a little more savvy than cheating stockholders: Pastor Steve Wende of First United Methodist Church of Houston, said in a statement that church member Lay died unexpectedly of a "massive coronary.'' Wende said Lay and his wife, Linda, were in Aspen, Colo., for the week "and his death was totally unexpected. Apparently, his heart simply gave out.'' The Lays owned property in Colorado, the only state outside the Southern District of Texas, which includes Houston, where he was allowed to go before that sentencing. ... According to a statement from the Pitkin County Sheriff's Office, deputies and an ambulance had been sent to Lay's Old Snowmass home at 1:41 a.m. for a medical emergency. Lay was then...
July 6, 2006
Taliban Man Denied Admission To Yale Degree Program
Sayed Ramatullah Hashemi will not get a degree from Yale, Hot Air reports in a blogospheric scoop later confirmed by the New York Times. The former ambassador-at-large for the oppressive Taliban regime in Afghanistan found out that Yale decided that they had endured enough embarrassment over their decision to allow Hashemi to enroll at the Ivy League school at all, and barred him from entering a degree-granting program after a cascade of criticism and protest: A student at Yale University who was once a roving ambassador for the Taliban regime in Afghanistan has been denied admission to a degree-granting program at Yale, one of the student's financial supporters said yesterday. The student, Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi, apparently can continue to take courses at the university as an untraditional student in a non-degree program, as he did during the past academic year, said Tatiana Maxwell, the president of the International Education Foundation,...
August 5, 2006
Keep John & Annie Glenn In Your Thoughts
Forget about all the dangers of the early space program and the issues of being the first septuagenarian to ride the Space Shuttle -- it turns out that Ohio freeways will really get you. Space pioneer, decorated Marine, and Senator John Glenn and his wife suffered minor injuries in a traffic accident early this morning: Former senator and astronaut John Glenn and his wife were taken to a hospital with minor injures after being involved in a car accident, police said. Glenn, 85, and his wife, Annie, 86, were in fair condition early Saturday morning at Grant Medical Center, a nursing supervisor said. The driver of the other car, Amy Myers of suburban New Albany, said she was driving east late Friday night when Glenn, who was headed west, tried to turn left onto a highway ramp. Myers, who was not injured, said her car hit the front of his....
August 9, 2006
Smoking Is Good For Your Legal Health?
The latest folly of defense lawyers in appealing a conviction comes to us via the New York Times. The attorneys for convicted murderer Phillip Elmore argue that a Columbus, Ohio jury rushed to convict him because the judge did not allow them to take cigarette breaks while deliberating: Lawyers for a man convicted of beating a former girlfriend to death with a lead pipe argued before the Ohio Supreme Court on Tuesday that their client should be spared the death penalty, partly because jurors were not allowed to smoke while deliberating. “A capital trial is supposed to be a considered process,” said Keith A. Yeazel, one of the lawyers. “Jurors shouldn’t be trying to speed up the process so they can go outside and smoke a Kool cigarette.” Of course, the appeal ignores the strong evidence that led to Elmore's conviction on the more serious of the charges jurors selected....
August 23, 2006
Stop The ACLU Interviews Catholic League President
William Donahue may be many things, but boring is not one of them. The combative president of the Catholic League sat down for an interview with John Stephenson of Stop the ACLU, and John has posted it to the site. Here's a taste: Q. In your opinion is the ACLU simply misguided or do they actually have a more malicious motive and agenda? A. I have asked myself that question a million times or more. I guess that I think that some of them are just wrong headed and sincere while others are actually more malicious and seeking to actually destroy America from its foundation. Some that are just misguided yet sincere truly believe that they have to defend the extremist speech in order to protect all free speech. Others are actually malicious. Norman Siegal is one of the few who I believe to be honest and sincere in their...
August 31, 2006
Revisiting Katrina, Revisiting Truth
A year ago, many of us watched in horror while New Orleans disappeared under the raging flood waters released from the levees containing Lake Pontchartrain. At the time, we all assumed that the hurricane brought down the walls and that the federal government failed because of their lack of foresight in that regard. Over the past year, however, we have learned much more about the levees of the Big Easy, and Kevin Aylward argues in today's Washington Examiner that Katrina may have saved tens of thousands of lives: In the year since Katrina, we’ve learned that the storm was a Category 1 by the time she hit New Orleans. We’ve also learned that the primary levee breach — the one that caused 70 percent of the flooding in the city — was not caused by the storm surge but by poor engineering. After months of dissembling and obfuscation by the...
September 8, 2006
The Da Vinnie Code
Italian investigators have called the FBI to unlock the mysteries of the Bible. Is this the Da Vinci Code? Opus Dei? More like omerta and the Da Vinnie Code: Italian officials have handed to the FBI a Bible that belonged to suspected Mafia kingpin Bernardo Provenzano to see whether it contains a secret code. Provenzano, 73, was captured in Sicily in April after 43 years on the run. The Bible found in his isolated hut contained dots, arrows and notations and investigators want to know if it is a code that will unlock other messages. ... Prosecutors say Provenzano constantly refers to the book, found in the hut close to his birthplace in Corleone where he was caught. The FBI has to be somewhat amused by the task, but it's no joke in Italy, where they have fought a deadly battle against the Mob. Provenzano made his reputation as a...
September 28, 2006
The Big Apple Becomes The Recipe Police
Everyone understands by now that trans-fatty acids create an avoidable health risk for people who ingest them on a regular basis. It causes heart disease, among other problems, and the Food and Drug Administration acted to ensure that Americans could track the amount of trans fats in their food by requiring manufacturers to reveal the amounts of trans fats on labels. That requirement pressured the manufacturers to find ways to reduce trans fats in their products, fearful of the market reaction when consumers became more informed of the composition of the food. However, New York City decided that consumers and food preparers couldn't be trusted to make their own decisions. The health board imposed trans-fat limits on restaurants in the Big Apple, transforming the debate from health to politics: City health officials maintained on Tuesday that they could not have suggested more strongly a year ago that restaurants voluntarily cut...
October 14, 2006
The Identity-Theft Scare
We have heard a great deal about identity theft over the last few years, and the ever-increasing risk in the age of the Internet of having our names and credit ruined by imposters. An entire industry of cybersecurity generated from the hype. These fears crescendoed when reports of lost and stolen laptops from various federal agencies arose over the past few months, computers which held the personal data of hundreds of thousands of taxpayers. But does the problem really exist on the level claimed by the security providers and the media that reports breathlessly on identity theft? In today's Washington Post, Professor Fred Cate of Indiana University says the risk has been vastly overrated by government and industry officials. The researcher for cybersecurity says that most identity theft comes from more mundane sources: Identity theft is getting a lot of attention these days -- from news stories about missing laptops...
November 22, 2006
Another No-Knock Disaster?
Police in Atlanta shot and killed a 92-year-old woman in a raid yesterday, apparently looking for illegal drug activity. The details are murky, but police claim that the woman shot three plainclothes detectives approaching the house to serve a search warrant, probably after an informant fingered the location: Three Atlanta police officers were shot and wounded and an elderly woman killed at a house in northwest Atlanta Tuesday night. The woman, identified by relatives as 92-year old Kathryn Johnson, opened fire on the officers from the narcotics division at a house at 933 Neal Street, according to officials. Authorities say they received a tip of drug activity taking place at the home and officers were headed to the house with a search warrant. ... "They kicked her door down talking about drugs, there's no drugs in that house. And they realize now, they've got the wrong house," Dozier said. "I'm...
November 25, 2006
Racists And Buttheads And Lawyers, Oh My
One of the most embarrassing spectacles in American pop culture just got a little more despicable. After Michael Richards shouted a series of racial epithets in response to hecklers at his comedy routine, we hoped Richards and the story would both disappear as soon as possible. Unfortunately, once Gloria Allred enters the picture, naked greed usually follows close behind, and this case is no exception. The hecklers now want "some money" from Richards in return for their pain and suffering: Two men who say they were insulted by actor-comedian Michael Richards during his racist rant at a comedy club want a personal apology and maybe some money, their lawyer said Friday. The men, Frank McBride and Kyle Doss, said they were part of a group of about 20 people who had gathered at West Hollywood's Laugh Factory to celebrate a friend's birthday. According to their attorney, Gloria Allred, they were...
November 27, 2006
The Informant Retreats
Five days ago, I wrote about the no-knock warrant that resulted in the death of a 92-year-old woman and the wounding of three officers in a drug raid gone bad. I questioned the facts as the police laid them out, when they claimed that they had announced themselves and waited for a response, but that the woman had shot the three officers as they approached the house. Now we hear today that the informant on whose information the warrant was issued has changed his story: The confidential informant on whose word Atlanta police raided the house of an 88-year-old woman is now saying he never purchased drugs from her house and was told by police to lie and say he did. Chief Richard Pennington, in a press conference Monday evening, said his department learned two days ago that the informant — who has been used reliably in the past by...
November 28, 2006
Christmas, As Sponsored By Secularists
One would expect that the new movie coming out this holiday season, The Nativity Story, to spend quite a bit of money on advertisements. Where might we see these ads? Television viewers will probably notice them on holiday specials and perhaps news shows; certainly they will appear in malls and shopping areas for those looking for Christmas presents. Perhaps some might even show up on bus stops and billboards around town. One place Chicago residents won't see the advertisements will be, ironically, at the city's Christmas celebration: A public Christmas festival is no place for the Christmas story, the city says. Officials have asked organizers of a downtown Christmas festival, the German Christkindlmarket, to reconsider using a movie studio as a sponsor because it is worried ads for its film "The Nativity Story" might offend non-Christians. New Line Cinema, which said it was dropped, had planned to play a loop...
Some Of His Best Friends Were Jewish
Just when it seemed that Michael Richards couldn't embarrass himself any further, he now has to explain his claim of Jewishness. Apparently, neither of Richards' parents were Jews and he has not converted, yet he has long claimed to be Jewish: Just when it seemed Michael Richards was about to leave the most troubling incident of his career behind, his publicist is having to explain how the comic could consider himself to be Jewish. Last week, crisis-management expert Howard Rubenstein acknowledged that Richards had shouted anti-Semitic remarks in an April standup comedy routine well before his appearance earlier this month in which he harangued hecklers with the n-word. But he defended Richards' language about Jews, saying that the comic "is Jewish. He's not anti-Semitic at all. He was role-playing." As Rubenstein's assertion circulated, Jewish organizations and commentators pointed out that the man who played Cosmo Kramer on "Seinfeld" has not...
December 12, 2006
Seattle Restores Christmas Trees
Here's one small victory for Christmas: The nine Christmas trees at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport were supposed to come down quietly over the weekend, in an attempt to avoid litigation and publicity. But it didn't quite work out that way. "We've created quite a national media sensation," said Seattle Port Commissioner John Creighton, whose agency ordered the trees removed after a rabbi threatened to file a lawsuit unless the airport displayed a menorah, as well as the trees, within 24 hours. Rabbi Elazar Bogomilsky, with the Seattle chapter of Chabad-Lubavitch, had requested that the Port of Seattle include an electric menorah as part of the airport's holiday display this year. But authorities decided to remove the trees, rather than be subject to accommodating all requests. Now, because of publicity and public outcry, the trees will soon be back. This is actually a defeat for small-minded bureaucrats rather than any explicit animus...
December 16, 2006
A Conspiracy To Defraud
I have not written much about the Matt Nifong debacle unfolding in Durham, NC over the past few months. Other bloggers like Jeralyn Merritt and Tom Maguire have done an excellent job in covering the fiasco, and I've enjoyed keeping up with their work. Today, however, the local Raleigh paper exposes a conspiracy on the part of Nifong to commit prosecutorial misconduct and keep exculpatory evidence from the defendants: The head of a private DNA laboratory said under oath today that he and District Attorney Mike Nifong agreed not to report DNA results favorable to Duke lacrosse players charged with rape. Brian Meehan, director of DNA Security of Burlington, said his lab found DNA from unidentified men in the underwear, pubic hair and rectum of the woman who said she was gang-raped at a lacrosse party in March. Nurses at Duke Hospital collected the samples a few hours after the...
January 16, 2007
Law Of Unintended Consequences, Michigan Style
If philanderers want to find a cozy hideaway for their assignations, they may want to avoid Michigan, at least for a while. Its appellate court just ruled that thanks to an overzealous prosecutor's application of the law, adultery is now a serious sexual crime (via Memeorandum): In a ruling sure to make philandering spouses squirm, Michigan's second-highest court says that anyone involved in an extramarital fling can be prosecuted for first-degree criminal sexual conduct, a felony punishable by up to life in prison. "We cannot help but question whether the Legislature actually intended the result we reach here today," Judge William Murphy wrote in November for a unanimous Court of Appeals panel, "but we are curtailed by the language of the statute from reaching any other conclusion." "Technically," he added, "any time a person engages in sexual penetration in an adulterous relationship, he or she is guilty of CSC I,"...
April 6, 2007
How To Apologize
A Texas radio host made a Texas-sized blunder during a debate about a bill in the state legislature that would issue a formal apology for slavery. Michael Berry, in an attempt to apply the apology efforts elsewhere to oppose it, wondered why Native Americans should get enormous welfare benefits after getting "whipped in a war". I suppose it might have made sense if (a) Indian tribes actually got enormous welfare benefits, and (2) that had anything to do with apologizing for slavery. Berry came to the same conclusion after checking his facts -- and he manned up immediately afterwards: A Houston City Council member and conservative radio host has apologized for saying taxpayers are paying large amounts of welfare to American Indians who are "whining" about having been "whipped in a war." Michael Berry said Thursday that he posted the apology on his station's Web site the night before "not...
April 16, 2007
Breaking: Mass Murder At Virginia Tech (Bumped - Update: 33 Dead)
At least one gunman has killed as many as 20 people at Virginia Tech, according to the BBC: At least 20 people have been killed and more injured after a gunman went on the rampage at the campus of Virginia Tech university in Virginia, US. Police say there were two separate shooting incidents - one at West Ambler Johnston Hall, a student dormitory, and Norris Hall, an engineering building. The incidents were about two hours apart. Police say that the gunman at Norris Hall is dead. Hot Air says the gunman -- so far it looks like only one -- carried an ammo vest and shot students in classrooms indiscriminately. I'll have more as details become available. UPDATE: The two shootings were two hours apart. The first occurred in a student dorm where an ID would be required for access. The second occurred in an engineering building. UPDATE II: The...
April 17, 2007
Tragedy And Heroism
The shootings at Virginia Tech that killed 33 people, including the gunman, will generate many stories of horror over the next few days and weeks. Already we have heard about the cold and mechanical manner in which the perpetrator selected and shot his many victims. However, the terrible day also will produce stories of courage and heroism, and the first has been that of Professor Liviu Librescu. The Romanian-Israeli engineering professor and Holocaust survivor gave his life to save his students: As Jews worldwide honored on Monday the memory of those who were murdered in the Holocaust, a 75-year-old survivor sacrificed his life to save his students in Monday's shooting at Virginia Tech College that left 32 dead and over two dozen wounded. Professor Liviu Librescu, 76, threw himself in front of the shooter, who had attempted to enter his classroom. The Israeli mechanics and engineering lecturer was shot to...
Shooting Fallout
The details are now starting to emerge from the shadows of rumors after yesterday's massacre at Virginia Tech. The shooting is now the deadliest civilian attack [not quite; see update] in our nation's history, with 33 dead, including the gunman, and "several dozen" wounded. None of the wounded appear in danger of losing their lives at this point, a welcome piece of news in an avalanche of tragedy. Despite rumors yesterday that the gunman was a Chinese national on a student visa, the Washington Post reports that the gunman was of Korean descent whose family lives in Fairfax County, Virginia: Virginia Tech president Charles W. Steger said today that the gunman who rampaged through the campus on Monday leaving 32 dead was a student who lived in one of the school's dormitories. The name of the assailant has not been publicly released, but Steger, in an interview on CNN, said...
Ismail Ax? (Updated)
The Virginia Tech shooter had a history of odd behavior, and his professors had gone so far as to recommend him for counseling, the Chicago Tribune reports this morning. Seung-hui Cho left behind a note that blamed the "debauchery" of "rich kids" for his shooting spree, and had the words "Ismail Ax" written on his forearm when he died: The suspected gunman in the Virginia Tech shooting rampage, Cho Seung-Hui, was a troubled 23-year-old senior from South Korea who investigators believe left an invective-filled note in his dorm room, sources say. The note included a rambling list of grievances, according to sources. They said Cho also died with the words "Ismail Ax" in red ink on the inside of one of his arms. Cho had shown recent signs of violent, aberrant behavior, according to an investigative source, including setting a fire in a dorm room and allegedly stalking some women....
April 18, 2007
It's All Her Fault She Was Murdered
Normally I don't write much about crimes and trials -- because if I ever did start those threads, I'd do nothing but trialblogging. Having weathered the OJ trial as an Angeleno, I have a profound distaste for what celebrity trials represent in terms of media coverage and have no real desire to add to it. Inevitably, the commentary becomes misinformed if not obnoxiously misanthropic. Wesley Strick should have avoided commentary on the latest celebrity trial as well. The third-tier screenwriter takes on the Phil Spector murder trial in a Los Angeles Times opinion piece that reads more like a Top Ten Worst Cliches About Hollywood Women, and quite explicitly blames Lana Clarkson for her own murder: Who knows what Lana and Phil were chatting about, in the back of that limo? They'd only met an hour earlier. Maybe Lana was staring out the tinted window as DeSouza merged onto the...
Searching For Scapegoats
After two days of absorbing the shock and devastation of the Virginia Tech massacre, we have already begun our search for scapegoats. One potential choice became obvious in the hours following the shooting deaths of 33 people, while the other may surprise people. Early this morning, I did an interview with Jamaican radio's Breakfast Club, which I believe airs on 102 FM there; I couldn't find a link. It's quite a popular show there, I have heard, and they routinely get American guests for interviews on politics, culture, and current events. Today they wanted to take the political temperature for gun control in the wake of the tragedy. I explained that most Americans were still absorbing the shock, and that the prevailing attitude thus far was to wait for more details before making decisions on who to blame and how to prevent further tragedies. The host asked me about two...
Bad Lead Cost Investigators At Virginia Tech (Update)
From the moment the bullets stopped at Virginia Tech on Monday morning, people have wondered why campus authorities didn't recognize the danger after the first two murders earlier in the morning. Now the New York Times reveals that the campus police worked on another lead, one that reasonably showed promise, rather than realize what they had on their hands: According to search warrants and statements from the police, campus investigators had been busy pursuing what appears to have been a fruitless lead in the first of two shooting episodes Monday. After two people, Emily Jane Hilscher, a freshman, and Ryan Clark, the resident adviser whose room was nearby in the dormitory, were shot dead, the campus police began searching for Karl D. Thornhill, who was described in Internet memorials as Ms. Hilscher’s boyfriend. According to a search warrant filed by the police, Ms. Hilscher’s roommate had told the police that...
Breaking: Cho Sent Package To NBC Between Shootings
The time gap between the two sets of shootings at Virginia Tech apparently allowed Seung-hui Cho to gather writings and videotape and send it to NBC. The network turned the material over to the police and called it "disturbing": Sometime after he killed two people in a Virginia university dormitory but before he slaughtered 30 more in a classroom building Monday morning, Cho Seung-Hui sent NBC News a rambling communication and videos about his grievances, the network said Wednesday. Cho, 23, a senior English major at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, killed 32 people in two separate attacks Monday before taking his own life. Network officials turned the material over to the FBI and said they would not immediately disclose its contents beyond characterizing the material as “disturbing.” It included a written communication, photographs and video. Brian Williams posted this at his NBC blog: NBC News has indeed received...
April 19, 2007
Potential Copycat Cho In Florida?
Fox News reported a few minutes ago that police have arrested a fourteen-year-old boy for making threats to outdo Seung-hui Cho. The teen sent an e-mail to friends that he would kill at least 100 students at school in order to set the "record" for school shootings. A concerned parent read their child's e-mail and reported the threat to the police. So far, it hasn't hit the wires, but Fox reports that police have had the cooperation of the family and found no evidence that the boy had prepared for an attack. I'll link to the story when it hits the Internet. UPDATE II: I'm putting this update above the other as it relates to the main topic. Fox reports that the incident occurred in Jacksonville, and that they are still awaiting official word from the police. UPDATE III: CQ reader Paxety sends this link from a local Jacksonville TV...
Therapy Nation
I don't normally agree with Taylor Marsh on much, and on this post, I don't agree with everything she writes. But she makes a point that NZ Bear and I discussed just a few minutes ago on the CQ Radio show (which you can stream from the sidebar) about the almost-choreographed national paroxysms of grief following any tragedy (via Michael Stickings at The Moderate Voice): Yesterday we were treated to a media spectacle that was as gratuitous as it was blatantly self-serving, with each cable network trying to prove they cared more, could send the most people to cover it; could set up the best on sight situation room and every single anchor swallowed his or her orders like good members of the corporate hack pack. They made sure their cameras were trained on the families and students grieving in the gymnasium, hoping to catch a glimpse of someone's loss,...
April 22, 2007
The Arrogance Of Silence
This week, I wrote that our national character these days seems to demand that everyone assume that all tragedies belong to the entire country, and that we all have to participate in a mourning/healing cycle that imposes itself of the real victims of the tragedies. We saw this yet again with the Virginia Tech shootings, where the media invaded the campus for much longer than factual reporting required, to intrude on the community there and give a voyeuristic and vicarious account of the ral grief of the friends and family of the dead and wounded. Now we have a suggestion that we extend this arrogance to the entire blogosphere by a group called One Day Blog Silence. They propose that all bloggers take Monday, April 30th off in honor of the victims at Virginia Tech: Silence can say more than a thousand words. This day shall unite us all about...
April 24, 2007
Cho Tabloidism
We're going to see a lot of these Seung-hui Cho stories pop up over the next few weeks -- I never realized who I was with! -- but perhaps none quite as weird and lurid as this one. Virginia's WSLS television station gives a first-person account from a woman who went out on a "date" with Cho two weeks before he killed 32 at Virginia Tech ... as an escort (via Hot Air): "I'm just so shaken by this, I don't know what to say." Chastity Frye says she spent an hour, all alone, with Virginia Tech killer Cho Seung-Hui last month. Frye said "He was so quiet, I really couldn't get much from him, he was so distant, he really didn't talk a lot. It seemed like he wasn't all there." Frye works for an escort service. She says, Cho hired her, and the two met at a Valley...
April 25, 2007
Bad Taste For The Ages
The Virginia Tech shootings have called into question a pastime among some college students that USA Today has apparently just discovered. Some students organize a game called "Assassin" on their campuses, which involves play-acting murders of each other until one person remains "alive" and wins the game. William Welch reports that the massacre has put a damper on the game and called some of the weapons used into question -- but fails to report that "Assassin" has been around college campuses for over twenty years and has been controversial in the past: After the horrors of the Virginia Tech massacre, a popular game on campuses nationwide called "Assassin" is raising concerns and prompting warnings from police. Officers in three communities in Illinois and Pennsylvania urged students to halt the games, which involve ambushing other players with sometimes realistic-looking toy guns or other objects, after the Virginia Tech shooting last week...
Miss America, Crime Fighter
Earlier this month, a former Miss America in her 80s got the drop on a thief with her .38-caliber handgun, shooting out one of his tires so that police could arrest him. Venus Ramey, meet Lauren Nelson, the current Miss America and the latest beauty-pageant crimefighter. Nelson teamed with John Walsh to take down some on-line sexual predators: Miss America can add crime fighter to her resume. Lauren Nelson recently went undercover with police in New York for a sting targeting sexual predators. Officers with Suffolk County's computer crimes unit created an online profile of a 14-year-old girl that included photographs of Nelson as a teenager. "I got to chat online with the predators and made phone calls, too," Nelson said by phone from Atlantic City, N.J. "The Suffolk County Police Department was there the whole time." The operation was filmed for a segment of "America's Most Wanted" that will...
May 6, 2007
Nifong And Durham: Worse Than You Think
Mike Nifong faces disbarment and almost certainly a flurry of lawsuits over his negligent and malicious handling of the Duke lacrosse players accused of rape by a mentally unstable woman. He may not be the only one on the hot seat, however, as the Durham police department apparently also failed to follow its own procedures and imcompetently investigated the charges. Police chief Steve Chalmers will finally issue a report on how his department investigated the woman's allegations, and it appears he has much to defend: The allegations of misconduct against District Attorney Mike Nifong have taken center stage, but an examination of police and prosecutorial records raises questions about whether the police ceded control of the investigation, violated their own policies, created false records and failed to pursue basic investigative leads. ... On March 31, Nifong directed Gottlieb and Investigator Benjamin Himan to show Mangum pictures of all 46 white...
May 7, 2007
Exploding Backpack In Las Vegas
UPDATE: Not a terrorist attack. See below. State and federal authorities have swarmed over the Luxor Hotel after an explosion in its parking ramp this morning. A man carried a backpack into the second level of the parking garage and it exploded, killing the man carrying it and injuring another: A backpack exploded in a parking garage attached to a Las Vegas hotel early Monday, killing a man who had picked it up and injuring another person, authorities said. The man had removed the backpack from atop his car when it exploded shortly after 4 a.m. on the second floor of a parking behind the Luxor hotel-casino, said Officer Bill Cassell, a police spokesman. The second person was taken to an area hospital. Aerial video showed no apparent damage to the parking structure, where entrances were blocked while police, firefighters and federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents...
July 17, 2007
Who Knew Whole Foods Market Sold Spam?
The CEO of Whole Foods Market apparently likes role playing, especially on the Internet. In fact, he likes it so much that he donned the full sock-puppet, praising his company and his own good looks while pretending to be someone else entirely on Yahoo message boards. The SEC has begun an informal investigation into his activities: On the Internet nobody knows you’re a dog — or the chief executive of a Fortune 500 company. Or so thought John Mackey, the chief executive of Whole Foods Market, who used a fictional identity on the Yahoo message boards for nearly eight years to assail competition and promote his supermarket chain’s stock, according to documents released last week by the Federal Trade Commission. Mr. Mackey used the online handle “Rahodeb” (an anagram of his wife’s name, Deborah). In one Internet posting sure to enter the annals of chief-executive vanity, Mr. Mackey wrote as...
July 30, 2007
Does The NAACP Endorse Dogfighting?
Michael Vick had a bad day in court, as one of his co-defendants apparently flipped and will cooperate with federal authorities. However, Vick got some public support from the NAACP -- which accused the government of "piling on" in prosecuting Vick: The president of the Atlanta chapter of the NAACP criticized the prosecution of Vick at a news conference Monday morning. Dr. R.L. White, Jr., accused the government of "piling on." "There's a penalty in football for piling on," White told reporters. "After a player has been tackled and somebody piles on, they're penalized for unnecessary roughness. Today, the NAACP blows the whistle and warns the powers that be that you are piling on." Will the NAACP clarify this statement? Are they now endorsing dogfighting and opposing the prosecution of those who allegedly stage these events and slaughter dogs who don't perform? Filing charges in court when grand juries hand...
August 15, 2007
Death Penalty For The Man Who Didn't Kill
Texas will execute Kenneth Foster on August 30th for the murder of a man whom prosecutors acknowledge was killed by someone else. Foster's crime? He agreed to participate in armed robberies and did with two incidents, but the murder occurred extemporaneously at another, unplanned place. Is this execution fair? It's certainly legal: Kenneth Foster Jr. is scheduled to be executed in Texas later this month for the murder of Michael LaHood, even though everybody -- even the prosecutors -- knows Foster did not kill the man. Mauriceo Brown, who has admitted to shooting LaHood to death in August 1997, was executed last year, but barring an unlikely 11th-hour commutation from Gov. Rick Perry and the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole, Foster will meet the same fate on Aug. 30. On the night of Aug. 14, 1997, Foster, Brown, DeWayne Dillard, and Julius Steen were drinking and smoking marijuana when...
August 20, 2007
Vick Pleads Out
Michael Vick may have to get his exercise in a prison yard after agreeing to plead guilty to charges connected to a dog-fighting conspiracy. The defense team announced that the Falcons quarterback accepted a deal to plead guilty to felony conspiracy charges that could mean as much as three years in prison: "After consulting with his family over the weekend, Michael Vick asks that I announce today that he has reached an agreement with federal prosecutors regarding the charges pending against him," lead defense attorney Billy Martin said in a statement. "Mr. Vick has agreed to enter a plea of guilty to those charges and to accept full responsibility for his action and the mistakes he has made. Michael wishes to apologize again to everyone who has been hurt by this matter," Martin's statement said. Vick's attorneys have been negotiating with federal prosecutors over terms of the deal, which must...
August 23, 2007
Should Crack Cocaine Get Stiffer Sentencing?
One of the odder aspects of the war on drugs has been the disparate treatment that different drugs get. No drug shows this difference more than cocaine. Produced and distributed by violent cartels in South America, it arrives in the hands of its American customers in two forms, powder and crack. One gets an average of 50% longer jail term than the other even though the two forms have essentially the same affect on its users. Jeralyn Merritt at TalkLeft has been actively working for equating drug sentencing for cocaine use, regardles of its form. She notes that a 2002 Sentencing Commission recommendation that would have achieved this never got implemented. This year, their new report to Congress -- their fourth on this subject -- recommends action again. They note that crack cocaine convictions get longer sentences than convictions for any other drug, regardless of quantities involved. The only one...
August 30, 2007
Requiem For A Betrayed Hero
Richard Jewell died yesterday at 44, the victim of diabetes and kidney failure. Richard Jewell's public reputation died eleven years ago, the victim of a mistake by law enforcement and a media blitz that did its best to paint him as a psychopathic bomber with absolutely no evidence -- when all Richard Jewell had done was save lives. In this instance, the New York Times gets it right: Richard A. Jewell, whose transformation from heroic security guard to Olympic bombing suspect and back again came to symbolize the excesses of law enforcement and the news media, died Wednesday at his home in Woodbury, Ga. He was 44. ... The heavy-set Mr. Jewell, with a country drawl and a deferential manner, became an instant celebrity after a bomb exploded in Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta in the early hours of July 27, 1996, at the midpoint of the Summer Games. The...
September 17, 2007
What Is It About OJ?
The saga of OJ Simpson continued yesterday with a bizarre arrest for armed robbery and conspiracy charges that could put the celebrity in prison for decades. Almost immediately, the moribund OJ industry snapped back to life, with people like Geraldo Rivera calling Mark Geragos back into session for the freak show that will follow the case as it wends its way through Las Vegas courts. And the nation sits in rapt attention, watching the further decline of a man who had reached the pinnacle of public adulation, only to become a by-word for narcissism and power. First, let's look at the case, which almost seems designed by OJ to land him in prison: Simpson, 60, was in custody at the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas on Sunday night after a judge ordered that he be held without bail, pending an arraignment set for Thursday. He was booked earlier...
October 24, 2007
Why Not Go With Experience?
Those darn Puritans in New York just can't let anyone have fun, even middle-school students. Can you imagine that people might have considered having strippers as volunteers at a Halloween celebration for Middle School 51 inappropriate? Why, they even volunteered for a task for which they have extensive experience: The head of New York's Puppetry Art Theatre uninvited a group of strippers from an upcoming school event in order to avoid any undue controversy. Timothy Young said that he decided to retract the erotic dancers' invitations to the Haunted Halloween Carnival Benefit due to worries that New York's Middle School 51 would cancel the annual event, the New York Daily News reported Wednesday. ... The strippers had volunteered to participate in the special holiday event, that includes a costume giveaway and a pizza party. Costume giveaways? Heck, that's their specialty! (via Power Line)...
October 25, 2007
Indian Casinos A Bigger Gamble Than You Think
Gary Hoffman was a millionaire, and then he wasn't. Hoffman hit a jackpot worth over $1.5 million in a New Mexico casino on an Indian reservation, and received all sorts of congratulatory salutations on the casino floor. Once he made it to the executive conference room of the Sandia Casino, however, the tone changed from celebration to intimidation: Hoffman, a retired Albuquerque city employee, was playing a "Mystical Mermaid" slot machine on the morning of Aug. 16, 2006, when he thought he hit it big. The nickel slot said he'd won $1,597,244.10. Patrons and casino employees came to congratulate him. He even got a marriage proposal, Hoffman said. But, soon he was asked to come to an executive conference room, where he says he was told the casino refused to pay. A casino employee "became quite intimidating with me, pointed his finger in my face and said, 'You didn't win....
November 8, 2007
China Has Another Present For Your Kids - Date-Rape Intoxication
As if the Chinese toy industry had not dug its own grave any deeper, the Consumer Product Safety Commission ordered another import recalled after determining that ingestion can cause chemicals to convert to GHB. That compound is commonly known as the date-rape drug, and both the US and Australia have scrambled to get Aqua-Dots and Bindeez out of the hands of children: Millions of Chinese-made toys have been pulled from shelves in North America and Australia after scientists found they contain a chemical that converts into a powerful “date rape” drug when ingested. Two children in the U.S. and three in Australia were hospitalized after swallowing the beads. With only seven weeks until Christmas, the recall is yet another blow to the toy industry — already bruised by a slew of recalls last summer. In the United States, the toy goes by the name Aqua Dots, a highly popular holiday...
November 30, 2007
The Irish Job
There's nothing like a great heist movie. Whether you like it hip and ironic (Oceans Eleven), played for laughs (The Pink Panther), romantic (The Thomas Crown Affair), or gritty (Heist), they give us a vicarious thrill of the forbidden. And when people do try to make them a reality, it quickly loses its charm. For instance, it's difficult to see how this would make good cinema: Irish police were hunting for a beer bandit who stole 450 full kegs from the Guinness brewery — the largest heist ever at Ireland's largest brewer. National police said a lone man drove into the brewery — a Dublin landmark and top tourist attraction — on Wednesday and hitched his truck to a fully loaded trailer awaiting delivery to city pubs. Diageo PLC, the beverage company that owns Guinness, said the brewery had never suffered such a large-scale theft before in its 248-year history....
December 10, 2007
Do Gun Free Zones Create A Legal Liability?
Not being a lawyer, this question will exist more as a philosophical one, much as we treated it on Saturday's Northern Alliance broadcast. Mitch Berg and I debated the efficacy of gun-free zones in the wake of the Omaha mall shooting that left nine people dead, but before the two shootings at New Life church facilities that left eight dead. In at least the first shooting, the perpetrator conducted his murder spree in a commercial facility whose owners had marked it as a gun-free zone, a designation that keeps concealed-carry licensees from bringing their weapons into the building. We both wondered if that decision opened the owners to legal liability for forcing people to disarm themselves without having enough security to protect them. D.J. Tice, one of the more thoughtful columnists at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, listened to our show and found the argument intriguing. He wondered, though, why we don't...
December 11, 2007
How Many Lives Did The Concealed-Carry Licensee Save?
Jeanne Assam carried her pistol with her to church on Sunday. She did so legally, having received a license to carry a concealed weapon. If a weapon in church seems incongruous, it also became providential on this particular Sunday, as Assam stopped an assault that may have killed many more people than it did (via Memeorandum and many CapQ readers): Assam said she believes God gave her the strength to confront Murray, keeping her calm and focused even though he appeared to be twice her size and was more heavily armed. Murray was carrying two handguns, an assault rifle and over 1,000 rounds of ammunition, said Sgt. Jeff Johnson of the Colorado Springs Police Department. "It seemed like it was me, the gunman and God," she said. Assam worked as a police officer in downtown Minneapolis during the 1990s and is licensed to carry a weapon. She attends one of...
About
Ed Morrissey has blogged at Captain's Quarters since 2003, and has a daily radio show at BlogTalkRadio, where he serves as Political Director. Called "Captain Ed" by his readers, Ed is a father and grandfather living in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota, a native Californian who moved to the North Star State because of the weather.
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How Many Lives Did The Concealed-Carry Licensee Save?
Jeanne Assam carried her pistol with her to church on Sunday. She did so legally, having received a license to carry a concealed weapon. If a weapon in church seems incongruous, it also became providential on this particular Sunday, as Assam stopped an assault that may have killed many more people than it did (via Memeorandum and many CapQ readers):
Assam said she believes God gave her the strength to confront Murray, keeping her calm and focused even though he appeared to be twice her size and was more heavily armed.Murray was carrying two handguns, an assault rifle and over 1,000 rounds of ammunition, said Sgt. Jeff Johnson of the Colorado Springs Police Department.
"It seemed like it was me, the gunman and God," she said.
Assam worked as a police officer in downtown Minneapolis during the 1990s and is licensed to carry a weapon. She attends one of the morning services and then volunteers as a guard during another service.
Boyd said Assam was the one who suggested the church beef up its security Sunday following the Arvada shooting, which it did. The pastor credited the security plan and the extra security for preventing further bloodshed.
Murray didn't show up to shoot a couple of people and call it a day. Two handguns, an assault rifle, and over a thousand rounds of ammunition would have equaled a church full of corpses had Assam and others not been able to defend themselves and their fellow parishioners. Before Murray had a chance to really open up on what he assumed was a defenseless congregation, Assam used her training and preparation to save dozens of lives, at the least.
Over the weekend, Mitch and I discussed the Omaha mall shooting, where eight people died in a "gun-free zone" when a lunatic started sniping shoppers. Some questioned whether a CCL holder with a pistol could outmatch a lunatic with a rifle. This shows exactly what one trained shooter can do to defend against someone who randomly selects unarmed targets for slaughter.
And this is the folly of "gun-free zones". Lunatics looking to kill people either will attack at places for which they have some animus (as in the case of the church) or where they can find a lot of unarmed people (as in Omaha). They don't stop because someone puts up a sign designating a site as gun-free, any more than people stop taking drugs because a city puts up a sign that designates a neighborhood as a "drug-free zone", as in my own neighborhood.
All that sign does is prevent the Jeanne Assams from being able to defend the defenseless. That's all it does. It doesn't make anyone more secure or safe, and it has the potential to make a lot of people into victims.
After the Virginia Tech shooting, people asked whether a CCL holder could have made a difference once the shooting started. Jeanne Assam answered that question on Sunday.
Do Gun Free Zones Create A Legal Liability?
Not being a lawyer, this question will exist more as a philosophical one, much as we treated it on Saturday's Northern Alliance broadcast. Mitch Berg and I debated the efficacy of gun-free zones in the wake of the Omaha mall shooting that left nine people dead, but before the two shootings at New Life church facilities that left eight dead. In at least the first shooting, the perpetrator conducted his murder spree in a commercial facility whose owners had marked it as a gun-free zone, a designation that keeps concealed-carry licensees from bringing their weapons into the building. We both wondered if that decision opened the owners to legal liability for forcing people to disarm themselves without having enough security to protect them.
D.J. Tice, one of the more thoughtful columnists at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, listened to our show and found the argument intriguing. He wondered, though, why we don't believe in liability for not banning smoking, a rather strange argument:
Granting, for the sake of argument, the Lottian view that gun-free status makes a place of business more dangerous for its patrons, this lawsuit theory seems a surprising position for conservatives to take, since they presumably are defenders of private property rights.Doesn’t a property owner have a right to ban guns from his property, even if it is unwise to do so? And aren’t those who believe such a ban puts them at risk free not to enter his property? Aren’t customers assuming any risk, and waiving any right to recompense, when they knowingly and voluntarily enter a gun-free zone?
The situation seems roughly comparable to the debate over bar and restaurant smoking bans. Conservatives as a rule argue that smoking bans are improper because a property owner should be able to decide whether to allow smoking or not. People who fear secondhand smoke need not work there or take their leisure there — or so the conservative line usually goes.
By and large conservatives can be expected to respond with disdain to the idea of lawsuits based on harm from voluntary exposure to secondhand smoke.
Tice misunderstands a couple of points. First, I've never said I oppose lawsuits over second-hand smoke; I oppose government mandates that ban smoking over the objections of private ownership. Second, as one of Tice's commenters at the Strib notes, people have chosen not to shop in "gun-free zones", including Mitch -- which is why there are fewer of them in Minnesota now. I would heartily encourage people to make their choices for retail business contingent in part on whether the owner bans legal licensees from carrying their weapons inside the store while putting up signs that announce to people that everyone inside is disarmed.
Mostly, though, I wonder at Tice's odd equation of second-hand smoke and gunshot wounds. I suppose a lawsuit over the former might make a lot of sense for someone who exposed themselves for thirty years to second-hand smoke through their job, but the first question I'd ask as a juror is why the plaintiff didn't change jobs. One exposure to second-hand smoke doesn't create health problems in any measure to anyone except asthmatics. One exposure to hot lead will kill a person, or at the least seriously wound them.
Private property owners should have the right to set the terms of entry to their property. Neither Mitch nor I demanded that Nebraska or Minnesota force property owners to allow guns on the premises when carried by license holders. Places like the Omaha Mall have the right to deny entry to people carrying weapons, even when completely legal and certified by the state. They should face the consequences of that decision, however.
For the record, I don't have a concealed-carry license, nor do I own a pistol. Neither do I fear those who do. The "gun-free zone" signs only show the baseless fear and vapidity of the property owners, and do nothing to keep criminals from doing as they please. If anything, those signs alert those with malicious intent where they can find the least amount of effective resistance. I'd rather shop at places where the owners allow a little more ambiguity, even if I don't carry a weapon myself.
The Irish Job
There's nothing like a great heist movie. Whether you like it hip and ironic (Oceans Eleven), played for laughs (The Pink Panther), romantic (The Thomas Crown Affair), or gritty (Heist), they give us a vicarious thrill of the forbidden. And when people do try to make them a reality, it quickly loses its charm. For instance, it's difficult to see how this would make good cinema:
Irish police were hunting for a beer bandit who stole 450 full kegs from the Guinness brewery — the largest heist ever at Ireland's largest brewer.National police said a lone man drove into the brewery — a Dublin landmark and top tourist attraction — on Wednesday and hitched his truck to a fully loaded trailer awaiting delivery to city pubs.
Diageo PLC, the beverage company that owns Guinness, said the brewery had never suffered such a large-scale theft before in its 248-year history.
Well, the joke's on them. Only 180 kegs of it were Guinness stout. The rest of the kegs held Carlsberg and -- the horror! -- Budweiser. One can imagine the disappointment when the trailer gets unhitched and inspected.
Ireland has a history of hijackings and thefts in alcohol and cigarettes, although not usually from the brewery itself. The IRA used to finance its activities through such thefts, selling the beer cheaply and without the usual onerous Irish taxes to supporters and sympathizers among pub owners. Gangs continue this activity to this day, neither not unlike the Mafia in this country that ran similar activities.
Like I said, pretty charmless. Instead of Thomas Crown, it's closer to Goodfellas. However, if you find yourself in Dublin, the brewery itself is anything but charmless. You can have a great pint of Guinness stout at a bar that provides one of the highest viewpoints of the entire city, after a great tour of the facility and the requisite souvenir shops.
China Has Another Present For Your Kids - Date-Rape Intoxication
As if the Chinese toy industry had not dug its own grave any deeper, the Consumer Product Safety Commission ordered another import recalled after determining that ingestion can cause chemicals to convert to GHB. That compound is commonly known as the date-rape drug, and both the US and Australia have scrambled to get Aqua-Dots and Bindeez out of the hands of children:
Millions of Chinese-made toys have been pulled from shelves in North America and Australia after scientists found they contain a chemical that converts into a powerful “date rape” drug when ingested. Two children in the U.S. and three in Australia were hospitalized after swallowing the beads.With only seven weeks until Christmas, the recall is yet another blow to the toy industry — already bruised by a slew of recalls last summer.
In the United States, the toy goes by the name Aqua Dots, a highly popular holiday toy distributed by Toronto-based Spin Master Toys. It is called Bindeez in Australia, where it was named toy of the year at an industry function earlier this year.
Gamma hydroxy butate can cause unconsciousness, drowsiness, seizures, and death -- and that's in adults. GHB has been used by rapists to instill lethargy, unconsciousness, and amnesia in their victims, usually in a dating situation or at bars and nightclubs. Ingestion by children carries even more health dangers; the children involved in the US and Australia are lucky to have survived it.
Unfortunately, it will take luck to save children in other countries. The Chinese manufacturer will not issue a worldwide recall of the product despite the demonstrated dangers. Beijing and the manufacturer have decided that the individual countries have to decide whether to recall the products, even though they know the toys present a clear danger to the children who play with them.
Consumers in these countries, including ours, should take matters into their own hands. We should make clear that this Christmas, Santa Claus will not deliver any Chinese imports -- period. Until they clean up their act and take responsibility for potentially poisoning millions of children, several times over now, consumers should take close looks at manufacturing labels for their gifts. If it says "Made in China", we should skip over that product, and tell the stores why.
I'm certainly not going to buy any presents for the Little Admiral that comes from a country that refuses to act when their product converts to a poison when ingested. Once parents, grandparents, and families think about the implications, I'm certain that most will follow that same path.
Indian Casinos A Bigger Gamble Than You Think
Gary Hoffman was a millionaire, and then he wasn't. Hoffman hit a jackpot worth over $1.5 million in a New Mexico casino on an Indian reservation, and received all sorts of congratulatory salutations on the casino floor. Once he made it to the executive conference room of the Sandia Casino, however, the tone changed from celebration to intimidation:
Hoffman, a retired Albuquerque city employee, was playing a "Mystical Mermaid" slot machine on the morning of Aug. 16, 2006, when he thought he hit it big.The nickel slot said he'd won $1,597,244.10. Patrons and casino employees came to congratulate him. He even got a marriage proposal, Hoffman said. But, soon he was asked to come to an executive conference room, where he says he was told the casino refused to pay.
A casino employee "became quite intimidating with me, pointed his finger in my face and said, 'You didn't win. We're not paying you any money. Do you understand what I'm telling you? You're not getting any money,'" Hoffman said.
The tribe claims the slot machine malfunctioned. It insists that the machine had a maximum payout of $2500, while Hoffman insists that it had a bonus play option which allowed for much higher winnings. The picture that Hoffman took shows a very precise number that the machine displayed of the jackpot, which indicates that the machine had routines that allowed for seven-digit jackpots -- and the machine's manufacturer insists that the machine cannot malfunction in the way the casino asserts.
Hoffman may have no recourse, however. New Mexico does not have the legal authority to give standing for a lawsuit against an Indian casino. Its sovereignty does not reach into the reservations, one reason why casinos can exist there in the first place. Even federal courts would be loathe to intrude on a contract dispute, which leaves Hoffman few choices to remedy his loss.
It's a costly lesson for those who gamble. Sometimes a jackpot turns into an albatross, and in most American casinos, the house holds all the cards.
Why Not Go With Experience?
Those darn Puritans in New York just can't let anyone have fun, even middle-school students. Can you imagine that people might have considered having strippers as volunteers at a Halloween celebration for Middle School 51 inappropriate? Why, they even volunteered for a task for which they have extensive experience:
The head of New York's Puppetry Art Theatre uninvited a group of strippers from an upcoming school event in order to avoid any undue controversy.Timothy Young said that he decided to retract the erotic dancers' invitations to the Haunted Halloween Carnival Benefit due to worries that New York's Middle School 51 would cancel the annual event, the New York Daily News reported Wednesday. ...
The strippers had volunteered to participate in the special holiday event, that includes a costume giveaway and a pizza party.
Costume giveaways? Heck, that's their specialty! (via Power Line)
What Is It About OJ?
The saga of OJ Simpson continued yesterday with a bizarre arrest for armed robbery and conspiracy charges that could put the celebrity in prison for decades. Almost immediately, the moribund OJ industry snapped back to life, with people like Geraldo Rivera calling Mark Geragos back into session for the freak show that will follow the case as it wends its way through Las Vegas courts. And the nation sits in rapt attention, watching the further decline of a man who had reached the pinnacle of public adulation, only to become a by-word for narcissism and power.
First, let's look at the case, which almost seems designed by OJ to land him in prison:
Simpson, 60, was in custody at the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas on Sunday night after a judge ordered that he be held without bail, pending an arraignment set for Thursday. He was booked earlier in the day on suspicion of two counts of assault with a deadly weapon, two counts of robbery with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit burglary and burglary with a firearm.Simpson has said he and his companions went to the room at the Palace Station Hotel & Casino on Thursday night to reclaim personal photos -- some snapped by his slain ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson -- and football souvenirs that he said had been stolen by a former agent. He said that no one in his group was armed; police said Sunday that they found two guns after the incident and that members of Simpson's entourage had pointed weapons at people in the room.
Simpson claimed that a former sports agent had stolen the items from him, and that he wanted to conduct a "sting" to get the material back. He openly admitted to conspiring to steal the items at least through intimidation, since he hadn't bothered to notify the police, and he had a good reason not to do so. Simpson had moved these assets out of his possession to keep them from getting confiscated by the Goldman family to satisfy part of the $33 million judgment against him for Ron Goldman's murder. An acknowledgment to police that these assets had been dispersed to keep them from the Goldmans would have amounted to an admission of fraud.
Instead, police say that Simpson started conspiring in August to track down the memorabilia, which he needs to provide some income. His co-conspirators pointed guns at the possessors of the memorabilia, and not only took back what Simpson claimed was his but also the cellphones of the victims so they could not call for help. That's armed robbery, and the Vegas police have charged everyone involved with two separate counts of that and conspiracy. If convicted, Simpson could spend decades in prison, and legal experts figure he will get little leniency from a sentencing hearing if it comes to that.
That's the case, at least for the moment. OJ has revealed himself to be almost uniquely self-destructive once again. Shaun Mullen at TMV has some thoughts in a good post on how his celebrity couldn't cover the vulnerabilities that "bedevil us all," but in fact, they don't. Very few of us murder our wives and innocent bystanders, and far fewer of those who do get away with it. Having done that, almost none of them commit armed robbery. In fact, it's very likely that no American celebrity has managed to dissipate his life so totally and completely, legally, financially, and morally, as Simpson has done over the last thirteen years.
And maybe that's the fascination. The original trial provided Americans with an object lesson on the perils of pedestals for our celebrities, but it was more than that, too. It was a trainwreck in progress, both for OJ and our own sense of judgment about people based on superficialities. Perhaps with OJ's second tour of self-destruction, the fascination will subside. Based on the breathless reporting we saw yesterday, that sounds a little optimistic.
Requiem For A Betrayed Hero
Richard Jewell died yesterday at 44, the victim of diabetes and kidney failure. Richard Jewell's public reputation died eleven years ago, the victim of a mistake by law enforcement and a media blitz that did its best to paint him as a psychopathic bomber with absolutely no evidence -- when all Richard Jewell had done was save lives. In this instance, the New York Times gets it right:
Richard A. Jewell, whose transformation from heroic security guard to Olympic bombing suspect and back again came to symbolize the excesses of law enforcement and the news media, died Wednesday at his home in Woodbury, Ga. He was 44. ...The heavy-set Mr. Jewell, with a country drawl and a deferential manner, became an instant celebrity after a bomb exploded in Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta in the early hours of July 27, 1996, at the midpoint of the Summer Games. The explosion, which propelled hundreds of nails through the darkness, killed one woman, injured 111 people and changed the mood of the Olympiad.
Only minutes earlier, Mr. Jewell, who was working a temporary job as a guard, had spotted the abandoned green knapsack that contained the bomb, called it to the attention of the police, and started moving visitors away from the area. He was praised for the quick thinking that presumably saved lives.
But three days later, he found himself identified in an article in The Atlanta Journal as the focus of police attention, leading to several searches of his apartment and surveillance by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and by reporters who set upon him, he would later say, “like piranha on a bleeding cow.”
What had Jewell done to attract suspicion? Ironically, he had performed too well in his role as a security guard. He noticed the backpack by the bench and quickly determined that it could be a threat. After inadvertently changing the position of the backpack -- which thwarted the bomber, whose shaped charge went up and not out -- he started clearing people from the area as fast as he could before the bomb exploded. The nail-packed charge killed one woman, but if it hadn't been for Jewell, many more would have been killed or injured.
Investigators wondered whether Jewell had planted the bomb deliberately to make himself look heroic and started checking him out in the first few days after the bombing. The FBI tried to con Jewell into a confession without telling him he was a suspect by asking him to make a "training video", a move which got some reprimanded when Jewell turned out to be innocent. Someone in the investigation leaked Jewell's name to the press, which started a feeding frenzy that Jewell himself likened to piranhas on a bleeding cow.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution first reported him as a suspect, and the rest of the national media thundered to the wrong conclusions. News media ran stories that emphasized the fact that the 33-year-old Jewell shared a home with his mother, attempted psychological profiling, and followed him and his family constantly. It only ended when the FBI finally acknowledged three months later that they had screwed up in focusing on Jewell. Jewell sued most of them and won settlements from NBC and CNN, and he died before he could succeed against the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
It was an infuriating tragedy, and the lack of a clear suspect for months afterward meant that the stigma of the media's insinuations stuck with Jewell for a long time. Only after it became clear that Eric Rudolph committed the bombing -- fifteen months later -- did people realize the extent of the harm done to Jewell, his reputation, and his family.
Richard Jewell should be remembered as a hero, a man who had the instinct and the courage to risk his own life to save others. Unfortunately, many will still remember him in part from all the innuendo and mud thrown at him in the aftermath.
Should Crack Cocaine Get Stiffer Sentencing?
One of the odder aspects of the war on drugs has been the disparate treatment that different drugs get. No drug shows this difference more than cocaine. Produced and distributed by violent cartels in South America, it arrives in the hands of its American customers in two forms, powder and crack. One gets an average of 50% longer jail term than the other even though the two forms have essentially the same affect on its users.
Jeralyn Merritt at TalkLeft has been actively working for equating drug sentencing for cocaine use, regardles of its form. She notes that a 2002 Sentencing Commission recommendation that would have achieved this never got implemented. This year, their new report to Congress -- their fourth on this subject -- recommends action again. They note that crack cocaine convictions get longer sentences than convictions for any other drug, regardless of quantities involved. The only one comparable to crack is meth, and for meth the quantities are calculated for only the pure chemical, while crack is measured including its impurities.
It's an interesting issue, and one that calls into question the strategies of the federal government in fighting the war on drugs. No one seriously believes that crack sentencing was made tougher because its users are disproportionately black, but the sentencing disparity means more blacks get longer prison time for drug violations. The problem has been reactionary Congresses, which have responded to eruptions of drug variants by specifying prison times for specific substances, trying to look tough on drugs, without considering the consequences of those decisions.
Jeralyn has more on this topic and wants to get sentencing parity on cocaine in all its forms. It would be better for Congress to look at the oddities in the inconsistent ways in which drug violations get handled and retool federal laws to make the overall system more rational.
Vick Pleads Out
Michael Vick may have to get his exercise in a prison yard after agreeing to plead guilty to charges connected to a dog-fighting conspiracy. The defense team announced that the Falcons quarterback accepted a deal to plead guilty to felony conspiracy charges that could mean as much as three years in prison:
"After consulting with his family over the weekend, Michael Vick asks that I announce today that he has reached an agreement with federal prosecutors regarding the charges pending against him," lead defense attorney Billy Martin said in a statement."Mr. Vick has agreed to enter a plea of guilty to those charges and to accept full responsibility for his action and the mistakes he has made. Michael wishes to apologize again to everyone who has been hurt by this matter," Martin's statement said.
Vick's attorneys have been negotiating with federal prosecutors over terms of the deal, which must be approved by the judge. While prosecutors can recommend a sentence, the decision ultimately rests with the judge.
This decision frees the NFL to consider its options with Vick. The league has taken a dim view of dimwitted behavior of late, but dogfighting goes beyond what Commissioner Roger Goodell has had to handle thus far. Presumably, dog lovers among the NFL's fans will want to see Vick pay a high price for the cruelty he sponsored, supported, and reportedly personally conducted.
Vick will likely miss this entire season just to handle the legal procedures from this case. Even if he got a three-year sentence, he would likely only serve a year, which could put him back on the field in 2009. The bigger question will be whether the NFL wants him back. His connection to gamblers in the dogfighting ring will worry the NFL, even if there is no evidence of a connection to gambling on NFL games.
No one doubts Vick's talent. They may have a serious basis on which to question his integrity. Can the NFL afford to put Vick back on the field?
Death Penalty For The Man Who Didn't Kill
Texas will execute Kenneth Foster on August 30th for the murder of a man whom prosecutors acknowledge was killed by someone else. Foster's crime? He agreed to participate in armed robberies and did with two incidents, but the murder occurred extemporaneously at another, unplanned place.
Is this execution fair? It's certainly legal:
Kenneth Foster Jr. is scheduled to be executed in Texas later this month for the murder of Michael LaHood, even though everybody -- even the prosecutors -- knows Foster did not kill the man.Mauriceo Brown, who has admitted to shooting LaHood to death in August 1997, was executed last year, but barring an unlikely 11th-hour commutation from Gov. Rick Perry and the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole, Foster will meet the same fate on Aug. 30.
On the night of Aug. 14, 1997, Foster, Brown, DeWayne Dillard, and Julius Steen were drinking and smoking marijuana when they decided to use Dillard's gun to commit two armed robberies, according to Foster's attorney, Keith Hampton.
As they drove home, LaHood's girlfriend Mary Patrick appeared to flag their car down. According to testimony from Dillard and Steen, the car pulled over and Brown exited the vehicle. There had been no discussion that he would rob or kill LaHood, and he was effectively "acting out of an independent impulse," according to testimony.
After Brown shot LaHood, Foster, who was 19 at the time, became very anxious and started to leave the scene, but Dillard and Steen made him wait for Brown to get back in the car. They drove off, but were arrested shortly thereafter, Hampton said.
Texas has a legal concept known there as the "law of parties", a concept that every state uses to ensure that all members of a group that commit a crime share the guilt, not just the triggerman. It eliminates the finger-pointing that arises during trial, when defense attorneys start shifting blame to co-defendants in attempts to get their client off the hook. However, that usually does not apply to sentencing, especially when the triggerman admits to the murder.
Not everyone in this case got the death penalty. Only Foster and Brown did, and Brown has already been executed. The other two conspirators pled out and got lighter sentence, even though apparently they forced Foster to continue with the group. Normally,in cases such as this, the non-shooter would get sentenced to life rather than executed.
No one doubts that Foster should be in prison for a very long time. Participating in two armed robberies should have landed him there for decades. Moreover, since his group committed a murder, he bears responsibility for that crime as well. But should the punishment for the non-shooter be the same as for the shooter?
Let's take a look at another famous case of armed robbery and murder. Kathleen Soliah participated in an armed robbery as a member of the SLA, a notoriously violent group. In the course of the robbery, someone shot and killed a bank employee. Soliah went on the run, and didn't get caught until 23 years had passed. She got six years for her participation in the murder of Myrna Opsahl, a ridiculously short sentence but the longest possible under the plea deal she made.
This is what bothers me about the death penalty. Its application is inconsistent, and it has the potential for abuse, which this case arguably demonstrates. Even if I supported the death penalty -- which at one point I did -- applying it to a known non-shooter would seem a miscarriage. Texas Governor Rick Perry should think about breaking his streak of non-intervention in this case.
UPDATE: Before the comments get too far afield, I'm not arguing that Foster is not guilty of murder. Clearly he is, and would have been in any state, not just Texas. I'm arguing that the death penalty is excessive in a case where he was the getaway driver and not the shooter.
UPDATE II: On the other hand, in this case we have a shooter who gets out of jail after seven months:
After spending a total of seven months in custody, the Tennessee woman who fatally shot her preacher husband in the back was released on Tuesday, her lawyer told CNN.Mary Winkler, a 33-year-old mother of three girls, was freed from a Tennessee mental health facility where she was treated for depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, lawyer Steve Farese said.
Does The NAACP Endorse Dogfighting?
Michael Vick had a bad day in court, as one of his co-defendants apparently flipped and will cooperate with federal authorities. However, Vick got some public support from the NAACP -- which accused the government of "piling on" in prosecuting Vick:
The president of the Atlanta chapter of the NAACP criticized the prosecution of Vick at a news conference Monday morning. Dr. R.L. White, Jr., accused the government of "piling on.""There's a penalty in football for piling on," White told reporters. "After a player has been tackled and somebody piles on, they're penalized for unnecessary roughness. Today, the NAACP blows the whistle and warns the powers that be that you are piling on."
Will the NAACP clarify this statement? Are they now endorsing dogfighting and opposing the prosecution of those who allegedly stage these events and slaughter dogs who don't perform? Filing charges in court when grand juries hand down indictments does not qualify as "piling on" -- unless one wants to argue that the alleged activity should go unprosecuted completely.
Vick could be innocent of the charges, but that will be the jury's decision. In the meantime, the NAACP just take a 5-yard penalty for offsides, and perhaps keep their mouths shut until after the trial. Something tells me that Vick can afford better representation than Dr. White.
Who Knew Whole Foods Market Sold Spam?
The CEO of Whole Foods Market apparently likes role playing, especially on the Internet. In fact, he likes it so much that he donned the full sock-puppet, praising his company and his own good looks while pretending to be someone else entirely on Yahoo message boards. The SEC has begun an informal investigation into his activities:
On the Internet nobody knows you’re a dog — or the chief executive of a Fortune 500 company.Or so thought John Mackey, the chief executive of Whole Foods Market, who used a fictional identity on the Yahoo message boards for nearly eight years to assail competition and promote his supermarket chain’s stock, according to documents released last week by the Federal Trade Commission.
Mr. Mackey used the online handle “Rahodeb” (an anagram of his wife’s name, Deborah). In one Internet posting sure to enter the annals of chief-executive vanity, Mr. Mackey wrote as Rahodeb, “I like Mackey’s haircut. I think he looks cute!” ...
For executives like Mr. Mackey, sock-puppeting is probably more gratifying than effective in swaying opinion or stock prices — until they get caught. Then it is embarrassing, and for chief executives, at least, potentially illegal. Laws carefully prescribe what executives of public companies can say. The Wall Street Journal reported on its Web site Friday night that the Securities and Exchange Commission had begun [an informal] inquiry into whether Mr. Mackey violated security laws with the posts.
Mackey, it turns out, was too cute by half. His competitors now can go back through years of message-board postings and sue for any false or misleading information Mackey may have posted. If he put out false or confidential information in an attempt to boost his stock price, he could go to prison. The Times notes that Conrad Black just got convicted on a similar allegation.
On one hand, we can get a chuckle at chuckleheads like Mackey who play games on the Internet in hope of boosting his fortunes with comments about cute haircuts. However, what does it say about how Wall Street execs see investors? Do they think all of us are suckers who will buy Whole Foods stock just because Mackey has a cute 'do? Every day I receive dozens of spam stock tips in my e-mail, so someone somewhere apparently thinks they can sell saps on at least some of it.
Exploding Backpack In Las Vegas
UPDATE: Not a terrorist attack. See below.
State and federal authorities have swarmed over the Luxor Hotel after an explosion in its parking ramp this morning. A man carried a backpack into the second level of the parking garage and it exploded, killing the man carrying it and injuring another:
A backpack exploded in a parking garage attached to a Las Vegas hotel early Monday, killing a man who had picked it up and injuring another person, authorities said.The man had removed the backpack from atop his car when it exploded shortly after 4 a.m. on the second floor of a parking behind the Luxor hotel-casino, said Officer Bill Cassell, a police spokesman.
The second person was taken to an area hospital.
Aerial video showed no apparent damage to the parking structure, where entrances were blocked while police, firefighters and federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents investigated. No further information was immediately available.
Terrorists used exploding backpacks in the 7/7 London bombings, and of course, today is the seventh of May, so there could be some connection between the two. No news agency has posted any further details as of yet, but I will be keeping tabs on the news channels today to see if anything else develops.
I would say that this appears botched, and unlikely to have been part of a terrorist attack, unless we see other explosions. A backpack explosive is designed to kill people, not damage structures, and I suspect the man wanted to get it into the casino first before touching it off, if he was part of a terrorist network. If so, we will see more casino attacks in rapid succession. If not, this may be just a lunatic operating on his own.
UPDATE: Michelle Malkin reports that the person who died worked at the hotel, and retrieved the backpack from a car, where it was left:
The explosion happened around 4 a.m. Reports were that the device was inside a backpack, which was on the vehicle. When the employee went to remove the object, the explosive went off. The employee was taken to the hospital where he died.Officials say the victim appears to have been the intended target.
Someone apparently targeted the employee, leaving the backpack where the killer knew the employee would retrieve it. That's what the news reports in Las Vegas say at the moment. It seems like a strange way to kill one specific person, and I expect this to get more clarification or to change as the day rolls along.
Michelle also reminds us that al-Qaeda has scoped out the Luxor in the past, as well as Las Vegas in general. The 9/11 plotters made several trips to Vegas in the months before the attack, too.
UPDATE III: As I noted earlier, it was not likely a terrorist attack, despite one blogger who apparently couldn't read that far into the post. Terrorists would have wanted to blow the bomb up inside the casino, not in the parking garage. Unfortunately, one man still died in the attack.
I don't consider it irresponsible to discuss all of the different possibilities when news reports come through talking about backpack bombs. The early reports in that sense were apparently incorrect, but it's still pretty unusual to leave a bomb waiting in a parking garage in the hope that the victim will pick it up. It should be an interesting case to follow.
Nifong And Durham: Worse Than You Think
Mike Nifong faces disbarment and almost certainly a flurry of lawsuits over his negligent and malicious handling of the Duke lacrosse players accused of rape by a mentally unstable woman. He may not be the only one on the hot seat, however, as the Durham police department apparently also failed to follow its own procedures and imcompetently investigated the charges. Police chief Steve Chalmers will finally issue a report on how his department investigated the woman's allegations, and it appears he has much to defend:
The allegations of misconduct against District Attorney Mike Nifong have taken center stage, but an examination of police and prosecutorial records raises questions about whether the police ceded control of the investigation, violated their own policies, created false records and failed to pursue basic investigative leads. ...
On March 31, Nifong directed Gottlieb and Investigator Benjamin Himan to show Mangum pictures of all 46 white lacrosse players (Mangum had said her attackers were white, so the team's lone black player was not named as a suspect). Mangum had earlier looked at photographs of 36 lacrosse players and failed to identify an assailant.Nifong's directive violated Durham Police guidelines, which says that identification procedures should include five fillers -- photographs of people unrelated to the case -- for every photograph of a suspect. Gottlieb did not include any fillers when he showed the photos to Mangum, who picked out four players as her assailants, three of whom were charged. ...
In July, Gottlieb produced his written report that seemed to shore up Nifong's identification procedure. Gottlieb reported that on March 16, Magnum had precisely described the three men who were later indicted, including this description of Finnerty: "W/M, young, blonde hair, baby faced, tall and lean." This description, however, contradicted handwritten notes taken by Himan during the interview, which described the three men as heavyset, dark, chubby or short.
That's a serious charge of misconduct by the police sergeant, Mark Gottlieb. He falsified records in order to press forward a case against these three young men. So far, the public has believed that the unethical and potentially illegal behavior was confined to Nifong's office -- but this indicates that the police investigators were heavily involved in deception as well.
Unfortunately for Durham residents, it's not the only instance of malfeasance:
The police department's conduct involves not just what investigators did, but what they didn't do. The rape charges rested on the uncorroborated words of Mangum, who gave multiple, conflicting versions of the alleged assault. Police never pressed her to resolve the contradictions. They waited seven months to interview her colleagues and boss at the Platinum Club, a strip club in Hillsborough where Mangum danced.According to Nifong's files, police waited six months to pull the report on Mangum's 2002 arrest on charges of stealing a taxicab from a Durham strip club. Mangum's behavior that night echoed her behavior after the lacrosse party and could have raised cautions about her reliability.
This is indefensible. The police want to investigate a serious crime, and they wait seven months to interview witnesses when the accuser can't get her story straight. Recall that it took only days for Nifong to start talking about the three defendants in highly prejudicial terms to the media. Only after half a year had passed from that point did the police -- under the direction of Nifong -- get around to interviewing witnesses to Mangum's background and behavior.
Eyewitness testimony does not improve with age. Details get lost and information gets more confused, as a rule. The delay would be inexcusable under any circumstances, but when the accuser's story contradicts itself in substantial ways, police should be interviewing witnesses immediately before arresting people. Instead, they lollygagged for months -- and even when the DNA results came back, they didn't act with any alacrity.
And some of this just shows a great deal of incompetence among the so-called professionals of Durham:
For example, when police first searched the party house at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd. on March 16, two lacrosse team captains told police that Kevin Coleman, a lacrosse player, had taken photographs of the party. Police never subpoenaed Coleman's camera or the time-stamped photographs, even after some of the images appeared on national television and the Internet. Police never obtained cell phones belonging to Seligmann or Finnerty, or their computers, or instant messages or e-mail.
That's because Nifong and the police weren't interested in justice. They just wanted a few Duke scalps to make themselves popular with the locals.
What an abject embarrassment the Durham justice system is. The state should take jurisdiction over the DA's office and the local police and start firing people until the message gets through to the rest.
CORRECTION: The witnesses they waited months to interview were not partygoers but Mangum's colleagues.
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