Duck Season

How do I get a job like this?

If someone tells you that domestic violence against women increases on Super Bowl Sunday, have that person read this.

Following up on Hei Lun's post, check out this Vodka Pundit post where VP googles the alleged recipients of Saddam's oil. What he and his gallery of commentors found is pretty interesting stuff, and a testament to the growing power of Google/the internet in our lives. Hopefully this story will gain traction with the mainstream media soon.

(Link via Instapundit)

After reading this Kos post about alleged dirty dealings in Iowa and New Hampshire, how does Kerry work up the balls to bitch about Republican tactics in Florida.

UPDATE: Here's the Trippi interview in GQ. Link via Kaus.

Nick writes below:

North Korea doesn't have the ability to hit our shores yet, and even if they were to develop that capacity, wouldn't the threat of Mutually Assured Destruction prevent an attack?

Yes, that would be correct. It would prevent an attack on them by us. Deterrence works both ways, and without a missile defense system, the threat of an invasion by us would effectively be foreclosed. And once that happens, whatever bargaining power we still have is gone. MAD might prevent them from attacking us, but it also prevents us from defending South Korea if North Korea invades. Likewise, we can forget about defending Taiwan.

And another point: MAD doesn't put democracies and non-democracies on a level playing field. Do you think North Korea is as concerned about one of its cities as we are? A democratically elected government that actually cares about its people is much more likely to be deterred than one controlled by an unchecked dictator.

As for the timetable set by Bush on Iraq that "happens to line up with the 2004 election season", I'd point out that the election season is pretty much the whole year of 2004. Would you prefer that the deadline had been pushed to last year, or forward all the way to sometime in 2005? And if the deadline were June 2005 instead of June 2004, don't you think Hillary would be saying that Bush had no plan and that he's just avoiding the problem until he's reelected? Hillary's nitpicking seems just as politically motivated as Bush's timetable.

(This reminds of the criticism by some that we shouldn't have been planning to invade Iraq in 2002 since it was an election year. As Rumsfeld pointed out, there's a national election every two years, so a policy like that would effectively only allow war planning in odd numbered years.)

I'm not in the business of predicting final scores, but anything that ends 6-2 or 3-9 Patriots would be mighty fine with me.

UPDATE: My numbers are much better than Viking Pundits.

Increasing spending on missile defense is a dumb idea.

Even if the technology worked, which it currently doesn't, whose missiles are we being shielded from? I would hope that our intelligent capacities aren't so taxed and incompetent that we would miss a terrorist cell securing a launch site for an ICBM.

North Korea doesn't have the ability to hit our shores yet, and even if they were to develop that capacity, wouldn't the threat of Mutually Assured Destruction prevent an attack?

Russia maintains the capacity to reach us, but the solution there is to aide the Russians in the dismantling of their missiles. China might develop the right missiles (this certainly has to be a consideration in their space exploration goals), but can't we give peace and negotiations a chance? Neither the US nor China has any obvious economic incentive to make an enemy of the other.

Bush also needs to be blamed for the growing turmoil in Iraq. Hillary was probably dead right when she said Iraqification was being moved on an artificial timetable that, *wink wink*, just happens to line up with the 2004 election season.

I'm back in school this week and that means that The Mass Media has come back in print. I haven't seen the dead tree copy yet, but be sure to check out this thrilling expose of life behind the mask and makeup... Disney World: Not All Play. I recommend that anyone truely inerested in learning about Disney read Carl Hiassen's Team Rodent: How Disney Devours the World.

Question for Gin: If you guys are running (what I can only assume are) wire pieces about working at Disney, why can't I have my own column damnit.

So Dean is suspending payments to his staff for two weeks because the campaign has money troubles. But hasn't he raised more money than anyone? How are we supposed to believe he can balance the budget when he can't balance his campaign budget?

It's live! With spelling mistakes galore!

7:00 One more sign of Lieberman's demise: the opening video showed Kucinich before showing Lieberman.

7:02 And Kucinich got a louder cheer than Lieberman! *Sigh* Edwards got the best reaction, while Lieberman and Clark got the most lukewarm.

7:04 Kerry artfully answers a question on his comments on the South and quickly segues into an attack on Bush. A very good answer.

7:05 Likewise, Edwards completely dodges a question on whether it's crucial for him to win South Carolina by answering Kerry's question.

7:07 Bad start for Dean, who sounded as if he got something stuck in his throat answering a question on his new campaign manager.

7:08 Sabotage! The power at my home cut out for a second so I missed half of Clark's answer on whether he should leave the race if he doesn't win a primary the next two weeks.

7:09 Same question for Lieberman, Kucinich, and Sharpton. Why do we have to have these dumbass questions every debate? I thought the point of a debate is to let voters decide who they like the most, not whose bandwagon they should jump on. Sharpton gave the best answer in rejecting the question.

7:12 Question for Dean on the war and the Kay report. Bush lied mislead, blah blah blah.

7:14 Edwards wants an independent commission to investigate intelligence failures. This might be one of the best ways for Democrats to attack Bush on national security.

7:15 Kerry defends his pre-war vote by saying Bush should have worked with the UN.

7:16 Question to Lieberman on whether Syria would have given up its weapons absent an Iraq war. He defends his vote by saying Saddam was the biggest WMD.

7:17 Question to Kucinich, so I'll take a few seconds to observe that so far Brokaw has been lobbing softballs by asking questions in which the candidates could give their best answers.

7:20 Clark repeats his claim that Pentagon people told him Bush wanted to invade Iraq 2 weeks after 9/11.

7:21 Sharpton brings up a dead soldier as an argument against the war. Classy.

7:25 Kerry lists some Bush exaggerations and reiterates the need for multilateralism.

7:27 Brokaw asks Clark whether the response to terrorism was inadequate under the Clinton administration, since he attacked Bush for not being ready for 9/11. Clark gave a non-answer by blaming Bush, again.

7:30 Bad format for the debate, since Brokaw couldn't ask a follow-up question.

7:31 Both Kerry and Kucinich called Bush "ideological", so presumably they'd be fair and balanced if they're president.

7:32 Lieberman retells an anecdote I've heard before about some woman who told him she's voting for him because she trusts his son's life as a soldier to Lieberman. The question to him was on Bush's comment that the US doesn't need permission from the UN on foreign policy. Again, the format allows candidates to completely ignore the question.

7:34 Sharpton sure knows how to sound authoritative without saying anything of substance.

7:36 Note to Edwards: there's a world market on oil. Even if we do find alternative sources of energy, cut our oil use in half and don't buy a single barrel from Saudi Arabia they'll still have as much power as they do now in manipulating the oil market to affect our policies.

7:37 Dean says "the terrorists might have already won" because Bush is taking away your civil liberties. And he throws in a mention to the Federalist society. During the break, Bush's secret police kills Dean and replaces him with a robot.

7:42 NAFTA question for Dean, with Brokaw noting that Gore was THE NAFTA guy. Dean says NAFTA has only applied and benefited corporations, whatever that means. He also says "people don't leave their country because they hate their country." Maybe not, but I think people like Eugene Volokh might argue that they leave because they hate their government and like ours better.

7:45 Lieberman says jobs aren't created by building a wall around America on free trade, and notes that many American industries depend on exports that rely on free trade. The second biggest reason why I support Lieberman. Comparative advantage, baby!

7:47 I think Kucinich just implied that people would be willing to pay higher prices for products because they have a conscience.

7:48 Kerry is "on the side of workers", that Bush is "selling jobs to large corporations", and referred to companies and CEOs that export jobs as "Benedict Arnolds".

7:51 After Kerry calls for training programs, Edwards attacks training programs by saying that they're no good for middle-aged workers.

7:52 I still don't know what Clark is talking about on anything he says.

7:56 Except for Lieberman, I can pretty much summarize everybody's answers to every question so far: "I blame Bush". Which might explain why Lieberman is trailing badly.

8:01 Dean repeats that he got everybody under 18 in Vermont health insurance. Rosemary Esmay thinks he's wrong, however. Also, he seems to think that we can prevent a social security disaster in the future by growing the economy and putting smarter people in charge.

8:03 Kerry lists some bills he passed by hiding it into another bill. I don't know if it's something to brag about though ...

8:04 Kucinich wants single-payer health care. [Insert joke here.]

8:05 Lieberman keeps saying he's moderate and thinks this will get him elected.

8:08 Medical malpractice question to Edwards. Edwards again dodges by answering a previous question to another candidate, then he proposes an independent panel that would review cases to decide whether they should go to trial, and if a lawyer abuses the system he's prevented from filing such lawsuits. Sounds like a good idea to me ...

8:11 Sharpton agrees with Kucinich on single-payer. Good to hear that the crowd isn't too enthusiastic about it.

8:12 Still no idea what Clark is talking about ...

8:17 Edwards is against gay marriage, while Dean defends the NRA.

8:18 Dean attacks Kerry's last answer on health care and gives him rebuttal time for the second time tonight. Kerry repeats his "we're coming, they're going ..." line.

8:21 Clark wants religion out of schools. That should win those southern votes!

8:22 Brokaw asks the Confederate flag question ... to Sharpton. Why can't this question be asked to one of the electable candidates?

8:24 The debate ends with Kerry's saying that he supports affirmative action.

Afterthoughts: the debate format stinks. There was no opening or closing statements, no follow-up questions, and almost no interaction among the candidates. Rather than a debate, it was more like a 10 minute question-and-answer session for each of the seven candidates. Because of that, the candidates could, and did, get away with not answering tough questions (which were few and far between, incidentally) by going on tangents and giving pre-formatted answers. Also, Brokaw asked the right questions to the wrong candidates. Instead of asking whether Lieberman whether Syria would have given up its weapons absent an Iraq war, Brokaw should have asked Dean that question. Instead of asking Sharpton the Confederate flag question, he should have asked Edwards or Kerry.

Winner: Kerry by default because of the format. Everyone basically gave stump answers, and none of the candidates stood out. Dean seems sedated. Kerry did good enough to preserve his frontrunner status. What's most interesting is Edwards's answer on tort reform for an independent commission. If he's the nominee I expect tort reform to become an issue in the general election, so Edwards might be making a preemptive right turn on this issue.

I voted: Carmella (OH), Cassie (WA), Chloe (MD), Desiree (GA), Emily (TN), Heather (FL), Jennifer (MA), Laura (MA), Lauren (AL), Shelly (KY).

By my count that is 5 blonds and 5 non-blonds.

How the system works:

1) If you're from Massachusetts I lower the bar a little bit. The brothers have to help the sisters out. Word.
2) Bonus points for

• Having a cool name.
  
• Being from an unusual state. I know there are lots of hot chicas on the beaches of Cali and FLA, let's have the rest of the country represented.
  
• Looking sexy without resorting to being in a bikini.
  
• Corollary to the last rule: If you're just going to lean forward and expose what God or MasterCard gave you, why didn't you put the bikini on?

3) Negative points for

• Being blond from a sun-shine state.
  
• Being Asian from New Jersey. I just know they all have much nicer cars than me.
  
• Not staying true to your roots.
  
• Thongs are sexy, full blown ass shots are not.
  
• Any photo that looks like the obligatory framing shot from a porn shoot. You know, the 1 non-nude "this is what the model was wearing" shot before she begins to strip. There is a fine line between "really sexy - yet tasteful" and "really sexy - why isn't she taking her clothes off?", be sure to observe it.
  
• Faux or too dark tans.

4) Above all else, look real.

After reading the accounts of a Miami high school senior on his recruiting trips to Florida State Universtiy and the University of Miami, does any one really doubt the allegations of rape during University of Colorado recruiting trips?

I mean, we've all seen He Got Game, right?

UPDATE ESPN.com has a complete story on the allegations:

In another deposition in the lawsuit, university police officer Timothy Delaria described another 2001 party as "some kind of sex party for the recruits."

Delaria's deposition, made in May 2003, said recruits were shown a pornographic video and told that easy sex was a benefit of playing at Colorado.

Delaria, discussing a transcript of a police interview with a football recruit, said the recruit told officers, "They told us, you know, 'This is what you get when you come to Colorado.' "

Keenan and Delaria gave their depositions as part of a lawsuit filed by Lisa Simpson, who contended she was sexually assaulted by two men at the 2001 party. Simpson filed her case anonymously but later said she wanted to set an example that victims need not feel ashamed.

The Answer: Lion Tamer, a big league Pitcher, and Porn Star.

The Question: Name three occupations that require being good with a whip.

Jonathan Chait says his job of taking down Dean is done.

Noam Scheiber has a hilarious example of Kerry's taking both sides of an issue. In 1991, Kerry wrote two letters to constituents, one in favor of the Gulf War, one against. Now the good part: the two letters were to the same person! (Via Kaus)

Michael J. Totten links to an article from dissent magazine with 6 great reasons for supporting the war. Check out this excerpt:

My friend's eyes widened, maybe in astonishment, maybe in pity.
He said, "And so, the United Nations and international law mean nothing to you, not a thing? You think it's all right for America to go do whatever it wants, and ignore the rest of the world?"

I answered, "The United Nations and international law are fine by me, and more than fine. I am their supporter. Or, rather, would like to support them. It would be better to fight an antifascist war with more than a begrudging UN approval. It would be better to fight with the approving sanction of international law-better in a million ways. Better politically, therefore militarily. Better for the precedents that would be set. Better for the purpose of expressing the liberal principles at stake. If I had my druthers, that is how we would have gone about fighting the war. But my druthers don't count for much. We have had to choose between supporting the war, or opposing it-supporting the war in the name of antifascism, or opposing it in the name of some kind of concept of international law. Antifascism without international law; or international law without antifascism. A miserable choice-but one does have to choose, unfortunately."

Don't miss out on the fantastic writing.

Sports Guy's blog sucks. It's just his regular columns (which, don't get me wrong here, are very good). He's not even producing a blog as I would define it, rather Page 2 is giving him a new web page everyday that's being updated at really odd hours.

CNN has a delegate scorecard.

Sports Guy is blogging. Just for this week, though.

Choices, Choices, Choices: Vote Chloe!

Shelly's a pretty good choice too.

Tom Maguire is expecting the issue of slavery reparations to come up in tomorrow's debate, since a judge has just dismissed such a case and stated that the issue should be decided by legislation.

In NCAA basketball betting pools, there's sometimes a consolation prize for the person who finishes dead last. I think I deserve that consolation prize after maybe the worst predictions of anyone on the New Hampshire primaries. With that said, I promise to keep making dumb predictions until I eventually get one right, or until we run out of primaries, whichever comes first.

Also, Viking Pundit says that Kerry's support is "a mile wide and an inch deep". Of course, that what the media said about Bush's support four years ago ...

OpinionJournal has a sensible editorial on David Kay's testimony and the "Bush Lied!!!" crowd. Along these same lines Calpundit concludes that just about everyone believed Saddam had WMD before the war. For more on Kay check out analysis by Instapundit, Roger L. Simon, and Bill Hobbs.

UPDATE: Michael J. Totten, Clifford May, Jonah Goldberg and the Washington Post all comment.

Michael also has a post on the growing anti-semitism in Europe.

Glenn also has a sad report about phony sexual harrasment suits on campus.

The Toronto Star has a wonderful piece written by Asma Arshad Mahmood entitled Why I Love the United States.

More speculation on Giuliani as Bush's veep.

Assignment: make a legal argument on how gay marriage (which I'm in favor or) can be legalized without setting a precedent for legalizing incest and polygamy. If a court decision states that discrimination against gays on marriage would be unconstitutional, wouldn't the same arguments in that case be used to argue that discrimination against polygamy be unconstitutional too?

I think that a comparison between gays and polygamists on marriage is instructive for two reasons. One is that moral arguments are legitimate in lawmaking. Most of the legal arguments for gay marriage can be used for polygamy, and yet many people who favor gay marriage are opposed to polygamy. For all the legal arguments gay marriage proponents make, it comes down to their feeling that gay marriage is moral while polygamy is not. The other lesson to be drawn is that it is absolutely not desirable for gay marriage to come via a court mandate instead of legislation, because court-imposed gay marriage is the first step to court-imposed polygamy.

So some guy decides to live on a diet of McDonalds for a month and make a documentary out of it. During that time, he gained 25 pounds and his health deteriorated. Of course, this is supposed to mean that McDonalds is bad for you and causes obesity blah blah blah. One has to wonder though whether he intentionally chose to eat least healthful foods on the menu (well, one doesn't have to wonder since we all know what the answer is). McDonalds does sell salads and as far as I remember veggie burgers as well. But a 30-day diet on salads and occasional fish sandwiches doesn't prove his point about bad McDonalds food, and it won't win him anything in the Sundance festival or gain him the notoriety that he wants by making his film the Bowling for Columbine of fast food.

Merde in France reports: "The Baghdad daily 'Al-Mara' has published a list of 270 people who received direct payment in barrels of oil from Saddam. No fewer than 11 of the names are French politicans (including Pasqua 'We must terrorise the terrorists') and businessmen." Former British MP George Galloway seems to be on the list too.

UCLA endorses religious view of homosexuality and bans "Just Say No to Drugs" posters.

has Kerry 36, Dean 31, Edwards 12, Clark 12.

See the comments in this Jeff Jarvis post. To these people, the war isn't justified on humanitarian grounds since 1) we didn't invade all the other countries with human rights violations, 2) only lefties are concerned with humanitarianism, 3) how do we know Iraqis want Saddam disposed? 4) it's the oil, and oh yeah, 5) "Bush lied".

President Bush scored 1206 on his Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), having received a 566 on the verbal and a 640 on the math. His adjusted post 1994 SAT score would be 1280 (640 on both tests).

The above information was found here and here.

Nick Schulz of Tech Central Station has a new blog on the intersection of sports and technology called Transition Game.

I'm back from the bookstore $350 lighter and ready to find many a nap inducing this afternoon. Expect blogging from myself to be light to non-existant until I conjure the correct balance between classes, homework, my night job, and the things in the world that I would actually like to do.

Human Rights Watch has decided that Operation Iraqi Freedom was not actually about providing the Iraqi's with freedom:

Human Rights Watch said Mr Bush and Mr Blair should not try to justify the war retrospectively as an effort to save human life.

"Only mass slaughter might permit the deliberate taking of life in using military force for humanitarian purposes," it said.

"Brutal as Saddam Hussein's reign had been, the scope of the Iraq Government's killing in March 2003, was not of the exceptional and dire magnitude that would justify humanitarian intervention.

So the only legitimate way to conduct an intervention in the defense of Human Rights is to wait until any given regime begins anew the slaughter of innocent people in a manner which can be deemed "exceptional and dire [in] magnitude"?

Whatever happened to fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me?

Some advice for Human Rights Watch: don't look down.

It took 4 minutes for Kerry to bring up Vietnam when talking to Imus this morning.

Ryan Lizza has the details on Joe Lieberman's new strategy: completely ignore Democrats while targeting independents. If enough independents show up tomorrow, Lieberman might finish as high as third.

Headline: Undecided Voters May Sway Outcome

Dean 29%
Kerry 28%
Edwards 18%
Lieberman 12%
Clark 11%

I think the Dean-backlash-backlash combined with Kerry's comments on the South, which will push a few people who prioritize electability to Edwards, will give Dean a narrow win. Edwards comfortably takes third while Clark will be the biggest disappointment, finishing behind even Lieberman.

"Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), under attack from Howard Dean for questionable judgment on the issue of war, said Sunday that his 1991 vote opposing the Persian Gulf War was "entirely consistent" with his vote in 2002 supporting military action in Iraq."

Patrick Belton of OxBlog has a few excerpts from a piece on the sad state of the Royal Navy.

If some company were to develop a medicine that prevents Howard Dean from making an ass of himself he'd probably complain that he can't purchase it in Canada:

"You can say that it's great that Saddam is gone and I'm sure that a lot of Iraqis feel it is great that Saddam is gone," said the former Vermont governor, an unflinching critic of the war against Iraq. "But a lot of them gave their lives. And their living standard is a whole lot worse now than it was before."

****

"Now I would never defend Saddam Hussein," Dean told the "Women for Dean" rally. "He's a horrible person. I'm delighted he's gone. Would there not have been a better way to get rid of him in cooperation with the United Nations?"

I thought the UN was advocating keeping Saddam in his box?

Meanwhile in Saudi Arabia (yet another box) actual Iraqis disagree:

"We remained nine days at the border, it was a very miserable time for thousands," said Bakkar Rasoul, a Kurdish eye doctor from Suleimaniya. "But I am really happy that we are free and God helped us to visit Mecca."

"I and many people are thankful toward the United States because they were able to release us and we will definitely never forget. I don't think any Muslim can forget this," he said, standing by Kurdish and Iraqi flags beside the Iraqi pilgrims.

Perhaps you saw John Stossel's show last week on "Lies, Myths and Downright Stupidity." Here's one of his many interesting findings:

Myth No. 5 — The Rich Don't Pay Their Fair Share of Taxes

We've all heard this one during the presidential campaign. When it comes to income taxes, the Democratic presidential candidates keep telling us, the rich don't pay enough.

That's a widespread belief, but do the politicians even know how much of the income tax burden the rich pay now?

According to presidential candidate Al Sharpton, "The top one percent in this country pays very much less than ten percent, very much less than five percent."

Sharpton said he thinks the wealthy should pay "somewhere around 15 percent."

But that's so silly because — and I bet most of you don't know this — the IRS says the richest 1 percent of taxpayers already pay 34 percent of all income taxes. Twice what Sharpton wanted them to pay.

Still you may feel the rich should pay even more. It's a tempting thought, since they have so much.

But let's remember the facts: the top 1 percent of Americans — those who earn more than about $300,000 a year — pay 34 percent, more than a third of all income taxes, and the top 5 percent, those making over $125,000, pay more than half.

Howard Stern is a much more intelligent guy than he gets credit for if this account is to be believed:

Howard Stern, of all people, got it exactly right today about the Dean Iowa post-caucus Yeearghfest: He said (paraphrasing - it's radio, after all) "Are we really going to disqualify someone from being President for getting excited? Do you have to be nearly dead to qualify now?"

Meanwhile Howard Dean just blamed the entire incident on the news media in a taped interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN. The whole tape can be seen later today at 5pm.

A set of 10 2003 New England Patriot 'Stackables'.

You'll note that the website lists Rodney Harrison as one of the players feature. That's actually a lie. The only safety depicted in that set is #36, former Patriot Lawyer Milloy. Rodney Harrison wears #37.

The television commercial selling these crappy dolls specifically states that Milloy appears in that set, so I wonder why they chose to lie about this on their website.

Speaking of television, why does Vanna White still have a job? I was watching Wheel of Fortune this evening, and to my surprise I discovered that they've replaced the puzzle board with a bank of tv monitors. All Vanna does is walk to a tv monitor, touch the tv frame, and pray that the guys in the booth time the change of graphics with her arrival. There's no flipping of letters involved at all anymore. And the girl isn't even trying anymore. She did her point-and-pose job this evening in a pair of wind pants and a baseball T.

Bob Barker had the good sense to hire new models eventually. Someone tell Pat Sajack to smarten up!

According to Technorati, this blog was last updated 12442 days 20 hours 50 mintues ago, which was December 31, 1969.

John Ellis:

Blaming Brit Hume for Clark's miserable debate performance is like blaming "the Curse of the Bambino" for Grady Little's disastrous management in Game Seven of the ALCS. It's grand, but it ain't true.