My dog only eats the socks

This dog made like Avis, and tried harder.

According to a bizarre story reported in The Grand Rapids Press, Kiko smelled an infection in his owner's right big toe and set about "amputating" it. Which in doggie terms, of course, means he ate it.

Kind of puts things in perspective, hm?  But how does a man have a toe gnawed off without noticing it?

... Kiko's owner, Jerry Douthett of Rockford, Mich., lay passed-out drunk in his bed.

That will do it.

Douthett actually had type 2 diabetes and was suffering from a dangerous infection in his big toe. ... Douthett's wife, Rosee, a registered nurse, had actually suspected her husband had diabetes and insisted he get checked out. But before he did so, he had a few beers. And then a few margaritas. After that, he went home, passed out, and Kiko got to work.

When you have diabetes, one of the sillier things you can do is ignore it in favor of knocking down some cold ones.  I believe the fancy medical term for this is "contraindication," which is doctor speak for "ARE YOU FREAKING NUTS?!!??!"

If you choose to drink alcohol, only drink it occasionally and when your diabetes and blood sugar level are well-controlled. ... Beer and sweet wine contain carbohydrates and may raise blood sugar. ... Do not drink more than two drinks of alcohol in a one-day period. ... Avoid "sugary" mixed drinks, sweet wines, or cordials.

This guy's lucky his nose wasn't infected.

Why I didn't renew my subscription to the Tampa Tribune.

My two weeks without Internet access at home was eye-opening. Without cable for Fox News, I was totally in the dark when it came to national news.

Local news also has blind spots as well. When was the last time your local news did a story on drug and alcohol abuse among the homeless? When was the last time your local news had a story which portrayed minorities as being racist?

For example, a Google search would show that the only Tampa Bay news organization which covered this was the local FOX affiliate. Do you think that if it were a local mosque or black church that got vandalized like this would only be covered by one station and none of the two newspapers? How many news decisions are made influenced by fear of the NAALCP and La Raza?

I already had a dim view of the Trib for ignoring this story. The day after I was lucky enough to see the vandalism story on Channel 13 I got my renewal notice from the Trib. And that day's Trib missing this story. I chose not to renew.

The NAALCP has already designated me a tea-bagging racist. I may as well speak my mind.

Homina homina homina

Remember when I was Homer-drooling over the car that looked like a plane?

Well, that's cool if you're on a budget. (And 300 mpg for under $30K would pay for itself very quickly.) But for those who can afford to spend money like they're getting a bailout, there's the official Real McCoy - the Terrafugia Transition.

The two-seater Transition can use its front-wheel drive on roads at ordinary highway speeds, with wings folded, at a respectable 30 miles per gallon. Once it has arrived at a suitable take-off spot - an airport, or adequately sized piece of flat private land - it can fold down the wings, engage its rear-facing propellor, and take off. The folding wings are electrically powered.

MUA-hahahahahaha! Screw you bastids stuck on the Turnpike.

The company website also says that the cargo hold is long enough to accomodate golf clubs and the like, which means that I can fly to my next tournament with my sticks and gear in the hold - and if something really bad happens, I deploy the FULL VEHICLE PARACHUTE, sweet mercy me.

Its cruising speed in the air is 115 mph, it has a range of 460 miles, and it can carry 450lb. It requires a 1,700-foot (one-third of a mile) runway to take off and can fit in a standard garage.

In fifteen years we're all gonna be flying a Swordfish II, and I for one couldn't be more jazzed if you spiked my LSD with Red Bull.

PS - there really was a Swordfish, a torpedo plane that helped sink the Bismarck.  And, this being the Internet, there's a rule that says that if it exists, there is also Lego of it.  Here they are - the real Swordfish and the Swordfish II, both built by featured on the amazing Brothers Brick.  This post has so many awesome things in it, Chuck Norris may be moved to leave a comment.

Teen sailor in distress

This is very bad news.  Abby Sunderland, attempting to sail around the world solo, without stopping, is in terrible trouble in the Indian Ocean.

As her brother, Zac, says - there's nothing out there at all.  It's the literal middle of nowhere.  He ought to know since he's actually made this sail himself.  Since she activated those beacons I hope it means that she's simply battened down and riding it out, unable to respond but not actually swept overboard.  It would be an awful way to go.

I know that a lot of people are dead-set against someone her age trying something so audacious.  I'm of two minds on it.  On the one hand, of course, it's natural to protect the young and desire their safety.  And yet...

Well - to put it bluntly, "safety first" can only get one so far - certainly it won't get one around the world in a sailboat, for example.  It won't get man to the moon.  It won't break the four-minute mile.  It won't even get one very far out the door in the morning.  "Safety First," writ large, is "Safety Only," and that thinking is a trap, coddling and cusseting and soothing kids into unpleasant, spoiled, nasty little narcissists.  Not that this happens to everyone, of course, nor that pushing a kid to achieve isn't free of peril - one thinks of the unfortunate Todd Marinovich, pushed by his frustrated father into becoming a quarterbacking machine, only to conk out in spectacular fashion.  For that matter, there's Tiger Woods, far more successful professionally but only marginally (if at all) better-off than Marinovich in character.  But in the middle there's the desire to risk in order to achieve and excel.

I think that Ms. Sunderland's attempt is on the high end of a desirable trait, in short supply in some quarters, and thus is not foolhardy so much as extraordinary.  The high end of that scale is peopled with folks who either succeed or fail spectacularly, but who kick forward humanity a little bit by the attempt.

A little down the page is a headline in the "Most Popular" sidebox - it may change so I screen-capped it, and highlighted the pertinent bit:



If Ms. Sunderland is indeed lost at sea, she was at least killed trying to do something she loved, trying to achieve an amazing and skilled feat.  There are worse ways to go; and worse enemies of humanity and excellence than failure.  I hope that she proves to be all right, so she can go on to achieve greater things than this.

UPDATE - because of course I'm an idiot.  I forgot to clarify something very important, the difference between being PUSHED into something to relive the failed dreams of a bitter elder, and a genuine desire from within to excel.  Nothing could be more different than a thirst for achievement borne of one's own free choice, and the imposition of someone else's will.  Sunderland is on the high end of the "healthy middle" on a spectrum of risk-taking, but on the far opposite of the scale of freedom from someone like Marinovich.  I should not have switched so abruptly between ideas in that paragraph.

DOUBLE UPDATE - she's all right.  Amen.  I look forward to her next attempt at great things.

Takeover Takedown

As of last night, thirteen separate states are already suing the federal government regarding the Health Insurance takeover.

While reporting this last night, the local talking head said something that made me laugh aloud: he assured us that "experts" (whom he neither quoted nor identified, natch!) said it was Constitutional, because "federal law trumps state law." (He may as well have added "So there!")

Now, he's right that the Constitution is binding on the several states, but that still leaves open the question of whether THIS is Constitutionally permissible.  So here I am with my pocket copy of the Constitution... Look, it's the Tenth Amendment! "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
 
For the sake of this post, we have to set aside the vast numbers of times the Congress has already ignored the Constitution and pretend that this time, they do care what it says and will abide by it.  You may pull something making this stretch, so take your time.

Good?  Good.

Right at the outset this Amendment is bad news for would-be totalitarians and Big Brotherists: it states openly and plainly that the powers of the United States Government are delegated to it by the people via the Constitution.  They are not inherent to it like the rights of the people are to them.  They are borrowed, and therefore can be taken back when used unwisely or recklessly.  In brief, We the People are the adults of this relationship; the Congress, the President, and the Courts are the balky children, and their powers over us are an allowance we grant exclusively at our sufferance.  We can ground them if they misbehave.  And this is the consistent language of the rest of the Constitution: in the Preamble, it is We the People who ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States, not the other way around.  Article I starts thus: "All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States..." etc.  And that confirms what was written in the Declaration of Independence, that Governments are established only to protect the inherent rights of the people, "deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed."

I highlighted those two words "herein granted" because they further illustrate what the Tenth Amendment was designed to emphasize - the Constitution is meant as an upper limit, not a minimum requirement.  If said powers are not "herein" the Constitution, they are "reserved to the States respectively, or to the People."  And even in the faintest penumbra and emanations of the Constitution, there is nowhere the right to have one's health costs insured by the Federal Treasury.  There's no right to have them insured at all by anybody.

So... going all the way back to our talking head, I would say that a federal law has to be Constitutional in order to be valid and binding on the states.  This thing ain't.

Am I confident about this?  Absolutely.  Will it matter to our rapacious government?  I'm not holding my breath, let's just say that.  If governments stuck to what they were told we may all still be British subjects; no revolution would have been necessary.  By their nature governments prey on their own people.  They don't shrink unless someone shrinks them. and then only with great truculence.  And We are not the same People as the revolutionaries and Founding Fathers.  They helped carve the colonies out of the wilderness, fought to keep them safe, and did so with no promise that their far-distant King and Parliament could swoop in at a moment's notice with millions in federal aid if some flood or fire obliterated their town.  Even the most urbane and loyalist of them had to be a lot more self-reliant than we are.

Not for a moment am I ungrateful to live today, with modern medicine, roads, cheap goods, the Internet, and a thousand other conveniences.  Still I have to say, they're not the reason for living, and they never were.  None of them would mean much if we were reduced to subservience.  Chains of gold and velvet still bind.  These particular chains are in fact so lavish that their forging will beggar every mother's son of us, and we will be a nation of pauper slaves instead of the land of the free and the home of the brave.

AND an update from Noel at Cold Fury: such a major and transformative act has been bipartisan, up until now.  Hell, even Prohibition was a two-thirds majority idea.  As that was eventually repealed, so let this be.

C'mon guys, make up your minds!

Christian Science Monitor (3/6/2010): John Patrick Bedell: Did right-wing extremism lead to shooting?

John Patrick Bedell, whom authorities identified as the gunman in the Pentagon shooting on Thursday, appears to have been a right-wing extremist with virulent antigovernment feelings.

Christian Science Monitor (3/6/2010): Political extremism: Not so easy to categorize.

Pentagon shooter John Patrick Bedell was an anti-Bush registered Democrat who believed 9/11 was planned and carried out by the US government, so he must be left-wing, right?

The truth here is way beyond such facile political analysis.

The truth is that it wasn't his politics that caused him to do this, but the fact that he was a nutjob. But what explains this first article? Wishful thinking on the part of the writer?

And these people wonder why their industry is dying.

I don't see you guys rating the kind of mate I'm contemplating

One night in Bangkok Calcutta makes the hard guys humble.

A leading French chess player turned up drunk and dozed off after just 11 moves in an international tournament in Kolkata, losing the round on technical grounds, domestic media reported Friday.

"Technical grounds" means that he fell asleep at the table and his clock ran out. He later protested because his opponent had fourteen giant pink rooks that floated off the chessboard and circled the room in defiance of the rules of chess.

John Daly was unavailable for comment.

This doesn't surprise me

MSNBC talking about the gun-toting racists out to get our beloved president.

Watching this video, you will notice the extreme close up of the AR-15. That is because the racist gun-toter is black.

I know that the only folks watching MSNBC are the hard-core Obama Kool-aid drinkers, so they are probably lapping this up.

I'd rather have a daughter on a pole an the Mons Venus than work for any NBC network or affiliate.

Hells yeah

Pudd'nhead Wilson stands justified: "When angry, count four. When very angry, swear."

Bad language could be good for you, a new study shows. For the first time, psychologists have found that swearing may serve an important function in relieving pain.

Basically, when we (for example) smack our bare toe against the coffee table, the amygdala, our fight-or-flight response center, fires up; one of the byproducts of this may be a well-timed cuss, which can actually help relieve a lot of the stressful emotion involved.

Psychologist Steven Pinker of Harvard University, whose book The Stuff of Thought (Viking Adult, 2007) includes a detailed analysis of swearing, compared the situation with what happens in the brain of a cat that somebody accidentally sits on. "I suspect that swearing taps into a defensive reflex in which an animal that is suddenly injured or confined erupts in a furious struggle, accompanied by an angry vocalization, to startle and intimidate an attacker," he says.

The reasonable counter-argument is that we are people, not cats, and we ought to know better. The larger part of me agrees with this statement. We are supposed to be in charge of our instincts, and our will is meant to order our passions to serve one goal - the definition of integrity. To lose control of them is to lose our integrity for the moment. It's probably a bad idea to simply let the cusses fly at every opportunity. (In other words, this doesn't qualify as clinical therapy just yet, no matter how good it may feel.)

In extreme cases, the hotline to the brain's emotional system can make swearing harmful, as when road rage escalates into physical violence. But when the hammer slips, some well-chosen swearwords might help dull the pain. There is a catch, though: The more we swear, the less emotionally potent the words become, Stephens cautions. And without emotion, all that is left of a swearword is the word itself, unlikely to soothe anyone's pain.

Yeah, like I said...

BTW- they won't let me put an exclam next to SCIENCE. I'm trying the double exclam (‼) but it's not standard ASCII, so we'll see...

Forget the restraining order....

...buy a gun.

TAMPA - Seven weeks ago, Richard Anthony McTear Jr. broke Jasmine Bedwell's door, hit her several times, broke items throughout her apartment, held her down, and poured household cleaner on her face and head, sheriff's deputies say.

A neighbor called deputies, and charges were filed with the state attorney's office.

Five weeks ago, McTear threatened to go to Bedwell's home and kill her infant son, according to deputies. They say he later bruised her enough for her to be taken to a hospital. More charges were filed.

Investigators say McTear followed through on his threat against her son early Tuesday by beating Bedwell, throwing the child onto a concrete floor and then kidnapping 3-month-old Emanuel Wesley Murray and throwing him out of a moving car onto Interstate 275. The infant was found dead.

McTear was arrested hours later Tuesday morning after a short chase. He is charged with first-degree murder, aggravated child abuse, kidnapping, felony battery and burglary with battery.

From my home I can walk to where this poor baby lived. On my ride home from work I pass by where this monster tossed out this child onto the highway. Read this story on how the local justice system could not find a way to put this beast in a cage before he murdered the innocent.

There is no legislation, no government solution to this. Restraining order? Sure ladies, hold up that piece of paper when the crazed, coked-up ex breaks down your door and see how well it works.

If you need a restraining order, you also need a gun. If you were out in the woods being attacked by a bear or a lion you would have no issue with blowing the creature away. It is also true in the urban jungle. To save yourself and your children you must drop the beast when he gets into range.

Again, Filibuster!

Keeping up the Fifth String meme.

Hey Tim, you can find portions of the Porkulus Bill here. It’s only a summary, but the House Dems promise to have it all up online 48 hours before a vote. (They promised! )

UPDATE: I think the whole thing is here.

My governor and the president’s new BFF is happy for the Porkulus, but a little bummed that cash for him will be less than he hoped.

Gov. Charlie Crist says he's pleased with a compromise federal stimulus plan although Florida likely will get less money than anticipated.

Crist's office had estimated Florida would get at least $10.4 billion, but that figure probably will be reduced because the $790 billion total in the compromise is lower than initially passed by either the House or Senate.

Crist, who appeared with President Barack Obama in Fort Myers on Tuesday to campaign for the stimulus, said Thursday he's happy because just a few months ago the cash-strapped state was looking at "no stimulus at all."

We know what you are, governor. We are merely discussing price.

Judd Gregg decided he doesn't want to be Commerce Secretary. Do you think it has to do with Obama taking the Census Bureau out of his department and under direct supervision of the White House?

Rahm Emanuel running the 2010 census. Nothing I need to be concerned about, right?

I don't want to lose my mind

Two Obama stories were in the St. Pete Times this week. One is the Supremes refusing to hear the Obama birth certificate case. The other is the sordid tale of Illinois Governor "Hot Rod" Soon-to-go-to-jail-ovich.

I am curious about the outcome of each (my guess is that someone from Obama's team talked to Hot Rod but didn't bite on the bribe, my other guess is that Obama's going to let these birth certificate folks get as whipped up as possible and then will release his long form birth certficate stating that he was born in Hawaii).

But I digress. While I am curious as to the outcome of each of these cases, I don't want to lose my mind. For eight years I've seen people foam out the mouth with Bush Derangement Syndrome over the war on Islamic terror. I will jump ugly on Obama when the time comes, but I don't want to be obsessed with finding the scandal that will bring down his socialist dictatorship.

Here's an example: I have been asked to join the resistance. Join the resistance? Have we become Nazi-occupied France? Am I being enlisted into the Underground?

Re: Hod Rod. He is quite the pottymouth.

Whoops! Obama met with Hot Rod Nov 5.

I am losing my mind.

Boss, I can't make it in today..

...I'm gay.

Some same-sex marriage supporters are urging people to "call in gay" Wednesday to show how much the country relies on gays and lesbians, but others question whether it's wise to encourage skipping work given the nation's economic distress.

Organizers of "Day Without a Gay" - scheduled to coincide with International Human Rights Day and modeled after similar work stoppages by Latino immigrants - also are encouraging people to perform volunteer work and refrain from spending money.

Maybe I'm feeling particularly insensitive today, but I think this is hilarious. The guy who dreamt this up is "Sean Hetherington, a West Hollywood comedian and personal trainer". Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I remember when the illegals did this last year. In Tampa we have many - there are several hundred living about a quarter mile east of where I write these words. Last year all I noticed was less traffic.

When cops do this it's called the blue flu. Would this be called the lavender cold?

From the halls of Montezuma...

...to the shores of Somali.

Pirates chased and shot at a U.S. cruise liner with more than 1,000 people on board but failed to hijack the vessel as it sailed along a corridor patrolled by international warships, a maritime official said Tuesday.

The liner, carrying 656 international passengers and 399 crew members, was sailing through the pirate-infested Gulf of Aden on Sunday when it encountered six bandits in two speedboats, said Noel Choong, who heads the International Maritime Bureau's piracy reporting center in Malaysia.

Luckily they were able to outrun the pirates. We're not talking about charming rogues who sing light opera.

International warships patrol the area and have created a security corridor in the region under a U.S.-led initiative, but the attacks have not abated.

In about 100 attacks on ships off the Somali coast this year, 40 vessels have been hijacked, Choong said. Fourteen remain in the hands of pirates along with more than 250 crew members.

That is a lot of scratch. Nuance would say that there's not much else for Somalis to do to survive, considering that the place has been a hellhole for something like twenty years. Then again, who is arming and supplying these folks? Who put up the seed money, so to speak, to outfit these bandits? Who provided the job training? It takes a certain skill set to successfully hijack a sailing vessel... weapons training, subduing the crew (who may well be armed), guarding the catch, setting up the ransom... This isn't a trade one can just wander into. I'm also wondering how a group of folks just decides to try piracy as a career. If the USA slid into anarchy, I'm sure there would be a subset of people working as highway robbers and such, but that doesn't require nautical training, specialized gear, tons of fuel, boats, ports, etc. And there would be just as many people who would organize into small city-states and run them by law.

Ukraine's Foreign Ministry spokesman Vasyl Kyrylych said Monday that negotiations with Somali pirates holding the cargo ship MV Faina are nearly completed, the Interfax news agency reported.

A spokesman for the Faina's owner said Sunday that the Somali pirates had agreed on a ransom for the ship and it could be released within days.

I'd file this under "bad ideas." Perhaps - possibly kinda maybe - I could understand a case where refusing to pay up would be worse, such as pirates claiming workable nuclear cargo that could be sold to enemies and used for mass murder... but even there, you could argue that it would only teach the bandits what cargo is actually worth risking life and limb for. For the most part I think these folks need stomping, not haggling, because paying up only gets you more of what you paid for. The only negotiation should be over how fast they surrender.

Of course, this is MSNBC, so the really intriguing factoid is down at the very bottom of the article.

Somali prime minister Nur Hassan Hussein said Tuesday that his country has been torn apart by 18 years of civil war and cannot stop piracy alone.

"This needs a tremendous effort," Hussein told The Associated Press. He has appealed for international troops, as his government's Ethiopian allies have said they would pull out their forces by the end of the year.

Ethiopia, the region's military powerhouse, has been integral in boosting the government. But Islamic insurgents have now seized control of all of southern Somalia except for the capital and the parliamentary seat of Baidoa.

Yeah, emphasis mine. It's the final sentence of the whole piece: after ads, links to related articles, two slideshows, a video, and a quiz. (And by the way - titling the quiz "Arrr, matey!" is in very poor taste considering the subject matter. Just saying, is all. Stay classy, MSNBC!)

We can't be everywhere all at once, but I think it would be prudent for the West to consider answering this appeal. This situation highlights something about the War on Terror that has caused much scoffing on the Left. The argument boils down to, "Iraq never did anything to us, why do we need to fight them?" Somalia isn't doing anything to anyone either, but letting them crumble into anarchy at the hands of Islamists has led to a situation where a lot of people are now suffering, not least of whom are the Somalis. This isn't really a private affair. Those responsible for these outrages on the high seas are only able to do so because of what has been done to Somalia - if the insurgents in question aren't actively arming, training, and supplying them. This is another front in the war currently being waged against the civilized peoples of the world, by people who are the avowed enemies of liberty. They are quite plain about how they would run things.

Those who carp about the cruel patriarchy of Christianity however many centuries ago have a unique opportunity here - instead of exaggerating and hyperbolizing the past, or claiming that the present is just as bad right where they live, they can lift their eyes past their noses for a moment and see people who really are worse than their worst accusations. They can speak out against those who make even the most outlandish lies against Christendom seem like tame euphemisms. There really ARE people who enslave women, butcher infidels and unbelievers, police speech and thought, pillage the land, and put to the sword all manner of "deviants." They're proud of it and brag about how good they are at it. None of them are currently President of the United States.

(Update - it took five minutes to find an example of what I've just described - from MARK SHEA of all people. Hat tip to the Creative Minority Report.)

(Just as an aside - 400 crew for 656 passengers? That works out to roughly 25 crew to serve every 41 people. No wonder it's so expensive.)

It's been a long month

Or, at least that's what it seems like in Chicago.

The above-referenced story (you're looking for the third of four) is difficult because it provides no attribution at all - no sources cited, something that NJ Lawyer is usually much better about, and a couple of very odd ideas thrown in for the kicks.

First odd idea, courtesy of the City of Chicago: "Four Chicagoans, the Second Amendment Foundation and the Illinois State Rifle Association are all suing Chicago to overturn its gun-control regime, and Chicago's principal defense seems to be that Heller is such a narrow decision that it applies only to the District of Columbia."

Emphasis mine, and boy howdy... I'm no lawyer but it seems quite a stretch to say that the Court is applying the Second Amendment only to DC. It seems like an amazing mental contortion to say that the Bill of Rights to the Constitution of the United States of America has a provision that confines itself specifically to a 68.3 mi² hunk of ground.

There is exactly one provision in all of the US Constitution that applies only to Washington DC: Article 1, Section 8, listing the powers of Congress: "To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular States, and the acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States..."* Nope, it says nothing at all about the Supreme Court there.

The city may be correct in that this decision only specifically overturned one law as unconstitutional - but the principle by which that law was overturned is something that applies nationally and that can be used to challenge similar provisions.

And as an aside - "gun-control regime" is a peculiar way to put it. These litigants are suing to overturn a law, not kick out the mayor and aldermen. I find it a little disturbing, actually, to think that people who obsess over the precision of their words could be so slovenly with this description.

Second odd bit comes in near the end. I'm including something from way up near the top to give the context: "Based on past experience, [Chicago's gun buy-back program] had estimated this year's effort would rake in more than 14,000 weapons - but that was before the Heller decision put its laws into question. ... . In this post-Heller world, the gun buy-back this year netted only 6,800 weapons."

"Post-Heller world"? I'm going to sound kook-ish here, but that whole phrase looks wrong to me in this context - as if Heller has been around for five years and we're studying its impact with the benefit of some hindsight and reflection. Heller was decided five weeks ago. And then there's "netted only 6800 weapons this year." The year has five full months to go! OK, they're behind their expected pace, and I agree that Heller is a big reason. It just sounds like they're moving to this overarching conclusion - like nobody is going to turn in another gun for the rest of the year; or that they snuck in some subtle editorializing instead of just saying "in the wake of the Heller decision, the city has bought back only 6800 weapons so far this year." Does it sound off to anyone else or am I a little too touchy?

*Given the area, it's obvious that ten miles square means ten miles on each side. And it turns out that Congress punted on some of the everyday work in 1973, passing a law to give Washington DC a mayor and city council.

(I found this article about the case, written about a month ago. My apologies for the lack of timely bloggage, but I didn't hear about it until the NJL sent me an email alert. And if you really want some fun, read that for all the arguments against and in favor of the restrictions. The summary:

Against ban - "People can defend themselves better."
For ban - "It's scary, it'll be like the Wild West, it's frightening that America loves guns."

That isn't an exaggeration, either.)

Score one for free speech

The Canadian Human Rights Commission has decided not to pursue Maclean's magazine for the excerpt of Mark Steyn's America Alone.

Not bad. We still have to wait for British Columbia's own thought police to rule on the matter, but that's one for human liberty; always a point gained.

Great statement from Maclean's on the matter can be found here. They sum up the inanity of the HRC's recent actions thus:

Though gratified by the decision, Maclean's continues to assert that no human rights commission, whether at the federal or provincial level, has the mandate or the expertise to monitor, inquire into, or assess the editorial decisions of the nation's media. And we continue to have grave concerns about a system of complaint and adjudication that allows a media outlet to be pursued in multiple jurisdictions on the same complaint, brought by the same complainants, subjecting it to costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars, to say nothing of the inconvenience.

Spot on. As Ezra Levant mentions in his own post on the subject, the ones who are most easily hurt are the ones without the resources to fight back - who can't spend the many thousands of dollars. Of course the accusers can since they're often taxpayer-funded.

Folks, free minds require free speech and free writing. It's that simple.

One Way to Increase Circulation..

...is to bow the knee to a demon.

Miami Herald employees, worried about retaining their jobs due to severe cutbacks in the newspaper industry, have now looked to a Santeria 'rooster' (photo) for help. The rooster is actually a life sized replica with a note attached that says:

Brought in by a Santeria priest (the real deal from Hialeah) to help save our jobs. Leave an offering.

The rooster and the offerings were placed on a fifth floor counter last Thursday facing an elevator bank in the Herald building in Miami. Among the offerings placed on the counter by the end of that work day were coins, cigars, and a Virgin de Guadalupe candle. Perhaps the Herald employees need to make even more offerings since the McClatchy Company which owns the Miami Herald just announced big layoffs today:

The McClatchy Company (NYSE: MNI) announced today that it plans to reduce its workforce by about 10% as the company accelerates efforts to manage through today's difficult advertising market and position itself for future success in an increasingly competitive environment.

Now I've had my criticism of my locals and other media, but I never accused them of worshipping various Baals (other than themselves and the Obamessiah). Maybe I'm giving them too much credit.

Tim Russert (1950-2008)

A great loss for his wife and son. And a great loss for the mainstream media. He had a background as a staff member for Dems, but he gave Dems a tough interview on Meet the Press The MSM would be in a lot better shape if there were more Tim Russerts. Now we don't even have the one.

He was well liked by all. Even Rush Limbaugh loved the guy. The scuttlebutt is that NBC is going to ask Tom Brokaw to come out of retirement to handle Meet the Press until after the election.

But what about after that? Past Brokaw and Brian Williams NBC news is a circus act. Keith Olberman? Chris "Thrill going up my leg" Matthews?

One more thing. I am going to be 50 years old in January. It seems that after you hit 50 you can go at any minute. If you, like me, are near the half-century mark or past it, please take the time to consider your eternal situation. This is one area where you don't want any surprises.

More Love for the Obamessiah...

...in the St Pete Times. Here is a paragraph in an areticle in today's paper about McCain and the environment.

Democrats also questioned how McCain could portray himself as a defender of the Everglades while a major fundraiser in Florida, developer Al Hoffman, has fought efforts to protect the so-called River of Grass. Democrats said McCain should return the money Hoffman has raised. "It's not worthy of reaction," McCain said. With a smile, he dropped the name of a Chicago developer whose relationship with Obama has caused problems.

"A Chicago developer?" The writer (Alex Leary) has such a mancrush on the Dali-Obama that he cannot bring himself to type the name "Tony Resko".

I think I'm going to be ill.

Does Cardinal George read this blog?

Apparently, he has the huevos.

CBS 2 News has learned that Francis Cardinal George is temporarily removing Father Michael Pfleger from his position as pastor of St. Sabina Roman Catholic Church on Chicago's South Side.

CBS 2 Chief Correspondent Jay Levine reports the move comes after several days of deliberation and consultation by the Cardinal, who first learned about Pfleger's racially charged comments about senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton from the pulpit of Trinity Unity Church of Christ last Thursday night.

The Cardinal immediately contacted Pfleger who agreed not to refer to the presidential candidates by name, but as CBS 2 reported at the time, there remained the possibility of some further disciplinary action against Pfleger. The Cardinal reportedly spoke to Pfleger again Tuesday morning.

"I have asked Father Michael Pfleger, Pastor of St. Sabina's Parish, to step back from his obligations there," the Cardinal said in a statement released Tuesday afternoon, "and take leave for a couple of weeks from his pastoral duties, effective today."

When one takes the priestly vows, is humility one of them? When the story came out that Fr. Pfleger said that his cardinal didn't have them, it forced the cardinal to show that yes, he did have them.