The Black Republican

I may be an Army guy, but you gotta hand it to those Navy boys. Following the ruckus over the summer where a Board of Supervisors committee considered banning The Blue Angels from the city's Fleet Week festivities, the team's high-speed, low-drag pilots apparently decided to tell San Franciscans what they thought of the idea. With style, baby.

Absolute Moral Authority

With all the shooting in malls and schools that have been occurring the past few years, I have an idea that I think will help all those who wish to "Go out in a blaze of glory" or to get back at someone who bullied them, or someone on a sports team, or someone who gets better grades... or someone who wouldn't return their romantic advances.

The first thing we need to do is wreck the two parent home structure by implementing State sponsored welfare and devise a State and Federal taxation scheme that will force any surviving two parent homes to require both parents to work just to stay afloat.

From there we replace the individuals responsible for the parenting duties in each home (AKA, the missing or busy working parents) with officials from or sponsored by the State - Social Workers from DCF, teachers, State Health care providers, Planned Parenthood, the ACLU, et al. These people will make sure that an individual child is never disciplined, taught only State proscribed dogma, that the boys are given drugs when they act like boys, that boys and girls are given contraceptives when they try to act like men and women, that the girls can have abortions when the State provided contraceptives don't work, that God is taken completely out of their lives, and then given powerful psychotropic drugs when they exhibit psychological or mental disorders due to a lack of parental guidance, educational guidance and spiritual guidance that has left them lost, confused and depressed.

Next, we need to have the all the popular culture outlets, Hollywood movies, and the Main Stream Media tell girls that they will only get the future they dream of if they are a 5'7, 105lb Blond with big breasts, perfect teeth, alabaster skin, and have sex with all the popular boys, and tell boys that they need to take steroids or HGH to give them muscles, take advantage of those that are weaker than they are, play sports, drink uncontrollably, drive fast, and not just have sex but have babies with as many girls as possible.

As soon as we have confused and depressed as many of these young people as possible, set them up with dreams and aspirations that most can never attain in a world that is not the utopia they were promised, taught them to rely on drugs to numb them and the State to provide for them, that's when we rip it all away and say "OK, you're on your own!"

Most young people will be able to cope with the cruel realities of the world and adjust their lives and expectations accordingly. Some, however, will not. Those that cannot will be angry and frustrated that the world - despite their elevated self-esteem and the promises they have been given by the entire State apparatus all their lives - is not the candy-colored wonderland they had expected. That anger and frustration - and a feeling of impotence to stop it - will only build as they realize that not everyone will accede to their wishes or tend to their needs. Luckily, the State will have thought of this possibility too, and provided zones where these lost, angry and frustrated individuals can go to vent. These will be zones that will not only legally guarantee that no one will be around who can stop them from venting, but will give them plenty of unsuspecting individuals with whom they can express their anger and frustration. These will be called Gun-Free-Zones and... Aw, never mind! What are the chances of all of that happening here in the United States?

After killing Lupins and collecting coconuts on Florina Beach, I headed over to Fark this evening to get some silly headlines. I'm sure that one of these days they're going to create a whole new website just for the Florida tag in the same manner that they did for another of their famous tags. Headline: "Walton County to alter Nativity scene."

The County Commission decided this week to include secular items such as a snowman to the display after Americans United for Separation of Church and State sent the county a letter in July claiming that the creche is unconstitutional

Happy birthday to me.

Banner never flown at Planned Parenthood

When I'm not pretending to be the reincarnation of a dead president, I'm known by an older (and far stranger) moniker that's a portmanteau of two names, together referencing my favorite cartoon character - not to mention the entity who first introduced me to conservatism.

Some people unfairly label the cartoonist Berkeley Breathed as "liberal" (I think it's his first name that cements the idea). But his work - if not exactly "fair" to some Republicans over the years - has certainly taken aim at the extremes and sacred cows of both parties and all ideologies. Though an ardent opponent of labels, he has said he's closest to a libertarian.

Today, Breathed's work is earning a stamp of disapproval many cartoonists take pride in - he's hit a target too close to the mark, and some of the newspapers that carry him have refused to publish it. Ironically, I find the content of the strip to be rather mild, but it's no surprise that it's generated furor since it relates to the media's favorite taboo-that-shall-not-be-attacked these days... ISLAM.

Since the interests of the First Amendment, my own politics, and the fate of the Republic are all in alignment, I'm proud to offer this taste of revolt against today's liberal intelligentsia. For the full strip, please take a trip over to Salon, where (give credit where credit is due) modern liberalism apparently still contains some measure of liberality.

(Incidentally, that's my alter-ego on the left.)

The President's statement.

"My decision to commute his prison sentence leaves in place a harsh punishment for Mr. Libby. The reputation he gained through his years of public service and professional work in the legal community is forever damaged. His wife and young children have also suffered immensely. He will remain on probation. The significant fines imposed by the judge will remain in effect. The consequences of his felony conviction on his former life as a lawyer, public servant, and private citizen will be long-lasting."

PS: It would now be appropriate for the Justice Department to go after Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame for their roles in concocting and perpetuating the real lie; Plame was not covert and could not have been outed as Wilson asserted. Plame knew this, Wilson knew this, and the political hacks in the Democratic Party knew it as well.

Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff appeared on Fox News Sunday this morning. Chris Wallace eventually asked about the failed immigration bill (a topic which Tim Russert did not bring up with Chertoff later on Meet The Press). Chertoff's response illustrated that he still does not get the message. He whined about all of the things we can not do to end illegal immigration and ended by saying that it is now up to those who killed the bill to come up with a better idea, which is exactly what Senator John McCain sneered to opponents as the bill was dying the first time around.

The better idea is a simple one: enforce the existing laws!!

As enforcement first was the proponents major selling point, (remember how many times we were told that rest of the Bill would not take effect until the enforcement portions were accomplished), this concept should not be news. The fact that they seem to be unwilling to enforce the laws shows that they were lying to us all along, just as we thought.

Wizbang Blog calls our attention to a tactic used in Panama City, Florida to discover illegal aliens. The local Sheriff is sending multiple police cars to construction sites with lights and sirens turned on, when the illegals take it on the lam the police track them down and report them to Immigration. It is having the desired effect.

"We immigrants, we are leaving Panama City. People are afraid they will be deported," he said. "The companies don't want to hire illegal people. Now they're only hiring those with papers."

Dang, ain't that a shame, no papers, no worky!

Sheriff Frank McKeithen is apparently one of many local and state officials willing to do the work our Federal government won't do. No word in this story on whether the INS immigration services follow up or if any of the illegals are actually punished; but we can guess that result, can't we?

Oh, and the story wouldn't be complete without the ACLU charging in to claim the tactics are like "Nazi Germany".

Today was one for the books.

It began with a vote in the Senate that beat, throttled, and mutilated the hotly contested immigration bill before it finally died. Good riddance. I can't help but wonder if we've seen a life preserver thrown to the Republican Party.

You can continue to follow the spectacle on the thousand-or-so blogs covering the action, but make sure you hear about Sam Switchback and MSM Dimwittery from the WSJ, both via HotAir.

FULL DISCLOSURE: As someone who has clicked occasionally on the "Those Shirts" ads on HotAir, I am apparently involved in the plot.

That would have been a full day's news, but we're not finished.

SCOTUS decided to get into the action by offering its final ruling (yet another 5-4 with Kennedy siding with the Originalist/Textualist half of the court) [ SCOTUSBlog] on affirmative action in public schools. We'll need time to really digest this mammoth ruling; I've only managed to skim the Chief Justice's opinion for the court. But, as widely reported, the CJ has offered a statement in conclusion that I trust will become one of the great catchphrases of Supreme Court jurisprudence:

The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.

Next, Mike Pence's preventative measure banning the UnFairness Doctrine thundered out of the House, 309-115. Expect the Senate to pass it on a voice vote some Friday night in July.

To finish off a tumultuous day with a little comic relief tonight, the Dems had a debate, where they discussed the evils of resegregation being forced on America by the Supreme Court. The event was held at Howard University.

"Just 14% of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in Congress.

This 14% Congressional confidence rating is the all-time low for this measure, which Gallup initiated in 1973."

You might say that I made a leap of judgment by claiming that 86% of Americans believe Congress sucks, but I beg to differ. Only 14% have a "great deal or quite a lot of confidence", and any other rating for an institution with so much control over ours lives (in a time of war no less) is so sub-standard that it equates to the colloquial term; so Congress sucks! And while I am not afraid to point out that this Congress is run by Democrats, party affiliation alone is not the cause of our displeasure with these bums. Whether they have a D, or an R, or an I in front of their names they are not getting the job done. On the whole they seem to lack common sense. They are easily swayed by political correctness. And, mostly they worry too much about winning re-election and making side deals under the table. When they do attempt to pass a bill it gets loaded with pork, which they now call by a new name, earmarks, in the insulting belief that we are too stupid to see that we are being taken.

They regularly behave less like Statesmen and more like confidence men. They use the English language in such a way that native speakers need an interpreter to sort out what their Congressman has just said. And then you find that you don't like half of what they meant and don't trust them to keep their word on the other half. Need I go on?

Basically, there is little wonder that Americans are discouraged by this bunch of insider trading, lying, demagogue, propagandists. After all, we are paying for that government, and it isn't that one we are sold each election year. Or is it? I'll have to wait for the translation.

Btw, there is a portion of our money that we feel is being used well.

"By way of contrast, 69% of Americans have a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the military, which tops the list."

Tonight, skipping from Ace to Captain Ed I stumbled across Let Freedom Ring, which tries to make the case that Fred Thompson is actually "a closet movement conservative." No less than David McIntosh, former congressman and co-founder of the Federalist Society has said, "he’s a real conservative." And now McIntosh is working on the Thompson campaign.

It was this last point that caused my nose to twitch. Back on St. Pat's, when the flame was just starting to kindle for Fred, OpinionJournal.com did an interview with him, where he discussed his federalist principles.

Mr. Thompson has also been criticized for failing to back some comprehensive tort-reform bills because of his background as a trial lawyer. Here he insists his stance was based on grounds of federalism. "I'm consistent. I address Federalist Society meetings," he says, noting that more issues should be left to the states. For example, he cast the lonely "nay" in 99-1 votes against a national 0.8% blood alcohol level for drivers, a federal law banning guns in schools, and a measure limiting the tort liability of Good Samaritans. "Washington overreaches, and by doing so ends up not doing well the basics people really care about."

A Bloomberg.com end-of-term preview of the Supreme Court laments that Chief Justice Roberts isn't getting the consensus he promised.

The dissenters are making no secret of their dismay about the direction of the court. Three times since April, one of them has read a summary of the dissent from the bench, a step that typically occurs no more than three times in an entire nine- month term.

In two of those cases, Ginsburg, 74, the only female justice, accused the majority of callousness toward women. The abortion decision, she said, reflected ``ancient notions about women's place in the family and under the Constitution.''

In the pay-disparity case, Ginsburg said from the bench that the majority ``does not comprehend, or is indifferent to, the insidious way in which women can be victims of pay discrimination.''

UPDATE: Apparently, Bloomberg needs a little bit of patience. According to The New York Sun, the Court issued rulings in five cases yesterday, the same day the Bloomberg article appeared. All five were unanimous.

I heard it said, the word "amnesty" crystallized the opposition and forced the end of debate on the so-called immigration bill. That sounds about right to me, the idea that people can enter our country without permission and be rewarded for their brazen defiance of the rule of law is a powerfully unwelcome notion. Amnesty succinctly described the situation, even if the bill's proponents wish us to avoid the "A" word.

But, the word that caused the bill to get so out of bounds is comprehensive. With that one word they admitted that they would insist upon one solution to many problems, problems that were not related to one another. With the use of that word, comprehensive, they were saying, we are going to solve border enforcement, and we are going to eliminate the illegals who are in our country now, and we are going to solve an economic need, and we are going to show the world that we are compassionate.

Well, you don't solve border enforcement with legislation, you solve it with action. You solve it by giving the law enforcers the tools to enforce existing law.

Their way of eliminating the criminals here illegally was to make them legal. A better solution would be to enforce the laws and remove the illegals when you find them, enforce existing disincentives to their presence here (employer verification, etc.), create new disincentives, (remove anchor baby provisions, end welfare for illegals) and generally make it a perpetual campaign to assure ourselves that we know that all who are within our boundaries are here legally.

If it is true that we need more workers, then have them enter legally.

If we wish to have them become Americans, let them pass muster in traditional style, let them earn it the way so many others before them earned it, (learn the language, learn the history, learn the laws and obey them, learn to assimilate).

And let's forget about creating an image for the world to see when we talk about immigration; if the world can not remember all that this country has done for humanity there is little hope that they will recognize our capitulation to those who sneak into our country as grace born of virtue, rather we will be seen as weak, impotent and scared.

So, let's end "comprehensive" immigration reform, tackling each issue on its own merits makes so much more sense, and assures a fairer outcome for the American people.

The following is a partial list of unlikely events whose chances of proving true are greater than are the odds that the current immigration bill will solve the open border situation.

Videotape proves existence of Loch Ness Monster

Sandy Berger tells whole story, wasn't covering up Clinton's mistakes.

Radical Islam is a religion of peace.

Laywer TB patient had greater good in mind.

Valerie Plame tells the truth.

Creationists prove Earth is 6000 years old.

Not making the list is the seemingly impossible news that the Beatles Sgt. Pepper album is forty years old. Where have all those years gone? (A live cover for your listening/viewing enjoyment here)

I have a question that perhaps a reader can help answer.

On Friday May 18 I joined a buddy at a local bar to catch up on things. Soon after I arrived we met up with some other friends, one of which was the owner of the English Pub I used to frequent. As we talked we kept noticing people we all knew from Joe's days as Pub owner. All of the fun ended when I said, "and there is that one-armed man that used to work in your kitchen". It turned out that Everett had been arrested while their employee and Joe's girlfriend had put up his bail. Everett had not shown for his court date and Joy lost her $500 bond. The police had not been able to catch up with the guy, and here he was partying in the same bar as Joe and Joy. Joy called the police, and they sent four cars out to arrest the dude.

But, once they arrived, they stayed at the back of the parking lot, and it seemed they would never enter and apprehend Everett. We remained patient, not quite knowing why they were waiting, until Joe's pal Brady insisted that Joe would have to stage a fight with Everett so that they would have reason to enter. I said no way, and begged Joe to give me time to go talk to the police; I offered to tell them exactly where Everett was and give them a description. Not waiting for a reply I headed outside. Once I made it clear to the police why I was approaching them and where they could find their man they headed around the side of the building and into the outdoor smoking area where Everett was sitting. Joe wasn't patient, and he let Brady talk him into starting something, so when they police arrived the staff was pulling him away from Everett, and perhaps only my friend Mike's interference, telling the police, "that's the one you want" while pointing at Everett, kept them from arresting Joe as well.

Anyway, back inside we went back to our business with one new point of discussion; could the police have come inside on their own accord, without my tip or Joe's commotion? Brady insisted that they couldn't come in, "that would be Nazi Germany" he hissed. "Nazi Germany?” I scoffed, "are you crazy?". I tried to explain the common interpretation of Godwin's Law, to no avail, and then I tried to explain the difference between the Nazi's actions and those of police responding to a citizen complaint, also to no result, and we basically had a standing disagreement on that topic (can the police come in) all the rest of the evening.

So, what do you think, could the police have entered and looked for Everett without further cause?

Btw, perhaps there needs to be a corollary to Godwin's Law that covers the non-internet introduction of Nazi/Hitler into a debate. Not so modestly, I propose Jones' Corollary to Godwin's Law; The predictions made in Godwin's Law apply in real life discussions at the same rate as with online discussions.

It has been more than a year since I wrote;

"All the King's horses, and all of the King's men can not create enough laws to correct our illegal immigration situation, unless someone has the fortitude to enforce the laws."

And that is just as true today as it was then. Our President and the US Senate got together last week and forged a compromise plan to deal with all of the foreign citizens who have crept into our country and taken up residence here. We are told that the plan will not grant the invaders any of the gifts contained therein until we secure our borders, thus, supposedly, putting an end to the uncontrolled flow of the invasion, and only then will we give away our heritage to the uninvited. I notice that we already have laws which forbid the unsanctioned transit into our country; and those laws are not being enforced. So, I am not impressed by any promises of future enforcement, no matter how pretty the law that promises enforcement, no matter how clever the explanation of the tenets of the new law.

I say to Washington DC, first prove that you can enforce the borders, and then we'll talk about the next step.

That next step, for many is to bestow all manner of privilege upon the invaders; they seek to reward the invasion rather than reverse, or punish the invasion. Or even to manage entry into our land. In that respect, the rewards, I see a parallel to Kehoe and other recent eminent domain cases wherein the government seizes a man's property for public use, paying the owner an amount which is less than enough to motivate the owner to sell on his own accord. And, the public use component of the deal is often spurious, or clearly not the facts.

As with the cases where the government forces the transfer of land title from citizen to, for example, a real estate developer who will use the land not for public use, but for private financial advantage; some of our lawmakers are attempting to take from us a portion, at least, of our heritage and our powers as citizens and deliver that property to others for their private use. It seems no concern to them that with each invader given domain to be a citizen the voice, a property, of the existing citizenry is diminished. Or, that as with a homeowner who does not wish to move, we do not desire to give up our property as citizens. Which is what will happen as we add more people, for the larger the pools of voices shaping this country the less impact each voice can deliver. And I haven't even mentioned the burden which will be added to our already strained network of social services. And how many other ways will an increased population diminish each of our shares in this great land. A system which will fill the voids in our work force is one thing, an understandable thing, one which gives away our national property without our consent is another.

But, the Supreme Court said the Kehoe vs. New London case was Constitutional. So, I conclude that private property rights are dying. And with so many lawmakers intent on giving away our control over our most precious commodity, the right to be an American, to anyone who sneaks in and refuses to leave on their own accord, maybe that is lost too. I doubt the success of a lawsuit to settle the matter, but let me suggest that if we call the US population Kehoe, then a Kehoe vs. New America should be tried. If it fails we can save so much money on borders, enforcement, and especially on lawmakers who create legislation which we don't have the stomach to enforce.

Additionally (5/25/2007)- I heard a caller on Sean Hannity's radio show today put the matter into a form that would fit on a bumper sticker"Our immigration law isn't broken, our government is. How true. If we would enforce the laws now on the books we would be on our way to solving the problem. Alas, those we pay to represent us do not understand that one simple concept, they think new laws solve problems when it is the enforcement of law that is the solution.

I sent the following terse email to the "Immigration" mailbox of my Republican senator:

Subj: All I want to know is...

Do you really want to be a 1-term senator?

Look, I'd prefer that we do all those things we keep getting told won't work: build a fence, deport every illegal currently inside our borders, make the crime a felony, etc. But in our republic, what I want isn't what we get; it's what can be hammered out in legislation... which then has to be enforced. You're right, we don't see anyone enforcing the laws. But enforcement is the job of the policing authorities under the jurisdiction of the executive. All we can expect from the legislative branch is the promise of tougher laws and oversight.

The immigration issue today doesn't quite reach the same level as slavery did, but it's weakening us tremendously. Just after the mid-term elections, I observed:

The idea that the leadership of my party is so ignorant of the political dynamics occurring within the rank and file is... well, it's beyond my ability to characterize effectively. Hell, I was even one of the Republicans trying to convince people that comprehensive immigration reform wasn't such a bad idea, and even I can see that handing the Democrats a victory on that issue now will completely capsize the Republican ship.

What gets me about this commentary at Wired is not the notion that some people want to make "virtual rape" a crime, or that some people want to defend society from such over-reaching, totalitarian gasbags before they enact laws and regulations to control every last variation of social interaction. After all, there are some crazy people in the world, and this fits the definition.

My problem is with some of the latter group of people, who, while seemingly able to grasp that the afrorementioned autocrats have gone beyond the pale, don't seem to realize that they enable the extreme by accepting the notion that this kind of interaction is something to leave anyone traumatized.

I am not suggesting that people aren't traumatized - the fact that they get upset and cry over this kind of stuff speaks for itself. I'm saying that our society has has become so disfunctional about the most basic notions of common sense that even an adult hasn't learned about "sticks and stones". Yes, people this damaged need some serious help. But apparently only those of us who don't buy into this therapy-based, squishy-morality, ultra-sensitive, Oprah-as-Messiah culture are able to see that the help they are going to get will inevitably be provided by the very same people who promoted the kind of childrearing that put them into that state in the first place.

Liberals, you are the children of your own creation. Why the hell am I supposed to feel bad for any of you?

Maybe it was naive of me to think that the Chinese government condoned video piracy. Apparently all those rip-off salesmen on the streets of Beijing and Shanghai are government workers, just like the people inside these amusement park characters.

I heard about this on Slashdot, which sums up the situation.

Apparently Japanese TV and bloggers have just discovered Disney's theme park in China, where young children can be part of the Magic Kingdom and interact with their favorite characters (like Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and the Seven Dwarfs). The park's slogan is 'Because Disneyland is Too Far,' and there's even an Epcot-like dome. The only problem? Disney didn't build it, and they didn't authorize it. What's more? It's state-owned!

I may skirt current copyright law on occasion with the wonders of digital media, but I'm pretty sure I've never stolen a whole amusement park before. Obviously, digital anti-copy mechanisms, DMCA notices, RIAA lawsuits, and punk-inspired commercials before our Blockbuster rentals have not done much to convince America's youth not to pirate movies and music. But could we have tried a different compensation paradigm for our artists before they started to side with our enemies abroad as well?

On Friday over at NRO - an old conservative bastion I used to respect, but which I am increasingly coming to dislike as a playpen full of children - Ramesh Ponnuru decided to take pot-shots at Fred Thompson over federalism. After rereading all the commentary in both directions, this strikes me as more than a simple case of a columnist trying to disrupt the nascent candidacy of someone I support.

It may just be me, but Ponnuru seems convinced of one of two things. Either he believes the fawning groupies who read NRO and tell him he is simply brilliant, and he needed to take on the growing popularity of Mr. Thompson to further burnish his own ego, or he's rooting for one of the other candidates running for President and decided it was time to reduce Mr. Thompson's threat level. More probably it was both. Regardless of motive, Mr. Ponnuru clearly has more at stake here than advancing his view of our ideology, and it is this kind of distraction from the dispassionate refinement of good policy from conservative theory that is annoying me most about conservative pundits lately.

Either for the thrill of the joust or sensing the importance of debating the concept at hand - and no doubt to face down the brush-back and show that he is no paper tiger - Mr. Thompson took Ramesh's challenge and offered a perfectly reasonable response that was properly dismissive without being rude.

Ponnuru not only returned the volley with more smoke and mirrors, he acted like a juvenile ass in the process.

I found Senator Thompson's stand on principle to be honorable, and it is clear the votes in question that he cast were made with an intention to set aside the complex and sometimes illicit dance of beltway horse trading in an attempt to spark an important dialogue on the vital balance of powers in our federal system.

I wish Mr. Ponnuru and NRO would make more of an attempt to engage in a respectful discussion of conservative ideals, and less time attacking other Republicans who dare to dismiss their beltway narcissism masquerading as ideology for the venal pastime it has become.

UPDATE: Fred has taken the discussion over to TownHall.com, and Ramesh has responded again

Senator Thompson has another essay on federalism, this time at Townhall. There he explains some of the goods that federalism serves. It allows states to be "laboratories for democracy" and to reflect their citizens' distinctive views. All true.

But sometimes federal action is required to make it possible for states to attain those goods. When big-city mayors, including Rudy Giuliani, sued gunmakers for, well, selling guns, Congress responded by passing a law blocking those lawsuits. Senator Thompson voted with the majority, and he was right to do so. Tennessee law can't reflect the values of its people if its laws are effectively being set by New York City's gaming of the legal system. Federal action was required to stop that from happening. Thompson saw that then; I just wish he saw that the gun case was the tip of an iceberg.

What an ass.

I've generally avoided using this term with the disdain that some have adopted over the years of our struggle against militant Islamists. Once, I quoted someone else using it. Once, I used it inside scare quotes, while querying those who use it more liberally. And once, I used it as the sarcastic do (but only in the RSS excerpt, which most people won't see), out of a fit of pique regarding one of the rituals of the Shiite sect that disgusts me.

But now I use it bluntly. In one of the articles I link to above, I mentioned (as I must have innocently believed at the time) that Islam as taught in America was relatively liberal, and not at all the same strand as that which we are fighting. So one has to wonder if the enemy has infiltrated Pittsburgh, or if Pittsburgh is no longer a part of America.

Prove me wrong. Dispute me, please. Moderate American muslims, convince the DemocratLiberalMedia Party to help you shout down this animal, or you're going to lose what support you have left among those people who have tried to remain dispassionate about the necessary reform you are NOT conducting within your communities. This isn't about prejudice, this is about survival, and if you're not going to help us protect you by clearly differentiating yourself from the enemy, we're going to be forced to conclude that you too are the enemy.

I read a feed from the History News Network at George Mason University whenever I can. A lot of times, the articles they highlight are mundane bits of esoterica about history. Sometimes they're better, and sometimes worse:

Because grand heroic acts such as Mr. Librescu's are so rare, Prof. Miller prefers to focus attention on people a little lower down the bravery scale. "What do we call just the ability to be there every day and not run, like these poor guys in Iraq?" he asked. "They see guys every day get maimed and sniped and roadside-bombed, and yet they just go and get in their Humvee every day and discharge their duty. They're not doing anything that's going to get mentioned in the papers, but they're showing up doing a dangerous, terrible crappy job, right? At some level you want to say that takes some sort of moral quality that is to be admired."

You won't see me posting this cartoon on these pages, and it is specifically this kind of bigotry that we renounced when we added the word "enduring" to our subtitle.

The next time someone complains about the prevalence of guns in America, just fall back on that old saw: "Guns don't kill tires, ex-beauty queens kill tires". Then ask them what they really expect an 82-year old woman, balanced on her walker, to do when someone tries to violate her property - or worse.

This deserves to be posted in its own right, but if you check out the thread at LGF where I found this, you'll get this extra-sweet treat in the comments:

I don't see these guys jumping out a window leaving an old man to hold the door shut.

I am absolutely disgusted.

After my rant on Tuesday, the blogosphere has brought out a number of complaints about the feminized culture we have wrought. The feminine response they have elicited from some parts is truly dispiriting. It's also immediate vindication of that argument.

John Derbyshire was probably first out of the gate, but Mark Steyn is also taking a lot of the heat. It was Steyn who brought a couple of posts from Ace, calling Steyn out for being "unfair". Ladies and cowards, when Ace of Spades, whose masthead proclaims we should "begin slitting throats", takes the feminine side in an argument like this, it's time to bend over, because we'll all be taking it like a Viking soon enough.

Kathy Shaidle, quoted by Steyn, sums it up best:

Remember: when we say "we don't know what we'd do under the same circumstances", we make cowardice the default position.

"I am pleased that the Supreme Court has upheld a law that prohibits the abhorrent procedure of partial birth abortion," he said. "Today's decision affirms that the Constitution does not stand in the way of the people's representatives enacting laws reflecting the compassion and humanity of America."- President George W. Bush

I believe that this is an issue which the founders of the Republican Party would have taken after with the same vigor with which they attacked the inhumane and degrading practice of human slavery. As we all know from history, the Republicans won that fight against slavery. One need not be a Republican, as I am not, to see that killing babies is wrong; just as one didn't have to be a Republican in the mid 19th century to understand that slavery was wrong.

Today the country is as divided over abortion as were the 19th century Americans over slavery. And, just as it was with slavery, some people can not be made to understand why abortion is wrong. For many, accepting that the mass of cells within the woman's womb is a living entity with its own unique DNA structure and its own life force is just too inconvenient for their life styles. Selfishly they invent substantiations for killing the child which fool no one but themselves. They abort so that the life they created so that it will not interfere with their otherwise irresponsible behavior. One might imagine that somewhere repressed within their thoughts is a voice asking, ' are we sure that it is better dead than fed?', and from the rest of their brain comes no reply. So, they take the life of their child and go back to dancing the night away, until the next pregnancy, and then they rinse and repeat.

It must be easier for them to be self convinced that a child still in the embryonic or fetal stage really isn't a baby than it is for those who wait until the baby is moving down the birth canal and is partly out of the mother's body when it is killed. Of course at that stage they understand that a complete delivery followed by an execution would be criminal, so they hang their legal right to kill the child upon the then flimsy notion that it is still a part of the woman as long as part of it is still inside the woman, as if they were umpiring a tennis match, on the line is in, outside the line is out.

So, having decided that the child is still a part of their body, they permit a butcher regulated by the American Medical Association to put a vacuum cleaner into the skull of the baby's body and suck its brains out. And then they can say, legally, 'hey it was dead when it landed outside the lines Mr. Umpire'. Sad but true. Of course, you never see anyone with a shop vac courtside at a tennis match attempting to influence the outcome of the ball's flight.

A University of Colorado student empathizes with the killer at Virginia Tech, is it such a reach to imagine that he attended Ward Churchill's lectures?

The Drudge Report

After lashing out at a Daily News editorial on his website, Glenn Reynolds got a chance to respond in their own pages. Good for him - and us.

If I hear one more time - and from a conservative, no less - how it's more important to show compassion than to demand or promise justice, I swear I'm going puke up a kidney. Stop simpering like babies, grow a pair of stones, and do something to solve the problems we face.

Holy crap, we've turned into a nation of eunuchs.

ESPN sportswriter Jemele Hill deserves a lot of praise for seeing that she was taken advantage of, and saying what needed to be said to begin to take responsibility for the wrong she unwittingly committed. If only the likes of Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson had this much propriety, the world would be such a better place. But then again, if there were no Al Sharptons or Jesse Jacksons (or Pat Buchanans or David Dukes...), there would be no need for the Jemele Hills of the world to apologize.

I'd been thinking it earlier, but I have to give credit to Mark Levin since he spelled it out on his radio show before I could post:

Now that charges have been dropped in the Duke rape case, and the North Carolina Attorney General has gone to the extreme of calling the three accused college students "innocent" (instead of simply "not guilty"), how long can Syndication One withstand the pressure on them to fire the man perpetuating the race-hatred that helped foster this injustice? How long?

(the title is from Proverbs 22:8)

UPDATE: Cox & Forkum strike again.

UPDATE 2: Classic Ace:

Crucified By The FCC: MSNBC announces end of Imus simulcast, which means they'll have to put together a new morning show that gets zero ratings; and the FCC will give Imus the full Stern treatment for his deeply offensive remarks.

They might also want to check out rap stations that may have played this Easy E song from back in the day:

so i grabbed the stupid bitch by her nappy-ass weave
she started talkin shit, wouldnt you know
reached back like a pimp, slapped the hoe

David Duke just emailed me again to say "That song touches my soul."

Valerie Plame finally spoke in public, and while under oath she contradicts the CIA's version of how Plame's husband became involved in WMD discussion.

"Plame said she did not select her husband for a CIA fact-finding trip to Niger. Wilson later wrote in a newspaper column that his trip debunked the administration's prewar intelligence that Iraq was seeking to buy uranium from Africa.

"I did not recommend him. I did not suggest him. There was no nepotism involved. I did not have the authority," she said.

That conflicts with senior officials at the CIA and State Department, who testified during Libby's trial and told Congress that Plame recommended Wilson for the trip."

One has to wonder what authority is required to make a suggestion. Sounds like doublespeak to me. A family trait perhaps, as it is now known that while Mr. Wilson's op-ed column had purported that his finding in Niger had debunked the pre-war intelligence it had actually contradicted his oral reporting’s to the CIA which had reinforced the prevailing belief that Iraq had been seeking uranium. Wilson's assertion that Vice President Cheney had sent him to Niger has also been shown to be in error. One has to wonder if the truth is ever in these two, Wilson and Plame.

PLAME COVER BLOWN YEARS BEFORE

Wilson has also made a big deal out of his assertion that his wife's cover was blown as a way to punish him, and that such exposure of her CIA employment put her at risk. But, those too are lies, and ones which she must have known as lies. For her cover had been blown twice before Novak reported it, once during the Clinton administration. You can't blame Bush for that one, (though we certainly expect the nut job Bush haters to try.). This revelation, that she was a known spy, may explain one part of this story which always bothered me. Why send the diplomat husband to spy and yet leave the spy wife (and WMD expert) at home when she was decidedly more qualified for the mission? The obvious answer now is that she could no long spy, her cover was already blown!

And, there is no evidence to support his paranoid accusation that the White house was out to get him as retribution. That is just partisan paranoia on his part.

Her exposure as a spy within the intelligence community created far greater danger, to her and the nation, than did her exposure to the public. Keeping her spy status secret from the public is only valuable when it helps to keep it secret from the intelligence community. A spy is in danger from the other spies, not from the public. The other spies already knew about her.

INDICT PLAME ON PERJURY

I don't buy her lame explanation on how her husband was chosen for the mission. Her own bosses say that she was the one who got his name in the mix. So, she just perjured herself. Time for a special prosecutor? No, just have AG Gonzales fire back with an indictment charging her with lying to Congress. I know it is not a crime when a Congressman lies, but surely it is a chargeable offense when a sworn witness lies to Congress.
Her appearance and testimony at this late date is no mistake either. This was a staged event, her testimony a manufactured and no doubt practiced parcel of deceit. Fitzgerald would have her in irons if she was a Republican. Ask Libby. He is convicted and she is walking around free; as long as that is the case don't talk to me about equal justice.

The jury in the case of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who was on trial for various offenses related to the CIA leak investigation surrounding Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his CIA-operative wife Valerie Plame, has reached a verdict of guilty on several counts. Earlier today, prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald announced the prosecution strategy while juror Denis Collins explained the jury's reasoning to reporters outside the courthouse.

UPDATE: James Taranto points out the truth of the matter in the Libby case by utilizing an interesting turn of phrase one does not hear too much anymore. "We won't gainsay the jury's verdict," he writes, "But it remains a travesty that Libby was ever prosecuted to begin with."

If you want to be convinced that LIbby lied to investigators, and his lies were part of a massive conspiracy in the Bush Administration to discredit Joe Wilson, fine by me. Frankly, I don't know how much of that is true, and how much is Democratic hyperventilation. But the point for me is that I just don't care either way. Because Joe Wilson is a proven liar himself, and he and his wife were partisan hacks actively trying to undermine administration policy. The whole affair has nothing to do with spying, or national security, and everything to do with the ordinary, everyday sausage factory of Washington politics, reputation-building, and lucrative book deals.

An apolitical cynic might say the travesty is that only one of them is looking at a prison sentence. But as a partisan and a political blogger, I fear for the Republic when politics itself becomes the crime.

Have you seen this presentation?

Very interesting, no? And not one word about the added effects of illegal immigration either.

We are all familiar with the phrase, "driving under the influence", though in some areas it may be worded differently. Well, today, after hearing several audio clips of Ted Kennedy, I was inspired to conceive a new protection for the public; it is time for a new law making it illegal to legislate while under the influence. I hereby propose that all legislators be required to pass a breathalyzer test to assure that their deliberations are truly sober.

And, I wouldn't object if this began a trend which lead to toxicology tests for banned substances in these same law-making individuals. It seems to be okay to test ball players, and their jobs are not all that important compared to the tasks we expect our leaders to fulfill on our behalf. So, why not know if they are doping? Sure, many ball players have better years than do our politicians, but isn't that all the more reason to be certain that we are getting the most wholesome of effort from the underachieving pols? And, not an excuse to deem them unworthy of meeting standards.

Further, would we not benefit from hooking them all up to polygraghs (the politicians)? Sure, we know already know when they are lying, their lips move, but isn't it sometimes necessary to have the proof in order to obtain a conviction?

And don't we wish we had tests which could accurately predict which ones are crooks, or pedophiles, or traitors?

And then there is the written exam, if they can't pass a combined history, American government, economics, mathematics, ethics, law, logic, and current events exam, they must go home; no passing GO, no collecting pensions or earmarks.

Sure, if I get my way, Washington will be a lonely place, but it will populated by an informed, conscientious, purpose driven and sober body. And I'll drink to that. Now, how do we our legislators to make a law which will cause so many of them to lose their jobs?

Update: January 20, 2007

The Oregon Legislature has a bill before them which, " Requires that certain public officials submit to drug test two times every calendar year. Specifies consequences of refusing or failing test." In PDF file form here

Also, noted here, and earlier here.

The Portland Mercury takes the high road on the subject.