Duck Season

Since the San Diego Comic-con is upon us this week the LA Times has a nice feature story on CrossGen Comics and its founder Mark Alessi.

Some resolution for those of us who caught FNC's daily police chase from Los Angeles around 12:30 EST on Friday. Police and Fox cameras chased this guy as he sped through streets and sped northbound in the breakdown lane on the southbound side of the highway. The chase came to an unfortunate end when the perp broadsided an SUV in a residential neighborhood. The Fox midday show left the scene without knowing the condition of the driver and any passengers in the damaged SUV. The LA Times had this to report today:

A Los Angeles man in a stolen pickup truck led police on a 20-minute chase through Southwest Los Angeles before broadsiding another vehicle carrying a mother taking her daughter to school, officials said.

The woman suffered a broken ankle in the crash but the girl was unhurt, authorities said.

Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies were taking a stolen vehicle report when the pickup's owner spotted his truck driving by. Authorities said Ricardo Antonio Larios, 22, was driving the white pickup on 91st Street as deputies gave chase.

Deputies, fearing for the public's safety, were forced to suspend the pursuit when Larios allegedly drove onto the Harbor Freeway, going north in the southbound lanes.

But officers caught sight of the pickup again minutes later at the intersection of 107th and Hoover streets.

Before they could resume the chase, the truck smashed into an SUV driven by the woman on her way to drop her 6-year-old daughter at school, said Deputy Scott Butler. The woman's vehicle veered to the right and smashed into the side of a house, knocking over a block wall under construction.

"The little girl is fine; she didn't break anything," Butler said. He said the mother, identified as Angela Mena, 30, had an ankle broken.

A resident of the house that was struck, Robert Pickering, 14, said he had been walking through the yard on his way to school just before the crash occurred.

He said his mother had called him back inside the house just moments before the vehicles collided. Otherwise, the Washington Preparatory High School student said, he might have been directly in the car's path.

Instead, the teenager said, he heard the crash and ran to a bedroom window to see what had happened.

Larios was arrested at the scene and deputies said he would face several felony charges, including driving under the influence, grand theft, and felony hit and run.

ABC has ordered that George Stephanopoulos' sunday morning show be revamped under 'Nightline' executive producer Tom Bettag. The man who defined fear for copy editors in the first Clinton Whitehouse has been anchoring ABC's 'This Week' since Cokie Roberts and Sam Donaldson where shown the door last fall. Stephanopoulos has "suffered a rough year at the hands of critics and rivals who note that the show has slipped behind CBS' 'Face the Nation'." 'This Week' will be reformatted to better mach Stephanopoulos' strengths, and will include "'Nightline'-type reports on the show."

Here's a bit of free advice for ABC... get this show away from Tim Russert's time slot! Before Stephanopoulos took over and ABC slid the syndicated version of Chris Matthews behind him, 'Meet the Press' and 'This Week' would start at the offset times of 10:30 am and 11 am. Now the shows go head-to-head, and ABC hardly ever gets my viewership. Back in the day I may have flipped from Tim's show over to ABC at 11 am if he were brining on his 'zzzz' inducing Doris Kearns Goodwyn panel, but now I rarely ever swap the channel because I hate coming into a show midstream.

How much does it suck to be Vincent Yarbrough right now? Vincent is #3 for your Denver Nuggets, aka the man that Kobe faked to the right, cross-over dribbled behind his back and dunked on. I must have seen that highlight clip 50 times today.

It's a wonderful country where Jim Armstrong can get paid for writing drivel like this about Lance Armstrong:

Tired of wading through a half-page of riveting bicycling copy to get to your morning box scores? I hear you, bubba. Sure, it was a nice story when it started, but by now it's gotten older than Jesse Orosco's bunions: See Lance ride, see Lance win, listen to French officials whine in their wine.

Yadda.

Yadda.

Yadda.

I'm sorry, I know he's overcome cancer and he's a great guy and all, but since when was Lance Armstrong born in a manger? Next thing you know, Al Gore will admit it actually was Lance who invented the Internet. Hoping for peace in the Middle East? No problem. Send Lance over there on his trusty two- wheeler. Heck, let's make it official right here and now: Lance for President.

When exactly was it that bicycling transcended recreation and became a sport, anyway? For crying out loud, we're already passing off ballroom dancing, skateboarding, chainsaw-wielding, street luge and synchronized swimming as legitimate sports. Where do we draw the line? It's getting so life's a beach volleyball game, then you die.

As far as I'm concerned, bicycling makes bowling seem like baseball in October. Which reminds me. Is there a beer frame in the Tour de France? If not, there ought to be.

Yeah, yeah, I know, those guys kill themselves getting up those mountains. No argument there. Trouble is, the only thing more grueling than doing it is watching it. If I'm going to watch a sport, it's going to involve a ball, thank you very much, not a ball bearing.

Let's leave the PC cops out of this, it should be the Good Sports Story cops who haul this jerk away. Lance Armstrong isn't some liberal puff piece, this isn't the Boston Globe covering women's sports once a week, it's an honest to God american classic. Where but the hallowed-halls of sport can synchronocity like this occur?

What's wonderful about Lance Armstrong is that he is a compelling american athlete competing in a global sport. We neglect the fact that, although we watch 'World Series' and win 'World Championships', not only is the globe shut out from competing in these events, an over whelming amount of the world simply doesn't care. Yet, forever intertwined with Lance Armstrong is this wholley american story of success despite impossible odds, an american appreciation for the ability of will-power and determination to define one's future, an american man wrapped in the garb of the United States Post Office making the american story entirely relevant to the globe in an event that is all their own.

And it really pisses off the French.

Mickey Kaus:

Anyway, we should all be nice to Dean until he fulfills his historic mission in New Hampshire--saving the nation from John Kerry.

In response to the French adding "e-mail" to the official government list of banned words Eugene Volokh has this insight:

A bit more on "e-mail": My New Shorter Oxford tells me that "mail" originates from . . . old French ("male," a variant of "malle," which means bag or trunk). True, the "e" is from Greek, but French borrows such words from Greek, too; I believe that "electron," for instance, is the same in French and in English.

So they invade jolly old England, conquer the place, foist their lingo on the locals, and then when they get one of their own words back (and with a jaunty Greek combo), say "Ew! Tainted! It's got those English cooties!" Greg Goelzhauser has a suggestion that will teach them: Expunge all French-origin words from English. It's only 28% of the language, he points out, shouldn't be too hard.

On a totally unrelated note, every time I review my résumé it feels like déja vu all over again. It's hard to believe my raison d'etre to this point in life has been turning channels and installing chandeliers. Now excuse me, I must retire to the commode.

Sing along at home:

The deficit rag, oh yeah the deficit rag,
Those budget gaps can be a twelve-digit drag,
I'm telling ya, that's the deficit,
They really made a mess of it,
That's the deficit rag!

Well John McCain feels your pain! From today's 'Friends of McCain' e-mail newsletter:

"Congress is spending like a drunken sailor"
Senator John McCain, July 17, 2003

Following are excerpts from Senator McCain's floor speech regarding the Fiscal Year 2004 Defense Appropriations Act. Click here to read the entire speech.

"Our current economic situation and vital national security concerns require that now, more than ever, we prioritize our federal spending. Yesterday, the Office of Management and Budget announced that we will be running a budget deficit of over $455 billion.

"In a report issued this week, the non-partisan Concord Coalition said that the first six months of this year was "the most fiscally irresponsible in recent memory." I would say that Congress is spending like a drunken sailor, but never in my naval career did I see a sailor drunk or sober act this irresponsibly."

I am still on the good senator's e-mail list from the year 2000 election. Last week I registered my e-mail address with the Dean, Kerry and Lieberman campaigns, but i've yet to receive anything from any campaign except three requests that I give them more information about myself. I suppose i'm not worth their time unless they have the ability to ask for money through the mail and via telephone, not just by e-mail like my buddy John McCain does.

Nick: "Where exactly do you think Bush is faltering?"

Short list:
1. steel tariffs
2. farm bill
I'm a free trade guy
3. deficit
4. judicial appointments
Rolling over on the filibuster sets a dangerous precedent
5. affirmative action
Rolling over part II

Let's face it: even his biggest supporters will admit he's not exactly great on domestic policy issues.

In one episode of Ally Mcbeal, some kid who really got the shaft in life decided to sue God. I always thought it was far-fetched and something that only happens on television, until I saw this case over at the Volokh Conspiracy:

UNITED STATES ex rel. Gerald MAYO

v.

SATAN AND HIS STAFF

***

Plaintiff, alleging jurisdiction under 18 U.S.C. § 241, 28 U.S.C. § 1343, and 42 U.S.C. § 1983 prays for leave to proceed in forma pauperis. He alleges that Satan has on numerous occasions caused plaintiff misery and unwarranted threats, against the will of the plaintiff, that Satan has placed deliberate obstacles in plaintiff's path and has caused plaintiff's downfall.

Plaintiff alleges that by reason of these acts Satan has deprived him of his constitutional rights.

Hei Lun said "every time I think that there's a Democrat that I can support if Bush continues to falter, something like this happens."

Where exactly do you think Bush is faltering?

With all this scandal talk Slate Explainer asks "What Exactly is Yellowcake?" Answer here. Interesting factoid:

Despite all the hubbub over Saddam Hussein's efforts to buy yellowcake, the stuff is by no means a rare commodity. Worldwide production is currently around 64,000 tons per year, and that's sure to rise as Central Asian nations like Kazakhstan begin to expand their uranium-mining industries. (By comparison, about 45,000 tons of tungsten, vital to the steel industry, is produced annually.) The competition has depressed yellowcake prices just a tad in recent months; a pound now costs about $10.90, down a dime from what it was trading for this spring.

Marty Meehan, D-Mass, is co-sponsoring HR 2752 which would "make it a crime to upload even one copyrighted work to a publicly accessible Web site or file-sharing network, since the bill operates under the assumption that each uploaded file gets copied at least 10 times. The penalties for felony copyright violation vary, but offenders could face a five-year prison term and a fine of up to $250,000." This bill would modify current law which stipulates that you must "distribute 10 authorized copies of a work with a retail value of more than $2,500 to make it a felony."

Who wants to bet Marty recently spent some time skiing in Utah? Read more about this over at MTV News, or track the progress of HR 2752 here.

Yoshitake Maeda passed away today, the 15 year old sumo wrestler weighed in at 308 lbs on just a 6 foot 2 inch body. This is unfortunate, but not unexpected "the sumo association has required wrestlers to undergo medical checkups after several died of heart problems in 1992. Since then, 10 wrestlers have been ordered to retire from the ring because of health problems. "

So lets get this straight, the japanese like to watch big fat man and cartoon women wrestle and bump titties? Why do we let our children watch their tv shows? Has anyone actually sat down and watched the kind of crap they pass off as Saturday morning cartoons lately? Where do I protest for trade barriers against this month's hot card game turned "tv" show?

Well, not exactly, not yet at least. But i've found two new interseting blogs about Boston sports. For a complete mockery of the Beantown angst over Pedro's extra vacation day check out today's post at Musings From Red Sox Nation.

Or for some commentary on last night's Pete Rose Trial check out Boston Sports Media Watch:

Eddie Andelman started his 1510 the Zone show today talking about his experience with the ESPN Pete Rose trial last night. He mentioned he had to "slap a woman down" in the jury room last night. He said she was trying to get a bigger role in the production.

Can you say "Bob Ryan"?

That coupled with his comments that Manny and Pedro should be grateful for their green cards got him off to a rousing start.

Just one thought on the ESPN trial, did anyone there even consider how much of a sham it was to have the jury foreman on a "trial" involving gambling being someone who delights in his relationships with Las Vegas insiders and numbers guys as much as Eddie Andelman does?

Prosecutors in Eagle County, Colorado, have announced that they will press charges against Kobe Bryant. If convicted Kobe could possibly face life in prison according to ESPN.com.

UPDATE: ESPN.com has a really thorough summary of the Colorado statute under which Kobe has been charged. Kobe has been charged for third degree sexual assault, a condition of which means he allegedly either physically forced the young woman to have sex, or he coerced her through a threat of force. You can find the specifics here.

The full text of Tony Blair's thrilling speech to the Congress can be found online here. I watched the whole event on CNN yesterday, and although i've found nothing but glowing praise for the speech on the internet (well, not from the Guardian, but what else is new?), some have struck me as an odd feint-praise.

I believe Blair's speech may have been the single most important congregation of thought expressed about the issuse's that challenge the western world in this post 9-11 era. More on that later though, this post is merely to lament the fact that neither the democrats or republicans have anyone as talented a speaker as Tony Blair running for president in 2004.

DNC chairman Terry McAuliffe promised that no Democrat will be on the ballot if there is recall of California Gray Davis:

"I want the folks here in California to know that we are not going to have another Democrat on the ballot. I think that is the single biggest message I can give today," DNC chairman Terry McAuliffe said at a downtown news conference.

"So if you're a California voter and you want to vote to recall Gray Davis, you are not going to have an option but a bunch of right-wing conservatives on the ballot," McAuliffe said.

Mark Kleiman is not happy:

... I'll give you three to one it's not going to work. Some Democrat is going to make the race. And even if no serious Democrat does, the voters are still probably angry enough to give Davis the boot anyway. Telling them up front that you're going to deny them any options is likely to make them more angry, not less.

But isn't this exactly the scenario Kleiman wished for: exactly one Democrat in the race? They'll be angry at Davis, and they'll be angry at McAuliffe, but they won't be angry at whoever the Democratic candidate is, since that candidate will have 1) given voters a real choice and 2) flagrantly defied the unpopular Davis. And again, as the only Democrat in the race, winning is highly probable.

Controversy in this mornings Guardian over a story filed by a Sky News correspondant aboard the HMS Splendid during Operation: Iraqi Freedom. 10 year veteran James Forlong has resigned over a report he filed in which "'gave the impression that HMS Splendid was engaged in action against Iraq, when, in fact, some of the scenes were reconstructions, or from library footage,' said Mark Sharman, the deputy managing director of Sky Networks, who chaired the inquiry." While it is a shame that this man has to lose his job over what was, essentially, video that lacked a caption stating "file footage", it appears as if our confidence in our media (here i'm referring to both the American and British public) is held together by such thin shards of faith that almost any incident must be dealt with severely for fear of irrepairable damage.

On this subject is where the Guardian story gets interesting:

After 12 years in which Sky News has sought to build up trust in the face of scepticism from the industry and the public, staff fear the danger of becoming tarnished with poor journalistic practices.

Sky News is proud of its news channel of the year award from the Royal Television Society - such accolades have been hard won, particularly given the attitudes of those who are suspicious of the channel's major shareholder, Rupert Murdoch.

I spent two weeks in Europe at the end of May and beginning of June. I was very surprised to find out that the two or three people that I happened to have political conversation with had never heard of Sky News. Not being familiar with the way television works in Britian I can't even begin to fathom all the possible explanations of this, but it's a sure bet that every college kid here has at least heard of Fox News.

link.

After not showing up at the NAACP cattle call, Joe Lieberman went into full pander vote in apologizing:

After offering the NAACP another apology for skipping the candidates' forum and then ticking off his own civil rights credentials, Lieberman praised the NAACP for its work during the Florida recount. That's when things became absurd. "We didn't realize at the time, Al Gore and I, that we not only needed Kweisi Mfume fighting for justice here in Florida counting votes," Lieberman said, "we need him on the Supreme Court where the votes really counted. Maybe that'll happen some day."

The New Republic's primary blog asks:

So Lieberman--a man who once questioned affirmative action--is now saying that he'll put Kweisi Mfume--a man who, according to his biography on the NAACP website, has not even attended law school--on the Supreme Court?

Every time I think that there's a Democrat that I can support if Bush continues to falter, something like this happens. Is it any wonder that in poll matchups against Bush, an unnamed Democrat always stand a better chance of winning than real Democrats?

Stephen Green and Michael Totten offer 100 words never to use on a first date.

I don't know about you, but hearing a girl talk about détente is a major turn-on.

Several days ago I linked to a story in the New York Times (or what was left of it after they start charging you for the full article) on how Republicans raised more from small contributions of $200 or less while Democrats did so from large contributions of $1 million or more. Then, yesterday, I saw a link over at Viking Pundit to these comments by Polipundit:

Bush has bested all the Democrats combined in the total amount raised last quarter - $34.4 million. Over 105,000 individual contributors donated less than $2,000 each, thus possibly giving the Bush campaign more individual contributors than all the Democratic candidates combined. Out of the 105,000 individual contributors, 85,591 are individuals who gave less than $200.

Isn't this precisely the sort of hard-money, small-contribution, fundraising that campaign finance "reformers" claim to look favorably upon? And isn't the extraordinary amount of disclosure - much more than the FEC requires - noteworthy? Let's see if campaign finance "reformers" will praise the president for his clean campaign. I wouldn't hold my breath.

Polipundit also includes a link to the page on President Bush's site where one can search for donors and their contribution amounts. I was going to write something similar to what Polipundit wrote, but before I did that I followed the link and searched for all the donors from Massachusetts, where I live. I immediately found sonething that, while definitely not rare, was very interesting on the very first page:

4. Mrs. Kristin Achtmeyer
Type: Individuals
Employer: Information Requested Per "Best Efforts"
Occupation: Information Requested Per "Best Efforts"
$2,000.00

5. Mr. Bill Achtmeyer
Type: Individuals
Employer: Parthenon Group
Occupation: President
$2,000.00

6. Ms. Olivia C. M. Achtmeyer
Type: Individuals
Occupation: Student
$2,000.00

7. Mr. Robert Achtmeyer
Type: Individuals
Employer: The Fenn School
Occupation: Teacher
$2,000.00

8. Mrs. Nell Achtmeyer
Type: Individuals
Employer: Information Requested Per "Best Efforts"
Occupation: Information Requested Per "Best Efforts"
$2,000.00

Somehow I doubt that Ms. Olivia suddenly decided one day, "hey, our president has been doing a really good job, so I'm going to help him out a little in his re-election bid." And if she did, it'd be an awfully big coincidence, since the other four members of her family gave their $2000 on the exact same day (6/27/2003, you can get this information when you click on the link to the donor).

(Digression: how lazy are these people? Couldn't they at least space out their contributions over the next year or so so that smartasses like me can't find this so easily? This isn't illegal, but it's laziness like this that got the lawyers who contributed to John Edward's campaign earlier caught. (Hey, get to the point--ed.))

Anyway, while I favor repealing most, if not all, of the campaign finance laws, and I would vote for Bush if the election is right now (though that can change any moment), spare me the rhetoric on how exemplary Bush's fundraising has been.

And this is also why I favor removing limits to hard money contributions: if someone want to give more than their limit, they'll find some way to do it, and at least you'll see who these people are, instead of a rich guy and 328 relatives, friends, and employees (most of who won't share the last name as the rich guy and so won't be easily detected unless they're really stupid like the Edwards contributors) each giving $2000.

Not quite, but a panel from the National Bureau of Economic Research did declare that the the recession ended ... 20 months ago.

We're a Wiggly Worm! (#3027)

... you might be a racist:

Steve Hinkle, a student at California Polytechnic State University, was posting fliers around campus last November 12 that advertised a speech to be given the next evening. The fliers contained a photo of the speaker, black conservative Mason Weaver, and the words "It's OK to Leave the Plantation," the name of a book in which Weaver likens African-American dependence on government programs to slavery.

When Hinkle approached a public bulletin board in the lounge of the campus Multicultural Center, some African-American students who were sharing pizzas nearby objected. They told Hinkle not to post the flier because they found it "offensive" and "disrespectful." By all accounts, his response was something like, "How do you know it's offensive? Why can't we talk about it?" The offended students then said that the flier violated the Multicultural Center's "posting policy," and threatened to call the campus police. Hinkle left, without posting the flier.

That was not the end of the matter, however. One black student did call campus police, with what was recorded as a report of "a suspicious white male passing out literature of an offensive racial nature." She and others also urged university authorities to discipline Hinkle, a member of the Cal Poly College Republicans, for what she called "hate speech" (i.e., the flier).

Incredibly, university authorities did just that, under the pretext of punishing Hinkle for "disruption" of what complaining students later claimed to have been a Bible study dinner and meeting. (Nobody had told Hinkle that this was a "meeting" at all, and he saw no Bibles.)

As usual, "diversity" means "diversity for me, but not for thee."

(Via Instapundit).

After an amazing 72 weeks Norah Jones is still at the number 8 spot on the Billboard 200 list. Her album is simply amazing, I can't recommend it more.

900,000 points in the classic arcade game.

Dear Secretary Rumsfeld: My husband has a problem with premature ejaculation. Is there something I could do to make him last longer? Ellen Shapiro, Knoxville, Tennessee

Secretary Rumsfeld: I'm just going to say this once. There is no such thing as premature ejaculation. There is ejaculation, and there is non-ejaculation. If your husband is ejaculating, then count your blessings. Congratulations, you just had sex. That's what men do, they ejaculate. All this business about, "Oh, henny penny, my husband is a premature ejaculator!" is just a lot of twaddle and claptrap. You say it enough and pretty soon, believe me, he won't be ejaculating at all.

link.

Timothy Noah, one of my favs, checks in on Slate with a two-part article about the Bush Administration, lies, and Yellowcake-gate:

The yellowcake lie landed on Page One solely because it occasioned a brief and fatal departure from the Bush White House's press strategy of stonewalling. "Bush Claim on Iraq Had Flawed Origin, White House Says" read a New York Times headline on July 8. Glancing through the story, Chatterbox initially puzzled over its Page One placement. Didn't we know already that Bush's yellowcake line was a lie? Then Chatterbox realized that the novelty component wasn't the lie, but the Bush administration's admission that it had told a lie. In the Bush White House, this simply isn't done.

You can start here.

Maybe we should just retitle the blog, All-Ann-All-the-Time! How about this URL: theydontstoptalkingaboutann.blogspot.com ?

This beauty comes from Spinsanity:

Colmes then said, "I'll give you another example" and described how we showed that she mischaracterized a quote by a Reagan administration official as the words of the Times. In her book, she wrote that the New York Times "reminded readers that Reagan was a 'cowboy, ready to shoot at the drop of a hat'" after the invasion of Grenada (p. 179). But the quote is from a Reagan administration official quoted in a Week in Review story who said, ''I suppose our biggest minus from the operation is that there now is a resurgence of the caricature of Ronald Reagan, the cowboy, ready to shoot at the drop of a hat.'' Coulter’s highly tenuous response parses the word "reminded" to claim she wasn't misleading readers. She then again tried to change the subject by claiming the Times was using the Reagan official to remind readers of the caricature, despite him or her describing it as such, in a long exchange with Colmes:

COULTER: I didn't say they said it. I said they reminded readers. It was placed in an editorial. And I do love all these quotes from anonymous officials. Yeah, some janitor picks up the phone. It's amazing how the Times can always get precisely the quote they want...

COLMES: You know people talk off the record all the time without for attribution. It wasn't the Times that said it, it was a Reagan official.

COULTER: I can't even believe I'm parsing this with people who have described a great American patriot, as John F. Kennedy called Joe McCarthy...

COLMES: Great American patriot. (sarcastically)

COULTER: ... As a virtual Nazi, and we're parsing whether "remind" is the correct word here. I say remind is the correct word, they cited it in an editorial. They were reminding their readers...

COLMES: You gave the impression that it came from the Times when it came was a Reagan person who said it.

COULTER: It did come from the Times! [unintelligible] information that is not necessary. And I repeat again, even stipulating that you were right that this is inelegant phrasing, I can't believe that, you know, parsing allegedly inelegant phrasing in the midst of a book that is disputing historical myths that we've been living with for fifty years.

COLMES: Because, in your attempt to paint the New York Times as a leftist newspaper that's not fair and balanced, you attribute quotes to it when the quotes come from other sources and other people having nothing to do with the Times. And they are simply reporting those quotes. That's what the point is.

COULTER: Wait, just let me say, I think you're confusing this book with the last book. I don't really care if it came from the New York Times, it doesn't add anything except more words to say "reminded readers by quoting an anonymous official." It doesn't add anything here. They reminded their readers, and this isn't the book attacking the Times.

Do you admire or do you fear that kind of insanity? Kudos to Alan Colmes for going after Ann like that, proving FNC hasn't sold-out entirely.

Shaggy and Rayvon have covered "In the Summertime" by your favorite band and mine, Mungo Jerry.

In partisanship, at least according to this guy.

Nick wrote:

Why can't we do research like this? Study finds that frequent masturbation lowers a mans risk of prostate cancer.

I think men do research like this every day.

Howard Dean had this to say today guesting blogging at Lawrence Lessigs's place:

I think we need to re-regulate the media that has clearly abused its authority by censoring information that should be made available to the American people.

Censorship is done by the government. When a media source doesn't run something, it's called editorializing. And it's not against the law. It's not that complicated either.

I'd also like to know what information Big Media is keeping me from knowing ...

While the Feds continue to search for Jimmy Hoffa under somebodies pool, I have to wonder - why exactly did Nixon pardon Hoffa?

Why can't we do research like this? Study finds that frequent masturbation lowers a mans risk of prostate cancer.

French President Jacques Chirac is in some hot water over the EUs mere €1 billion donation to fight AIDS in Africa.

How is it that Rupert Murdoch is one step a head of Pinky & The Brain? Because he's about to aquire DirecTV, which would give him a satellite system which finally spans the globe. More over at The Nation:

Murdoch is on the cusp of fulfilling a longstanding ambition that will finally give him a global network of powerful orbiting, interactive, direct broadcast satellites. Imagine a torrential downpour of dozens of Fox News Channels targeting major US cities; a super-broadband site continuously promoting the viewpoints of the Weekly Standard; and the ability to focus similar political messages simultaneously in Asia, Europe and North and South America. Murdoch's proposed control of DirecTV, the country's leading direct broadcast satellite (DBS) service, will ultimately harm the interests of those seeking greater political and social justice, let alone quality news and entertainment programming.

A few points: While I'm kind of inclined to think shrinking the satellite tv market from three companies to two probably isn't in the consumers best interest, this article wreaks of the sort of psuedo-liberal alarmism which really bothers me. How does Fox News on satellite harm anyone? It probably should be known that DirecTVs biggest draw is its exclusive 'NFL Sunday Ticket' which allows NFL fans with their service to watch any football game they choose on any given Sunday. Needless to say, the NFL is not exactly a subervsive organization to either political party.

Do hysterical liberals actually believe that FNC is brain-washing people? You don't have to ring my arm to get me to admit that FNC presents a specific ideological view point, but how is that any different than subscribing to a certain 'progressive' magazine? Why is someone acting against the interests of "political and social justice" when they exercise their freedom to chose a source of information? And am I allowed to say that I think the term 'social justice' just sucks. Every time I see that term it just feels like a slap in the face, an accusation that either I comply or be accused of commiting some kind of crime.

Here's my absolute favorite quote from that article - "We should not only be aware of the more immediate threats from Murdoch's new acquisition but also reflect on why progressives, labor and others are shut out of any major electronic media resource." Maybe it's because you people are poor and haven't actually bought a news network yet?! There isn't actually a law against progressives owning a cable news network, and their isn't some boogey-man keeping you away either. Or maybe there is. Let's call him "The System". Heaven forbid liberals buy into "The Sytem" and conduct their business the way The Political Middle of America care to approach issues, less they be ostracized for being too corporate. Am I wrong to believe that notions of social justice gain philosophical vigor solely because they're unpopular?

Boy am I full of rants lately.

Yahoo! is reporting that the pro-american mayor Hadithah, a town northwest of Baghdad, and his son have been assasinated. This comes on the heels of a report I saw on AOL of an Iraqi crowd cheering the death of an american soldier.

What do we know about the progress of the Iraqi state and the repair/devolopment of the Iraqi infrastructure? The american people were told by this administration that we would not only free the Iraqi people from Saddam, but also rebuild a viable Iraqi state. The phrase "Marshall Plan" was constantly tossed around, and initially it appeared as if there was political pressure enough to make this promise stick in Iraq despite the fact that the american public quickly forgot about their promise to the Afghanis.

So can the Dems press the "he's done nothing for our economy, and he's doing nothing for their homeland" issue, and would the american people care? As a further indicator that this country is getting over it's Vietnam disease, there doesn't appear to be much political pressure due to the daily death of yet another young american G.I. If the country's dedicated will can embrace our youth in body bags with only remorse for the soldiers families, can the lack of material and political success in building the foundation of a free Iraqi state grab their attention?

The Ataris latest hit single is a cover of Don Henley's 'Boys of Summer'. We need a presidential commision to look into this whole "no-name bands covering really great songs" phenomenon.

For a very entertaining debate you need to read this post and every subsequent post/reply involving Anathema, Mark4 and Phobos_ColZ.

Is it a co-incidence that both the Constitution and the Harry Potter series have recently been interpreted as libertarian documents? I don't think so.

The best from the last link:

4. There is no indication that Harry pays inheritance tax on his holdings in Gringotts.

5. The goblins in Gringotts do not monitor large cash withdrawals, or in any way conform to regulations to prevent money laundering.

6. Talking of goblins, "Gringotts Bank - Not An Equal Opportunity Employer". But since everybody seems happy, that's OK. We do not need state-enforced quotas.

8. Nobody is troubled by Political Correctness when pointing out the high proportion of sociopaths in Slytherin house.

10. The Health and Safety Executive have obviously never crossed the Hogwarts threshold. Among the violations of safety legislation are improperly secured moving staircases, flying broomsticks under the control of minors and dangerous wands in the hands of minors.

12. And, since Hogwarts is not bankrupted by ambulance-chasers or insurance claims either, it looks as though contract dominates tort in the magical world.

13. The troll is seen off by the unorganised militia, as are other baddies. You do not see Harry banged up for murder or violation of the troll's civil rights.

John Swartzwelder is back in Season 15! Episode capsules from the Simpsons Archive:

EABF21 - Treehouse of Horror XIV - Written entirely by John Swartzwelder
"Reaper Madness" - Death Takes a Holiday/Meet Joe Black/Final Destination/Meaning of Life/Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey/... spoof. Death becomes H(om)er and our hero must learn to reap what he sews (and pull a fast one on the almighty). "Frinkenstein" - Frankenstein spoof. Soon to be Nobel-prize winning Professor Frink reanimates Professor Frink Senior for some gruesome body parts-swapping. "Stop the World, I Want to Goof Off" - Clockstoppers spoof, starring Bart and Milhouse.
Guest starring Jerry Lewis as Frink Sr. and Jennifer Garner as herself. (Will air likely as the unofficial season premiere)

EABF22 - The Regina Monologues - Written by John Swartzwelder
Mr. Burns loses a thousand-dollar bill that is quickly turned into the main display at the Museum of Modern Bart. After Burns shows up to reclaim his money, Bart realizes he still earned enough from charging admission to take the Simpsons to England. When they arrive, Marge begs Homer to make this an incident-free trip, which he actually succeeds at until he accidentally runs into the Queen. Now the only thing that will earn Homer a stay of execution is whether he can uncover the plot to poison her majesty. (Will likely air as the season premiere, following the annual Treehouse of Horror episode.)
Guest starring Tony Blair, Ian McKellen and J.K. Rowling as themselves.

Apparently it's unconstitutional to refuse play the Dixie Chicks' music, at least according to Senator John McCain:

[Cumuls Broadcasting CEO Lewis] Dickey concluded that continuing to play the Dixie Chicks on the chain's country stations would alienate listeners and ultimately cost Cumulus money. I'm not sure the 30-day ban was a smart business move, but there's no question the decision was the company's to make.

No question, that is, except in the minds of John McCain and people who share his confusion. McCain called the Dixie Chicks moratorium "an incredible, incredible act," explaining: "I was...as offended as anyone by the statement of the Dixie Chicks. But to restrain their trade because they exercised their right of free speech to me is remarkable."

Not just incredible and remarkable, McCain told Dickey, but unconstitutional: "Because if someone else in another format offends you, and there's a huge hue and cry, and you decide to censor those people, my friend, the erosion of the First Amendment in the United States of America is in progress."

I think McCain needs a lesson on the First Amendment, and the difference between the right to say something and the privilege to have your speech disseminated. That'll come after the First Amendment lesson on money as speech.

So says Bob Graham.

(Via The Corner).

So it's day two of Howard Dean's guest blogging at Lawrence Lessig's site. So what's there? A post on media consolidation that doesn't fully make an argument and another on how we need to base decisions on facts and to fight "the special interests". Why is deregulation bad? Because Internet access providers could block content they "didn't like". Why would they do that to drive their customers to all the other Internet access providers? Didn't say. Why else is deregulation bad? Because the content "media conglomerates" provide are less independent and less dependable. Why is that? Didn't say. And of course, the fearmongering in the end about "economic power" seizing power, and how AT! THIS! VERY! MOMENT! that possibility is greater than ever, as if he had never heard of William Randolph Hearst.

The second post is a gem too. First a plethora of platitudes and how he's "here to listen" (insert Hillary/listening tour joke here - ed.). Then he tells us that unlike that guy in charge, he bases his decisions on facts. We're supposed to trust that he did this with regard to Iraq because he changed his mind on a needle exchange program. Now I'm convinced! Then the stuff about special interests and how there's 33 lobbyists for every Congressman. The next bit is absolute gold and requires setting it aside with an inset:

How do we change that? By working together.

Well knock me over with a feather! We're saved now!

Creation Science fair: link.

So the baseball All-Star game will decide whether the American or the National League gets home-field advantage in the World Series, which is supposedly very important. But doesn't this favor the American League since they have home-field advantage in the All-Star game?

Nick:

We had this argument over this last week, and i've finally been able to find my source.

The government spent $258,069,000,000.00 in 1999 and $279,110,000,000.00 in 2000 on the military according to congressman Christopher Cox who published this report. This amount represents 13% of all national expenditures, behind only social spending at 56% and interest on the national debt at 17%.

I look up where I thought I saw my information, but it's clearly not 4%.

My defense: I mis-remembered!

Don't we both agree that the readers of The Nation are totally wrong to be outraged by an advertisement? We know that The Nation editorial staff would never actually endorse FNC. A savy The Nation reader should actually be pleased with the ad because through it the Vast Rright-Wing Conspiracy is helping to fund their beloved magazine. On top of that, this lefty reader should know his brothers in subscription are generally disgusted by the idea of ever turning on Fox.

From this perspective FNC is just dumping its money down the lefty toilet with hardly any hope for a gain in viewership, although I'd bet dollars to donuts FNC put those ads in just to drive the readership base of The Nation nuts.

Isn't there a subtle yet significat difference between just putting an ad in your magazine and actully making a product available through your book service? Just like i'm sure Sports Illustrated makes no particular endorsement of Skoal, I'm sure The Nation considers itself neutral on the content of the ads (so long as they're all in good taste) placed in its magazine.

On the other hand, the National Review book ad clearly shows that the magazine is endorsing Ann's book by putting it for sale through its own book service. Every merchant has the right to decide what kind of product they sell, and if the National Review doesn't believe Ann should be writing for their magazine, why does it make sense to put their magazine logo in an ad for something that she writes?

Several months ago: The Nation accepts ads for Fox News. Readers are angry. Best quote:

''We're fair and balanced,'' said Robert Zimmerman, a spokesman at Fox News in New York. ''Why wouldn't we advertise in The Nation?''

If National Review accepting ads for Ann Coulter's book means that they endorse her views, does this mean The Nation endorses Fox News?

We had this argument over this last week, and i've finally been able to find my source.

The government spent $258,069,000,000.00 in 1999 and $279,110,000,000.00 in 2000 on the military according to congressman Christopher Cox who published this report. This amount represents 13% of all national expenditures, behind only social spending at 56% and interest on the national debt at 17%.

I doubt that this has fallen to four percent in just the last three years.

UPDATE: Congressman Cox has this report for the year 2002 describing US military spending as representing 13.5% of the total pie, even though total military spending rose to $309,527,000,000.00.

John Derbyshire, always a ray of sunshine, writes about the future of Hong Kong. He is not optimistic.

If we pessimists are right about events in China, the omens for Hong Kong are not good. As the skies over the mainland darken, the beleaguered Communists will revert to Leninist type, repudiating agreements, turning away from economic sense (to the degree that they have ever really faced it), and striking out savagely at all opposition. Such freedoms as Hong Kong has held on to will not survive such a catastrophe. If China breaks up, the city might regain some independence, or even thrive as the commercial capital of a Cantonese state. More likely the Communists, or the military junta that succeeds them, will maintain central control by force and police terror. Hong Kong's talented people will flee for happier climates, and that marvelous, improbable city will revert to what it once was: a shabby second-rate place, a dull backwater, Pera become Beyoglu.

Michele Catalano at A Small Victory links to a post on Dave Barry's blog urging everyone to enter a poem at www.poetry.com with the line "the dog ate my mother's toes" and a psuedonym of Freemont as a first name. Here's my entry:

Kid Stuff
By Freemont Fomenter

There once was a little girl named Rose
Who put dog biscuits in her mother's hose
She then heard a yelp
So she ran to get help
Saying, "the dog ate my mother's toes!"

Russ Baker is on the trail of some Bush administration shananigans with their economic data over at Slate:

Another administration trick is playing with the length of its economic forecast periods, which puts the best possible face on bad news while exaggerating the projected benefits of its own initiatives. For example, to heighten the impression that Social Security is running out of money (thereby strengthening the case for allowing workers to divert money from the system into private retirement accounts), the administration has predicted shortfalls far in the future by relying on preposterously long forecast periods. In a superb analysis of the budget in the June Harper's, Thomas Frank noted that in 2002 the administration declared an $18 trillion shortfall in Social Security and Medicare—about five times the current national debt. Frank notes that in order to arrive at the $18 trillion figure—since Social Security is currently in surplus—the administration used a "cumulative seventy-five-year estimate [Frank's itals] based on extreme long-term projections ... ." Meanwhile, even as it relies on 75-year projections for Social Security, the same document replaces traditional 10-year budget projections with five-year ones, claiming the longer-term numbers were unreliable.

Nick wrote:

I think Dean hits a huge homerun in the general election with his critique of the Bush economic policy and the buzzwords of fiscal responsibility. *If* in fact he managed Vermont as well as he says he has, I think the Dubya is especially vulnerable for the record deficits his tax cuts have created. Dean has been the only democrat i've seen make this criticism of the President stick.

His foreign policy stance is really out of whack, but other than that Mrs. Lincoln, I don't see why Howard Dean can't be the star of this play. It's not as if we've never elected a president with a non-existant bordering bad foreign policy history before, right?

Most moderates aren't going to vote base on how bad Bush has been on domestic policy, they're gong to vote on foreign policy, and Dean won't get many votes from them. Let me find a few people who can say this better than I can. First is an article in Salon.com last week by John B. Jodis, who co-wrote The Emerging Democratic Majority.

If Dean himself can gather a modicum of support from blue-collar and minority Democrats, he might even be able to win the Democratic nomination for president and face George W. Bush in the general election. The Democratic field this year is pretty mediocre. But if that does happen, it could lead to a long and unhappy fall for Democrats. Some of the factors that make Dean attractive to Democrats will not endear him to independent and Republican voters.

According to Jodis, Dean won't be able to attract the white working-class voters:

In general, Dean's antiwar stance and his identification with gay rights would cause him difficulty among white working-class voters in the Midwest and the South. Democrats don't have to win majorities among these voters, but if they can't win at least 40 percent, they won't be able to win traditionally Democratic states like Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Ohio, Tennessee, and West Virginia. Bill Clinton was successful because he could speak to professionals in Silicon Valley and autoworkers in Fenton, Mo. Gore couldn't win those states largely because he was too culturally identified with the Northeast, with college-educated professionals, and with postindustrial social liberalism. Dean suffers from the same political disability.

Bottom line:

To put it in regional terms: Dean, a culturally libertarian New Englander who opposed the war, could virtually forget about winning any Southern or border states. Southerners are willing to support a Southern Democrat like Clinton with whom they can identify, but they will not vote for a Dukakis or Dean. Dean would not simply get trounced in the South: His candidacy would allow Bush to take the entire South for granted and move all his resources into states like Michigan and Pennsylvania that the Democrats have to win. In the end, Dean would be lucky to hold on to Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, D.C., Maryland, Illinois, Minnesota, California, Oregon, and Washington.

Wouldn't the other candidates do just as poorly? If Bush's popularity remains high, they might also be trounced. If, however, the economy continues to falter, and if Americans become skeptical about the benefits of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, a Democrat could defeat Bush -- though only if the election pivots on Bush's successes and failures and not on the qualifications of his Democratic opponent. The Democrats would be much better off in that case with a blander, more faceless, less exciting Kerry, Gephardt or even Lieberman (perhaps with Edwards, Florida Sen. Bob Graham, or retired Gen. Wesley Clark as running mate) than they would be with a fiery, controversial Dean. [emphasis added]

Jodis concludes his article by noting how similar Dean is with George McGovern. Another to make this comparison is Larry Kaplan of the New Republic. Writng in OpinionJournal.com last week, Kaplan notes the overwhelming importance of foreign policy in the last, and the next, election:

During the 2002 midterm election cycle, polls found that most voters rated national security as the country's top priority, even more important than the economy. And as defense and foreign policy issues have re-emerged, so too has the Republican advantage. Hence, numerous recent surveys have shown that once again Americans trust Republicans over Democrats on national security issues, often by a margin of 3 to 1 ... True, the economy will play a crucial role in the 2004 presidential election. But, as Kerry adviser Chris Lehane has put it, "To get to that issue, you need to satisfy [voters'] expectation and desire that you can handle national security."

And nominating Dean won't exactly close that gap:

The good news here is that, after a decade of touting microinitiatives, school uniforms, and Fleetwood Mac tunes, the party of Harry Truman has finally rediscovered its voice on national security issues. The bad news is that it's the voice of George McGovern ...

... despite the economy, the president still enjoys approval ratings of 60% plus. If the Democratic Party intends to run against a popular war, its leaders might wish to recall the lesson of a Democrat who ran against an unpopular war. He lost 49 states.

Conservatives like Rod Dreher are absolutely giddy with excitement:

... Dean's my favorite Democrat, for the same reason he's Karl Rove's. Go, Howard, go!

(Jodis article via Dan Drezner, Kaplan via Michael Totten).

Those are some really interesting points you make about Wesley Clark, but allow Dale Arnold and I to play devil's advocate here for Howard Dean.

While i'm not up on the legitimacy of the claims against Dean's governership in Vermont, I think Dean hits a huge homerun in the general election with his critique of the Bush economic policy and the buzzwords of fiscal responsibility. *If* in fact he managed Vermont as well as he says he has, I think the Dubya is especially vulnerable for the record deficits his tax cuts have created. Dean has been the only democrat i've seen make this criticism of the President stick.

His foreign policy stance is really out of whack, but other than that Mrs. Lincoln, I don't see why Howard Dean can't be the star of this play. It's not as if we've never elected a president with a non-existant bordering bad foreign policy history before, right?

Slate's new layout royally sucks. Whats with this left/right column stuff, and the font is all screwy, i don't like looking at it at all.

Should Wesley Clark run for president? Franklin Foer thinks so:

... Clark's shot at beating Bush is exponentially better than those of any of the other contenders.

Nobody could possibly take Clark, the former NATO supreme commander, for a McGovernite pacifist -- even when he makes his critique of Operation Iraqi Freedom. When the press refers to him, his first name will always be "General." Without being the least bit exploitative, his ads will feature him with stars across his shoulders.

But Clark's virtues go beyond foreign policy concerns and his jacket full of medals. When he articulates mainstream Democratic issues, as he does on abortion, affirmative action and taxation, he manages to sound like a centrist maverick. In part, he benefits from a southern accent and a cool demeanor. But he also approaches politics as an outsider. This isn't to say that he is a policy ignoramus. On the contrary, he talks about domestic issues with a surprising proficiency. (He didn't finish first in his West Point class for nothing.) Clark's appeal is that he intelligently veers from traditional Democratic rhetoric to make the party's case.

I think Foer is getting a bit ahead of himself there. His argument is that Clark can attract the moderates who may lean left on domestic issues but would vote for Bush if a Dean or even a Gephardt were the Democratic nominee, because of national security. The problem is, moderates don't vote in the Democratic primary. Any argument in favor of a Clark candidacy must begin on his ability to win the primary.

So what are his chances? His biggest appeal is that he would be the most electable Democrat. Can this get people to vote for him? Clearly he won't persuade any of the Dean Fedayeen, who despite their claims are not supporting an electable candidate. He might draw votes away from Kerry, but only after he has established himself as a viable candidate. For this he would need to get the DLC type votes that now support Edwards, Gephardt, and Lieberman. This is a crowded field, and though they might have control of the Democratic rank-and-file, they don't exactly command a controlling majority of primary voters. The only thing a Clark candidacy might do is to further split the moderate vote and enhance the chances of Kerry or Dean.

Another way for Clark to get votes would be for him to energize those who normally don't vote. But this is unlikely. His support would come from moderates, and these are the last people who would vote in a primary because they think that one of the candidates is more electable than the others. An undecided moderate won't spend their time voting for Clark in a primary if they haven't already decided that they're voting against Bush. And of course many of these moderates are unregistered and would not be able to vote in the closed primaries. Most of them happen to be in the South (including South Carolina), precisely the states in which Clark would really need to have a strong showing (the link shows the types of primaries in 2000 for Democrats; I don't know whether any of them have changed since then).

The only way Clark could win, it would seem, would be to draw away a significant amount of support from Edwards, Gephardt, Lieberman, and maybe Kerry. This isn't impossible, but it might be tougher for him to win the nomination than to beat Bush in the general election.

(Foer article via Oxblog).

From a PETA press release:

I am writing with regard to the unfortunate events of July 9, when Pittsburgh Pirate Randall Simon viciously attacked the "Italian Sausage" participant in Miller Park’s famous "Sausage Race." We at PETA feel that now would be a perfect time for you to take us up on our suggestion from last year: You should include a vegan "soysage" in the big race.

Violence seems to be everywhere in baseball these days: Fans are attacking players and umpires in the field, Pedro Martinez "beaned" two Yankees in a row, the Reds are fighting everyone in sight, and now this. Something must be done. What better way is there to set a good example for the rest of the baseball community than by allowing a nonviolent "soysage" to participate in the Sausage Race? By rejecting the castration, dehorning, debeaking, wing-breaking, and throat-slitting that are part and parcel of the meat industry, you can send a powerful message that violence will not be tolerated in baseball—on the field or in the slaughterhouse.

Miller Park already offers veggie hot dogs in the stands—in fact, PETA named Miller Park one of the Top 10 Veg-Friendly Ballparks in our annual list this year. Why allow veggie dogs into the ballpark but then exclude them from the race? Perhaps Randall Simon was simply expressing his frustration at the fact that the vegetarian hot dog was not allowed to compete. By allowing the peaceful "soysage" in the race, you could possibly avoid future player-meat confrontations.

Michele Catalano at A Small Victory is all over their case:

Honestly, I have no idea what to do with these people anymore. I have run out of snarky comments and sarcastic quips for PETA. They are just out of their fucking minds.

I wish I had seen this sooner, then I would have known that PETA was staging a protest not too far from my home today. I would have picked up a couple of hunks of salami and drove down there, where I would have my kids throw the salami out of the car window and at the protesters, screaming IF MEAT IS MURDER THAN MURDER SURE TASTES GOOD WITH MUSTARD!

72% of Democrats still can't correctly name a single candidate for president, according to a July 8-9 CBS poll.

q32 From what you have heard or read, can you name any of the candidates running for the 2004 Democratic nomination for president?

Yes, can name a candidiate 34%
No, can't name a candidate 66%

q33 Who is the first one who comes to mind?
Howard Dean 7%
John Edwards 1%
Richard Gephardt 3%
Bob Graham 1%
John Kerry 7%
Dennis Kucinich 1%
Joe Lieberman 6%
Al Sharpton 2%

Hillary Clinton 2%
Others 4%

After twenty years of nonsense, JLA/Avengers to hit the comic racks the first week of September. You can preview some of the art work here.

Tom Maguire links to a story in the Miami Herald about the NAACP candidates forum in which four of the nine candidates initially refused to attend:

''If you can't come to the nation's oldest and largest civil rights organization's national conference to lay out what you believe in and the direction you think our country should go in, you certainly have no legitimacy going into black communities asking for votes,'' said Mfume, as he prepared to welcome delegates to the NAACP's annual conference. ``If you can't do a forum where you're simply asked a question and asked to respond, the question is can you really lead?''

... Mfume suggested a different theory for the candidates' reluctance: a fear of matching wits with Sharpton or Dean, whose lively style and support for positions backed by the NAACP are likely to win enthusiastic applause.

''If you're afraid to appear against Al Sharpton, then maybe you need to be running for another office,'' he said.

Maguire adds this comment:

As Charles Barkley famously inquired about one of the 1992 Olympic Dream Team opponents, "Why don't ya'll take your ass-kickin' like men and go on home?"

Daniel C. Dennett in the New York Times on what a "bright" is:

What is a bright? A bright is a person with a naturalist as opposed to a supernaturalist world view. We brights don't believe in ghosts or elves or the Easter Bunny — or God. We disagree about many things, and hold a variety of views about morality, politics and the meaning of life, but we share a disbelief in black magic — and life after death.

The term "bright" is a recent coinage by two brights in Sacramento, Calif., who thought our social group — which has a history stretching back to the Enlightenment, if not before — could stand an image-buffing and that a fresh name might help. Don't confuse the noun with the adjective: "I'm a bright" is not a boast but a proud avowal of an inquisitive world view.

Many liberal commenters on Kevin Drum's blog don't like it. Best quote:

Yes, bright make you sound like a moron.

Rush Limbaugh to appear on ESPN's Sunday NFL Countdown as "the voice of the fan".

Limbaugh, who will appear either on the show's Bristol, Conn., set or via satellite, will provide a weekly opinion piece on an aspect of the NFL making news that week, and participate in impromptu exchanges with the analysts and challenging their opinions on various issues. Limbaugh will be allotted three challenge opportunities to use at his discretion during the show.

Democrats are consulting their lawyers on whether this violates campaign finance laws.

K.Lo has it in 'The Corner', by way of CNN, that the Mass. Supreme Judicial Court will not return with its verdict in the gay marriage case today.

And in other CNN news, Hotel Condoms are all the rage in China to help celebrate UN World Population Day.

aka The Military. Clinton has consensual sex in the Oval Office and gets impeached, but as Roger Clegg demonstrates in 'The Corner' today, if the Pentagon takes bribes and the services of prostitutes, the issue is ignored in favor of slamming minority programs:

The Washington Post reported Friday that two former high-level Pentagon officials have been convicted of getting more than $1.1 million in cash, as well as sexual favors and gifts—“including expensive gold watches and the services of prostitutes”—in exchange for helping minority-owned companies secure government contracts. One of the men had actually headed the Defense Department’s influential Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization. This is, of course, only the latest in the unbroken record of corruption in the federal government’s minority contracting programs. But since the whole point of these programs is to award contracts to companies other than those that submit the lowest bids, what’s a little additional baksheesh among friends?

What hypocracy, what a sheer fucking joke. The military constantly gets a free-pass from the right. They'll scream about waste at every level of the government, but when the Pentagon loses a trillion dollars of tax-payers money no one does anything (except blame Clinton)! Someone needs to cut the pork out of the military, the real cash cow.

I'd like to apologize in advance for mixing farm animal metaphors and for citing Bill O'Reilly as a source. It was the first article that I found on Google News.

From today's Daily Telegraph, Russian Mafia rub-out caviar sniffing Cat:

Russia's only "sniffer cat", hailed for its successes in the campaign against the bloody and lucrative world of caviar smuggling, has been run over and killed in a suspected contract killing.

Stolen from 'The Corner'.

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court to rule on gay marriage.

This post says it all: The Stick Army Must Be Stopped!

Play this game.

It's stories like these which make me want to call for a culling of the herd. What kind of pervert finds anything entertaining about flying to Las Vegas in order to hunt naked women with a paintball gun? And it costs upwards of $10,000.00! Channel Eight Eyewitness News reporter LuAnne Sorrell has the story.

I wonder how long it will take Michael Moore to re-release "Bowling for Columbine" with this story edited into the dvd-extras.

The Counsil on American-Islamic Relations wants you to know that France definitely has issues with its Muslim population. If you're running around this country afraid that the USA has turned into Germany circa 1933 maybe you should ask yourself why Bush hasn't revoked the right of a muslim woman to wear her head-scarf, because that is exactly what happened in France the other day. A court in Lyon ruled that a muslim woman wearing her head-scarf on the job constitutes a "particularly serious offense" against the French state. They're warm and fuzzy people, aren't they? Perhaps this explains why the UN ranked France so poorly?

And since it costs money to register for the Ireland Times i'll just copy this next article straight out of the daily e-mail that CAIR sends me, emphasis my own:

SAVING MUSLIM WOMEN FROM A PIECE OF CLOTH
Lara Marlowe, Irish Times, 7/12/03
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/opinion/2003/0712/4079938464OPLARAM12JUL.html

Nothing is as certain to make you unpopular in a French gathering - whether left-or right-wing - as saying you don't understand the fuss about le foulard islamique.

I recently committed the faux pas of asking: "If a Muslim woman wants to wear a headscarf, what's the problem?" The decibel level of the dinner conversation exploded. Normally rational French men and women, including one of Arab origin, tried to outdo each other with denunciations of Islamic fundamentalism. For a reporter who has worked in the Islamic Republic of Iran, where men are obsessed with forcing women to cover their hair, it sometimes feels strange to live in a society where the majority seem determined to force women to uncover their hair.

It was an example of what the former cabinet minister, Jean Glavany, called the "plus laic que moi tu meurs syndrome", which translates roughly as a nose-thumbing taunt of "I'm more secular than you are." Mr Glavany heads the socialist party's "Permanent University of Secularism". In an interview, he accused the right of "trying to appropriate the issue." Over the past two months almost all French politicians, including President Jacques Chirac, have become involved. The debate is meant to encompass secularism in general, but invariably zeroes in on the headscarf.

It is partly an attempt to placate the millions who voted for the extreme right-wing, anti-immigrant leader Jean-Marie Le Pen last year. It may be related to September 11th and events in Palestine, Algeria and Iraq. In any case, "it's not caused by an upsurge in veiling in France," Mr Glavany admitted. "The numbers are levelling off." At the end of July a tribunal in Lyons will decide whether Nadjet ben Abdallah (33), a lawyer of Algerian origin, has the right to wear a headscarf at her government job. She sued after being suspended. "I don't represent all the headscarves on the planet," Ms ben Abdallah said after her July 3rd hearing. "I'm a work inspector. I like my profession and I am a Muslim. I don't want to have to choose between the two." Other highly publicised cases have strengthened the perception that Muslims are attempting to impose their lifestyle on the secular republic. The mayor of Evry tried to shut down a grocery store because its owners, Mohamed and Abdel Djazari, refused to sell pork or wine. Franprix supermarkets withdrew the brothers' franchise, though a kosher Franprix in Paris has been in business for over a decade. A right-wing deputy of Arab origin has called on inhabitants of towns where swimming pools provide women-only hours at the request of Muslim associations to sue their mayors. No one has complained about similar arrangements for Jewish groups in Strasbourg and Sarcelles.

On July 3rd President Chirac established a commission on secularism. Prominent politicians, including the Prime Minister, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, have called for a law banning the wearing of headscarves at school, and the presidential commission is to make a recommendation by the end of this year. Bernard Stasi, the president of Mr Chirac's commission, was asked by Le Monde whether the resurgence of the debate on headscarves risked stigmatising Islam. His response conveyed the ambiguity of the government position.

"We mustn't start a war against a religion, nor give them the feeling they've been ostracised," Mr Stasi replied. "That said, everything depends on the image that Islam gives of itself. If a religion has an aggressive behaviour, one mustn't be surprised if it inspires reactions." The "give 'em an inch and they'll take a mile" argument is used most often against the headscarf. It was summarised by Alain Juppe, a former prime minister and the head of Mr Chirac's UMP party, in an interview with Valeurs Actuelles magazine.

Mr Juppe said legislation would be necessary "to defend secularism". He mentioned mayors segregating swimming pools. "Why wouldn't the next step be separate train compartments for men and women, beaches reserved for one sex and forbidden to the other? This system has a name: apartheid." A few, isolated voices have noted that a law against the wearing of headscarves would further impede the integration of France's Muslim children by forcing them into Koranic schools. And it would probably violate Article 9 of the European Convention of Human Rights, which the French helped draft...

Why should a scarf be so offensive on the head of a Muslim schoolgirl, but perfectly acceptable if it's Hermes silk worn by the British queen or a lady from the 16th arrondissement? And why does it pose no problem in the US, which has often showed anti-Muslim bias?...

Why should France, the self-proclaimed country of human rights, feel compelled to save Muslim women from a piece of cloth? Yes, protect the secular basis of the French republic. Resist attempts by religious groups to impose their beliefs on others. But stop poisoning inter-faith relations with your headscarf obsession.

Gotta love the cheap-shot at the end, God-damn Irish.

It's the top of the 9th inning in Baltimore, and the fans are booing lustily because has Cito Gaston left pitchers in his pen even though he has a big lead, including the home-town hero Mike Mussina. The game ends with the Moose in the pen and the Baltimore fans lustilly booing both teams off the field, even though the American League womped on the NL in an AL ballpark. Gotta love baseball. Even though it doesn't "count", MLB still figured out a way to screw with the fans.

Have you seen this commercial yet? "World's Greatest Air Guitar Album." Just look at the track list:

Disc 1
01 Bohemian Rhapsody | Queen
02 Smoke On The Water | Deep Purple
03 Song 2 | Blur
04 Walk This Way | Run DMC Featuring Aerosmith
05 Since You've Been Gone | Rainbow
06 Yankee Rose | David Lee Roth Featuring Steve Vai
07 Wipe Out | Surfaris
08 Rocky Mountain Way | Joe Walsh
09 Johnny B. Goode | Chuck Berry
10 Little Sister | Stevie Ray Vaughan
11 Black Magic Woman | Santana
12 All Right Now | Free

Disc 2
01 Takin Care Of Business | Bachman-Turner-Overdrive
02 Cult Of Personality | Living Color
03 Ace Of Spades | Motorhead
04 Round N Roud | Ratt
05 Rebel Yell | Billy Idol
06 Sorry Somehow | Husker Du
07 American Woman | The Guess Who
08 Jet City Woman | Queensryche
09 More Than A Feeling | Boston
10 Green Grass And High Tides | Outlaws
11 Down, Down | Status Quo
12 Have A Cigar | Foo Fighters & Brian May

Me thinks i'll pick this up when its $21.99 at best buy. In other news, John Smoltz just threw two two-out wild pitches to allow (you guessed it) two extra runs in the 1993 MLB All-Star game.

This must be the biggest 'who'd have thunk it?' story since, well, the last one: April 9 declared national Iraqi holiday, Iraqi's to celebrate Saddam's demise.

The United Nations reports that the USA is better place to live than stupid Canada!

The top ranked nations were: Norway, Iceland, Sweden, Australia, Netherlands, Belgium, United States, Canada, Japan, Switzerland, Denmark, Ireland, Britain, Finland, Luxembourg, Austria, France, Germany, Spain and New Zealand.

link.

Projected first round picks in my fantasy football league:

1. QB Mike Vick (Randy)
2. RB Priest Holmes (Francis)
3. RB LaDanian Tomlinson (Mr. Fav)
4. RB Ricky Williams (Chi)
5. QB Peyton Manning (Chris)
6. RB Marshall Faulk (Kit)
7. RB Clinton Portis (Meredith)
8. QB Donavon McNabb (Nick)
9. QB Drew Bledsoe (Jim)
10. RB Deuce McAllister (me)

George Will on WMD - regime change is not a sufficient justification for the Iraq War:

An antidote for grand imperial ambitions is a taste of imperial success. Swift victory in Iraq may have whetted the appetite of some Americans for further military exercises in regime change, but more than seven weeks after the president said, "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended," combat operations, minor but lethal, continue.

And overshadowing the military achievement is the failure -- so far -- to find, or explain the absence of, weapons of mass destruction that were the necessary and sufficient justification for preemptive war. The doctrine of preemption -- the core of the president's foreign policy -- is in jeopardy.

To govern is to choose, almost always on the basis of very imperfect information. But preemption presupposes the ability to know things -- to know about threats with a degree of certainty not requisite for decisions less momentous than those for waging war.

Some say the war was justified even if WMD are not found nor their destruction explained, because the world is "better off" without Saddam Hussein. Of course it is better off. But unless one is prepared to postulate a U.S. right, perhaps even a duty, to militarily dismantle any tyranny -- on to Burma? -- it is unacceptable to argue that Hussein's mass graves and torture chambers suffice as retrospective justifications for preemptive war. Americans seem sanguine about the failure -- so far -- to validate the war's premise about the threat posed by Hussein's WMD, but a long-term failure would unravel much of this president's policy and rhetoric.

The NY Post reports that 60% of married women will have an affair:

July 13, 2003 -- More women are cheating on their husbands - and doing it without remorse, sex researchers say.

A stunning 90 percent of adulterous wives told one Manhattan researcher they suffered "no guilt," but rather felt "entitled" to the pleasure and excitement of their secret trysts, said Susan Shapiro Barash, a gender-studies professor and author.

The Sunday Times reports that Burgers are addictive as drugs. The problem, of course, is in the pudding:

However, a meal at a fast food outlet — burger, chips, drink and dessert — can deliver almost all of an adult man’s recommended daily calories in a single sitting. For example, a McDonald’s quarter pounder with cheese contains 516 calories. A large portion of french fries adds another 412, and an accompanying large milk shake another 500 calories — while a chocolate doughnut or dessert gives a further 379.

The total is more than 1,800 calories, most of it coming from fat and sugar. By comparison, a leg of chicken with boiled potatoes and peas plus an apple contain about 800 calories, with a relatively small proportion comprising fat or sugar.

While I certainly do not endorse eating McDonalds food at all, I won't go near the stuff, who the hell makes a meal of a single leg of a chicken, boiled potatoes and peas with an apple for desert?

Andrew Stuttaford, who I stole the link from, dismisses the findings:

Notice the use of conveniently vague words and phrases such as “significant” and “similar to,” but even if we do accept the researchers’ premise that junk food is somehow ‘addictive’ (and I don’t) all that this signifies is that our notions of ‘addiction’ are so vague as to be meaningless. You can prove this by playing a simple word game. Instead of saying that burgers are, say, as addictive as heroin, turn the phrase round to say that heroin is no more addictive than fatty food. Nonsense? Yes.