Silent Running: Taking up the torch from War Now.

2003-05-07T05:35:00.000-07:00

Big Hair? At this point, I think I can only say that sometimes simple directions aren't the best for obscure routes, and I can't take complete responsibility for someone's tardiness on Saturday...hey, at least I called and asked. Now about that big hair thing....and do I have to cut holes in all my jeans now?

2003-05-07T01:21:00.000-07:00

EVERYBODY'S PROBLEM The stout-hearted roast beefs of Old England at Samizdata (hi Alice!) weigh in on this whole "I'm not anti-semitic, I just hate the Jews" meme being produced by the Left in the UK. As usual, read the whole thing.

Anti-Semitism is a problem for us all, because civilisation-destroying evil is a problem for us all. Would Marxist nutters be trying to take over Europe right now if Europe hadn't annihilated a vast swathe of its own cultural topsoil sixty-five years ago? I wonder. In considering the Holocaust, most attention has been given to its direct victims, as is appropriate. However, we must also consider that it was a form of self-administered lobotomy for Continental European culture [ ... ] ... Tom Dalyell, the Leader of the House accusing Blair of having built his war policy on "being unduly influenced by a cabal of Jewish advisers”, rather than on any kind of moral or political substance. As Jack Straw (one of the “cabal”)’s spokesman responded: "If these reports are accurate, these remarks are too unworthy to be worth a comment." I agree, in theory anyway. But Mr Dalyell also said, "I am not going to be labelled anti-Semitic." Well, sorry Mr Dalyell, but you are anti-Semitic. Objecting to the influence of British MPs on the basis of their Jewishness can hardly be described as anything else. And I am amazed at the new respectability anti-Semitism has achieved since the growth of left-wing anti-capitalism inspired by the actions of good nations in the war. [ ... ] The kind of brain that can turn liberation into annihilation in one fell slander is not the kind of brain we want festering in the UK. I don’t know exactly how we’re going to deal with it, but we are definitely going to have to find ways soon. Otherwise the next suicide bomber might indeed turn up in Oxford Street M&S, and it might be you or me who gets blown to smithereens in the frozen ready-meals section. And the next person who tells me that targets should not attract trouble in the first place can go and live in Switzerland and get citizenship there and then write me an essay entitled, "What would have happened in WWII if the UK and the US had acted like us." Zionism: it's not just for Jews anymore.

And for any anti semites who might think we're rattled by them, well, okay we probably are, but when the going gets tough, the tough buy Israel Bonds! $46 million from New York on Sunday! Suck on that! (Hat tip - Meryl Yourish, recently seen at services with a handsome airman. Watch this space for salacious lies and filthy gossip...)

2003-05-06T22:02:00.000-07:00

Anyone care to guess... the hair colour of the girl who can't remeber where she parked her car this afternoon and is now out looking for it while I take the whole class by myself? You're not helping the stereotype Nadene.

2003-05-06T20:48:00.000-07:00

For no reason at all... Here's my Amazon Wish List. Go ahead and analyse me. BTW its birthday season in the Hill tribe. Father was first I'm next and whats-his-name in last. So will I get a flatering sumary of achievements like father got or will he finally publish one of these alleged stories he has about me. Perhaps the threat of retribution deter him once again?

2003-05-06T05:42:00.000-07:00

WHAT I'M LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW I don't want to give anyone the impression that I'm some sort of angry loner, holed up in his apartment, obsessing about enemies and plots and muttering "You talkin' to ME?" at the mirror or anything. But lets face it, it wouldn't be terribly wide of the mark at the moment, what with the antisemitism, and the violence against Jews that isn't being reported in the media, and the paralysis of the Jewish community leadership (such as it is), and just the general atmosphere of gathering doom. When the longest-serving MP in the House of Commons can get away with casually suggesting that powerful Jews in America and the UK are conspiring to start a war in Israel's interests, then I think it's safe to assume nothing good is waiting around the corner. A cursory examination of Jewish history would suggest that a few warning flags ought to go up. Of course, in the most extreme circumstances, when the torch-wielding mobs start roaming the streets looking for Yids, we can employ our Secret Semitic Survival Tactic of all crowding together in the nearest highly flammable synagogue to chant tehillim. One of these days, that's BOUND to actually work! In the meantime, I'm listening to The Men They Couldn't Hang, and "Ghosts of Cable Street".

England, 1936. The grip of the Sabbath day In London town the only sound Is a whisper in an alleyway Men put on their gloves and boots have a smoke before they go From the west there is a warning of A wind about to blow Liek Caesar marching to the East Marches Mosley with his men Dressed in their clothes of deepest black Like a gathering hurricane This is the British Union With its flag of black and red A flag that casts a shadow in Berlin and in Madrid Chorus: So listen to the sound of marching feet And the voices of the ghosts of Cable Street Fists and stones and batons and the gun With courage we shall beat those blackshirts down So mile by mile they come on down To a place called Cable Street And other men are waiting there Preparations are complete Mosley comes so close They now can see his outstretched arm A hand raised up that way Never took the future in its palm The battle broke as the fists and the batons fell From the barricades came the sound of the wounded yells Jack Spot burst through with a chair leg made of lead Brought down a crashing blow on Mosley's head And so we learn from history generations have to fight And those who crave for mastery Must be faced down on sight And if that means by words, by fists, by stones or by the gun Remember those who stood up for Their daughters and their sons

2003-05-06T02:38:00.000-07:00

I'M NOT ANTI-SEMITIC, BUT... ...we have to do something about all these damn kikes.

The Labour MP Tam Dalyell yesterday scornfully brushed aside accusations of anti-semitism but stood by the allegation that has landed him in political trouble, that "there is far too much Jewish influence in the United States" and one over-influential Jew in Tony Blair's entourage.

Things have come to a pretty pass indeed when reality itself is so over the top that satire becomes redundant. I suppose the obvious question that needs to be asked of Tam Dayall is, what precisely is it he wants to see happen to resolve The Jewish Question? Banning Jews from the civil service? Removal of civic rights, including the right to vote and stand for election to Parliament? Instituting background checks on all government appointments to see if they have any taint of Jewish blood? Of course, you realise it's been tried before.

2003-05-05T10:50:00.000-07:00

Odd...
Imshin doesn't say anything about having a party....

2003-05-05T06:14:00.000-07:00

Remembrance Day for the Fallen of Israel's Wars and Israel Independence Day 6-7 May 2003 - 4-5 Iyar 5763

Thanks to Imshin for the link.

2003-05-05T03:12:00.000-07:00

And by the way...
If you get a chance to go to services with Meryl, do so. As a bonus, it was teacher appreciation night, and I got to see Meryl get some recognition for the work she's been doing for the past few months. A wonderful, relaxing evening, even if I did have to call three times for directions, and had to break it to her that the 'money man' picture is backwards...

2003-05-05T02:54:00.000-07:00

Technical annoyance kinda thing
And no, I'm not talking about the three rounds of caged death match that I endured yesterday trying to come up with a decent CSS based three column design for our new Moveable Type weblog. New Weblog? Yeah, yeah, keep your pants on, going to be a couple of days before its ready for prime time, since I wasted most of the weekend on the red herring of a CSS based design *sigh*. Nope, what I'm on about is this: I'm surfing around through non-commercial sites (like, weblogs), I'm sitting, minding my own business reading an article at someone's personal site, and all of a sudden, in the background, pop-up city. Usually one trying to emulate some bogus 'memory low - increase now!' or 'your downloads are slow - make em fast' bullcrap. Noticed it for a couple of months now, but it has really gotten to bug me lately, because I've been paying attention to where I've been before these things pop-up, and I'm not hitting any 'smoking gun' locations. I've gone in and manually hunted down and killed all the little ad server cookies I could locate, and any others that look to be 'helping to enhance my web surfing experience,' to no avail. Call me a control freak, but I really hate it when the damn machine does things for reasons that aren't apparent. 'Puters only do exactly what they're told to, and I don't really relish the idea that someone has told my machine to stick this crap in my face at regular intervals. Needless to say, if I could somehow induce a really bad case of athletes foot upon the people responsible for this annoying crap, you'd easily be able to spot them in public, because they'd be walking awfully funny. All that aside, don't go away kids, because we are within mere days of the launch of the newest internet phenomena (yes, after ranting about egregious advertising practices, I'm not averse to engaging in it myself) -

Silent Running TV!

Best part is, no increase in TV tax for our readers in the UK.

2003-05-03T23:16:00.000-07:00

THE ARTFUL DODGER'S LATEST MOVE IN THE CHESS GAME OF LIFE Not satisfied with marrying Sasha Castel, a merger of two bloggers so influential there was talk that the Securities Exchange Commission might have to examine it for possible violations of federal anti-tust laws, Andrew Dodge, one the very few Republican/Tory vampires in captivity, is making a bid for literary immortality. Needless to say, our would-be overlords in the Brussels-based Fourth Reich do not come away unscathed...

Andrew Ian Castel-Dodge is an author, reviewer, blogger and soon to be game designer, as well as an occasional actor and lead singer of a rock band, Recently he was the solo star of a documentary filmed in London. Here we release the first in his series of three cyberpunk novels set in a decaying European Union. Below you will find And Glory, in the coming months Blogcritics will publish the two other novels in the trilogy. You can order this e-book for the price of $3.99.

2003-05-03T16:01:00.000-07:00

Middle East Peace Phase II What you want to bet that if we took two divisions and a couple of Air Force wings and rolled on over into Iran, we would be greeted by throngs of Iranian celebrants in the streets? If I was Mad Mullah, I wouldn't be saying things like this.

2003-05-03T11:56:00.000-07:00

And there I was.... Right after Sept 11, I was assigned duties as a force protection battle captain at the base I was stationed. Late one night, some soldiers on my shift were bored so they started watching a DVD. It was The Ladies Man. I'm not sure if you have seen this movie, but there is a scene where he is going around showing an audition tape to radio stations. For comic effect, the producer splices about 15 sound bytes in a row of the ladies man saying "DOGGY STYLE". As luck would have it, this man walks into my office and wants a briefing about the force protection status of the base while the ladies man is echoing "DOGGY STYLE" in the background. I'm standing there with my mouth open with a very frightened look on my face. He didn't say anything to me, but my battalion commander let me have it the next day. PS.. if he doesn't look familiar, he is the guy that was giving the daily CENTCOM briefings during the war.

2003-05-03T07:55:00.000-07:00

Its Saturday in the US of A, so you know what that means...
Frank is spreading more filthy lies about Glenn Reynolds. In this week's episode: The Manchurian Candidate connection... And what the hell is up with the moped?

2003-05-03T05:38:00.000-07:00

A SINGLE JEWISH GRANDPARENT... ...was all it took for you life to be in danger under the Nazis. And they didn't particularly care if you were a Christian. And today it seems some on the Left have dusted off a few of the old documents from last century's earlier flirtation with European Unity for a more modern, but no less sinister purpose. Link via Andrew Sullivan, who I don't think quite realises the full, ghastly significance of the final reference.

...quoted Labour Member of Parliament Tam Dalyell, the longest serving member of the House of Commons, as saying he thought Blair was unduly influenced by a cabal of Jewish advisors. Margolick said Dalyell named Peter Mandelson, a former Blair cabinet member, Lord Levy, Blair's chief fund-raiser and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, an Anglican who has a Jewish grandparent.

Is it just me, or was there a sudden chill? The Nuremberg Laws were quite specific and detailed about race. Here are the operative sections.

ARTICLE 2. (2) An individual of mixed Jewish blood is one who is descended from one or two grandparents who, racially, were full Jews, insofar that he is not a Jew according to Section 2 of Article 5. Full-blooded Jewish grandparents are those who belonged to the Jewish religious community. [ ... ] ARTICLE 4. (1) A Jew cannot be a citizen of the Reich. He cannot exercise the right to vote; he cannot hold public office. (2) Jewish officials will be retired as of December 31, 1935. In the event that such officials served at the front in the World War either for Germany or her allies, they shall receive as pension, until they reach the age limit, the full salary last received, on the basis of which their pension would have been computed. They shall not, however, be promoted according to their seniority in rank. When they reach the age limit, their pension will be computed again, according to the salary last received on which their pension was to be calculated. [ ... ] ARTICLE 5 (1) A Jew is an individual who is descended from at least three grandparents who were, racially, full Jews... (2) A Jew is also an individual who is descended from two full-Jewish grandparents if: (a) he was a member of the Jewish religious community when this law was issued, or joined the community later; (b) when the law was issued, he was married to a person who was a Jew, or was subsequently married to a Jew; (c) he is the issue from a marriage with a Jew, in the sense of Section I, which was contracted after the coming into effect of the Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honor of September 15, 1935; (d) he is the issue of an extramarital relationship with a Jew, in the sense of Section I, and was born out of wedlock after July 31, 1936.

So here we are in 2003, after having supposedly won the war and driven a stake through the heart of the fascist beast; and an MP in the House of Commons, the Mother of Parliaments and the supposed guarantor of the rights of Englishmen, is busily denouncing the Foreign Secretary as a Mischling in the second degree!

2003-05-03T03:46:00.000-07:00

FURTHER TO THIS WHOLE "CULTURAL VICTORY" MEME... Ian Murray, at "Edge of England's Sword", notes the latest polling on British atitudes towards foreign countries indicates that decades of Europhilic media brainwashing appear to have been washed away more or less in an instant, and we're back to where we should have been all along, side by side with our American cousins and damning the French for cowards and the Germans for bullies. Capital!

The research, carried out at the tail-end of the conflict in Iraq, shows three quarters of Britons (73%) consider America to be Britain's most reliable ally - with Australia getting the second highest poll position with one in 20 (four per cent) naming it. European countries do not fair so well, with France, Germany and Ireland considered Britain's most reliable ally by just one per cent each.

It's interesting to experience this modern phenomenon of old patterns of belief and behaviour reasserting themselves after lying dormant in a morass of post-modernist decline-of-the-west cultural relatavist nonsense for so long. I'm becoming more and more convinced that most of the people on the Left aren't seriously interesting in reforming Western civilisation, with correcting its imbalances and making it live up to its own ideals. I believe many, if not most of them, actually hate their own culture and want to see it destroyed. Largely because they are starting to realise they have no hope of ever gaining power through democratic means. Their ideas are increasingly discredited, and their influence had already been starting to slip before September 11th, 2001. That date of course provided all of us with a bucket of ice-water in the face, and the Left is now is very serious trouble. Last night on my way home from work, I passed the usual suspects sellng Green-Left Weekly on the Flinders St/Swanston St corner, right next to the Railway station entrance. They were shouting "End the Occupation, all foreigners out!" with exactly the same fanaticism and singular lack of success as the occasional Christian fundamentalist street preachers. Am I alone in wondering if the experience of being totally ignored and proven definitively wrong over the Iraq issue may produce a wave of domestic political terrorism in the not too distant future? Some of these people are desperate enough to consider it. Their world view is collapsing, the certainties they live their lives by are challenged as never before, and their prescriptions for a better world incresingly regarded as irritatingly childish and nonsensical. Some of these people are going to snap soon, and a Baader-Meinhof/Red Brigades/Weathermen-style 70's flashback is not beyond the bounds of possibility. That, or a comeback tour by Bony M, and I couldn't say which would be more damaging. In the meantime, I for one welcome some of the older relationships and attitudes that are now being re-established. And just to screw with the Left's collective head some more, here it is, your weekly moment of Anglospheric Zen.

England's Answer By Rudyard Kipling Truly ye come of The Blood; slower to bless than to ban; Little used to lie down at the bidding of any man. Flesh of the flesh that I bred, bone of the bone that I bare; Stark as your sons shall be -- stern as your fathers were. Deeper than speech our love, stronger than life our tether, But we do not fall on the neck nor kiss when we come together. My arm is nothing weak, my strength is not gone by; Sons, I have borne many sons, but my dugs are not dry. Look, I have made ye a place and opened wide the doors, That ye may talk together, your Barons and Councillors -- Wards of the Outer March, Lords of the Lower Seas, Ay, talk to your gray mother that bore you on her knees! -- That ye may talk together, brother to brother's face -- Thus for the good of your peoples -- thus for the Pride of the Race. Also, we will make promise. So long as The Blood endures, I shall know that your good is mine: ye shall feel that my strength is yours: In the day of Armageddon, at the last great fight of all, That Our House stand together and the pillars do not fall. Draw now the threefold knot firm on the ninefold bands, And the Law that ye make shall be law after the rule of your lands. This for the waxen Heath, and that for the Wattle-bloom, This for the Maple-leaf, and that for the southern Broom. The Law that ye make shall be law and I do not press my will, Because ye are Sons of The Blood and call me Mother still. Now must ye speak to your kinsmen and they must speak to you, After the use of the English, in straight-flung words and few. Go to your work and be strong, halting not in your ways, Balking the end half-won for an instant dole of praise. Stand to your work and be wise -- certain of sword and pen, Who are neither children nor Gods, but men in a world of men!

Read it to your local neighbourhood Professor of Sociological Femino-Linguistic Analysis. With any luck, his head will twist right off...

2003-05-02T19:45:00.000-07:00

Yawn Presented with a situation such as the one we are facing in Korea, if I was POTUS, I would simply BOMB THE FUCK OUT OF THEM. Why does an idiot like Kim, Jong Il think he can play with the big boys? Hey kimchi breath, it doesn't matter if you have nukes, your missiles that deliver them take three days to fuel, arm, and launch. Go ahead and roll one out on a launch pad and see how long it and your country continue to exist.

2003-05-02T19:24:00.000-07:00

No surprises here
United States Of America - The most well-renouned country in modern day times.
The militaristic superpower, the United States
of America are also known as the bossiest
nation.

Positives:
Known Worldwide A Beacon to Others. Powerful. Fast Food. Negatives:
Bossy. Despised by Most Others. Elitest.

Which Country of the World are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

2003-05-02T19:06:00.000-07:00

KNOWN FOR HIS MORDANT WIT... Alastair Campbell is Tony Blair's Director of Communications and Strategy, and by this acount of 10 Downing St on the eve of war, deserves to be one of the stars of "The West Wing".

The Prime Minister is working on his broadcast announcement to the nation that British troops will tonight be engaged from "air, land and sea". How should he begin it? "My fellow Americans," suggests Campbell. Tony Blair does not even begin to laugh.

I dunno, I nearly wet myself when I read it! I cabn just imagine Toby Zeigler coming out with a line like that. Then there's this other President Bartlett moment...

"I want to end with God Bless You," he says. There is a noisy team revolt in which every player appears to be complaining at once. "That’s not a good idea." "Oh no?" says the Prime Minister, raising his voice. "You are talking to lots of people who don’t want chaplains pushing stuff down their throats." "You are the most ungodly lot I have ever . . ." Tony Blair’s words fade away into the make-up artist’s flannel. "Ungodly? Count me out," complains speechwriter Peter Hyman, who is Jewish. "That’s not the same God," the protesters insist. "It is the same God," says the Prime Minister, scribbling fiercely on his text.

2003-05-02T16:34:00.000-07:00

Let me guess... IT'S THE J.E.W.S! They want someone in power that they can easily label a terrorist or dangerous, someone you should be afraid of and be ready to attack. I have a suspicion that Mr. Abbas may not live to see his policies come to life because the "Fear Party" is a dangerous machine and peace makers tend to have abbreviated careers i.e. JFK, Gandhi, and MLK. I do believe that George Bush has gone on record as saying he will not deal with Yassar Arafat. So I guess that blows your little stupid theory straight to hell. Moron.

2003-05-02T11:35:00.000-07:00

Odd pairing, interesting results
For some reason this strikes me as the oddest pairing since Bing Crosby and David Bowie. Frank J and Bill Whittle: The Interview Sessions. Go take a bathroom break, spread some plastic sheeting over your keyboard and monitor, and then go on over and check them out.

2003-05-02T06:52:00.000-07:00

I have been thinking... I never knew that G. W. Bush served in the military, and even was a pilot (or maybe I just did not pay too much attention to the fact during the election campaign). So I was pleasantly surprised last night. Sure, it was a PR stunt, and not a bad one, either. But coolness aside, I think it is a plus to have a president who has some idea about how military operates, especially in times of war. It is not for nothing that so many Israeli PM's have been former generals. While thinking about W's background, and how much (or little?) I was able to learn about it during his election campaign, I remembered the time just before the elections, as I very often have been since 9/11. Just a couple of days before the vote I had a conversation with a neighbor, who told me she was going to vote for Bush. As one of the major reasons for this she gave the need to support the military, which has been severely undermined under Clinton. Despite the fact that I voted for Gore, this actually seemed like a pretty good reason, although at the time it still did not sound important enough for me to change my mind. Then she mentioned something that stuck in my mind, and that was the bombing of the USS Cole. It did not make much sense to me at the time, and we did not get a chance to elaborate on the issue, but I kept thinking about it repeatedly. I don't think I was even fully aware of the existence of al-Qaida and bin-Laden at that time, and that bombing seemed just like an isolated incident. It was in the ME, after all... Of course, after 9/11 everything became so much clearer. I don't know much about my neighbor’s and her family's background, and if they are connected to the military, or some information sources in any way (which could have explained her being better aware of the imminent danger than other ordinary people). What I am curious about is how many people who were in a position to know, actually knew, and how much hell did they, or did they not try to raise over the issue during the Clinton years. I am especially curious how many of those people were Republicans. Like, say, members of various classified committees of Congress. I am also wondering why was it that the Republicans tried to topple Clinton not over security and defense concerns, but over Monica Lewinski issue.

2003-05-02T05:15:00.000-07:00

A MODEST PROPOSAL Okay, so the Saudis are so inbred they're starting to produce an insustainable proportion of genetically damaged offspring. This is what happens when cousins marry. It's called genetics, it's been known for a while, you might try cracking a few science textbooks other than "Selling Crude Oil for Fun and Profit". Never fear though, Laurence Simon has a Cunning Plan that once again reassures us that beneath his cuddly exterior beats the granite heart of a ruthless, sadistic maniac. But funny, so we forgive him! The plan is - import the Palestinians as fresh breeding stock!

Forgo the mythical "Right of Return" in United Nations Resolution 242 and instead welcome, embrace, and frequently hump the Palestinians into your cultures. Actively keeping them out of your cultures and bedrooms for a few generations should have had the desired effect of keeping them genetically distinct enough to breathe some life into your gene pools. I know, I know... there's a danger in treating the Palestinians as mere gene samples. They're batshit insane and bloodthirsty right now after Yasser Arafat's soaked them in the anti-culture of hate for a few decades. It would be like trying to breed pandas that have wolverines and sawblades glued to them.

Unless you're into that sort of thing of course...

2003-05-02T03:34:00.000-07:00

THE MOST POWERFUL MAN IN THE WORLD I know Michael Douglas muttered weakly that it was just a metaphor as Annette Benning advanced on him in the Lincoln Bedroom in "The American President", but check out that photo of Bush in his flight suit again. Has that guy got a package on him, or what? Another spinoff benefit of today's little action-hero stunt is, apparently, going to be a series of medical mishaps among leftist New Zealand commentators.

The best thing about this entire Bush jetting onto the Abe Lincoln thing is that Russell is going to pop a blood vessel. McLauchlan may well have a coronary. And would you look at that tackle...I know he's cinched up tight in the parachute rig but crickey! No wonder the man is taking on the islamo-fascists.

Well, I guess any red-blooded male, upon experiencing a carrier landing, might be a tad...excited. Meanwhile, Donald Sensing reports on a nice bit of Navy protocol.

In the Navy the custom is that when a commanding officer visits a ship, he is announced aboard by a bosun who simply states the name of his command. Hence, the commanding officer of Sixth US Fleet is announced, "Sixth Fleet, arriving." When that moment came today, the bosun called out, "United States, arriving!"

What, all of them? Better let the mess crew know... Oh, and here's my favourite quite from "The American President":

President Andrew Shepherd: My nervousness exists on... several levels. Number one, and this is in no particular order, I haven't done this in a pretty long time. Number two, uh, any expectations that you might have, given the fact that I'm... you know... Sydney Ellen Wade: [approaching seductively] The most powerful man in the world? President Andrew Shepherd: Exactly, thank you. I think it's important you remember that's a political distinction; it comes with the office. I mean, if, uh, Eisenhower were here instead of me, he'd be dead by now.

2003-05-02T03:14:00.000-07:00

THESE PROCEEDINGS ARE CLOSED!

2003-05-01T20:10:00.000-07:00

Sleeps with the Swishes?
Are we going to see the gay rights activists up in arms about this one? Tales of the Fairy Godfather. Fugedaboudit....

2003-05-01T18:55:00.000-07:00

Well, color Glenn dissappointed
Glenn isn't all that impressed with the President flying out to the TR -

The jet-pilot arrival, on the other hand, rang false. The whole leader-who-flies-jets thing seems, somehow, Third World to me. People say that it'll make great campaign footage in 2004, but I actually doubt it -- or at least, I think it will backfire if they do too much of this. The President is commander-in-chief, but he's a civilian leader, and Americans want him to be one.

Sorry Glenn, jets onto carriers is waaaay cooler than a sax and some cheap sunglasses. I maybe, possibly, might think this was just a bit of a stunt if he jetted out, made the speech, then left. But he isn't leaving. He's spending the evening with 5000 or so American Sailors and Marines that have spent 10 months - almost an entire year - the longest recent carrier cruise, participating in not one, but two major campaigns. Belittle if you will the potential useage of footage for the campaign trail, but this is as much about the C in C visiting his troops. That, plus anyone that's ever gotten the kick out of flying a jet wouldn't eeeeeven pass up the chance for a carrier trap, with the bonus that he gets to swap carrier landing stories with dad now. Yes, the American people want a civilian leader. That's what they've got. Emphasis on leader - a component that was sadly lacking from the previous administration. But go ahead and cluck if you have to, Prof....

2003-05-01T18:12:00.000-07:00

So, what's up with this?
Very intriguing questions in an article by Tim Graham over at The Media Research Center. Looks like all the major American Networks that were all too happy to give George Galloway face time for his anti-war hystrionics have been, well, absolutly mute on the subject of Mr. Galloway, and the evidence that he accepted payoffs from Saddam. There is also a one liner that mentions that apparently Jim McDermott (Ba'athist - Washington State) took about five grand for his legal defense fund from the Iraqi Ba'athist contractor that arranged the trip he took to Baghdad so he could go on camera and call Bush a liar. Where's the coverage? Oh, right, it got bumped for more outrage over missing clay pots, and the lack of 132 premium cable channels on three TVs per household, even in rural areas of Iraq. (Via The Corner)

2003-05-01T16:09:00.000-07:00

The Commander in Chief
Ladies and Gentlemen, today George W. Bush made history, by being the first sitting President of the United States to make a trap landing on a US Navy Aircraft Carrier underway.

REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Good on ya, Mr. President.

2003-05-01T13:01:00.000-07:00

And you thought he didn't care
Well of course he does! As an example, Laurence has thoughtfully designed this easy to review and learn poster for aspiring ~~bulldozer bait~~ ~~loonbat morons~~ sensitive souls willing to be ruthlessly used by a thinly veiled organization collaborating to assist the Pelestinian campaign of terror. No, this post was not fabricated simply as something to put up to remove that really, really nasty 'old!' marker that he's using on his blogroll for unupdated blogs. Talk about your negative re-inforcement...

2003-05-01T07:20:00.000-07:00

RESISTANCE IS FUTILE I enjoy playing computer games, especially those huge-scale build-your-own-civilisation thingys such as, er, Civilisation. There's one thing that occasionally happens in Civilisation III that always makes me feel particularly good, and that's when a city belonging to a rival civilisation wakes up one morning and realises my culture is incredibly sophisticated, powerful, attractive and wealthy, but their own is still holding committee meetings to decide whether to investigate this "wheel" invention any further, while dealing with an increasingly powerful groundswell of opposition to this highly dangerous and untested new technology, "fire". And bless their little cotton socks, they say "Sod this, we're backing the winner" and suddenly I have a delegation of civic notables outside my Palace asking for permission to become part of my kingdom. Or republic, or People's Democratic Socialist Arab Jamhariya, or democracy or whatever scheme for relieving the plebs of their money I've got going at the time. And the borders of my civilisation expand, amid much rejoicing. And if I continue to build up my cities, installing wonders of the world, ruling peacefully and well, with a healthy, employed, educated public living long and prospering, why it's entirely possible that all the other nations of the world may one day have to admit that I'm the dog's bollocks, the cat's whiskers, and various other things indicating that I have won the sweetest victory of all - Cultural Domination! It's happening right now for real. Can you feel it? All I have to go on is myself of course, but it's clear that if I were a city, I'd have defected to the United States already. Since September 11th, I've found myself coming to sympathise with, empathise with and increasingly identify with the USA. The attack on America was also an attack on the modern democratic Western world. The World Trade Center represented all of us, not just America, and New York is definitely the capital of the world. When it was attacked, I felt violated. It was an attack on us all. It was an attack on me. I find myself 19 months after the event to have become intellectually assimilated by America. My political frame of reference has shifted completely. My internal map of the world used to have London at its centre. Coronation St, Bruce Forsthye, Morcambe and Wise and the Queens Christmas message were part of my upbringing. When I visited London as a teenager, I found that it was not unfamiliar. I was able to navigate the Tube system easily, I knew where the important public buildings were, the language and culture were utterly familiar to me. It was different, but it wasn't in any sense "foreign". At university, politics were still UK-centred. "Thatcher!" was the worst epithet available, and the Left were still banging on that "The Miners! United! Shall never be defeated!" (They were. By Thatcher!). Billy Bragg, Neil Kinnock, and privatisation were part of the background to political discussion in New Zealand at the time. If there was a cultural cringe, if we were looking over our shoulder, it was in the direction of London. But now, I find all my ideas coming from New York and Washington. Not always from Americans mind you. Andrew Sullivan and Christopher Hitchens are both Brits, but they live in the US. I'm ordering books by Dinesh D'Souza and from Amazon.com, and wondering if David Horowitz isn't perhaps just a little too over the top. I curse the Dummycrats, and rejoice when Cynthia McKinney and her ilk are driven from office. God held me, I even know what the demographics of the 4th Congressional district in Georgia are, and whether cross-party voting is allowed in the primaries (they are, which is how Denise Majette was able to defeat McKinney thanks to Republican votes). American politics is now my passion, which is a shame, as I used to be able to give anyone who cared to listen a blow-by-blow description of the train-wreck that was the Bermondsy by-election! (Which gave us Peter Tatchell, who still hasn't learned to shut his gob I note) Not any more. The centre of gravity has shifted, and for me, and many, many others I suspect, the navel of the world is now Times Square rather than Westminster. America is, without perhaps even meaning to, in the process of winning a cultural victory in the great game of nations. Osama bin Laden, who is without doubt tactically a very clever, cunning and shrewd man while simultaneously being in strategic terms as dumb as a rock, said something quite smart (by accident I'm sure). He said when people see a weak horse and a strong horse, they will naturally prefer the strong horse. We do. It's America and the cause of freedom. I'd bet the farm on that nag.

2003-04-30T22:34:00.000-07:00

Cry Cuddly and let slip the Bears of War! Ok it's not Shakespeare, but they are cuddly. Say hello to the newest products available from Silent Running The Shop. These bears are available in either green or camo uniforms as seen, with either the Army or Marines T shirt saying "My dad liberated Bagdad and all I got was this lousy teddybear". Now before we leap on the sexist wagon and try to run me down with it, I only had room for the two samples. If anyone wants one that says "Mom, brother, sister, bloke I once met in a bar" or anything else just email me and I'll set it up and pass you the link. I'm also happy to provide any artwork if you want something else on the t shirt. Silent Running will not be making anything from the sale of these bears as I've set them up to sell at cost, however NMFA will be collecting a percentage. Don't let that stop you from purchasing any of our other fine products though, or you can help us to go pro by donating with the link up top. --------- Army Bear ----------------- Marine Bear ---------

2003-04-30T13:26:00.000-07:00

Place your bets, place your bets please
Reports are that the bombers at Mike's Place in Tel Aviv were operating with British Passports. Anyone care to lay odds on exactly how long it will be before the name 'Finsbury Park' pops up? Maybe it won't, but somehow I get the feeling that I won't be too surprised if it does.

2003-04-30T08:40:00.000-07:00

Paging Dr. Bill, Dr. Bill, pick up on line 7
Dr. Bill has some sound medical advice, and a few things on other, um, crap.

2003-04-30T08:36:00.000-07:00

Hey kids, its Career Day
In Frank's world at IMAO. Tom Daschle gets it in the chops! The only thing missing - you guessed it, monkey pictures. No, wait, he's got those too. So, there you have it, a little something for everyone, from the man with the cojones (que grandes son, ese! Chuleta!) to expose Glenn Reynolds as a hobo killing, satan worshipping puppy blender. Ooops, there is one thing missing. Frank has apparently neglected to recommend that everyone come over here and toss us a buck or two to help us escape evil, evil Blogger. We're confident that Frank will remedy that shortly, even if he does call us a bunch of cheapskates in the process.

2003-04-30T06:23:00.000-07:00

Public Service Announcements: Allison has written an overview of Israeli English blogs, and she is lucky enough to have been able to do it as part of her day job. Go check it out. Hopefully, next such overview will include your's truly. A new group blog, Free Speech, is looking for contributors. If you are interested, go and send Del an e-mail.

2003-04-29T17:51:00.000-07:00

Double Tap
There was another homicide Bombing in Tel Aviv today. The day the Pali 'Prime Minister' was elected and 'denounced' terrorism. On Yom HoShoah. And the targetted location? A pleasant little bar, called 'Mike's Place', very close to the US Embassy. A favorite hangout for - wait for it - Americans. This was in a letter to Kathryn Lopez, posted over at The Corner

It is one convenience store away from the extremely well-secured American embassy. It is owned by two Israeli/American brothers--Assaf and Gil and caters almost exclusively to American expats--tourists, long term residents, embassy staff and even American forces ages 18-80 (literally). Assaf plays the blues in a band called Southbound Train, a band that has given many of us who have spent time in Israel a desperately needed taste of home. He is also a consummate bartender in the "Sam Malone" style. They throw one heck of a Fourth of July party.

Hand these idiots a road map, and the first thing they do is jerk the damned wheel and head for a tree while stomping on the gas. The apologists had best keep their distance, and their yaps shut. They have the freedom to open them to be sure, and they may get the lesson of a lack of FREE-dom in dental work. They can all go and toss themselves in front of buldozers for all I care. This isn't desperation. This isn't hopelessness. This is rabid, insane, out of all sense of control evil run amok. The timing and selection of this event could not have been better chosen to send a 'message'. They may think the message is that they are unstoppable, that no one is untouchable. Wrong. The message they've just sent is 'yeah, we want some of that. Come and kick our asses.' The message that they've sent is that there is a cancerous growth, festering in the territories, that will not be treated with kind words, or medicine, or tender loving care. It is a tumorous infestation that must be cut out, and simply killed, for it has absolutely no place in a peaceful future, and will do everything in its power to ensure that such a future is farther and farther away. No road map can be followed until they are gone. No plan can succeed lest they are stopped, forever. No peace can be had with these murderous bastards that will not stop until one or the other is dead. Them or us. And I would prefer to spit on their graves, thank you very much.

2003-04-28T22:35:00.000-07:00

Birthday Boy This young man is having his birthday tomorrow but I thought I'd get in early so you all have time to say happy birthday to him since he'll be here in the morning to read all your thousands of messages. Anyway, here he is, not long after he joined his first ship in 1951, HMNZS Bellona at the age of 16. He had joined the Navy 14 months earlier thinking it looked more interesting than this school thing. At least one of his relatives approved as one of his aunts observed "those trenches are hell boy"... err right... anyway. He travelled about a bit, tried out the first "Mr Whippy" franchise on a warship... AGGH! No pater not the stick!! Moving along, he spent some time in a few ships: HMNZS Tamaki HMNZS Philomel HMNZS Bellona HMNZS Lachlan HMNZS Pukaki HMNZS Royalist HMNZS Wakefield HMS Pembroke HMNZS Blackpool HMNZS Inverell In April 1968 he was given an LS & GC for having stuck around so long. In June 1977 it was The Queens Silver Jubilee Medal for not being caught, then another LS & GC in April 1983 for having stuck around for a really long time. Finally in 1984 he was made an MBE for sticking around for a really long time and never getting caught. Seen here getting it pinned on by another chap who was a boy seaman several classes ahead of him back in 1950, Sir David Beatty. After thirty seven and a half years he decided to give something else a go. All this and he manged to squeeze in being responsible for me and Bruce.

2003-04-28T14:32:00.000-07:00

Not Like Sheep to the Slaughter. Alex posted some of the following in Russian. I googled for an English version, and found it here:

Yossel Rakover's Appeal To G-d In the ruins of the Ghetto of Warsaw, among heaps of charred rubbish, there was found, packed tightly into a small bottle, a testament, written during the ghetto's last hours by a Jew named Yossel Rakover. Some extracts are written below: "I am proud that I am a Jew not in spite of the world's treatment of us, but precisely because of this treatment. I should be ashamed to belong to the people who spawned and raised the criminals who are responsible for the deeds that have been perpetrated against us or to any people who tolerated these deeds. I believe that to be a Jew means to be a fighter, an everlasting swimmer against the turbulent human current. The Jew is a hero, a martyr, a saint. You, our evil enemies, declare that we are bad. I believe that we are better and finer than you, but even if we were worse, I should like to see how you would look in our place! I die peacefully, but not complacently; persecuted but not enslaved; embittered, but not cynical; a believer, but not a supplicant; a lover of G-d, but no blind amen-sayer of His. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our G-d the Lord is One. Into your hands, O Lord, I consign my soul."

Tonight, and tomorrow is Yom Hashoa - The Holocaust Day. Update: I would like to thank Michal Cahlon for alerting me to the possibility that the piece is most likely a literary fiction. I find it very powerful nonetheless.

2003-04-28T07:08:00.000-07:00

Who says some people...
don't have a sense of humor? My favorite

Have you heard the one about Saddam and Sahhaf [Baghdad Bob] on the banks of the Tigris? A man on the other side raises two fingers in a victory sign. "What happened?' asks Saddam. "Did we win the war?" "Don't be stupid,” Sahhaf says. "He means there’s just two of us left."

2003-04-28T05:28:00.000-07:00

YEAH? AND YOU POINT IS...WHAT EXACTLY? The culture faddists are gnawing at the grain store of Western Civ again. Better get the poison pellets out...

Schools should reconsider the New Zealand content taught in classrooms if they want to encourage more foreign fee-paying students into the country. Pamela Barton, education programme director for the Wellington-based Asia 2000 Foundation, says short-term students with no prior knowledge of New Zealand culture can struggle because they do not know our background, history and geography.

Well, seeing as they have come to New Zealand to go to school, maybe they could, I don't know, LEARN IT? Just a suggestion...

Rangitoto College principal Allan Peachey saw nothing wrong with teaching NZ literature and history to foreigners."What better way to master the language," he said. "I see nothing wrong with Asian students studying our culture. We should never apologise for our history or literature."

True enough, but with one vital caveat. New Zealand can never apologise enough to the world for allowing Vincent Ward to escape from the Maximum Security wing of the NZ Film Institute and make his way to America. That twit totally wrecked Alien 3 before the studio realised what was going on and replaced him with David Fincher, but by then it was already too late to save the picture. WRECKED IT! Killed off Newt, rendering Aliens utterly meaningless, celibate psychotic killer monks repenting in an isolated monastery...mind you, it was almost worth it just to see Charles Dance get his head bitten off. For what it's worth though, I apologise for Vincent Ward. We're really, really sorry. Really.

2003-04-27T23:09:00.000-07:00

And yet again. If you have not already
Go and marvel at the brilliance, and the style, that is Bill Whittle's writing. Victory An absolute wonder to behold.

2003-04-27T11:19:00.000-07:00

EVOLUTION IN ACTION I'm just reaching the end of the most remarkable book - "Evolution" by Stephen Baxter. Scared the living crap out of me it did.

Baxter's hominid history is framed by a story set in 2030. A visionary palaeontologist, Joan Useb, is trying to convince her fellow scientists to embrace the next evolutionary leap forward, a "cognitive breakthrough" allying the global connectivity of new technology with "older primate instincts of cooperation". It's a last-ditch attempt to save the ecosystem and "stave off the human-induced extinction event". But ironically the final holocaust is not man-made; it comes from mother earth. In Baxter's Evolution , volcanic eruptions, impacts from comets, ice ages and indeed evolution itself destroy our delusions of grandeur and remind us that we are just naked apes, unique ones, perhaps (after all, we're the only ape that sweats), but still just "animals embedded in an ecosystem".

Since beginning this book, I've been seeing almost everything in Darwinian terms. On watching a mini-series on the sinking of the Titanic, the behavious of the men in getting the women and children on the lifeboats first ("Be British! Be British!") suddenly seems less disinterestedly altruistic, or "good", and more like a calculated survival strategy to preserve their genetic heritage and send it safely into the future. A mother with one child is frantically searching for her other baby, when one of the ship's officers tells her the last lifeboat is leaving, and suggests that saving one child is more important than trying futilely to find the second. The mother is torn, but agrees he's right. Better to save one genetic inheritance than lose both. Just looking at the TV takes on new meaning. Seeing a silly sit-com where a bunch of teenage girls are lying around the bedroom, brushing each other's hair and giffling about their boyfriends is an instant flashback to the socially significant grooming rituals of the African savannah. It makes me wonder how much of our supposedly free and autonomous individual behaviour is actually programmed survival traits. Some behaviour which we think of as noble and self-sacrificing turns out to actually be hard-wired long-term survival mechanisms. While sometimes fatal to the individual, they tend to benefit the wider group, especially the chances of offspring and breeding females to continue on. Robert Heinlein menmtions the story about an incident that occured many years ago near his home town. A young couple were crossing the railroad tracks, when the girl got stuck. A train was coming, and was clearly going to hit her. A hobo who was nearby saw this, and began helping the girl's partner try to free her. Both of the men could have saved themselves by jumping free, but they both kept struggling to save the girl as the train bore down on them. All three were killed. Now you might say the girl's partner had more reason to stay with her than the hobo, who had no connection to either of them. You could say both men showed nobility and character. And I wouldn't argue, I think that's exactly what they were showing. But in this circumstance, nobility and character were the outward psychological manifestations of an ancient inner voice demanding that potential breeding stock must be saved at almost any cost. Two men died, but the potential benefit if they had succeeded in freeing the girl was worth the sacrifice. Reading this book is actually a bit depressing. For one thing, humanity doesn't make it. And for another, it makes me question my own sense of self. How much of what I do, say and believe is actually me being a unique individual, and how much is just the hard-wired evolutionary code talking?

Roughly the first third of Evolution (200+ pages) is devoted to the stories of our pre-human grandparents, whose daily lives consist mostly of foraging, flinging shit at one another, and fleeing predators. Although Baxter's depictions are brilliant, with some inspired conjectures to spice up events, there's only so much drama that can be squeezed from foraging, shit-flinging and predator-fleeing.

Sounds like a normal day at the office to me. "Evolution" is having a similar effect on me as Olaf Stapeldon's "Last and First Men" and "Starmaker", which is to say, it's making me philosophically dizzy, dpressed and uplifted at the same time. If you haven't read Stapeldon, do so at once. His perspective is so incredibly distant in time that you can be surprised to shut the book and find yourself still in the 21st century. It all helps put minor things like the war in Iraq into a decent perspective. In the end, most things are pretty insignificant. "Evolution" is like a minature version of the Total Perspective Vortex from Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Read it and prepare to be crushed by the weight of Time itself!

2003-04-26T17:46:00.000-07:00

Tim Blair is ATTACKED!
But fortunately, lives to relate the tale of a pitched, back and forth battle, from which he barely escaped with his life. Archives are still bloggered, but it should be near the top.

2003-04-26T14:37:00.000-07:00

Russell, Nerd is spelled with an 'e'
Sometimes I've noticed that some of the most militant non-smokers are in fact ex-smokers. Apropos of nothing, but I can't help but make the same observation about Russell's post about Gene Rodenberry's vision of life in Star Trek=Marxism. He's correct, and states the case very well, as always. But the vehemence...hmmm. He does admit, somewhat grudgingly, that he watched quite a few of the episodes, including Voyager. C'mon Russell. It was really Seven of Nine, wasn't it? Or was it a Janeway thing? Hmmmm. Tell it all brother, tell it all. And yes, Farscape was much better television sci-fi, not just because it was made in New Zealand.

2003-04-26T13:53:00.000-07:00

Another referendum on the internet
Is being sponsored by Frank over at IMAO. There is absolutely no truth to the rumor that Frank was unable to convince former President Carter to oversee the fairness of this election, and report an incidents of polling place violence, having to settle instead for getting Cedric from the Quick Mart stoppin by with a 6-pack to check out how it is all shakin out. Head on over and make your voice (and mouse click) thunder! Vote MONKEY. Vote often! And remember, vote MONKEY. (This has been an unpaid public service announcment, in no way connected with anything. Really.)

2003-04-26T06:51:00.000-07:00

In other news from The Reynolds State
Or, other details you could go without hearing about. Happy to bring them to everyone's attention. Ouch. But there is an opportunity to vote in a useless poll, after you involuntarily flinch.

2003-04-25T19:21:00.000-07:00

Puzzlement
I can understand someone disagreeing with a political position, or heaping scorn on a statement that they do not agree with. But can someone explain to me why it is necessary for some on the left to basically misrepresent, in other words lie, about a position or statement and then whip up an argument more to their liking? Is it an extension of the post-modernistic approach, in that everything is perception based, and therefore, if a group feels threatened or like raising a snit about a pet issue, that anyone going anywhere near it is subject to being the opponent to their argument, whether or not the points made are relevant to the activist's argument, or only in a broad tangential way? And is it also a necessary part of this tact to ascribe motivations, thoughts, and concepts not enunciated by the target of such use, so long as it furthers the straw man argument? Apparently so. In three recent episodes, this pattern of assault, that of basically advancing a lie, has been employed. To bring these episodes up will certainly, to some, indicate that I'm talking about racism, or religion in the classroom, or sodomy. I really don't want to talk about any of those things. See, I can't get to the merits of those discussions, because I keep getting stuck at the point of realizing that a lot of the folks making the most hoo-ha out of the events in question are lying. Plain and simply, lying. Example number one. Trent Lott's asinine off the cuff boneheaded remarks at Strom Thurmond's birthday gathering. Holy crap batman. Yeah, I saw the video on that, and at the time, I recognized that I'd probably just witnessed one of the dumbest things I'd ever hear a sitting politician say. I did not, however, hear Trent Lott fervently endorsing Jim Crow, or slavery, or any number of other things that the critics of his remarks ascribed to him. I also was not able to telepathically discern exactly what was on Trent's apparently over gigglish and vapid mind at that particular moment. But just because I missed it, to listen to quite a few of the folks throwing rocks, you could have almost bet that he was broadcasting with such psychic volume that dogs in Alberta Canada began barking, for no reason that their owners could discern. And those two things - insinuation of the meaning that Lott left wide open, and ascribing specific damning thoughts to the man - were the basis of the pasting that he received. I'm glad to see he stepped down as Senate Majority leader, to be sure, but glad not because of anything that my imagination has spun up from his idiotic comment. Example number two - although this one didn't grow legs like examples one and three, it is in it's own way is just as disgusting a display as the others. On the 7th of April, Education Secretary Rod Paige, answering a fairly broad question during an interview by a religious publication on the topic of what type of University he'd like his kids to go to, gave a reply that included the phrase

"[...] But, you know, all things being equal, I would prefer to have a child in a school where there's a strong appreciation of values, the kind of values that I think are associated with the Christian communities, and so that this child can be brought up in an environment that teaches them to have strong faith and to understand that there is a force greater than them personally."

Now of course, because Rod used that 'C' word, even though he was using it in an analogous way, almost immediately the attempt was afoot to portray him as evil incarnate, wanting to introduce Christian based religious teaching into every public school room in the country. That of course, is a flat out lie, in that Mr. Paige indicated no such thing, nor expressed any such desire. Nevertheless, the extrapolation, the piling on based on that lie virtually portrayed Rod Paige as just this side of zealotry, stirring up rifts and divisions in society, and anything else that could be thought of short of blaming him for cats and dogs not getting along. The whole thing was so ridiculous on it's face that it faded as quickly as it sprouted, although, you can be sure that if Mr. Paige's name comes to prominence again, we'll likely see it be trotted out for some additional mileage. Which brings us to example number three, the pot currently on the front burner of the stove, getting a liberal stirring. So exactly what was Rick Santorum going on about? Was he really saying that gays were in the same category as bestials or those that practice incest? No, he wasn't. He was commenting more on his position that the laws governing sexual relationships and practices is best handled via the legislative versus the judicial process. However, sexuality in general ia a hot button topic, and an esoteric, dry argument over the separation of powers under the constitution isn't going to attract nearly as much attention as the discovery and denouncement of a real, live, public gay basher. Only one small problem; again, it is based on a lie. A misrepresentation to create a straw man, then using it as a righteous reason to rant and rave, with Sen. Santorum as the grease on the treads to get it all rolling. And this latest one, like example number one, has grown legs, and is running. Running wild. Santorum's point, which actually seems a better argument to have, is of course lost in all the noise. The lie has taken on its own life, and the battles being waged swing at it in earnest. Take, for example, Andrew Sullivan. I can easily understand that Andrew would have quite a lot to say on the subject of gay rights, and sexual liberty, however, his current assaults on Santorum, or rather the straw man effigy, do neither of those causes any favors.

But Santorum has gone far further than disagreement. He let it slip that he believes gays should be put in jail for our relationships. I'm sorry but that kind of statement is unacceptable, non-negotiable, intolerable. The Senator must withdraw it. I worry that the president means well but just doesn't get it. So let me put it another way: Senator Santorum believes that the vice-president's daughter should be made a criminal for her relationship.

One of two possible comments on this passage - either it's Andrew who 'doesn't get it', or Andrew doesn't care to 'get it', preferring to pillory the straw man. That, rather than engage in the examination of in which venue these things are best settled, for good - via legislation, of via the courts. By his use of supporting material, which appears all built on the same house of cards, it appears that Mr. Sullivan chooses not to 'get it'. If the phrase 'then the law, sir, is an ass' is really the issue, and I think that is the point, then why are we not discussing that? Why are they expending all this time attempting to figuratively burn the witch? I find that I must agree with Senator Santorum, or at least my read on what his point actually is, in this particular instance. While there is ample reason to believe that Santorum's personal views do not hold homosexuality, its forms or its practices in high regard, that is not the basis of his indictment. What that is, is that if society has changed so much that the practice of homosexuality, and its forms, are socially acceptable, then in fact, the law, she is an ass. And such laws, specifically with regards to sodomy, should be re-examined by the various legislative bodies of those states that still have such laws, and repealed or modified to better fit the sensibilities and practices of the society we live in. As I perceive Senator Santorum's concern, I share it. By addressing this issue via the courts, and using this as another opportunity to construct a framework for an argument as to the existence of 'sexual rights', it is of great concern that by opening that door, and giving that concept credence, it would only be a matter of time before it was used to strike down, despite the sense of society as to their necessity as expressed through legislative action, the various laws proscribing bestial or incestuous or other such conduct, on the basis of the 'rights' argument. Put simply, and just as simply pooh pooh'd and dismissed, the slippery slope. Have that argument. Advance whatever cause you believe in or see fit to live your life by. However, Andrew, please make your arguments honestly. It would be so refreshing to for once see an argument at this level that wasn't based upon a lie. ::Update:: To provide point of reference, here is the full text of Senator Santorum's remarks. Hat tip to Angie Schultz.

2003-04-25T16:43:00.000-07:00

New Zealand Taken For a Ride. What is the penalty for Nation Conversion anyway? When I went to bed last night I lived in a small, moderately well off, fiercely indendent South Pacific island nation. This morning I awoke to find we were now anchored just off Holland and permeant mooring posts were being sunk to hold us there. At first I assumed it was an ANZAC Day prank by boy racers who had had what seemed to be “a good idea at the time” and they had taken us for the mother of all joy rides. If only. It turns out that we have joined that Axis of Weasels. I shit you not, Dear Leader Helen observed ANZAC Day by toadying, snivelling and grovelling to the EU and generally selling our collectively souls. Ha, she won’t get much for mine even if she can find it. How pleased would you be to find out your nations representative had stood on the world stage and declared “only the EU has the moral right to undertake the rebuilding of Iraq”? Not satisfied with slanging of the US, first claiming that the US operation was failing (?????), then that there never would have been a war under Gore (no Sept 11 either?). She then headed off to piss the Aussies off by saying NZ is so morally superior that it would not join in an unjust and illegal war just for the sake of trade agreements. Attila the Hen managed to actually look surprised when the diplomatic backlash came – the US Ambassador here described her comments as “unfortunate", the diplomatic equivalent of cocking a derringer in a poker game – and she had to apologise in writing like an errant schoolgirl. Now we are sniffing around the foul stench of the collective EU’s asses in the hope of picking up some crumbs. Woo hoo! We got a visa free six months for Kiwi’s to stay in Belgium… hold me back! All it took was the trampling over the twitching bodies of our former alliances. It was exactly this time back in 1942 when we had asked the US for help and thousands of US Marines where steaming across the Pacific to set up camp just over the hill from here. The Japanese were quite close, this time the enemy is a lot closer. I’d like some help here please. I don’t need a division of Marines (haven’t done any shopping for the long weekend so I couldn’t feed them). But if the US made an offer of some real cheap F16’s to a centre right coalition here, assuming one wins the next election – you can’t offer one to a left coalition because they renege on the signed deals – it would go a long way towards us getting a leadership that even vaguely reflects the nature of our people. Lets see, could have gotten Bush, Blair, Howard or Clark. Fuck did I get the short straw. I don't think so Helen.

2003-04-25T16:32:00.000-07:00

Thanks Glenn
For mentioning Silent Running (the movie), but dissing us completely. And we have something about trees! Not Bruce Dern gone whacko ice your friends kinda nutso about trees, but we mention them! Hell, trees are even part of our logo! Hey, some of us like Star Trek too. And Might have even caught an episode or two of Deep Space Nine, Voyager, or Enterprise. What, so we don't speak Klingon? Never talked to Murray after a few six packs, I see. Just when you think you're occaisionally noticed by someone, something like this has to happen. This calls for some more Cap'n Crunch.

2003-04-25T11:23:00.000-07:00

Bold 'new' proposal? The North Koreans propose we give them everything they were getting from the '94 deal, and then some, and then maybe we can talk about their nukes. I propose they prove they've got nukes by setting off their test shot in downtown Pyongyang. Right after they use it as a suppository for Kim Jong Il. Just wondering when Kim Jong's stupidity level is going to cross the Chinese "that's enough of THAT crap" level.

2003-04-25T11:03:00.000-07:00

Is he dead?
Speculation runs rampant. Although there hasn't been a confirmed sighting in some time, there is sketchy evidence that this bane, this hideous beast, whose activites absolutly could not be ignored, may have finally met with what some consider a well deserved fate. A proper approach to handling him was discussed, and discussed, and discussed some more. But now he seems gone, but is he really? Can the world truly sleep better, or is it just a ruse, a sleight, or imagination run wild due to the inordinate fixation on the issue? Saddam? Nah. Osama? Not even. Meryl's woodpecker. Actually, the picture reminds me of a tennis ball. Does Maintenance Guy have UN credentials? How else will the French believe his report of what he finds? And which room is maintenance guy?

2003-04-25T10:34:00.000-07:00

Disturbed by the hubbub over reconstruction contracts? Think Dick Cheney is a money grubbing so-and-so?
Then you may want to take a look at Noels's piece over at Sharpknife (of course, as usual, blogger is, well bloggered, and archives are hosed. scroll to the 'haliburton' entry). Gots all the goods. Nails them whats deserves to be nailed. But good. You get em, Noel. None of them bastages staggers out alive....

2003-04-25T00:47:00.000-07:00

IT'S ANZAC DAY - BE ASHAMED. BE VERY ASHAMED. That's the message from Australia's trendy Left, as delivered via a cartoonist and an actress on SBS's "Insight" item this afternoon. It was one of those TV current affairs shows that makes you want to put a fist through the screen. One of those items where, as the head of the RSL (Veterans association) talks about the recent war in Iraq, the camera operator thinks it's clever to zoom over his shoulder and focus on a statuette of two Gallopoli veterans on the bookshelf. Probably thinks that was really clever and insightful. And can someone tell me why leftist intellectuals still think they look more intelligent, compassionate, concerned and committed if they're smoking cigarettes? It's that whole Left Bank, Jean-Paul Satre, black turtleneck sweater thing. You can view the entire item (around 15 minutes long) here. For those of you without high-tech Yankee technology in the form of broadband connections, you can read the transcript here (scroll down to the bottom to the item entitled "Patriotism"). And for the even lazier, here are some of the edited highlights from the game.

BILL LEAK, ‘THE AUSTRALIAN’: I see our involvement as an extension of, or part of a period of great shame and disgrace for this country. Bill Leak is one of Australia's leading cartoonists, commenting on the state of the nation every day. BILL LEAK: I know that it's become a cliche, already, for people to say, "For the first time in my life I feel ashamed to be Australian." But I've felt very ashamed to be Australian ever since the 'Tampa' was turned back. The crimes of a nation are not easily forgotten. And I feel very ashamed of the fact that these elected representatives are seen as an extension of us.

There are elections. People vote. The party which gets support from the most people wins, and implements its policies. It's called democracy, you might care to make a cursory examination of the basics. Don't like the policies? Then support an alternative, and argue in favour of it. If you persuade enough people to your side of the argument, the government will change. See, it's so simple, even a cartoonist could understand it (if he made the slightest attempt)

JUDY DAVIS, ACTOR: The Australian people want this war to stop.

Er...hey Judy, I don't know if you've been keeping up with current events, but it IS over. And just to piss you off even more, we kicked their arses. It made most of the big newspapers. Do try to keep up with the rest. Oh, and on latest polling, your assertion is dead, flat wrong.

JUDY DAVIS: You know, one of the problems with the concept of nationality is that we're asked to take responsibility for what a part of the community - for a government that part of a community has voted for and at times like these, some of those decisions are...they're big decisions involving, as we're seeing now, carnage in a country on the other side of the world. But we can't take responsibility for a man like John Howard. He should be ashamed, and maybe one day he will be.

See above under "Democracy, how it works".

BILL LEAK: The very fact that the Government has been so rigid in enforcing silence and limiting journalistic probing into what our soldiers are doing over there, is a real source of great worry and I think anybody who prides themselves on their nationalism and patriotism should look at that first. Is that something to be proud of? I mean, how can you be proud of something you don't understand? We don't understand what's going on over there and it's just as well that we bloody well don't. It's not our business.

Thanks to Bill Leak for echoing the wise words of that greatest of European statesmen of the 20th century, Neville Chamberlin.

“How horrible, fantastic, incredible, it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas-masks here because of a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing!”

And we all know how well THAT policy worked out!

BILL LEAK: Instead of being an outward-looking nation, aware of its own emerging sort of position in the world and even its own geographical position within South-East Asia, we've suddenly reverted back to being the lickspittle of an American government in the vain hope, or the some kind of fervent hope, that one of these days they're going to be grateful. People...I don't think people are grateful to sycophants. They might need them and they're handy to have around in times of dire urgency, but afterwards, I think they usually just find them repulsive.

Note for non-Australian readers: Unbelieveable though you may find this, it is an item of Holy Writ amongst the Australian Left that this is an Asian nation. In their hatred of Western civilisation, they point to Australia's geographic location as somehow meaning that we have to somehow become Asian, subscribe to "Asian values" (whatever they may be) and repudiate our European identity. And the best way to do that (apparently) is to oppose the United States. And ask regional tyrants if we may please be permitted to lick the blood off their tank treads. Australia actually did this for many years, with former foreign minister Gareth Evans the worst offender. This desire to ingratiate with Asia, pushed so hard by the Left, may well have contributed to Australia's shameful acquiesence in the Indonesian invasion of East Timor, and certainly influenced the subsequent disgraceful silence on the matter. Apparently Australia can only be "independent" when we're sucking up to undemocratic reigimes in Asia, and giving the finger to the world's greatest democracy. Truly, the Left has no moral compass, only the True North Star of anti-Americanism. Everything else is irrelevants.

JUDY DAVIS: Australianness is an idea. They're all ideas that can be used to unite people with generosity, and when I say unite I don't mean you will be just like me, you will believe exactly what I believe in. By unite, I mean you're different to me, you have a different belief structure, and getting to know you will be an adventure because I'll change and you'll change. That's what I would call being united.

That's what I would call being overrun, but what would I know, I'm just a Kiwi blow-in.

BILL LEAK: And I think that we are creating an international image for ourselves with which we are now going to have to live, and it will be for a very long time and I think that when we sift through the history of this particular time, a lot of us will come to the realisation that we've acted like utter bastards.

Unfortunately, he is NOT referring to the anti-war movement. It would be more accurate if he was. I'm sorry, the Left right now is like some end-of-the-world religious cult, holed up in a remote compound, foaming at the mouth about vast conspiracies, and getting ready to drink that big vat of kool-aid because the world was supposed to end, and it didn't, and they believed in it so much, and it must be because they didn't have sufficient faith, or it's all the fault of the Jews..uh, neoconservatives, and it's JUST NOT FAIR! Maybe if we get them surrounded by the BATF.....

2003-04-24T19:11:00.000-07:00

OK, I am back to my normal moderate self. I still think that Arabs are Arabs, but I am no longer mad about the fact that they don't put it in quite these terms on TV. Besides, I realised that morning and day time is a bad time to watch any of the news channels. I guess the news during that time is geared towards dumb houswives like yours truly. They don't want to upset us too much by some serious stuff, lest we burn the onions, or the husband's shirt. I'll have them know that I actually burn the onions when there is nothing interesting on TV, and so I keep sneaking away to the computer, and forget to check the stove. Come to think of it, what's that smell?...

2003-04-24T18:47:00.000-07:00

With friends like these...
Leaping to George Galloway's defense is none other than - ta da! Scott Ritter! George could probably start handing out bullets to the firing squad himself and not quite do as complete a job.

I was shocked to read about the allegations, ostensibly based upon documents discovered in Iraq, that George Galloway was somehow compensated financially by the Iraqi government for championing its cause.

Apparently, Saddam and Tariq swore to Scottie that he was 'the only one' and that they'd 'never done anything like this before...

But I was also shocked because of the timing of these allegations.

Yeah, who knew that as soon as a third party got their hands on the abundant documentation (damn those fascist types and their absolute obsession with writing everything down!), and actually started to read some of it...odd about the timing of all that. Not like you could count on all of the media having a streak of CNN-itis.

Having been on the receiving end of smear campaigns designed to assassinate the character of someone in opposition to the powers that be, I have grown highly suspicious of dramatic revelations conveniently timed to silence a vocal voice of dissent.

Cry me a river Scott. If you can't run with the big dogs, or keep out of the Burger King, stay on the porch, son.

But I do know a few things about George Galloway and the cause he championed with regards to Iraq. I know that he helped found the Mariam Appeal, a humanitarian organisation established in 1998 initially to raise funds on behalf of an Iraqi girl who suffered from leukaemia and who, because of economic sanctions, was unable to receive adequate medical care.

Now, treatment for a chronic condition, and long term care can be expensive, granted, but the amounts being discussed here go a bit beyond a plane tickets for one (uno, singular, solo) Iraqi child and her grandmother, treatment, and room and board at a non-profit outfit. And odd how the structure was set up to specifically avoid outside scrutiny of the books. It's highly, highly suspicious, and reeks of a distractionary poster child set up, using a sick little girl as cover for money laundering.

The case for war, as flimsy as it was in the months before Operation Iraqi Freedom began, has been shown to date to be utterly without merit, as no stockpiles of hidden weapons of mass destruction have been uncovered by the US and British military forces occupying Iraq.

Beat that drum as loud as you can Scott - it could be taken away from you at any moment. This sense of utter denial sounds almost like, excuse the slur, you also were paid to glad mouth the regime...got a spare $450,000 on ya Scott?

To allow George Galloway to be silenced now, when his criticisms of British policy over Iraq have been shown to be fundamentally sound, would be a travesty of democracy.

I'm all for letting him continue to ramble and rant also, but it has nothing to do with any of the apparently paid politcal pronouncments he's been making. It is simply that the more he talks, the more it sounds like a shovel, hitting the dirt, over and over, digging, and digging, and digging. However, I've never been to Iraq. I never met Saddam. How could I possibly have any idea what I'm talking about. Good point. So go, and ask someone who has - they've supplied this email for inquiries - WSRitter@aol.com . Go ahead and ask him, or express your own opinions, directly.

2003-04-24T15:37:00.000-07:00

2003-04-23T13:55:00.000-07:00

New Zealand Population hits 4,000,000! And it only took us twenty years to get there from 3,000,000. According to the dept of statistics, Kiwi # 4,000,000 was born at 17:30 zulu today. Love how precisely they guess. The same method is used by Inland Revenue to work out my tax bill... with a similar number at the bottom of it too. To give you an idea of how small this country really is, in 1908 we hit 1,000,000. Two world wars thinned us out temporality but we bounced back and hit 2,000,000 in 1958. Lots of weetbix and marmite brought us up to 3,000,000 in 1973 and since then our growth has slowed right down, because in spite of being a liberal paradise we just keep on leaving for some reason... go figure. Could it be that we are now officially an international fucking joke with Aussie ministers laughingly telling us not to worry and its "unlikely" the US will bomb us. A bitter man would say this would actually make a nice change since US pilots have killed twice as many Kiwi soldiers as enemy fire in the last ten years... but that would take attention away from the real enemy. Attila the Hen (as father now calls our PM) continues slanging off our increasingly less tolerant allies to the point where we know we're about to get royally screwed and she's off snivelling to the EU in the hope of scoring a trade deal or two by sniffing around the BELGIUMS!!!. We now (all four mil of us) have a leader so out of touch with the country that she fails to notice that every time she opens her yap to dis the team we should be on she takes another hit in the polls. Even Kiwis who have already left the country are changing citizenship in shame. And people wonder why our population is predicted to peak at 4.8 mil then drop.

2003-04-23T12:05:00.000-07:00

So what is a girl supposed to watch while she is cooking? Well, I am getting tired of that FOX TV's cheerful patriotism. I kind of enjoyed it when there was fighting going on, but I have my limits. It is probably just me (reminds me of the Old Country too much, I guess), but I just cannot help it. Tried to switch to MSNBC - not as patriotic, but still dumb. And forget CNN. Besides, when "American Idol" becomes a news item, something tells me I am not about to miss much by turning the tube off. OK, so I'll miss something. So I won't be the first to post it on CP. But I just cannot take this crap any more. I guess it is back to NPR. Damn. Note to Gordo: be careful what you wish for.

2003-04-23T11:27:00.000-07:00

Emily Jones is a Slacker
She's only oppressing, exploiting, or otherwise using at a 2.7 planet rate. Weak. Get up to needing 8.4, and maybe we can talk. I'm going to have to try this again in another language and use the most outrageous values to see if it comes back with something along the lines of 'congratulations, as a non-American you are very Earth friendly and working well towards the future, unlike those resource swilling North American pigs' ::Update Aha! The damn thing IS rigged! Went back through it as a young Nigerian answering in German, from a town of over 1,000,000 that eats meat all day everyday, in between driving my 7 member family around in a gas guzzling car over 150km a day, when I'm not logging my over 100 hours of flight a year...result, only needs 4 planets for that crap! Bogus? I think so....lying greenie bastages...

2003-04-23T06:04:00.000-07:00

Intellectual Gag Reflex
Is how Mark Goldblatt describes part of the thought process of the anti-war left crowd. He makes a good case

There's something more significant going on here than a profound lack of historical perspective or a skewed understanding of the scholarly record. Both of those are signs of ordinary ignorance. But this is willful ignorance — which is much more insidious. It's as if the very suggestion of America's fundamental benevolence triggers an intellectual gag reflex among hardcore leftists. It cannot be tolerated; the system rejects it whole, regardless of the mental contortions that follow, because allowing it to penetrate would gum up the entire works. Concede American benevolence — concede, in other words, what cannot be denied by a reasonable observer — and the epistemological underpinning of radical politics crumbles to dust. Can Gore Vidal continue to publish once that concession is made? Can Noam Chomsky continue to deliver speeches? Can Tim Robbins even go out in public? In such circles, it's become a matter of self-preservation to posit America's essential evil. To posit, in short, a condition contrary to fact. Precisely because our policies seem so well intended, and their outcomes so often benign, critics who operate on the assumption of American malignancy must turn to conspiracy theorizing in lieu of inductive logic.[...]

Sums it up pretty well.

2003-04-22T23:59:00.000-07:00

Apparently my aplication for the Syrian Minister of Information position has been accepted!
Running away? You yellow . . .

What Monty Python Character are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

2003-04-22T23:32:00.000-07:00

Crazy like a Right Wing News Source! This just in from Gordo at NZ Pundit, you know I love a good cause and if we get it I'll be round Gordo's place, knocking back the free tinies and soaking up the real news! Unedited Rumsy! Gad can man live with such joy?

Let's Get Fox News Here I'm concerned that we aren't outraging lefties enough. Consequently it's time to pull out the big guns, namely one of those nasty multi-national media conglomerates like FOX! I've had an initial discussion with SKY television about them carrying it but they keep waffling on about how it has to be commercially viable and they have to get a certain number to watch it etc etc. Personally I suspect the young woman who does the PR about the programming may be a closet lefty. Surely any right thinking person could understand that FOX would quickly become the most popular news channel they carry. What else would people watch?...the BBC?...puleese. Anyway, go and sign the petition, and more importantly, get the link to your mates. We need thousands and thousands (10,000 minimum) so I'm relying on people like YOU-KNOW-WHO to get the petition onto large volume online distribution lists like YOU-KNOW-WHAT.

http://www.petitiononline.com/skyfoxnz/petition.html Our FOX News in New Zealand Campaign Sign the FOX News for New Zealand Petition

2003-04-22T23:20:00.000-07:00

ANZAC Day On the 25th of April each year New Zealand and Australia observe ANZAC Day. A day on which we commemorate our fallen. It is a unique event that both individualises and unifies our nations. It is not a day of celebration or glorification of war, it is not a time of protest against the horrors of war. It is an acknowledgment of the price we, as small nations have paid to earn and maintain our freedom and independence. It is also a measure of of our will. Every town in this country right down to the tiny village of Glenorchy at the northern end of lake Wakatipu, has a monument in its town centre. There was concern that as our WWII vets dwindled, that attendance would fall off over the years, but over recent years numbers have been growing. In particular, many younger people are attending the dawn services and youth organisation are laying wreaths at the many memorials throughout both counties. It has been suggested by some individuals not worthy of mention here, that the observance of ANZAC Day could offend Muslims and should be cancelled. I make no reply to this myself, I will let Mustafa Kemal Ataturk respond. Ari Burnu memorial, Gallipoli. Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives .... You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehemets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours ... you, the mothers, who sent their sons from far away countries, wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well. ATATÜRK, 1934 Here in Wellington the Turkish Ambassador will, as always attend services and take part in the ceremony at the Ataturk Memorial at Tarakina bay. An area selected for its similarity to Anzac Cove, Gallipoli. Similar services will take place at Gallipoli itself, attended by many Aussies, Kiwi's and Turks. ANZAC Day is our most sacred day, it defines us as a people, it sets us apart and will be observed while either country remains above water, if not longer.

2003-04-22T22:20:00.000-07:00

New Word I received the following from Jay:

.Hi Murray What is the correct title for a racist that hates his own race rather than another one ? Perhaps we need a competition to describe Michael Moore as I can't think of an appropriate adjective ! "What we did not expect was to feel so enraged at one point that we almost walked out. It was when (Michael) Moore went into a rant about how the passengers on the planes on 11 September were scaredy-cats because they were mostly white. If the passengers had included black men, he claimed, those killers, with their puny bodies and unimpressive small knives, would have been crushed by the dudes, who as we all know take no disrespect from anybody. -- Yasmin Alibhai-Brown " Jay

Frankly it got me thinking, what do you call someone how goes around running down his own race and basically apologising for being white in a public place. I’ve seen more and moore of this sort of behaviour in the last couple of years. We have our own local version, they wear hand knitted sweaters, bone carvings and over pronounce the hell out of every Maori place name. We call them “plastic Maori’s”. Now that’s not going to cut here, we have to go global so we do actually need a word for this and given that Fat Mikey is the worst example and I’m president of his fan club I’m putting up “Moorest” as the new word for the good people at Oxford English. Moorest adj: a person so consumed with self-loathing and overwhelming sense of inadequacy that they methodically run down and denigrate their own race. E.g. Michael Moore.

2003-04-22T19:26:00.000-07:00

Messages for big game hunters
The paint ball idea would probably kill it, and misses will leave residue of all the attempts. Bad idea. The cat hair idea, on the other hand, has potential. Dog hair works to keep deer away. No. I don't like heights either.

2003-04-22T17:31:00.000-07:00

What the?
Ladies and Gentlemen, the blogger formerly known as John Cat (at least thats what Babelfish called him). Head on over and call him other things, if you care to, for making you think that your bookmarks are jodido. I sense...a change of some sort, can't quite put a finger on it though. Anyway, I think the cat has used up its ninth life, and been re-incarnated, somewhere in the Shallow End.

2003-04-22T17:16:00.000-07:00

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2003-04-22T13:54:00.000-07:00

This just in! NOW devil-woman, Marva Stark, attempts to partially remove her head from her anal orafice.

Stark, who heads the Morris County NOW, spoke Monday with the national organization's vice president, Terry O'Neill. Stark said O'Neill told her that NOW "felt it wasn't the right thing to take a position right now" on either the Peterson case or fetal homicide statutes.

"...wasn't the right thing to take a position on right now." Really? Ya think? I mean, it's not like Laci Peterson's family just officially had their entire freakin' world turned upside down.

"I was thinking out loud," said Stark, who had mused on Saturday that the double-murder charge could provide ammunition to the pro-life lobby.

Yeah, so I'm thinking that maybe Ms. Stark should listen to that little voice inside her head (ya know, the one most of us like to call "common fuckin' decency") and shut her pie-hole at least until after Laci's family has had the chance to bury their daughter and Laci's "fetus?"

2003-04-22T08:24:00.000-07:00

Is this true? If so, ha!
Just got this via an e-mail group. Did a quick check via snopes, but couldn't find anything on it. Unfortunately, no source is attributed. If anyone in the NYC area can confirm or deny, feel free to leave a note in the comments. Ok, here it is -

The FOX News offices in NYC were the frequent site of war protesters during the last month. The following is a sample of the electronic crawls (big LED sign on the front of the bldg.) that the FOX NETWORK ran outside of their NYC headquarters during these anti-war protests: 1) "Does anyone here have a job?" 2) "The most clever sign wins a weekly free vacation to Baghdad" 3) "Who won your freedom to protest ... Protesters, Actors, or, Soldiers?" 4) "CNN agrees with you. They're 2 blocks west & they have free doughnuts" 5) "War Protesters Audition Here Today ... Thank you for coming. Try to look Scruffy" 6) "Attention :Protesters The Michael Moore Fan Club meets on Thursdays. It's the the Phone Booth on 6th and 50th" 7) "Yell as loud as you want; we're still not hiring Phil Donahue"

Heh. Heh heh. ::Update::Courtesy of Jim in the comments section (they do work folks, use 'em!) we have confirmation! Looking at the article, we also see confirmation that of course, several humorless people just didn't get the joke. Waah.

2003-04-22T07:29:00.000-07:00

BUFFY THE NEO-CONSERVATIVE? Lots of zeitgeisty goodness in the episode just screened here in Australia, "Bring on the Night".

BUFFY (solemn) You're right. We don't know how to fight it. We don't know when it'll come. We can't run, can't hide, can't pretend it's not the end, 'cause it is. Something's always been there to try and destroy the world. We've beaten them back, but we're not dealing with them anymore. We're dealing with the reason they exist. Evil. The strongest. The First. GILES Buffy, I-I know you're tired. BUFFY (resolute) I'm beyond tired. I'm beyond scared. I'm standing on the mouth of hell, and it is gonna swallow me whole. And it'll choke on me. We're not ready? They're not ready. They think we're gonna wait for the end to come, like we always do. I'm done waiting. They want an apocalypse? Oh, we'll give 'em one. Anyone else who wants to run, do it now. 'Cause we just became an army. We just declared war. From now on, we won't just face our worst fears, we will seek them out. We will find them, and cut out their hearts one by one, until The First shows itself for what it really is. And I'll kill it myself. There is only one thing on this earth more powerful than evil, and that's us. Any questions?

Yes. When did you start chanelling Bill Pullman's performance in Independence Day? And how long has Donald Rumsfeld been moonlighting as a TV scriptwriter?

2003-04-22T05:24:00.000-07:00

And the obits keep rolling...
in the latest tragedy...killed by little girls. Too bad.

2003-04-22T05:15:00.000-07:00

YOU DON'T NEED A TIME MACHINE TO CHANGE THE PAST Just a publisher and a contract to write history books for schoolchildren from a shiny new, Euro-friendly perspective. Remember how the Vikings peacefully came across the North Sea to trade with the Britons and settle down in a multi-cultural paradise of mutual respect? No, neither did I.

The Vikings have gone from being depicted as pillaging aggressors to skilful, peace-loving traders. In early editions of From Cavemen to Vikings (A and C Black), the Vikings are referred to as 'fierce raiders [who] began to attack our coasts'. But in its 1994 edition, they are described as 'Danes [who] besides being farmers, were much better at trading than Saxons. The Danes and Saxons settled down together and Saxon England became one rich and peaceful kingdom.'

And here was me thinking they were utterly maniacal Norse warriors who looted, burned, raped and pillaged all across Europe, mainly because they enjoyed doing it and it beat the hell out of being cooped up at the head of a fijord all winter with the wife and kids. Guess I'm just a Scandanaeophobe. Neil Gaiman (yes, THAT Neil Gaiman) suggests ways this new form of historical revisionism can be continued.

I think it's a lovely way to teach history, missing out all the slaughter and pillage and burning and going straight to the positive warm fuzzy stuff, and I am looking forward to the next round of textbooks. "People in England and Europe did not get real holidays back then, so the Crusades were started as a way of getting some sunshine and exercise and to help people meet their Islamic counterparts in places like Jerusalem, for multicultural dialogue and a change of air." "It was forbidden for Christians to lend money for interest, which meant that many Jews became moneylenders. This made them them tremendously popular and respected community members all across Europe."

Read his suggestion on how to teach kids about the Spanish Armada, it's a hoot. I imagine Novermber 5th will simply have to be cancelled. No nasty anti-Catholic prejudice in our brave new world, where the history of mankind is apparently going to be written by the Teletubbies. Or the Cultural Re-orientation Section of the European Ministry of Truth.

In Journeys into the Past (Zeitern und Menschen), the traditional image of the Saracens as barbarians is transformed in 2001 to one of a civilised race which lived in peace and harmony with the crusaders. National transformations, such as the division of the Frankish Empire into three kingdoms in the ninth century or the French Resistance in the 1940s become part of a natural evolution towards the inevitable creation of a future Europe.

Someone please tell me when this damn culture war is over, my sword-arm is getting kinda tired...

2003-04-22T04:03:00.000-07:00

IT'S AWFULLY DRAUGHTY IN THE TOWER THIS TIME OF YEAR As we hope MP for Baghdad Central, George Galloway, will be given a chance to discover, while awaiting his execution for High Treason. I don't know what else you could call this!

George Galloway, the Labour backbencher, received money from Saddam Hussein's regime, taking a slice of oil earnings worth at least £375,000 a year, according to Iraqi intelligence documents found by The Daily Telegraph in Baghdad. A confidential memorandum sent to Saddam by his spy chief said that Mr Galloway asked an agent of the Mukhabarat secret service for a greater cut of Iraq's exports under the oil for food programme.

You can read the documents here. They make for fascinating reading. I'm sure this little business of taking Saddam's money had ansolutely nothing to do with Galloway's attempts to halt the war which liberated Iraq. And what does he have to say in his own defence? Something suspiciously lawyerly and Clintonian that ought to ring alarm bells with any halfway decent Public Prosecutor.

Asked to explain away the document found in Baghdad, he said: "Maybe it's the product of the same forgers who forged so many other things in this whole Iraq picture. Maybe The Daily Telegraph forged it." [ ... ] Mr Galloway spoke to The Daily Telegraph by mobile phone. He would not disclose where he was, saying it was "none of your business". When the contents of the letter from the head of the Iraqi intelligence service was read out to him, he quickly came out with a flat denial. "The truth is I have never met, to the best of my knowledge, any member of Iraqi intelligence. I have never in my life seen a barrel of oil, let alone owned, bought or sold one.

To the best of my knowledge, I have no clear recollection of having directly received actual barrels of oil, depending on what your definition of "receive" is. Or "oil". He's going to have to do a LOT better than that when he's up before the beak. Although if I were representing him, I think I'd have the bastard encased in frozen carbonite for the duration to avoid having him self-incriminate. Here is the definition of High Treason: 1. "When a man doth compass or imagine the death of our lord the king, of our lady his queen, or of their eldest son and heir". 2. "If a man do violate the king's companion, or the king's eldest daughter unmarried, or the wife of the king's eldest son and heir". This aspect pertains to carnal knowledge, forced or unforced, of a royal female. The intention of this law is to guard the royal blood from any suspicion of bastardy, whereby the succession to the crown might be rendered dubious. It is important to note that in a monarchy, the transition of rule and the reign of the monarch must be unquestioned, less civil unrest result. 3. "If a man do levy war against our lord the king in his realm". 4. "If a man be adherent to the king's enemies in his realm, giving to them aid and comfort in the realm, or elsewhere". This aspect of the treason law pertains to trading with enemy nations, as well as trading with pirates. I'd say Gorgeous George fits snugly into the fourth definition. So what do we have for our lucky winner today? Oh dear, it really isn't at all pretty... 1. That the offender be drawn to the gallows, and not be carried or walk: though usually (by connivance length ripened by humanity into law) a sledge or hurdle is allowed, to preserve the offender from the extreme torment of being dragged on the ground or pavement 2. That he be hanged by the neck and then cut down alive 3. That his entrails be taken out and burned, while he is yet alive 4. That his head be cut off 5. That his body be divided in four parts 6. That his head and quarters be at the king's disposal You know, since hopping the ideological fence and becoming on of those new-fangled neo-conservatives, I'm increasingly finding myself attracted to the concept of preserving what's solid, worthwhile and wholesome about our Anglospheric customs, folkways and legal system. It really has been far too long since a squad of armed soldiers tromped into the House of Commons to clap one of the MPs on the shoulder and inform him that on the orders of Her Majesty, he was to be conveyed forthwith to the Tower, via the Thames, entering through Traitors Gate. I don't know why people belong to the Left these days, when being a Conservative is just so much darn FUN!

2003-04-22T02:49:00.000-07:00

FRANK IS A FUNNY GUY I have to link to him, or Donald Rumsfeld will have me killed.

"I wanted to talk about more of our military strategy." "Again!" Bush exclaimed, "But I wanted to watch T.V. now. You keep working me like this and I'm going to have to complain to my union boss." "There is no presidents' union!" Rice answered irately. Bush looked confused. "But Ariel Sharon keeps taking my dues each week..." A thought then struck him, and his expression turned to anger. "That Jew bastard! If he just wanted more money to bulldoze Palestinian homes, he could have just asked. I hate those Palestinians, always blowing themselves up. Why don't they just kill themselves?" Rice had a number of things she wanted to say in response, but she decided to let it go. "We need to talk about Syria." "Why can't we just talk about Iraq?" Bush complained, "We kicked ass there. I thought for a moment there was going to be trouble, but then 'zip' 'bang' 'pow', we took Baghdad. Now I just have to set up a new government there chock full of democracy, and people will be like, 'Hey, Bush, you're the best president ever!' and I'll be like, 'Yes I am. Now get me a soda, bitch!'"

IMAO - the only blog with a concealed microphone in the Secretary of Defence's office! Link to him now....while doing so is still voluntary. Reading Frank's hilarious transcripts of the goings-on at the White House reminds me of something Hunter S. Thmpson wrote once about some no doubt drug-induced vision of strolling into the Oval Office, only to find Nixon ripped to the tits, swallowing Wild Turkey by the quart and babbling incoherently about how the Russians were just asking for a good ass-whuppin' with Kissinger calmly taking notes, while the Oakland chapter of the Hells Angels divided up a huge pile of cocaine on the desk by shovelling mounds of it around with the butts of their shotguns. Come to think of it, I'm not sure Rumsfeld wasn't in that fantasy, calmly throwing darts over his shoulder into a giant map and then ordering invasions of the countries they landed on. There was a time when such a vision might have disturbed me...

2003-04-21T10:03:00.000-07:00

Oh now what...
Meryl is sponsoring a Harem over at her place. Fast times in the big city, I guess.

2003-04-21T08:58:00.000-07:00

Another excellent idea - Follow the Money
From William Safire (NYT, free reg req'd)

Why do you suppose France and Russia — nations that for years urged the lifting of sanctions on oil production of Saddam's Iraq — are now preventing an end to those U.N. sanctions on free Iraq? Answer: the Chirac-Putin bedfellowship wants to maintain control of the U.N.'s oil-for-food program, under which Iraq was permitted to sell oil and ostensibly use the proceeds to buy food and medicine for its people. (In reality, Saddam skimmed a huge bundle and socked it away in Swiss, French and Asian banks.)

Maintenance of this program, basically if it means 'money for nothing' sounds like an excellent motive for the current Franco-Russian jerkishness.

My Kurdish friends, for example, who are entitled by U.N. resolution to 13 percent of the oil-for-food revenues, believe their four million people are owed billions in food and hospital supplies. I wonder: in what French banks is the money collected from past oil sales deposited? Is a competitive rate of interest being paid? Is that interest being siphoned off in "overhead" to pay other U.N. bills?

Sounds like there has already been a little bit of mischief afoot - forget selling fantasmagorical intell tidbits, or spare parts contracts on hoeplessly outclassed show piece weaponery, now we're talking some bucks.

What other money trails need to be followed? Few doubt that vast Iraqi assets have been secretly transferred out of the country for years, and especially in the prewar months. This is done through cut-outs, phony foundations, numbered accounts, intelligence proprietaries, leveraged currency speculation through proxies in unregulated hedge funds and a hundred other financial devices. Taken together, Saddam's huge haul is now terrorism's central bank account.

The double whammy of being caught red handed in the cookie jar, and getting the lid slammed on it at the same time is a very, very convincing rationale for the French and the Russians to be obstinate asses at this point. We don't need to be simply combing through the intell HQ documents in Baghdad - we need to let loose a divison of forensic accountants and start tracing all this crap. This, this is what the Europeans fear coming into the open. This is why they resisted so vehemently. How many billions have been purloined? They weren't afraid of simply being revealed as Saddam's facilitators, but as his co-equal partners in the rape and pillage of a nation. Their hands may be covered in blood, but their wallets are fat. For now. And they still have the unmitigated gall to demand payment of 'debts owed,' with straight faces, no less. Someone get me a shoe...

2003-04-21T08:34:00.000-07:00

Anyone have a better idea?
I can go with the Krauthammer solution:

But if the State Department sentimentalists who worship at the shrine of the United Nations insist on a pilgrimage to Turtle Bay, we should go to the Security Council and submit a one-line resolution: "Whereas the sanctions were imposed on the regime of Saddam Hussein; whereas that regime is no more; whereas sanctions are now needlessly preventing Iraq's economic recovery; the sanctions are hereby abolished." No "modalities." No negotiations. No deals. Dare France and Russia to veto. If they do, if they dare so naked a display of cynicism, we then simply declare that the Security Council has demonstrated its utter bankruptcy and forfeited all moral authority -- transcending mere uselessness and becoming now an agent of harm, deliberately standing in the way of the reconstruction of a suffering and now innocent country. We then ostentatiously stand up, walk out and declare the sanctions dead. We then open the oil spigots and rebuild Iraq. It is the right thing to do. It is the only thing to do.

yeah, baby. Hell, yeah.

2003-04-20T20:47:00.000-07:00

Hope for the future
Challenger disintegrated before our eyes. Colombia streaked and tumbled across the Texas sky, recreating that feeling of loss. This week, the man in charge of the program will step down because of this latest failure, a failure that the numbers said was going to happen. The shuttle was always designed as an interim step, one of several steps that we have yet to follow through on. The International Space Station is in a waypoint position, not that of a final destination. We seem to have come to a point where the many many cooks stirring the government sponsored pot are incapable of deciding if it should be soup, and ruining whatever is in there in the process. Meanwhile, no progress is made. Apparently. For some, the dream is still there, alive. And they will give it wings of flight. See now - SpaceShipOne. Thank you, Burt Rutan.

2003-04-20T19:36:00.000-07:00

Deceit, Betrayal, and Double Dealings
Noted with interest Stephen Den Beste's commentary on the discovery of files within the Iraqi Intelligence service files that implicate the Russians and the Germans with some pre-war cloak and dagger activities. Also noted that Russell Wardlow had a rather lengthy expression of outrage at these activities specifically, and the axis of weasels in general for the treachery and perfidy demonstrated over the past several months. My take on the entire series of events is as follows. Have to say that I can't get really all that worked up about the games afoot from the Russians. Even in the depths of the 'finger hovering over the button' bad old days of the cold war, these types of shenanigans were part and parcel of the landscape. The Kremlin has always played for best advantage, however marginal, regardless of the players bellied up to the table. The entire subject of Russian conduct in these past few months has been a quandry to me, and I have a hard time beleiving it was over the fear of potential 'damage' that the revelation of the Iraqi Intelligence files might cause. The Russians had to know we were going to go ahead with this, they had to know we were going to prevail. If Putin didn't know, then possibly he misread George Bush as potentially badly as Bush has apparently misread him. I think the Russians were laying markers here, on the bet that no matter what, the relationship with Washington could afford the damage points, while they picked up some points of their own in Western European capitols. The Germans are a disappointment. Not the commercial aspects of it, nor the cover our butts actions from the German government over them. These activities, while quite probably unethical and certainly reprehensible, are not in and of themselves a knife directed at the United States. The vehemence of their resistance to a position shaped from those activities, the baseness of tone, and the unwavering willingness to get down in the muck along with Cherac and de Villpen simply for apparent personal political advantage at home was startling and as disgusting as watching our own Slick Willie work a room. It is dismaying that there were German officials even in Baghdad speaking of the issues being discussed, however, the material released so far appears very one sided in the mischief department. Restraint on the part of the US in the form of retaliation, tit-for-tat over this, could well be an indication that the contacts were known, and the information developed was being passed along. That would be the only face saving sort of circumstance that would excuse the German activities, but only in this one particular case. As for the French. Despite those that are going to question the lack of, or validity of any evidence pointing to the French, and continue to proclaim the French position was humanitarian in nature only, you most probably won't find the type of records such as is present for the Germans and the Russians, in which the Iraqis are asking for assistance, and or quite pleased by the 'special' arrangement. For the French, the arrangement doesn't have to be special. They'll tell anyone they can about the size of their mother's underwear and when she starts her cycle if they think it will get them some sort of quid pro quo out of the deal. There are three ways to transmit information - telephone, telegraph, and tell a Frenchman. I can recall the French being quietly but firmly instructed to remove certain personnel from the theater during the first Gulf War for questionable activities, to include apparent intelligence gathering, and it was generally accepted that the French were not to be trusted much beyond the distance that an ant could toss the Eiffel Tower. But what quid pro quo? The TotalElfFina contracts are a good start. Defense armaments, wither under, over, around or through the table, the money still ends up in the French economy. These, and other exclusive and/or particularly lucrative contractual arrangements. To a certain extent also, that we have not yet seen more evidence on, the Chinese. The Chinese, however, had the good sense to know when it was time to let one of their milk cows head off to the slaughterhouse, and not bother to mess up their suits with a lot of crocodile tears. And they also know that it is probably a good idea to keep as many markers as they can, with the prospect of things getting rough over things in their own back yard. So, they voiced objection, but they didn't get in everyone's face about it 24/7 like the Euro-boobs. What to do? Quite a lot of the damage here I suspect is going to be assessed in the long run as self inflicted. The French have certainly made a lot of friends in Eastern Europe by addressing them in such a patronizing tone, and by using the 'reward' of EU membership in such a blunt carrot and stick approach. They have also quite probably taken some of the wind out of the sails of those in Great Britain pushing for a closer relationship with those across the channel. Regulations about the proper size or how a banana is weighed may well be considered more than just an amusement of adjustment. I like the option of dealing with each of the N3 differently, based upon their level of involvement and deceit, the likelihood we'll need anything from them in the near term, and keep the interactions separate. As this is appears to be a marriage of convenience amongst them, discord and disharmony shouldn't be too hard to create, and soon they may even turn upon each other, in a figurative way, at least. Eventually, at least in the cases of France and Germany, the electorates will become so disgusted with the entire thing that the prime perpetrators will be invited to retire from public service. As for how to handle the proceedings in public, simply publicly ignoring them except on our terms seems to be a good route to take. It will drive the French sense of self importance into an absolute tizzy. It won't affect the Germans too much, and I'm pretty sure the Russians could actually give a whistle about 'world public opinion' unless it is in their favor, if Chechnya is any indication. Let them stew in the pot they've constructed, over the fire they've built for themselves.

2003-04-20T16:42:00.000-07:00

Go read Emily Jones
Because I said so. I'm making up for not updating her on the blogroll sooner. So go!

2003-04-20T15:12:00.000-07:00

The plot 'thickens'
Since being outed as a puppy blending maniac by Frank at IMAO, what has happened to the Instaman? The guys at Happy Fun Pundit have now joined in the chorus, admitting that, a la CNN they knew but didn't report it!. Earlier reports that Glenn may have been languishing in a dank county cell in the Tennesse backwoods

Can't wait to hear the tale of how some podunk inbred Tennessee yokel with a dime store badge, a wad o chaw, mirrored sunglasses, 4000 hound dogs, an AOL account and no sense of humor, or sense in general has hauled Glenn in to spend some time in 'his jail' in some backwoods county down there, and he's having to sit there till Monday when the local magistrate, that happens to be the brother-in-law, nephew, 1st, 2nd, and third cousin to the Barney Fife wannabe, decides to take a break from tinkering with his still to come in and set Glenn's bail at $75

may turn out to be just a conveniently fabricated cover for his escape. There is an ominous quiet at Instapundit, only a couple of random postings that could have been set up to slightly cover such a getaway. Or possibly posted by a confederate. Odd that one of the central posts is pointing to Jeff Jarvis, who quickly adds on his home blog, Baghdad Bob style, that the proff is alive. Conspiracy theorists, no need for any Reynolds Wrap on this one, it should be obvious that Glenn is making a run for it. Late update: Andrew, of Pathetic Earthlings, has gone into full blown puppy-watch mode. And for some reason, he's headed to Australia - hot on the puppy blender's trail? We'll stay with this one folks, until the truth comes out....

2003-04-20T08:45:00.000-07:00

Yeah, what she said...
Well, what is it that 'she' said, and who is 'she?' She is long time commenter 'zulubaby' on Charles Johnson's Little Green Footballs weblog. Born in South Africa, now living in California, one of the comments she dropped at one of Charles' posts pretty much brings us all up to date on what has been happening in little Bobby Mugabe's corner of the world, Zimbabwe. Without further ado.... _________________________________________

In a defiant speech marking the country's independence from Britain 23 years ago, Mugabe said Western opposition to his seizure of white-owned farms for landless blacks was part of a drive to keep the Third World poor.

Oh sure, like Zimbabwe could get any poorer than it is under his maniacal rule. Now the West is to blame for the mess he's made. Zimbabwe was a thriving country. He threw everyone out and has turned the place to shit. Keep up the good work there, Mugabe. The lies are standard issue.

"We abhor imperialistic machinations and iniquitous efforts by Britain and its ally, the United States, to recolonize us and we stand ready to resist such attempts," the 79-year-old Mugabe told an independence rally in Harare.

Where he gets this idea that Britain and the US (?) want to recolonize Zimbabwe, I don't know. Somewhere in the recesses of his moth-eaten brain I suppose. And let's not talk about imperialistic, hmmm. So far the crisis in Zimbabwe has been blamed on drought, Britain and the US attempting to recolonize, Peter Pan, and the tooth fairy. Note that Mugabe himself takes no responsibility for the wasteland that he is single-handedly creating.

"Africa is for Africans and Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans...

That so? Well I'm an African too so you can kiss my sweet white ass. How's that?

In his speech, Mugabe said he would not tolerate unrest. "Those who reject democracy and choose the road of violence to achieve their political goals are the enemies, indeed evil enemies of Zimbabwe and will not be allowed to succeed."

Democracy Mugabe-Style: No "unrest" will be tolerated, rejection of said "democracy" will result in your death, either by torture, brute force, or starvation. Depends on my mood. Oh, and those that don't agree with my version of democracy? You're evil. So there. Yeah. From the BBC link:

This week, as petrol prices nearly trebled and inflation hit 228%...

Some drought they're having there, eh? Mugabe hails land grabs on Independence Day Mugabe Says Britain, U.S. Try to Colonize Zimbabwe Need I mention that Mbeki has refused to speak out against Mugabe? This is an interesting link that zaza posted yesterday. Mugabe needs to be tried for crimes against humanity. If ever there was a candidate, it has to be him. Fuck the UN. Fuck the EU. They are useless and have proven, once again, that they only pretend to care. Figures really when you think about it. They're so busy witchhunting the Jews it leaves time for little else. My contempt knows no limit. Model4 (#71) That is sickening. Like I'm not nauseous enough. Eyewitness: Zimbabwe torture victim Famine plagues Zimbabwe "France has a long history of associating with African dictatorships" "When is Bush coming to save us?" G-d help these people. Or Bush. Whoever responds first. ________________________________ zulubaby, you feel like posting over here, give us a shout and I'll talk to the guys...

2003-04-20T08:13:00.000-07:00

Yes, someone is watching
News has come out today that Iranian journalist/blogger Sina Motallebi was hauled in for interrogation by the Iranian police about his activities. Chief among his activities? His weblog [in Farsi], which includes accounts of interviews with foriegn media.

Motallebi developed the Farsi website rooznegar.com after the reformist daily Hayat-e-Nou, or New Era, for which he wrote, was banned by the hard-line judiciary in January over a cartoon showing the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of Iran’s 1979 revolution, being crushed by a hand. The editor of Hayat-e-Nou, Hadi Khamenei, is the younger brother of Khomeini’s successor as Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Hadi Khamenei opposes his older brother’s policies.

Spread the word of this as far and wide as possible - not simply to get the word out about Motallebi, which should be done, but to send a wider message: Yes, we are watching you. Your own people are watching you. We see the things that you do, and know who you are. And we are keeping score. All of us. Thanks to Hossein Derakhshan for letting us all know

2003-04-20T07:39:00.000-07:00

No, not kidnapped
Sources indicate that the Instaman was not kidnapped. He might, however, be trying to make bail for being hauled in on a cruelty to animals charge... On the other hand, why is it you never see Reynolds and Ingrid Newkirk in the same place at the same time? Hmmmm. ::Update:: Can anyone confirm or deny Glenn saying something about being on his way to a barbeque?

2003-04-20T04:32:00.000-07:00

Say no to the UN part 2 Very well written document outlining the moral bankruptcy of the UN.

2003-04-20T03:43:00.000-07:00

JUST TO PROVE WE'RE AN EQUAL-OFFENDER BLOG.... In the long run evil in the extreme will be the End of those who do evil; for that they rejected the Signs of Allah, and held them up to ridicule. al-Qur'an 30:10 Ah yes, that would be me. Guilty as charged. News fresh in from the front indicates that the mighty warriors of Islam, fierce, proud and determined to convert the world to the unchallenged rule of Allah as foreordained by the Prophet (pbuh) are running to their mummies, crying about a little ideological competition. It seems the concept of a level playing feild isn't acceptable. Mosques in New York? Great. Madrassas in Glasgow? Check. Islamic clerics appearing on western TV programs? Multiculturalism in action. But Christian missionaries in Iraq? Apparently this is not permissible.

Already two Southern Baptist missionary leaders are preparing to spread the word of God to the Arabs. One is the Reverend Charles Stanley, pastor of the First Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, with a congregation of 15,000. He is head of In Touch Ministries and a board member of the National Religious Broadcasters Association, which backed President George Bush's campaign for the White House. The other evangelist is the Reverend Franklin Graham, the son of Billy Graham, and head of Samaritan's Purse, a humanitarian and missionary group. He recently caused an uproar by calling Islam "a violent and wicked religion", and denouncing the prophet Muhammad as a pedophile and terrorist.

Did he declare Muslims to be the descendants of pigs and monkeys, and declare they should be exterminated, while waving a kalashnikov over his head? Did he say Muslims kill non-Muslim children to drain their blood to bake special food? You know, I don't remember reading about that. I'm sure it would have made the papers if he had. Muslims in the West have the freedom to prosyletise to their heart's content, and do so with no interference. They continually boast that Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. Western converts are by no means uncommon. This is as it should be. But how many churches will you find in Saudi Arabia? None. Christianity in the Arab world faces savage restrictions and informal violence from Muslims. Perhaps with Iraq's liberation, it's time to introduce a bit of religious as well as political freedom. In fact, the kind of secular government we're trying to help the Iraqi people establish is impossible without religious freedom. I mean, why would Muslims be against it? I thought the sons of the Prophet were hardy and bold, and quite unaccustomed to fear? They couldn't possibly fear that given a free choice, some people might turn to an alternative to Islam? Or even worse, that many might choose not to bother with religion at all? I'm sure that can't be it. Meanwhile, in response to some of the mewling from the nay-sayers (from the State Department, naturally), Ari Fleischer has come up with a zinger that's positively Rumsfeldian.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer deflected suggestions of a Muslim backlash by saying: "The President knows Islam is a religion of peace."

Nice one Ari. You get to keep your job another week.

2003-04-19T18:14:00.000-07:00

LAURENCE SIMON DID NOT KILL JESUS CHRIST And neither did I. Or anyone else I know in the Jewish community, okay? The evidence is flimsy at best. Ever read the Gospels? Four guys who can't get their story straight. Two Jews, one living in Antioch writing self-hating polemics, the other left behind in Israel, another Jew going slowly mad on Patmos, surviving on desert cactus, and 'shrooms, seeing beasts with seven horns rising out of the sea (wow, that was some powerful shit man) and some Greek quack who wasn't even there when it (allegedly) happened! No prosecutor would go to trial with evidence that flimsy. Lionel Hutz could take that crew apart on the stand without breaking a sweat.

First off, I wasn't there at the time. It's impossible. That was 33 AD, and now it's 2000-something. Unless you think I am some sort of Two Thousand Year Old Man or I have a time machine jammed up my ass, I have an incredibly fucking strong alibi. If I did have a time machine, I wouldn't be going back and killing the Son of God. After finding out who really killed Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe, I'd be castrating your father with a hedge trimmer just before he fucked his sister and she gave birth to you. [ ... ] Next, if you believe the creepy ghost story that the bearded hippie came back from the dead, then it really wasn't murder after all. When you murder someone, they're dead. Draw a chalk outline around them and start looking in their pockets for spare change. But Jesus apparently didn't die. A few days later, he's back causing a public disturbance again. You'd think that the first thing he'd do is bathe... being dead a few days must have stank up to high hell. But at worst, it was attempted murder and not Murder One like the holier-than-thou "Christ Killer" claim. Since we've got more lawyers in our clan than you guys, I bet we'll get off with reckless endangerment or assault, so after 3 or 4 years we'll get parole so you can kindly shut the fuck up about Christ Killers after 2005, got it?

To advance their careers, Rabinovich and Khaimovich decided to convert to Christianity. As they were afraid of the baptism ceremony, they dragged their feet for several months, each of them hoping that the other one would convert first and then tell about the procedure. Finally, they couldn't put it off for longer, so they threw dice. Rabinovich was to go to the church first, and Khaimovich would wait outside. With tears in his eyes, Rabinovich hugged Khaimovich and, shaking in fear, walked into the church. Khaimovich stayed outside, waiting impatiently for his friend's reappearance. In twenty minutes Rabinovich walked out, stretched his limbs and lit a cigarette. Khaimovich ran toward the new Christian and asked, "Nu, Isaak, tell me, how was it?" Rabinovich answered, "First, I am not Isaak, but Ivan. Second, kike, you better tell me why did you crucify our Jesus Christ?"

2003-04-19T11:03:00.000-07:00

Cue the Bratwursts... Bush pointedly did not congratulate Schroeder on his narrow victory. The two have not spoken since November. German media have reported Bush has declined to take calls from Schroeder. "Even though differences of opinion on this question were so serious, it does not impair transatlantic relations," Schroeder said. "I think political leaders on both sides are professional enough to recognize relations are on a solid foundation." Nothing like a little cognitive dissonance to start the day off with. Gerhard ol buddy, have you noticed that Bush won't take your calls? I'd say that is a sign of an impaired transatlantic relationship.

2003-04-19T07:32:00.000-07:00

WIBBLE Another scene from the Culture War. As soon as I get a handle on whether we're winning, I'll be sure to let you know.

A Perth principal who tried to cancel the school's traditional Anzac Day ceremony yesterday defended his decision, saying he thought a formal service might traumatise students from war-torn countries. Koondoola Primary School principal Rudy Rybarczyk [for the love of God, buy a vowel!] had decided it was not appropriate to have an Anzac Day service given the ethnic diversity of the students.

Western Australia's elite politico-educational bureacracy creaked dozily into semi-action mere days afterwards.

But Education Minister Alan Carpenter intervened yesterday and overturned the decision, saying it could have led to vilification of the school's Iraqi students. "Anzac Day is about understanding what war is about and it is an integral part of the Australian cultural landscape," Mr Carpenter said. "If I hadn't interfered this way, that school would have had everyone on their doorstep demanding to know why it was done. It would have done more damage than holding the service." [ ... ] Mr Carpenter said that since the war on Iraq began, his office had received many letters asking "in base terms" why the Government allowed Islamic schools. He was concerned about vilification which could extend to the school if it had banned the Anzac service. "It would have ignited all that ugly prejudice we don't want to see," Mr Carpenter said.

I note that the education minister's desire to hold the ANZAC Day service is prompted not by the fact that it's important in and of itself as an expression of Australian culture and identity, but because of fear of a backlash. Evil, racist, white Skippies, crazed with Christian fundamentalist-inspired hatred of the Prophet (pbuh), would doubtless descend on the school and tear the innocent Muslim students into bloody chunks. Puh-leeze!

2003-04-19T06:52:00.000-07:00

CULTURAL CONVERGENCE I don't understand why the Left has it's collective pants in such a wad about US cultural imperialism, when it's as clear as day that New Zealand has already drifted over the event horizon and is even now spiralling swiftly into the unbreakable grip of the gravity well that is Getting Paid For Being Insulted.

A student who accused a Maori Anglican bishop of racial insults received a secret payout of $10,000. Miriama Mokomoko claimed she was driven from a social services course by bullying tactics from Bishop John Gray, who heads the Maori Anglican church in the South Island. The bishop taught cultural awareness to social work students at Te Whare Wananga O Te Waipounamu – the church's regional training and education arm. He allegedly called Ms Mokomoko a "mixed-up Maori" who had "too much pakeha" because she wore attractive clothes and make-up.

I remember at school, any Maori student who did well in exams was labelled a "Mallowpuff" (chocolate on the outside, but white in the inside, the US equivalent would be "Oreo") and teased unmercifully. It was a way for some of the dumber kids to drag their superiors down to their level by imposing an assumption about Maori culture not valuing education. Being clever just wasn't "street" enough. I also recall that there were plenty of Maori kids who refused to buy that crap, but others lacked the will to defy the collective. At least this girl stood up for herself!

Four other students who attended Te Waipounamu are now locked in their own battle with the Anglican church. They are demanding almost $90,000 compensation for alleged "abhorrent behaviour" by Bishop Gray, and other grievances. One of the students, Sharyn Wasley-Hill, alleged the bishop asked her how she would react to the name "white trash". Another student, Nyree Bowen-Lilly, complained after being told the bishop had allegedly called her a "half-baked cookie" behind her back.

How much of this race hucksterism is going on that we're NOT hearing about?

2003-04-19T06:34:00.000-07:00

SIGNS OF INTELLIGENT LIFE AT THE AL-GUARDIAN Remote probes are sending back weak signals from behind the lines indicating that a few brave souls are still operating deep in enemy territory, Top special forces operative in this sector of the Culture War is Julie Burchill, god bless her and all who sail in her.

When anti-war/pro-Saddam types had finished trotting out all the dumb clichés to no avail - "It's About Oil!" (yes, among other things, and unless you live in a cave or a windmill and walk everywhere rather than take a car, bus or plane, then shut up, you hypocrite); "We Armed Him!" (not much, the USSR mostly, but even if we did it a bit, then surely it was our responsibility to make up for that by taking him out); "It'll Make Muslims Angry!" (duh! they were angry before) - they always came over all misty-eyed about the troops. "Our Boys! Bring them home! Now!" Yes, what were formerly units of the English Fascist Imperialist Killing Machine, all through the 30-plus years of keeping the Catholics and Protestants from massacring each other in Northern Ireland, who as an occupying army deserved all they got from those brave kiddy-killing Republicans (but anti-abortionists! the IRA, like Reagan, believed that the sanctity of life began at conception and ended at birth), are now suddenly precious flowers of humanity, not one of whom the most hardline of self-loathing Brit-haters can bear to see suffer so much as a flesh wound.

Smoke her a kipper, she'll be back for breakfast, just in time for tea and medals.

2003-04-19T06:27:00.000-07:00

I've changed my mind
And think that everyone should immediately begin making donations to PETA. Recommendation? Send them a bag of charcoal. Nifty purse design suggestions might help, too.

2003-04-19T06:09:00.000-07:00

HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN? I can't even begin to forget, even assuming I wanted to, which I don't think I do. I think the images of 9/11 will be with me for the rest of my life. James Lileks says for him, the sight of the US flag that flew at the Pentagon on that day covering the face of that statue of Saddam bookends the experience. I can see why. It may not be the end, or even the beginning of the end, but as Churchill said, it is the end of the beginning. I've spent the past wek or so rather obsessively viewing DVDs about 9/11. Not sure why. Maybe, like Lileks, I'm feeling the need to bookend the past 19 months. The victory in Iraq has triggered several reactions, the main one being...weariness. Not the "too tired to fight anymore" tired, just the need to stop, take a breath, look around, and live like a human being for a moment. Like a lot of people, I'm not the same person I was on the 10th of September, 2001. Not at all. Those planes brought my entire world crashing down in flames and rubble. The experience scratched me fiercely and deeply, in a way that goes beyon mere politics. It's altered me in ways I'm still exploring. The cynical might suggest I'm much more willing to employ violence than I was, and I wouldn't disagree. And I don't apologise for that. That's another change. I don't apologise for anything anymore. I'm sick of it. By launching his challenge to the West, Osama miscalculated badly, as Arabs almost always do. He forced many of us to reflect seriously on "why they hate us". Trouble is, upon investigation, it turns out we're Number One! Western civilisation has brought an end to slavery, the concept of human rights, rule of law, free speech, democracy and capitalism. In the meantime, Arab culture has developed the suicide bomber and not such else. Compare and contrast. I'm reliably informed that Islamic culture was the dog's bollocks circa the 12th century. Fantastic. Congratulations. What have you done for the world lately? They've been in freefall since the collapse of Al Andalus (caused by Islamic fundamentalist intolerance of Jews and Christians, there's a clue in there for anyone who cares to look) and nowadays all I hear is a lot of whining about how it's just not fair Arabs don't run the world. But very little actual reflection on the causes of their relative decline, and some that do talk about objective reality tend get a fatwa-inspired reprimand between the shoulder-blades. Ask Naguib Mafouz. A side-effect of this forced reflection on culture, politics, religion and identity has been (for me, and possibly for others) a rediscovery of history as a process. History isn't somerthing that happened years ago, it's something that shapes us, and which we are shaping in turn. My own journey has led me to look at my own cultural roots in England and Scotland. Now I know as a white person that I am supposed to have no culture, that anything I own was stolen from indigenous third world victims, and my role in life is to make amends for the alleged sins of my ancestors. But here's what I say to that sort of thing nowadays. Get stuffed. Let me tell you something about my ancstors, and lessons I have learned from studying their deeds. Back two hundred years ago, they lived short, painful, impoverished lives in appalling conditions, with rampant disease, shocking levels of infant mortality, and vicious tribal warfare. Needless to say, this lifestyle has now been glamourised as the glorious days of yore when the Clans fought with honour in the romatic glens and lochs of the Highlands. The battle of Cullodden, which finally ended the Gaelic-speaking Highland culture, has been painted as some sort of gallant last stand of ancient warriors, standing shoulder to shoulder in the Celtic twilight for that most Gaelic of things - a Lost Cause. Let me tell you something, as a descendant of one of the commanders of the Jacobite Army at Cullodden. It gives me no particular pleasure to say this, but here goes. It's a good thing that the Hanovrian Army beat us. It's a good thing that the lowland Scots were finally freed from the terror of the armed tribes. It had to happen. The future was coming, and if that feudal warrior mentality had lasted, Scotland would have fallen under it's wheels and been crushed. Instead, the extinction of the military power of the clans, the prohibition of highland plaid and forbidding of the Gaelic tongue forced the medieval serfs out of their darkness and into the modern world, albeit very much against their will. The Highland Clearances, which replaced people with more profitable sheep, forced a massive migration of Highlanders to America, Canada, Nova Scotia, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. That's why there are so many Scots names in your local phone book. They're citizens of the modern democracies, all because some bastard laird sold out their ancestors, broke the ties of feudal loyalty, and was paid handsomely by an absentee landlord for the land they lived on. More money could be made from running Cheviot sheep than people. And in the Enlightenment, who needed several hundred loyal men-at-arms anyway? Don't get me wrong. I'm not excusing what happened. Crofts were burned over people's heads. Evicted families ate seaweed on the shore or starved. When the emigrant ships left Tobermory, there was often cholera below decks before they lost sight of shore. An average 70% of the children under fived died during the voyage. An entire culture and language died, or lived on in incresingly dim memories in Ontario, South Carolina, Ballarat and Dunedin. It was ugly, it was unfair, and many people suffered terribly and died because of it. But here I am now, a citizen of the modern world, speaking English, using the very best communications technology on the planet, living a free, prosperous and (hopefully) long life. And all because of an act of near-genocide two centuries or so ago. Will there be any Arabs in the year 2203 who will reflect similarly on their position? Will they acknowledge that something had to be done to jerk them out of their madness, and turn them, perhaps forcibly, towards the modern world? Because it has to happen. Bonnie Prince Shit-for-brains got all the way to Derby before turning back, and although Osama and others of that ilk haven't met with similar success yet, the danger they pose to the modern world is very real indeed. When the Hanoverian forces went up north in pursuit of the retreating Jacobites, a new, third verse was added to the National Anthem.

"God grant that General Wade May be Thy mighty aid Victory bring May he sedition hush And like a torrent rush Rebellious Scots to crush God save the King"

It never really caught on in Scotland.

2003-04-18T20:34:00.000-07:00

Recipe time again
The name of this is 'that chicken thing I just made up'

4 chicken wings
about 1 cup or so of cooked rice
1 can of cream of chicken soup
Garlic powder
onion powder
pepper
butter (of course)

Prepare rice in rice cooker, with liberal dosage of garlic and onion powders and a couple of tablespoons of butter. Arrange chicken wings in the bottom of Pyrex dish. Coat liberally with garlic and onion powders, and pepper. Mash cooked rice onto and around wings. Add more butter. Dump can of cream of chicken soup on top, as is. Cover and bake for one hour to one hour 15 minutes in a 350(F) oven. Chef's tip: Do not take a nap and let this cook for almost three hours instead of the recommended period. It doesn't burn, per se, but the chicken does stick to the bottom, and is so tender that it comes apart when you dish it up. The nice golden brown and crispy skin parts get left behind. Still tastes good, though.

2003-04-18T19:30:00.000-07:00

Escalation
Things have totally gotten out of hand now, haven't they. What started out as simply a morning annoyance has now spread half way around the world, leaving consternation in its wake. I'm just as amazed as Bruce is, that this situation continues unabated. The only first hand example I can draw on is the 5am prayer calls from my time over in the Gulf. Wake you up they will, the first two or three mornings, blasting over the finest PA system that can be rigged from a mosque tower less than 100 yards away from your billet. Usually, however, by the third morning or so, it is an expected background noise, and it doesn't even register. Since this was a possibility, and there weren't any scary images being generated for constant consumption on all the cable channels, letting this just play itself out was the first choice. Have to say that no, can't just whistle up a cell of BUFFs to lay in a full load of Mk82s on the neighborhood. Wouldn't want to either, as this would certainly be assigned to the 'high risk of collateral damage' targeting list. This would call for much subtler weaponeering - to the point of obliterating the target (woodpecker), without inflicting damage to either the metal flue stack, nor the surrounding shingling. Think we've heard a lot about this bird? Imagine what it'd be like every time it rained if there was a leak in the roof! The outrage would make the looting of the Museum in Baghdad shrink to the level of a kid swiping a candy bar from the corner 7-11 in comparison. Direct action (such as the Arc Light approach, or even the popular JDAM through the upper left corner of the top right window) would probably be way too messy. It also runs additional risks as well, the possibility of running afoul of Federal Animal Protection statutes and all. Sheesh, the thought of the US Attorney's office and PETA teaming up to come after you...the stuff of nightmares. That pretty much eliminates that type of approach, thank goodness. The staffing of the request up to the JCS (including but not limited to - background papers, PowerPoint briefings, funding and apportionment hassles, impacts on recurring training and qualification levels for the crews, the studies to determine effect on the overall life cycle of the weapon system, the need for a specialized improvement to existing detection and targeting systems to increase the percentage of times that the woodpecker 'signature' is correctly identified, spiral development timing and cost estimates for the upgrades program, formulation of specific tactics, techniques and procedures for woodpecker engagement in a variety of modes to include low level, medium level, and high level, along with a complete integration of known or suspected threats and options for dealing with same in all profiles, plus the exercises and live range validation of these procedures...) is a 'significant hurdle' to overcome for just a frikkin noisy bird. Not that it couldn't happen, with the right backing, but without that, realistically estimate that by the time all the paperwork is done, if there isn't a fight in Congressional appropriation for the funding, and there are no unexpected glitches from the R&D realm, we might have a solution for the problem by the 3rd quarter of fiscal year 2009. Not so sure I can really endorse the psyops options described either. Although some humans may have demonstrated a marked lack of environmental adaptability in this particular situation, there are many examples of birds doing so. For years now, civilian and military airfield managers, particularly along migratory flight paths, have grappled with the issue of birds. Not for the noise factor at 6am, but simply because the modern turbofan engine gets severe indigestion after sucking up a few ducks, or a couple of Canadian geese. Now while the artificial noise tack does seem good on paper, the 'stupid' animals usually catch on pretty quickly, and ignore it. Most places have hired teams, with dogs, random noisemakers, all very expensive. As for the final set of four courses of action, exploring the military option makes about as much sense. Keep in mind that these tips come from a bunch of folks dedicated to making sure that nary a feather on the lil' darlings heads gets ruffled in the process. Somehow, I have a hard time visualizing, much less even conceiving, of Meryl climbing on the roof with a roll of hardware cloth to construct a barrier around the chimney vent to keep the woodpecker at bay. Not that I don't think she can manage the construction aspect of it, its that she herself has mentioned an absolute dread of heights. however, sidestepping this fear of heights might just be the ticket. Meryl needs to sweet talk somebody into climbing up there. But not armed with unsightly hardware cloth. Pine resin. Now is the time of year for it, and its everywhere. Just check your car (jeep) if you park anywhere near pine trees. And it isn't too water soluble so it won't just wash off with the first heavy rain. Its sticky. *note* most birds HATE sticky. Avoid it like, well, sticky. Get someone to coat the top of the flue (only the top) with some pine resin. It isn't sticky enough to make the woodpecker a semi-permanent rotting fixture, but enough to probably make him cross it off his '10 good ways to pick up babes' short list.

2003-04-18T07:28:00.000-07:00

THE WOODPECKER MUST DIE! Hands up everyone who is as sick of Woody Effing Woodpecker as Meryl Yourish? Yup, thought so. Right, this whole episode has gone on long enough. It's time the Blogosphere took a hand in this deteriorating situation, and moved in to stabilise matters, paving the way for a peaceful resolution fair to all the parties, and ratified by an international body to add credibility to the process. That, or kill the damn bird. Actually, you can't do the simplest and most obvious thing - plink the little bugger with a BB gun. Woodpeckers are protected by the Federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act as migratory, nongame birds. Some species are also protected by state laws. You cannot shoot them! Also, hiding in bushes in a suburban street pointing a firearm might get one invited to drop by the police station to explain matters. Okay, let's take a look at the problem. In essence, Meryl keeps getting woken up at the crack of dawn by a woodpecker trying futilely to hammer it's way through sheet metal. When they were handing out brains to birds, this guy was clearly at the head of the line - to hold the door for everyone else. Let's assume we're dealing with the Pileated Woodpecker, the most common species in the US. It says here that the pileated woodpecker feeds mostly on carpenter ants, which are found in decaying wood. They also will eat termites, acorns and berries. A mated pair of woodpeckers will get together each morning to search for food. A pair eh? Meryl only mentions one. Maybe he's hitting the dating circut, and he's whacking away at the metal just to draw attention from a lady woodpecker. "Hey babe, lookit this. I can make a REALLY loud noise. See? I can even make a human get out of a nice warm bed to come outside and biff an ice-cube at me. Pretty neat eh?" Let's take the direct approach. Assuming for arguments sake that Brad can't whistle up a B-52 "Arc Light" strike, we're left with more natural approaches. When sparrows were making a shocking mess of the Crystal Palace during the 1856 Great Exhibition, they couldn't shoot the damn things because they'd smash the glass. The sparrows were too smart for poison. Frankly, the experts were stumped. So Queen Vicky turned to the Duke of Wellington and asked him. Once he'd completely woken up (he was getting on a bit by that stage), he thought for a bit and finally said "Sparrowhawks!" and resumed his nap by the fire. Worked a treat too. Let's see, what are the natural predators of the Woodpecker? Squirrels, tree-climbing snakes, other nesting birds and birds of prey. Hmmm, squirrels eh? Meryl, I seem to recall it's pretty much squirrel central where you live, your cats were always trying to catch them running along the fence. But even if you caught a squirrel and put it on your roof, it'd just jump off. I suppose you could tether a hawk to your roof, but that might not be easily arranged. You'd probably wind up getting your face clawed to rubbons. Your cats? They might have, ah, "issues" with you if you put them on your roof in the pre-dawn. Pissed off cats are not nice to be around. They hold grudges. Trust me, I know. Okay, let's try a moderate technical approach. You may not be able to force the woodpecker's natural enemies onto your property, but there is a way to attract them to the vicinity, giving you a better chance of having the bird perish by natural causes. I refer of course to Johhny Stewart Wildlife calls - tape recordings of distressed wildlife guaranteed to attract just the critters you need!

CT116A Squealing Bird Grown Woodpecker Distress Super Effective On All Predators CT116B Baby Woodpecker Great Sounds For Cats, Coons & Coyotes CT116E Squealing Woodpecker Rapid, High Pitch Distress Will Bring Impressive Results

According to the website, any of these recorded distress cries should bring you bears, bobcats, cougars, coyotes, foxes, and raccoons. Um, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't suddenly have a pack of cougars wandering past your window, or get slapped with a nuisance writ by your neighbours because a grizzly took little Timmy. Suburban Richmond would only have raccoons and maybe foxes, right? Right? Back me up here! Actually, what it almost certainly WOULD attract is cats. And even if they don't nail the woodpecker, he might take one look at your neighbourhood, now swarming with deadly felines, and decide Maryland looks a lot healthier. There, a possible solution. And they say the Internet is a waste of time! If all else fails, I suppose you could always read "4 Ways to Get Rid of Woodpeckers", but I'm sure Meryl wouldn't want to do something as obvious as that.

2003-04-18T06:06:00.000-07:00

Say No to the UN Ask these guys how many roads they have built in Afghanistan in the past year and a half. If the answer is none (it is), then why should we allow them to control Iraq's reconstruction?

2003-04-17T20:03:00.000-07:00

I wonder why the Dems got left out?

2003-04-17T19:52:00.000-07:00

Dogs, Guns, Weasels, say no more
Perry de Havilland over at Samizdata has a pretty good take on the latest ploy from the Weasels...in terms even PETA can understand.