The 16th Minute

Time's up! Mother Sheehan at a book signing in Crawford, Texas last week. That's the way it looks when one's fame is built on a foundation of quicksand... And she thought the crowd of handlers and looky-lous were her friends/fans. Sad, really.

Quick mid-afternoon roundup

Just a kinda "drive-by" roundup. RW duties call... Already noted Adam's blogs Call for Submissions: The Carnival of Christmas. Oh, did it again. :-) Note these below. Good reads. Stuck On Stupid: Wednesday Politically Correct Linkfest Party "Some of the most politically correct words of 2005: Deferred Success rather than Failure- so as not to embarrass those that do not succeed. Misguided Criminals: One of the Phrases used by the BBC instead of the word terrorists Oh, and he even mentions my favorite assinine PC term: CE (Common Era) to replace AD (Latin for Year of The Lord) Another from Adam's Blog: The Priest of the Abortion God: The LA Times has an article that makes my blood boil. Its about an abortionist, William F. Harrison(the man is not worthy to be called a doctor) who has done more 20,000 abortion and had 6,000 live births. He stopped doing Obstetrics in 1991... Peakah's Provocations weighs in with: You are Going to hear a Sucking Sound: The non-shalant [sic] attitude and twisted perspective consistently fed to us despite the clear and present tragedy of abortions is nothing short of devious. Has Choose Life! started an anti-abortion blogburst or something? That's three today... Liberal Common Sense: Fair Taxation? The above linked post gives you all of the numbers per state from 1981 to 2003. While Ohio is finally in a situation since 2000 where it is receiving more Federal Tax money than is collected, $1.02 for 2003, I still take issue with this. Here's why:... Do yourself a favor: Click on the link to The Fair Tax Book in my left sidebar. Really. The Florida Masochist: Time to boycott Birmingham Alabama? That would seem to be the fair response after Morgan Quitno Press released a report saying Birmingham was the 10th most dangerous city in America. Governor Bob Riley called for a boycott of Aruba based on one murder... Sounds good to me. All I had to hear was "Birmingham Alabama..." Spent a long week there one night... Bloggin' Outloud is begging for comments. Go leave him a "Hey!" wouldja? Search, People, Search: Recent search strings from Google reveal the inner thoughts of lurkers. I don't mind the hits, but please leave a nice comment! :-) IRIS Blog: More Evidence that the Rafah Deal was Another Fraud Here is more evidence of yesterday's post about the fraudulent Rafah deal. Well, duh, ya think? The Florida Masochist is a glutton for punishment, fer sure. No you don't! Some news out of Texas. If Ms. Rector has no influence over her planned husband's work directly or indirectly, I don't see a conflict. However Texas laws on this could be strict, and I'm aware there are good reasons to not allow nepotism. Not in my family. Customerservant.com pays me a compliment. Better watch out! That kinda talk'll get you blogrolled, bubba. heh Living Poetry David opines that there is no poetry more beautiful than the Psalms, and references Psalm 89. Personally, I have to agree with him. The Psalms (Tehillim) contain something for just about every occasion imaginable, and are an excellent source of inspiration... From Freedom Folks: Paying The Bill This article discusses the role of personal change in regards to the death penalty. Governors Schwarzenneger of California and Warner of Virginia must decide whether to grant clemency in two current cases. Fry 'em sez I. Proving his name once again, the The Florida Masochist writes: Tear down the Orange Bowl? I was to Miami Dolphin or Miami Hurricane games about a dozen times in the late 70's to mid-eighties but not since. The stadium was on the antiquated side back then. Seats had no backs etc. There's been alot of history at the OB but all stadiums even... Is It Just Me? notes Rummy talk: Rumsfeld's Epipheny - Insurgents No More? More hyperbole as to what to call "those that wish to kill infidels". According to Defense Secretary Rumsfeld during an epipheny(?) he realized that insurgents shouldn't be called insurgents anymore. When asked what "those that wish to kill infidel... Read on... Freedom Folks is on a roll: The Left: Demoralizing The troops Dragon Master Gunner provides today's high blood pressure post. Yeh, well, Ted Rall *spit* earned his place in at least the ninth circle of hell the other day... (h.t. Cathouse Chat) The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns aint... so crazy, that is... How The Politicians Stole Christmas: Thanks be to Macstansbury.org for inspiring me to write this article when he sent me this link, Cox and Forkum. It is rather pitiful what Canadians are going to have to deal with for the next 55 days... From Choose Life: The War on Christmas: Part Deux: Right on schedule and just as predicted, the war on Christmas has begun. It seems the American Family Association did a survey in which they gathered advertising inserts (totaling 280 pages) from 11 different companies placed in two newspapers... Sing along, now: "Oh, 'holiday tree' we'll chop up thee into the tiniest pieces..." Scrooges, one and all... All for now. More later? Maybe. Gotta fly.

Interesting...

As I noted in Filtering my readers, folks who view this blog in IE (especially at 800X600) may find it an unpleasant experience, given IE's non-compliance with web standards, particularly CSS. Well, surprise, surprise! My IE readership is filtering down a bit...without appreciably affecting my ratio of return readership or overall "unique visitors". And no wonder: the percentage of "other" browser users is now approaching the 50% range. Given that about half the IE users are now viewing my blog at 1024X768 resolution, the still high IE using visitor number is about right. That means only a little over a quarter of visitors see the layout as really, really wonky. That leaves just really wonky, wonky and hunky dory for almost all Firefox and all Opera users. I'm happy with that. At about the level of June (floated a bit on a Hugh Hewitt link for a while) averages and rising steadily, if Statcounter is any good as an assessment tool, and smarter people are visiting (that is, fewer IE users. *LOL* Apologies to all the smart but stubborn, cantankerous IE users out there trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. I have a bit of that in me. After all, I've stuck it out with Blogger, haven't I? :-). Back to regular programming.

It's not "Guard the Borders" blogburst day, but...

...this is just too good to pass up. A discussion on Jerry Pournelle's Current Mail page yesterday includes this gem, among others: If we were to offer $2,500 to $5,000 a head for illegal immigrants delivered to the Border Patrol by bounty hunters, no questions asked -- we don't mind if they turn in each other -- with a very stiff hard labor sentence in a chain gang for repeat offenders, it would cost at most a couple of billion dollars a year, and the more it cost the more successful it would be. Now, Pournelle does go on to say rewards should only be given for LIVE illegals, and he does specify some restrictions to curb abuse. And, of course, he notes that such an idea would die before even budding in the halls populated by that (mostly) vermin called congresscritters. Man. Even at the $2,500 bounty rate, I could gross about $50,000 a day here in America's Third World County™... until news got out. heh 'K, THIS one's linked at Diane's Stuff (And I hope you're feelin' tons better, Diane. :-)

Let's Bring This One Up Front NOW

Adam's doing something I kinda wish I'd thought of. Oh, well. He's calling for submissions to a Carnival of Christmas Head on over and hit it, will ya? And check out Support Christmas - Sign The Petition at Stop the ACLU, too.

Catching up on reading/Open Post

[Yeh, Macstansbury caught me out in an inexcusable (and baffling) typo. Thanks, Mac... :-) ] Wednesday is OTA Day! Link here and post a, well, how did Is It Just Me? put it? Oh, yeh, "Although there is no monetary outlay involved to participate, a donation through reciprocal recognition of this site on your site is greatly appreciated. To reciprocate - please do not use the "o" word in conjuction with the "tb" word, or the "tb" word by itself, or even the "l""l" words to give acknowledgement. If you feel really compelled to use these words any site recognition to those sites you are advertising at will probably not occur. Please practice these rules of self-censorship for continued success in traffic exchange. What? You say that all this is clear as mud? Good. It was intended that way." heh These came in later yesterday but are still worth reading: My Blog is Not Blogging Outloud "Me wanted to recruit . . . them horse tooth paste of which it is possible to clean foot-wear." That's what you get when you go to Blogging Outloud instead of Bloggin' Outloud. Choose the real cola. Yeh, he has a point, but I stopped drinking Pepsi products when their CEO made an ass of herself... ;-) Another, uhm, pointed commentary by Bergbikr at TMH's Bacon Bits: Point - Counterpoint As is my daily practice, on November 28 I shared an article with a list of friends (and polemical counterparts), a Chicago Sun-Times article by Mary Laney, "Our accomplishments in Iraq make for a long list." Some good points... BIG DOG's WEBLOG grabs Jean Fraud sKerry by the throat and shakes his sorry... uhm, body a bit Another Week And No 180 Another week has passed and John Kerry has failed to live up to his promise to sign an SF 180 that is completely unrestricted so that his military records can be released in their entirety. You will remember that big John promised to do this on national TV... Now, as to catching up on my reading... Had a nice lil blurb about Lars Walker's "The Year of the Warrior" here, but Zoundry's Blogwriter totally hashed that post, so I'll just say: worth a read. Events surrounding Olaf of Norway's attempt to subjugate all of Norway and bring Christianity to the heathen with an iron fist. (Yeh, he didn't quite get the concept.) My 12 (or is it 13?) year old nephew had me picking Aeschylus and Sophocles up again a short while ago. By the time I caught up with him, he was already at Oedipus at Colonus. It's a good idea, I've found, to go back and read the sources of some of our cultural memes every now and then. Thanks, T.F., for the impetus. "Who is like unto Thee?" (Ps 89). Where can you find poetry like this? Only in the Psalms. Bow down thine ear, O LORD, hear me: for I am poor and needy. Preserve my soul; for I am holy: O thou my God, save thy servant that trusteth in thee. Be merciful unto me, O Lord: for I cry unto thee daily. Rejoice the soul of thy servant: for unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. For thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive; and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon thee. Give ear, O LORD, unto my prayer; and attend to the voice of my supplications. In the day of my trouble I will call upon thee: for thou wilt answer me. Among the gods there is none like unto thee, O Lord; neither are there any works like unto thy works. All nations whom thou hast made shall come and worship before thee, O Lord; and shall glorify thy name. For thou art great, and doest wondrous things: thou art God alone. Teach me thy way, O LORD; I will walk in thy truth: unite my heart to fear thy name. I will praise thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart: and I will glorify thy name for evermore. For great is thy mercy toward me: and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell. O God, the proud are risen against me, and the assemblies of violent men have sought after my soul; and have not set thee before them. But thou, O Lord, art a God full of compassion, and gracious, long suffering, and plenteous in mercy and truth. O turn unto me, and have mercy upon me; give thy strength unto thy servant, and save the son of thine handmaid. Shew me a token for good; that they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed: because thou, LORD, hast helped me, and comforted me. Words from an adulterous murderer who found mercy... maybe there's hope for some of us, eh? Hit me with your best shots, folks. ;-) Brazenly advertized at Stuck on Stupid, woulda advertized at Don Surber After hours, but he apparently closed his Wednesday open post before I sat down here (love ya, Don :-), MacStansbury's, Right Wing Nation, Rempelia Prime, Choose Life!'s "Cowering Chicken" post, TMH's Bacon Bits (I'll hit you with another one later, bud :-) and Diane's Stuff and elsewhere, when posts go up.

If you have a good ear...

...and a weak stomach, do NOT click this link. (mp3) I warned you...

Drive-by post

Yeh, walking through when the TV's babbling one of those touchy-feely "PSAs" that are totally cracked, I hear: "Friends always make you laugh." Riiiigggghhht. "Hey, dude, your grandma died? That's like, so totally hilarious, man!" "Whoah! Your dad lost his leg in a freak meteor strike? Ha-ha-ha-ha... Dude, you crack me up!" [Musta been Smallville or something] TV, so often even when it's trying to "be helpful" it's like a bad comic book written by monkeys on crack. OK, so the History Channel sometimes manages to not be ahistorical and TLC is sometimes ahysterical. OK, so Smallville is the funniest nighttime soap I've ever even heard about. And that includes "Soap" and "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman".

Around and About Tuesday

TMH's Bacon Bits lays out the skinny on Jean Fraud sKerry in no uncertain terms with "Kerry's 180: Profiteering on Cowardice" The French-looking (yet underived) Kerry would not know a coward if he were wearing the suit of a senator from… MA. Is Sen. sKerry afraid of abiding by his promise made 303 days ago to release those records that were to be liberated via his SF-180 See the link to Cao's Blog at "I'll Be Home for Christmas..." (below) or at TMH's Bacon Bits for more on this weasel. Two Three from Freedom Folks: "Bush Tap Dances Around Illegal Immigration" I just forced myself to sit through Bush's speech in Arizona yesterday about border control and illegal immigration. I knew I needed to. I knew it would be difficult. I knew it would be painful. Catch it again over at The Political Teen... Yeh, half a loaf sometimes isn't better than none... And, "Define Nefarious Bastard Please": This just in: State Department churns out super weenies! *yawn* Dog bites man, FF, dog bites man... *S* Last, but not least, "Illegal Immigration: From My Perspective" In a recent article I quoted Mark Krikorian as saying that we truly don't need illegal slave labor. I'd like to expand on that a little bit from my own experience. An IMPORTANT issue contained within the larger Guard the Borders issue. READ IT! Adam's Blog ranks TTLB and Technoratti in "Technorati v. The Truth Laid Bear Ecosystem: The Final Showdown" There's been a lot of talk about "The Truth Laid Bear" ecosystem as it changes its rankings to make it more complex with the intention of stopping people doing unfair things that endanger the sanctity of the Bear's rankings. Uhm, shouldn't "sanctity" be in scare quotes? *smirk* Now we know why the blog's title is The Florida Masochist:"Now bend over, this won't hurt" Some news from the Sun-Sentinel website. Could you imagine being one of the researchers studying this? Nope. I have a vivid imagination, but it's just not willing to go there. "Butt why?" you ask? Find out for yourself. Oh, and TFM is also hosting its own awards... Come Fly with me Wizbang is having the 2005 Weblog awards. Here at TFM we'll be having the Knucklehead awards. For the biggest and worst of 2005. Categories will include Sports&Entertainment, MSM, Politics and our judicial system to name just a few. More power to ya bubba. "If nominated, I will not run. If elected, I will not serve" is my motto. ;-) And missing in a roundup yesterday, "Mystery solved and Case closed" For almost 13 years a mystery remained in Lantana Florida. Who killed Rita Bado and her daughter, Lisa Bado. Romeocat, a real lady, posts "My Momma taught me not to swear"- but I'm thinking a whole lotta four letter words right now. When you see what brought her to this pass, you'll want to spit... on someone's grave. Well, at least I do. An email correspondent at Jerry Pournelle's place pointed out a primer on Iraq. Must-read for folks wanting to get up to speed on the history of the region, because today didn't happen in a vaccuum, folks: Iraq: A Short History of Violence. Also missed in yesterday's "Around and About" was this uhm, well-crafted post from "Is It Just Me?- Self-Censorship To Continued Traffic Exchange This post will seem vague to some - if so, ignore it. As I really appreciate your SHARING HERE, due to constraints of regulatory censorship some words will not be used to describe the ongoing activities pursued on this site to enhance traffic of those who... Arcane enough for ya? There's more, of course, but I'll either get to it later... or not.

Soapbox for a reader

Via email from a frequent commenter here who said, " Wanted to post the following comment, but it wasn't clear (to me) under which entry was best to post the comment... If you see fit to add it, OK." . I'll just let Hugh speak his piece here: This nation really, Really, REALLY needs a major catharsis--any definition one chooses. I've been a Dubya supporter for a while now. However, I'm beginning to think it's OK for him to go down in flames--he's kicked his conservative base in the shins too often. He started out as a Republican, but he's transitioned into a RINO. Most all presidents tend to move to the center, but he's gone far overboard trying to out Dimo-crat the Democrats on domestic issues. He was definitely the lesser of the evils in both elections. Having said that, one of my friends reminds me from time to time that voting for the lesser of the evils is still voting for evil. No, I don't think Dubya is evil per sé. He recognizes appeasement doesn't work with radical Islamists who want to kill us all. Yet, he has worked "overtime" trying to appease Dimo-crats. That will never work. No amount of apppeasement ever works--it only stiffens the opposition by thinking they've won "one more." So far they've won several more by his appeasement attempts. Catharsis? How about cutting the federal welfare programs--all of them! When the freeloaders have to work for their food and housing, then perhaps there won't be so many jobs available for illegal aliens that "Americans don't want to do." Let the states do what they will with welfare--get the feds out! All welfare should go back to the local churches (synagogues, etc.) and charity organizations. With the feds out of welfare we can cut both the budget and taxes. Another budget/tax cut would come with getting the feds out of education. Again, let states and locals handle education. To use an old aviation idiom: Dubya, being a former aviator, has "screwed the pooch." What's worse, he continues to do it. (That terminology ain't got nothing to do with Lady Laura!) There's more, but that's sufficient for now. I think Hugh makes some valid points. One of the reasons President Bush got no slack from some on the Miers nomination was the perception that he was soft on "Dhimicratic Terrorism"-and all these issues certainly fed into that. Comments?

"I'll be home for Christmas... " (A free Kerry's 180 OPEN POST)

(Open Post) I've been wondering for a while if this poor guy needs therapy or some such. After all, he makes promises he doesn't keep, makes wildly contradictory statements (and asserts they are not): lies out of one face while... lying out of his other face at the same time, so to speak. Surely some therapy would be in order. But no, maybe all he needs is some time with friends and family, away from the pressures of work. It's only a few weeks away. I think he ought to go home for Christmas. (Cox and Forkum's excellent suggestion for a Kerry Christmas Card... Look! Lucky Hat!) If you're tired of this deranged pol's mouth-flap, encourage him to go home for Christmas. Maybe he can find those records he's promised to release stored in a box somewhere... along with his integrity, common decency and a shred of honesty. Go home to Cambodia, John. This has been a Free Kerry's 180 Blogburst post. Ya want in on the thing? Drop in on Cao and pick up the info there. Oh, and for this Open Post, I'd especially welcome any snarky comments headed Jean Fraud sKerry's way. By now you probably know the drill. Link to this post in your own and trackback here. I'll try to get all the tracked back posts up in an "Around and About" later. Linked at Those Bastards!, NIF, Don Surber, who speaks for me as well when he says, This is an open post... IDGAF who doesn't like them. You worry about your little blog. I will promote mine. heh. Oh, and also linked at Right Wing Nation, Choose Life! and others as the mood takes me, maybe. :-)

Revisiting Pournelle's observations...

I linked to some comments by Jerry Pournelle below, but for some reason, one portion of his comments I didn’t quote has been bring Harrison Bergeron back to haunt my thoughts all day… “And there remains the ceaseless striving, with no peaceful end: is it any wonder that bureaucrats form feudal organizations and effectively end the striving and competition? Is it any wonder that the rise of the modern egalitarian state has produced the rise of bureaucracy and rule by bureaucracy?” Any wonder at all? If bureaucrats had to demonstrate a genuine contribution to the good of society in order to keep their jobs, we could weed their ranks by 90% over night… Oh, and DO pop on over and read Harrison Bergeron as well. It’s a very short story, and it's also one of the few really good pieces by Kurt Vonnegut, IMO.

Of slightly more than passing note...

See Around and About Monday, Monday's Featured Blog-and Open Post and Almost a "Guard the Borders" post (all below) for links to more good reading I've noticed. This is a short roundup of recent ping-ins that may have slipped under the radar--worthwhile reads, all. Peakah's Pub mistook Teach Your Children Well for an Open Post and pinged in with "Front Page News"-and I'm glad he did cos there are some good reads listed in his link roundup. TMH's Bacon Bits only pinged me with Guard the Borders: What Is "Practical" Interior Enforcement, Anyway?, and that's a shame, cos while it is a powerful post on an important topic, "Democrats Eat Their Own" Is Not News by new contributor, DL, is an equally good read. The Florida Masochist brings the issue of Cindy Sheehan's character-and those of her detractors-into focus with Tasteless. Indeed. ;-) And last but far from least is the collection of links posted at The Carnival of True Civil Liberties. Gribbit honors my submission with the label "important" and though I'd certainly agree (or I'd not have submitted it), I'd sooner lavish such a lable on some of the other submissions. Worthy reads, all. Well, that covers early afternoon, here. Later.

Almost a "Guard the Borders" post

Ditched my “Guard the borders” post for today, since The Tar Pit seems to have raided my hard drive for a draft and posted it as his own (Just kidding, dude: a good post on a topic I had planned to write on—not gonna duplicate the effort, though; just point folks to your post :-).   See this post at Diane’s Stuff for another border issue. “Homeland Security” my… *cough*   So… what? Here’s a (all too short, but very pointed) brief commentary on “The Drama of Atheist Humanism” and the impact of atheist humanism on the health (or lack thereof) of Western Civilization in general and the U.S. in particular. Pournelle commenting, of course. It's hard to excerpt any portion of Pournelle's all-too-brief (well, he added this during the holiday to last Wednesday's post) exposition, but here's a sample: ...when I was young there were no public ceremonies without an invocation and a benediction, usually both with one by a Roman Catholic and the other by a Protestant Minister. For sufficiently important events there would usually be a rabbi as well. We paid public attention and deference to "Divine Providence" and saw the Hand of God in our works. "The courts in the name of liberalism have thrown all that out. Soon after of course goes most of civility: again I refer people to the Drama of Atheist Humanism, and where it has always led. Yes, there are highly ethical atheists. Some of them tend to militancy, at least among their friends. Marvin Minsky is a great example. But The Drama of Atheist Humanism still plays out in a different way because for every Minsky there will be two Trotsky's and a Stalin. "Today's liberal establishment makes war on religion, which is odd, because the roots of liberalism are in religion. The assumption of human equality makes sense only in religious terms -- surely few of you feel equal to the drooling idiot who camps on your doorstep and shakes the paper cup at you asking for change? Some see the Image of Christ, but that is not a rationalist or materialist position. Some see "But for the Grace of God there go I," but again that is not a rationalist position..." Just go read the rest. It's germane to the topic "Why we do NOT guard our borders... or the rest of our civilization."

Around and About Monday

A few of the interesting reads that cropped up over the weekend… Pray for Kender. Seriously. Saw this at Cathouse Chat. Stop a moment and pray for the guy, would ya? The Tar Pit wrote my Monday “Guard the Borders” post (I just have to improve the security around here! :-) when he featured, “Fred Barnes pimps the Bush Amnesty”. Gee. Now do I go ahead and post, “Don’t Read His Lips” for my GTB post or just refer everyone to The Tar Pit? heh And, how did I miss this important news embedded in Pirates! Man Your Women!’s Thanksgiving Day post??? “You know its [sic] Thanksgiving when the SciFi channel is showing Army of Darkness.” *sigh* Found via a link in a post featured in a linkfest that linked to another post that linked to (convoluted enough for ya?): The Neo Con Blogger(TM)’s: “Young Drinkers Thinner Than Non-Drinkers”. His conclusion” “Enter LSU when you’re 20 and drink your butt off for 18 years and you’ll end up skinny, drunk, and stupid!” Just caught up with this one: Rich Casebolt liveblogging Thanksgiving Day. Okaaaayy… (But really, some good stuff.) With the upcoming Christmas season, many folks’ll just be too busy to lay back with old favs. Lotsa people like  to catch “It’s a Wonderful Life” (for some reason that has yet to reveal itself to me). For those who like the flick but may run short on time, be sure to save this link to “Frank Cappra’s ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ in 30 Seconds (and re-enacted by bunnies)”. I can’t tell much difference between it and the original except that it’s shorter and doesn’t have Donna Reed. ;-) Sam’s begging for votes. Help out a tad, ‘K? Meanwhile, check out her post on an activity I could never quite get a handle on. Diane comments on a “How-to” article written by a speech-impaired piscine. heh And her post on the Asian Bird Flu pretty well reflect my own views (apart from her musical selection :-). S’all for now. Maybe more later. Time for more coffee.

Monday's Featured Blog—and Open Post

N.B. The Maryhunter dropped me a note to say his trackback to Guard the Borders: What Is “Practical” Interior Enforcement, Anyway? hadn't shown up. Hmmm, I've heard rumbles of not-talking-nice between Moveable Type(??? Or was it another??) and Haloscan, so that might be the culprit. Anyone else attempting to TB and having no success let me know in comments, 'K? Today’s featured blog, introduced to me via a linkfest/tb party, is Liberal Common Sense. More about that is a second, but first, let me point you to the Open Trackback Alliance and Open Trackback Provider blogrolls on my right sidebar. Hit up those blogs listed as Monday (or daily) Open Post bloggers for links to some fine reads you might otherwise miss, won’t you? It’s how I found Liberal Common Sense, and there may be others you’ll enjoy discovering either here, on this open post or elsewhere today. And do trackback posts to this one that you want to bring to others’ attention, eh? On to Liberal Common Sense. Some folks who have read here for a while might think I dislike liberals, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s just that real liberals can’t be found among the Mass Media Podpeople and Loony Left Moonbats I so often deride for their faux liberal blather. Lisa Renee, at Liberal Common Sense doesn’t talk “reality based fantasy” but reality based reality, apparently grounded in the kind of liberal thinking John Stuart Mill would recognize, you know, the real thing. Take “Ramsey Clark, Saddam Hussein and the Media”—a post where she sensibly and calmly argues that both the AP and Worldnet Daily twist or selectively report news according to apparent bias. (Granted, she does score the WND article more highly for quantity and quality of info—by a hair. :-) Good commentary. As is this, while this whimsical piece is typical of other posts. So, now you know why Liberal Common Sense is in my blogroll.  It earned a place there. Open Post. Trackback with a post linked to here, and I’ll work it into an “Around and About” later on today. And do note open posts at OTA member sites, Committees of Correspondence, The Land of Ozz, Pirates! Man Your Women!, Don Surber, Bloggin' Outloud, and others as I get around to it or they get their Monday Open Posts up. For this Open Post, link here and trackback to this link.

Welcome, R'Cat!

Cathouse Chat's Romeocat has long been a fav "voice" among bloggers for me. Ever since I first visited Cathouse Chat, I've known her "voice" was special, and as I grew to know the person behind that voice, I became aware of just how great was the honor to be called her friend. Thanks for joining the voices, here, Romeocat.

Teach Your Children Well

There are two central problems I see facing the preservation of true civil liberties in America today. No matter how committed to preservation of liberty or resolute in defense of liberty anyone might be, commitment and resolution fail in the face of these issues. Most Americans are historically subliterate, if not illiterate and have no idea what the civil liberties the Founders and Framers wrought for us are. That being the case, these historically sub- or illiterate folk fall prey to every manipulation of the media, academia, politicians and such organizations as the ACLU use to poison the well of liberty. The same historically sub- and illiterate folk can vote. *shudder* And do. (Though fortunately, not in as great a number as they could.) And the problem is exacerbated by the simple fact that so many people grow up in these United States not only historically ignorant but unable to reason. Witness: just about any evening news program or major newspaper, where strings of fallacies are presented as “news” and sheeple eat it right up, completely unaware—as I do not doubt most of the media folks who perpetrate the crimes against reason are—that what they are hearing/seeing/reading is drivel. Of course, sheeple are not born; they are made. Made by a process of government interference, parental stupidity and laziness, educrats’ “academia nut” theories used as child abuse in the classroom (e.g., “new math”, “look-say”) and increasingly lazy and indifferent students. Add to that an ever more removed-from-reality educational system, and it’s no wonder so many adult Americans are truly functional illiterates, and masses are culturally, historically and even literarily subliterate._1_, _2_, _3_ (Linked: three pdf files comprising the 1992 National Adult Literacy Survey, and folks, the news hasn’t improved since then.) Yes, moral fibre is essential to preserving liberty. But absent the knowledge of true liberties, the enemies of liberty will win over even an “upright” and  fervent, but ignorant, populace. So, what shall we do? Depending on public education is a recipe for disaster. Even good teachers are stifled, blocked, prevented from, well, teaching by stupid, entrenched bureaucracies and generations of mistaught students who are now… parents. And stupid, entrenched bureaucracies (and by at least one objective criterion—GRE scores—educrats/school administrators are the stupidest people working in the education sector) will NOT “go gently into that good night.”   *sigh* We must do it. It would be nice (“‘Nice,’ he says… ” heh) if the words of the song were more substantive, but at least one line rings truer all the time as we travel the road that leads to preservation of true liberty for our children… or not… “Teach your children well.” You who are on the road Must have a code that you can live by And so become yourself Because the past is just a good bye. Teach your children well, Their father's hell did slowly go by, And feed them on your dreams The one they pick’s, the one you'll know by. Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you will cry, So just look at them and sigh and know they love you. And you, of tender years, Can't know the fears that your elders grew by, And so please help them with your youth, They seek the truth before they can die. Teach your parents well, Their children's hell will slowly go by, And feed them on your dreams The one they pick’s, the one you'll know by. Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you will cry, So just look at them and sigh and know they love you. Powered by Castpost“Teach your children well… ” *sigh* (And as I learned when attempting to explain the Fair tax to an older voter recently, “Teach your parents well” also applies.) They are NOT going to learn what they need to be good citizens of a democratic republic in school. Count on it. It is up to us. Our children and grandchildren (yes, and in some cases, parents) must learn somewhere if the friends of liberty are  to have the fundamental tools and knowledge—and numbers!—necessary to defeat the foes of liberty. (Yeh, I expanded on this post in "Comments". So? :-) Linked at: Otimaster, Peakah's Pub, the rather racy, Where Are My Socks?, Choose life! and Don Surber After Hours... for now. :-) [Yes, that is the lyrics and an instrumental cover of the Crosby Stills & Nash piece. Recorded from a midi file collected years ago from… I don’t know where. If you know who created the midi file this mp3 is based on, let me know. Meanwhile, sing along if you have the hankerin' to. :-) ]

Commenting/Trackback Policy

I've finally, partly because of some recent comments and partly because, well, I guess about time, decided to post a "Commenting/Trackback Policy" CLICK the link if you're interested. There's also a "permapost" link in my right sidebar, if anyone cares (or if anyone doesn't care--so? :-) Have fun, folks.

CPR stands for "Coffee Provides Resuscitation"

Tripping my blogroll this a.m., I naturally stopped off at my fav "coffee shop"—Morning Coffee and Afternoon Tea—for a lil eye-opener. (heh—I typoed "sys-opener" a sec ago. Actually took me a sec to realize it. Need. More. Coffee.) Christine actually hasn't posted anything new in the past coupla days, but this time I followed a link she provided to... Cubicle Coffee, but not to the neat Bodum French Press. No, I went straight for the philosophy cubicle. Rick Lee shows what can be done with Thanksgiving Dinner leftovers. What an eye! And, of course a stop at Kat's for a lil weekend music is in order. How 'bout this one from John Prine and Iris Dement? Great Saturday morning fare! Not to your taste, try the Bill Morrissey she has posted. Kris links to a near death experience at WallyWorld... heh. Oh, and a real nice after action report on her week, too. Don Surber links to a WallyWorld mayhem video. Funny, Don. "The Next Wal-Mart Millionaire" indeed. heh. And another "indeed" just for the heck of it. And, I oppose the death penalty but it would be awful tempting to pass a law that would allow the people of the United States to elect each year a celebrity to be pelted to death with US magazines. Droll, Don. But... just for good measure, (three is and even number, right? :-) let's round out the "After hours" posts with, "Christmas 1, PC 0". heh Nothing new since Wednesday at Jerry Pournelle's, but in a mail post that starts with a tomatoe bazooka and ranges through intellectual property rights, computer security, ID and the once (and future??) USSR, there's plenty for everyone there. I thought about the "Scotch tape foils Sony copy protection" notice in his Current View section for my "Around and About" the other day, but didn't carry it through... of course, I would never defeat copy protections schemes. No, not I! heh Carol Platt Liebau rips into a grade school teacher for propagandizing his students. Justifiable ripitude. heh And her succint summation of the Boston "Holiday Tree" flap is bang on, too. Dan Riehl has commentary on Sir Elton and "Lady David". Feelin' a tad snarky, Dan? :-) He also includes a link to another video of Wal-Mart Mayhem. Bret Rogers over at Beat Canvas has already painted his Christmas card for this year. Next step, reproduction/printing... Good job, Brett! I'm looking forward to The Conservative Cat's exposés: "What makes John Murtha a better expert on Iraq than Michael Yon" and "The Truth about the Truth Laid Bear thing", but until then, I can click through the wealth of links he offers on really important topics... Grab a cuppa joe, sit back and dig into a recent history lesson with Cao's October 1998: Military Analyst Goes Where Spies Fail to Go, but Her Efforts Are Rejected. Significant stuff, folks. And check her post on the Padilla indictment (and how the ACLU is attempting to interfere) over at Stop the ACLU. That's about it for now. RW stuff needs doing. Linked at Don Surber After Hours, The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns, and Stop the ACLU's Weekend Open Trackbacks..

Another round of "Around and About"

A few pings from some interesting reads the last coupla days. Check out: Due to blogger error (mine, I think, not Blogger's :-), somehow a trackpack ping to Committees of Correspondence was "etherized". DO READ: it's a big deal. In "When I was Ten Years Old" he links to a story you really ought to hear. Pajamas Media / Stuck On Stupid Blog The True Meaning Of Thanksgiving, “Christmas Season starts this week beginning with Thanksgiving. While I was looking for something to post this Thursday I ran across this article and decided now is a good time to share it. From The Branson Courier: Thanksgiving is all about to whom the thanks is given…” [On target] T F Stern's Rantings brings Having an Attitude of Gratitude to the Thanksgiving table. “I’ve heard some demean this truly American holiday by calling it ‘turkey day’, which may well be the reason I decided to write my thoughts about having an attitude of gratitude.” [I’ll not refer to Thanksgiving Day as “turkey day” either, thanks. :-) ] Small Town Veteran’s collection of Holiday Quick Hits is a concise list of good reads, and I say that not just because he linked my “An ACLU Thanksgiving”— “Some things I'd excerpt and link to individually if not for the holiday: An ACLU Thanksgiving Wilsongate: Motive, Means, and Opportunity More Mistakes by the Washington Post on the Foreign Fighters Debate General calls Iraq pullout 'destabilizing' M.. ”. [Some good reads. Not a turkey in the bunch] Another history lessn, this one from Peakah's Provocations— Thanksgiving 2005 “Our Founding Father, George Washington, Proclaimed Thanksgiving Day an Official American Holiday... click on picture to read his words…” [The text of Washington’s 1789 proclamation. Worth reading in its entirety. More than once a year. Out loud. With a bullhorn. In front of an ACLU office.] History lesson #3 from California Conservative: The History & Meaning of Thanksgiving “Why and to whom are we giving thanks? There’s more to Thanksgiving than family, feasting and football. All too often the significance of our cherished holidays is forgotten, and replaced by a rewriting of new intentions. As we celebrate this special American holiday, may we also remember the history and be reminded of the true meaning behind it.” [Another perspective—with depth and a link to a History Channel video] Freedom Folks  could repost this for a guard the Borders blogburst: The Toll of Illegal Immigration  “MJ shares a horrifying account of the hidden costs and dangers of illegal immigration…” More as I see ‘em.

Why Everyone Who Blogs "Important Issues" May Have to Quit Blogging

Nah, it's not because the FEC or some other government weenie bureaucraps might dump on ya. It's not even because NZ Bear might decide every link to Instapundit is worth 10 links to anyone else (heh--just kidding Bear). No, It's because this guy is covering every single topic he touches better than anyone else. Yep. Anyone. In fact, linking to him in such a way as to open the link in a new window is probably an exercise in futility. You'll click the link, read posts like this one and never come back. Oh. Wah. Not that I'd feel the pain, cos if you did click on over there and get lost in the wealth of good blog and never come back here for my mediocre stuff, I'd feel that I'd served you well and be pleased. Seriously: that's one fine blog. I'd love for you to come back, but if I lose your readership to someone like this, I'll feel that the service I've done you was well worth it.

*sigh*

Just noticed. Concurrent with Blogwriter starting to delete portions of posts when uploading or saving locally, posts originally posted via Blogwriter (as of today's latest bug session) apparetnly canNOT ne edited to apply to the variable-width center column any more... So, Opera, naturally, sees things correctly, and no other browser I've tried does. I'll explore this carnage wrought by my used of a beta blogging product as I have time. Meanwhile, it looks like hash is all I have to offer nonOpera users. Either that, or go back to raw html editing in Editpad. *sigh*

Riffing Off Dumbledore/Open Post

[UPDATE: See The Real Ugly American's take on Open Trackbacks. Good post. Meat on those bones, bubba. AND due to blogger error (mine, I think, not Blogger's :-), somehow a trackpack ping to Committees of Correspondence was "etherized". DO READ: it's a big deal. In "When I was Ten Years Old" he links to a story you really ought to hear.] My Wonder Woman's a children's librarian, so for our anniversary, we caught "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire." I had to wait until the end of the flick for something besides the typical "Harry Heroics" and boffo special effects. That was when Dumbledore spoke to Harry of a time approaching when everyone they knew would be called upon to choose between doing what's right... or what's easy. And then, following the tracks of one linkfest to another to another late last night,—just kinda casually cruisin' n perusin'—until I lost track of the links in the chain, and I ended up at Alexandra von Maltzan's All Things Beautiful. There, I found a post to end my evening with: "Loyalty To The Truth on Thanksgiving." She refers to Hugh Hewitt's article on how to have a political argument with family (just read it) and then builds a powerful "tribute" to genuine bloggers she knows. From her leadoff: "The loyalty and integrity we should have as bloggers is to the Truth and liberation of that Truth, and not to the Truth we assign to the political denominations we belong to. And above all to the good old fashioned family values of integrity and loyalty to that Truth which we celebrate at Thanksgiving. Respect for each other as bloggers no matter what we believe in is paramount, and no amount of self gratifying echo chamber rhetoric should come in the way of a good upbringing, and manners, above all being grateful today that we have a voice." And you know, the truth she's talking about applies whether it's bloggers who are devoted to so-called "important" issues or to personal journaling—or even to food and recipes ("Do YOU credit the sources of your recipes every time, David? Well, do you?") It's a post I believe well worth reading in its entirety. In fact, I archived the text just in case her permalink should ever prove less than permanent, so I can return to that one statement from time to time. The quote the other day from Jo's Cafe? It's worth repeating in this context: "What is most important is who you are and does your blog reflect you... " There are the hard choices... and the easy ones. When we're blogging, the hard choices sometimes demand introspection... just to know they really are there. "Where is my bias? What do I believe and why?" If we ever allow our biases or our egos to persuade us to shade the truth, to twist it or even to outright lie, then we become the little people who populate the boob tube opinion programs calling themselves "news". Just a thought. Read the two posts linked above for better presentations. In a strangely related post dealing metaphorically with blog ethics, The Crazy Rants of Samatha Burns reports, Source Code Stolen From NZ Bear. heh Indeed. Consider this my Friday "Open all weekend" Open Post with The Open Trackback Alliance Link to this URL: http://thirdworldcounty.blogspot.com/2005/11/riffing-off-dumbledore.html Trackback to this URI: http://www.haloscan.com/tb/mnmus/113293642547681487/ See Ferdy's Open Trackbacks Pingposters List here. I'll try to do a frontpage post rounding up interesting pings posted here, later. PingLinked at: NIF, Is It Just Me?, The Blue State Conservatives(apparently not: MT seems to be having trouble accepting trackback pings--but go to BSC and read up, anyway, 'K?), Conservative Cat, Don Surber After Hours, Right Wing Nation, Stray Dog, Blogin Outloud, TMH's Bacon Bits

Thanksgiving Day meal finished, food put away. lazing until my Wonder Woman and I leave to take in a flick. Just opened another "stash" blog for low-stress, not-too-techie stuff about software/hardware. Any further comments about browsers or other software stuff will be stored there and the only real mention of the contents will be a short comment/link here. Anyone wants to treat this as an open post, feel free. SPAM trackbacks or comments will of course be deleted and their domains banned. Some things just aren't worth wasting time on. Spammers, for one class, will never "get" the idea that what they are doing is unethical, any more than other sociopaths can understand their own inhumanity. Have fun folks. Outa here until tomorrow, most likely. When tomorrow rolls around, I'll bring interesting trackbacks/links onto the front page in an "around and about" post. (And then, Real World stuff, again. :-)

Thanksgiving and 11-24-78... and other days

While it's easy to say I'm at least one of the most blessed men alive, I can never tell the story below with any eloquence. My hands still shake and yeh, I mist over a tad. Happy Anniversary to my Wonder Woman... "The Water is Wide" is a longtime fav of mine (a guy named Roger McGuinn gives a credible performance here-warning: mp3). The tune was strong in me Oct 4-6, 1998, and glad I was for it... I didn't sing the usual lyrics, though. I sang these (below), not because they are better poetry, but because my Wonder Woman was sleeping for those days, hooked up to a bunch of machines after three occurences of what the doctors later labeled "Sudden Cardiac Death" on Sunday October 4, 1998. Yeh, not the best of poetry, "a poor thing but my own" as it were. Still, sharing the twenty-seventh anniversary of our wedding day on Thanksgiving Day this year is nice-something bordering on the miraculous-and I always think these words and tune at this time of year... well, and other times of the year as well. Twenty-seven years, and we very nearly didn't make it together to twenty. Each year since then has been a double blessing. Yeh, I have more to be thankful for than most every year about this time. Some aren't as fortunate. I especially feel strongly for those who have lost a loved one about this time of year. I was almost you. And someday, I may be you. But until then, I hold her hand; she holds my heart. Powered by Castpost Just click to play it, would you? :-) Technorati : Thanksgiving

Job was a piker

[NOTE: I am posting this "Thanksgiving" post in advance of Thanksgiving Day in hopes that it might help even just one person redirect their thinking as we approach a day set apart especially for giving thanks. Update: Bumped to Thanksgiving Day.] The biblical story of Job is a story of faith in the face of extreme adversity. You probably know the story well. Satan makes his appearance in the court of The Most High and suggests that he can turn even the most faithful of men, Job, away from faith in God. God gives Job over to Satan to afflict reserving only Job's life for Himself. In the trials that ensue, Job loses his wealth, [almost all of] his family and his health. His friends counsel him to forsake his faith, and in one of the most famous lines of the Old Testament, his wife tells him to "Curse God and die." Pretty darned bad, eh? But, you may say, Job's just a myth, right? How about an historical example, well-known and verified? It was the worst of times; it was the worst of times. (Not so Dickensian, but oh, so true.) War ravaged the land for 30 years. During that time, Martin had served as one of the pastors of a once-prosperous town that had suffered greatly in the war. Sacked three times. Saved from sacking once only by courageous negotiations with a conquering general/king by one simple pastor... but still ruined again economically at the end of the negotiations. This simple pastor had also seen his family, friends, colleagues and thousands of townspeople and refugees killed by plague and hunger, and during the war years, when he was the sole remaining pastor of the town, he was called upon not only to conduct the funerals of his own wife and children, but also to conduct as many as 40-50 funerals a day for families of friends and neighbors-the townspeople he served so long and knew so well-and of those from the crowded masses of refugees from the war-torn countryside. All-in-all, he performed nearly 5,000 funerals during these years. The war was the Thirty Years War (1618-1648). The town was Eilenburg, in Saxony. The man was Martin Rinkart. In response to all those years of affliction, he penned these words: Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices, Who wondrous things has done, in Whom this world rejoices; Who from our mothers' arms has blessed us on our way With countless gifts of love, and still is ours today. O may this bounteous God through all our life be near us, With ever joyful hearts and blessèd peace to cheer us; And keep us in His grace, and guide us when perplexed; And free us from all ills, in this world and the next! All praise and thanks to God the Father now be given; The Son and Him Who reigns with Them in highest Heaven; The one eternal God, Whom earth and Heaven adore; For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore. Be thankful for your blessings? Yes. But even when you cannot see any "blessings" be thankful still. Crossposted at Whistling in the Light and Cathouse Chat. Linked at The Uncooperative Blogger, Don Surber, Peakah's Productions, Stop the ACLU, Soldier's Angel, Common Sense Runs Wild, MVRWC, Outside the Beltway, MacStansbury, Right Wing Nation, TMH's Bacon Bits, NIF, Basil's Sunday Brunch, and Mensa Barbie. Technorati : Thanksgiving Del.icio.us : Thanksgiving

An ACLU Thanksgiving...

With apologies to J.R.R. Tolkien and the members of the Pennsylvania delegation to the Continental Congress, 1777. Time: December 17, 1777 Place: Valley Forge, PA; tent of General Washington; the commons, before the Standard Dramatis Personae: General George Washington, commander of the Continental Army; James McHenry, General Washington's secretary; Grimma Wormtongue, attorney for the ACLU General Washington [writing]: Tomorrow being the day set apart by the honorable Congress for Public Thanksgiving and praise, and duty calling us devoutly to express our grateful acknowledgments to God for the manifold blessings he has granted us, the general directs … that the chaplains perform divine service... [a knock interrupts, General Washington's secretary enters] McHenry: General, a Mr. Wormtongue insists on seeing you immediately. Washington: What does he want? McHenry: He says he has a letter from the Pennsylvania delegates to the Continental Congress declaring that any proclamation of thanksgiving cannot make reference to God. Washington: [stunned silence, then] Show him in. Wormtongue: General Washington. Thank you for seeing me. I have here a letter enjoining you— Washington: Give it to me, sir. [Washington reads] I also have these men's signatures on a proclamation to be read from the Continental Congress giving thanks to God for our victories and asking The Almighty to intercede on our just behalf. How do you then give me this? Wormtongue: I met with the gentlemen privately and convinced them it would impose an undue coercion upon those who do not hold your—or their—Judeo-Christian religious beliefs, and persuaded them to urge you to issue a non-religious statement of gratitude. Washington: Who then would you have us express gratitude to, if not to the Providential Hand of the Most High God? I have my authorization and your plea has no virtue. Mr. McHenry? See this man from the camp. [December 18, in the commons before the Standard, the army assembled. We laggards come in late...] Washington: ...for solemn thanksgiving and praise. That with one heart and one voice the good people may express the grateful feelings of their hearts, and consecrate themselves to the service of their Divine Benefactor;... and their humble and earnest supplication that it may please God, through the merits of Jesus Christ, mercifully to forgive and blot them (their manifold sins) out of remembrance... " [fade]   Yes, I've taken liberties with the historical record. Washington's troops, in summer uniforms (if any uniforms at all), some barefoot, short on food, were actually on their way, through a bitterly cold winter, to their winter camp at Valley Forge when Washington read to them the Thanksgiving Proclamation issued by the Continental Congress.   There was, thankfully, no ACLU there to object to Washington's reading of the Founder's words. There were only American patriots, from a wide array of colonies, braving the cold, undersupplied, facing a long and bitter which many of them knew from experience would be difficult to survive.   Many did not survive.   But these were men who, for the most part believed in the Hand of Providence and trusted their cause, their lives and their service to Almighty God. And those who did not share that religious faith respected the deep faith of their commander-in-chief.   Shall we bow to the Wormtongues among us today and accept the secular "Thanksgiving" the ACLU and its ilk would have us celebrate? Are we thankful for our comfort, our possessions, our achievements? Thankful to whom? To ourselves alone, apparently—at least in the public arena—if the ACLU has its way.   THANKFULLY, those who braved the winter at Valley Forge, short on provisions, without even adequate shelter or clothing, were not members of the ACLU... nor, dare I say, would they be today.   I thank God for the First Amendment which, counter to the ACLU's twisting of it, allows me to practice my faith—or not, as I choose—in public, freely, without any right of any government or court to interfere, no matter what some court may claim. This was bought and paid for by the blood of patriots: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. It doesn't say that religious expression is excluded from the public arena, as the ACLU would increasingly have it.   If I could wish one thing for America for Christmas (not "the Holidays"), it would be to erect an impenetrable "wall of separation" between the ACLU and the free expression of religion in the public arena beginning with Thanksgiving and Christmas.   As a start. Then we could work on the rest of the year. CLICK HERE for more. And be sure to catch Jay's Thanksgiving post at Stop the ACLU, as well as "Happy Thanksgiving, ACLU" at TMH's Bacon Bits. Crossposted at Stop the ACLU Linked at Diane's Stuff, TMH's BAcon Bits, Don Surber's After Hours' "Anonymous Open Post" (heh), Pajamas Media/Stuck on Stupid, Robinik.net, Basil's Thanks Giving" and Cao's Blog This was a production of Stop The ACLU Blogburst. If you would like to join us, please email Jay at Jay@stoptheaclu.com or Gribbit at GribbitR@gmail.com. You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll. Over 130 blogs already onboard.

Jo's Cafe: QOTD

THE Quote of the Day is from Jo's Cafe referring to the flap about N.Z. Bear's arcane and idiosyncratic ranking system, "spam" filtration, etc. Jo hits the nail on the head and then clenches it tight with: "What is most important is who you are and does your blog reflect you and are YOU comfortable with who comes and reads. I spent all this month dealing with diabetes as much as I could. Did everyone read the posts? Probably not, but then again, I have received some wonderful e-mails from folks thanking me for a particular post. When I get those, I don’t care if the ecosystem even is out there. I end by saying — Thank you to all those that do stop by here, even if it’s to scroll down past recent posts to find the SOTD and do a trackback. I read 99.9% of all the trackbacks btw—isn't that why we do them really?" Amen. Preach on sister!

Around and about ;-)

Some posts I've *cough* "noticed" today... Committees of Correspondence says "I support the Fiscal Watch Team Offset Package [well, I would too, except I'm also waging a small guerilla war against a certain ursine... ] Help curb all the unnecessary spending in Congress." The Real Ugly American posts, "From France: What Fires? What Riots? It is a matter of riots in certain neighborhoods around urban centers, those infamous ghettos which one finds in American Cities too. Elsewhere life goes on as usual." [The peasants are revolting. Now, if they'd simply bathe more often and eschew their goat-loving, woman-stoning, head-chopping ways... ] Those Bastards! posts: Man, that's really not holding your liquor. From MSNBC.com: A 32-year-old Norwegian bartender was sentenced to six months in prison Wednesday for serving a customer so much tequila that he fell into a coma and died.. [Yep. But I'd call this as much a case of Darwinian micro-evolution as anything else.] Once more, from Committees of Correspondence, an observation about the benefits of violence: "One Tin Soldier-The Rest of the Story. One Tin Soldier also known as The Ballad of Billy Joe had a certain vogue once as a Peace Anti-War Song, whose message is, "Violence is Never the Answer". I never understood that... Today we have those who genuinely believe that "Violence is Never the Answer". To the Evil in the World they are like Dodos."  [Duh, of course. "But the meek shall inherit the earth!" Yep. About 6'x6'x2' worth... ] Those Bastards! proclaims, "Man, that's really not holding your liquor" and notes the story: "A 32-year-old Norwegian bartender was sentenced to six months in prison Wednesday for serving a customer so much tequila that he fell into a coma and died... " [A case of Darwinian micro-evolution at work, friends. Charge the bartender with being a practicing Neodarwinist and move it right along...]  [Pajamas Media/Stuck On Stupid Blog is tryin' to tick me off with its elitist stuff, cos "Yes, I have no pajamas, I have no pajamas today!"]  "Pajamas Media Trackback Party The Name of this blog has changed to: Pajamas Media / Stuck On Stupid Blog. The referrer URLs are: http://pajamasmedia.ws , http://pajamasmedia.us and http://pjmedia.us [And here's a trifecta from IRIS Blog. Each of which earns a "Duh" in its own right. BTW, what's Bloggiquette on how many "Duhs" are allowed in one post?]  "IRIS Exposes Reporters Stealing Others' Errors. Journalists repeatedly act like students cheating on an exam, where the same error propagates around the room because of "group-think." Here are some that eluded fact checkers multiple times... [And...] "Strategic Victory Achieved in the Ongoing War Against Israel ...The Rafah Border Crossing Deal... How committed are the Palestinians themselves to preventing weapons from being smuggled from Egypt into the Gaza Strip, or from the Gaza Strip... [And...] "Evidence the "Paris Riots" Are Actually the "French Intifada" This entry will be updated regularly, because it may be the only comprehensive documentation of the Intifada-like elements of the French rioting. [Yeh, and since the French don't have a Charlemagne—oops! Charles Martel... Chalemagne was the grandson— this time, maybe the Mussie's desire for a "do-over" of The Battle of Tours will go differently for them this time...] More as I notice 'em... (and do notice that this includes more actual content from me than any number of comparable citations/link doobies at Instapundit and his groupies.) Linked at bRight and Early and Basil's Picnic Lunch

Well, slap me down with a wet noodle...

The NYT publised an at least halfway sensible piece on... nuclear energy! Stop the world. I wanna get off and see if it's just my head spinning or what. Can Nuclear Power Become Just Another Business? Well? Can it? Will loony left moonbats let it? And if it does, will some miniscule element of the Mass Media Podpeople's Army not shoot it in the back? Perhaps even an element with Momentary Sanity "Disorder" at the NYT? Let's see: Other countries, especially China and India, are likely to build more nuclear plants and to do so sooner. "People are talking about China building 20 to 21 new reactors," said David M. Schanzer, utility analyst at Janney Montgomery Scott. Well, in a business piece (in a paper notoriously hostile to any business that doesn't toe its own political correctness line), this is about as good as it gets. Misses the critical information that the (many more than 20 or 21) nuclear power plants already being built by China are almost all of the ultra safe, ultra low waste pebble bed reactor type, which is also much less expensive and less technically demanding than traditional reactors of the type that Three Mile Island conjures up. Why does the NYT article still play up the investment (and other) risks of nuclear power and ignore the safety, financial advantage and technical ease of building pebble bed reactors? Maybe because their business section doesn't talk to their science/technology guys or even that their sci/tech guys aren't aware of pebble bed reactors. Heck, here's an MIT site devoted to modular pebble bed reactors. Downsizing even what the Chinese and others are now doing. A little homework would have improved the NYT article, but then, research in areas foreign to its political agendas isn't exactly the NYT's strong suit. Heck, I'm not even going to do your work for you, it's so easy. Just google "pebble bed reactor" now that you've heard about it from a long-in-the-tooth musician/comptechie. Linked at Don Surber's "Of Course There's an Open Post" and others later...

Happy Thanksgiving, Diane! (DOUBLE OPEN POST!! and STACLU Contest)

Today (Wednesday) is Diane's Thanksgiving Day, since her husband's working all day tomorrow and it was either "A day early or six days late". heh. Soooo? So how about everyone links to Diane's Wednesday Open Trackback Alliance Post and tracksback to her with a (early) Thanksgiving Day greeting, eh? She'll be busy putting the finishing touches on her cornbread stuffing and all the other trimmings, but when she's able to sit down for some blogging tomorrow evening, it's be great to have her Open Trackback Alliance post filled with well-wishers. 'K? Post on any topic, of course, but please put a "Happy Thanksgiving, Diane" in there somewhere with a link to her. Then trackback to her... and to here (with a link to this post in yours, of course :-). Here's the link to Diane's Open Trackback Alliance Post for Wednesday. Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family, Diane! BTW, here's the trackback URL to Diane's post, as well: http://www.dianesstuff.com/wp-trackback.php?p=258 BTW, Stop The ACLU is running an Open Trackback Post/Contest. Trackback to this post's URL with something like "Contest" somewhere in the subject line and you might win a Stop the ACLU T-shirt. If I win one off this post, I'm gonna ask that they give it to "Joseph" to wear in a live nativity scene scheduled for display on public property, somewhere. Open Post info: Edit a post (or posts :-) of your own that you want to have featured here to include a link to this post. Trackback to my trackback URI (just right-click on "trackback" at the foot of this post and select "copy link" or "copy link location"--however your browser indicates). If your blog software can't send trackback pings you can use Wizbang's Standalone Trackback Pinger. If you have trouble, please leave a comment. I'll try to help. Be sure to reference the Open Trackback Alliance blogroll and the Open Trackback Provider blogroll in my left sidebar. The more you play, the more folks will see your posts! Linked at Big Daddy, Rempelia Prime, Don Surber (of course :-), The Political Teen. (And a few more after I get some coffee in me... a few hours from now. Need. Sleep.) No matter WHAT N.Z. Bear says... :-) Hey! Tell ya what. I'll figure a way to work any trackbacks to this post into a long-winded roundup that oughta sail past N.Z. Bear's "SPAM" filters until he decides to block alla my stuff for some arcane reason. If your trackbacks AND the roundup post are recognized, cool. If not, you'll at least get some links counted. heh Technorati : Thanksgiving