Merry Christmas!

A Merry Christmas to all!

And, for anyone who takes offense to such statements: Please, find a hobby, you have far too much free time.

Coulter on Palin

Ann Coulter has a good column this week about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and the unsuccessful GOP bid for the White House.

You can read it here.

But, here's a little piece that I found interesting:

True, Palin made some embarrassing gaffes.

She complained that we didn’t have enough “Arabic translators” in Afghanistan -- not realizing the natives don’t speak Arabic in Afghanistan, but rather a variety of regional dialects, the most common of which is Pashtun.

Speaking to military veterans one time, Palin said, “Our nation honors its unbroken line of fallen heroes -- and I see many of them in the audience here today.”

She bragged about passing a law regulating the nuclear industry that it turned out never became a law at all.

Some days Palin said Venezuela's dictator Hugo Chavez should suffer "regional isolation" -- but then on others she’d say she supported the president’s meeting with Chavez.

She told one audience about recent tornados in Kansas that had killed 10,000 people. In fact, a dozen people were killed in the tornados.

She referred to the “57 states” that make up the U.S.

Speaking of her eldest daughter’s pregnancy, she said Bristol was being “punished” with a baby.

As you probably know -- or guessed by now -- none of these gaffes were uttered by Palin. They are all Obama gaffes. Luckily, he made them to a star-struck press that managed not to ask him a difficult question for two years.

Interesting, ain't it? Yet, Palin's been called every variation of "stupid" that liberals could think of, just like they did to Bush over his Yale grades ... never mentioning that their pick, John Kerry, did even worse in school.

Sigh.

Congressmen Get Raises Amid Recession

With the economy in the state it is, with many Americans either losing their jobs or going day-to-day not knowing for sure if they'll continue to have a job, congressional lawmakers have voted to give themselves nice raises.

Here's the story:

A crumbling economy, more than 2 million constituents who have lost their jobs this year, and congressional demands of CEOs to work for free did not convince lawmakers to freeze their own pay.

Instead, they will get a $4,700 pay increase, amounting to an additional $2.5 million that taxpayers will spend on congressional salaries, and watchdog groups are not happy about it.

“As lawmakers make a big show of forcing auto executives to accept just $1 a year in salary, they are quietly raiding the vault for their own personal gain,” said Daniel O’Connell, chairman of The Senior Citizens League (TSCL), a non-partisan group. “This money would be much better spent helping the millions of seniors who are living below the poverty line and struggling to keep their heat on this winter.”

However, at 2.8 percent, the automatic raise that lawmakers receive is only half as large as the 2009 cost of living adjustment of Social Security recipients.

Still, Steve Ellis, vice president of the budget watchdog Taxpayers for Common Sense, said Congress should have taken the rare step of freezing its pay, as lawmakers did in 2000.

“Look at the way the economy is and how most people aren’t counting on a holiday bonus or a pay raise — they’re just happy to have gainful employment,” said Ellis. “But you have the lawmakers who are set up and ready to get their next installment of a pay raise and go happily along their way.”

Member raises are often characterized as examples of wasteful spending, especially when many constituents and businesses in members’ districts are in financial despair.

Rep. Harry Mitchell, a first-term Democrat from Arizona, sponsored legislation earlier this year that would have prevented the automatic pay adjustments from kicking in for members next year. But the bill, which attracted 34 cosponsors, failed to make it out of committee.

“They don’t even go through the front door. They have it set up so that it’s wired so that you actually have to undo the pay raise rather than vote for a pay raise,” Ellis said.

Freezing congressional salaries is hardly a new idea on Capitol Hill.

Lawmakers have floated similar proposals in every year dating back to 1995, and long before that. Though the concept of forgoing a raise has attracted some support from more senior members, it is most popular with freshman lawmakers, who are often most vulnerable.

In 2006, after the Republican-led Senate rejected an increase to the minimum wage, Democrats, who had just come to power in the House with a slew of freshmen, vowed to block their own pay raise until the wage increase was passed. The minimum wage was eventually increased and lawmakers received their automatic pay hike.

In the beginning days of 1789, Congress was paid only $6 a day, which would be about $75 daily by modern standards. But by 1965 members were receiving $30,000 a year, which is the modern equivalent of about $195,000.

Currently the average lawmaker makes $169,300 a year, with leadership making slightly more. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) makes $217,400, while the minority and majority leaders in the House and Senate make $188,100.

Ellis said that while freezing the pay increase would be a step in the right direction, it would be better to have it set up so that members would have to take action, and vote, for a pay raise and deal with the consequences, rather than get one automatically.

“It is probably never going to be politically popular to raise Congress’s salary,” he said. “I don’t think you’re going to find taxpayers saying, ‘Yeah I think I should pay my congressman more’.”

When You Need a Gun, Nothing Else Will Do

Watch this video, and keep in mind two simple facts: Laws only apply to the law-abiding; and it's not the law-abiding you have to worry about.

Here's the video.

Thin Skin, Thick Heads

It's the end of the world as we know it. This is a story from the LA Times:

Claremont parents clash over kindergarten Thanksgiving costumes

Email Picture

Kathleen Lucas

Cody Lucas, left, and Vince Tran participated in last year’s Thanksgiving celebration, a four-decade-old Claremont school district tradition.

Some say having students dress up as pilgrims and Native Americans is 'demeaning.' Their opponents say they are elitists injecting politics into a simple children's celebration.

By Seema Mehta
November 25, 2008

For decades, Claremont kindergartners have celebrated Thanksgiving by dressing up as pilgrims and Native Americans and sharing a feast. But on Tuesday, when the youngsters meet for their turkey and songs, they won't be wearing their hand-made bonnets, headdresses and fringed vests.

Parents in this quiet university town are sharply divided over what these construction-paper symbols represent: A simple child's depiction of the traditional (if not wholly accurate) tale of two factions setting aside their differences to give thanks over a shared meal? Or a cartoonish stereotype that would never be allowed of other racial, ethnic or religious groups?

"It's demeaning," Michelle Raheja, the mother of a kindergartner at Condit Elementary School, wrote to her daughter's teacher. "I'm sure you can appreciate the inappropriateness of asking children to dress up like slaves (and kind slave masters), or Jews (and friendly Nazis), or members of any other racial minority group who has struggled in our nation's history."

Raheja, whose mother is a Seneca, wrote the letter upon hearing of a four-decade district tradition, where kindergartners at Condit and Mountain View elementary schools take annual turns dressing up and visiting the other school for a Thanksgiving feast. This year, the Mountain View children would have dressed as Native Americans and walked to Condit, whose students would have dressed as Pilgrims.

Raheja, an English professor at UC Riverside who specializes in Native American literature, said she met with teachers and administrators in hopes that the district could hold a public forum to discuss alternatives that celebrate thankfulness without "dehumanizing" her daughter's ancestry.

"There is nothing to be served by dressing up as a racist stereotype," she said.

Last week, rumors began to circulate on both campuses that the district was planning to cancel the event, and infuriated parents argued over the matter at a heated school board meeting Thursday. District Supt. David Cash announced at the end of the meeting that the two schools had tentatively decided to hold the event without the costumes, and sent a memo to parents Friday confirming the decision.

Cash and the principals of Condit and Mountain View did not respond to interview requests.

But many parents, who are convinced the decision was made before the board meeting, accused administrators of bowing to political correctness.

Kathleen Lucas, a Condit parent who is of Choctaw heritage, said her son -- now a first-grader -- still wears the vest and feathered headband he made last year to celebrate the holiday.

"My son was so proud," she said. "In his eyes, he thinks that's what it looks like to be Indian."

Among the costume supporters, there is a vein of suspicion that casts Raheja and others opposed to the costumes as agenda-driven elitists. Of the handful of others who spoke with Raheja against the costumes at the board meeting, one teaches at the University of Redlands, one is an instructor at Riverside Community College, and one is a former Pitzer College professor.

Raheja is "using those children as a political platform for herself and her ideas," Constance Garabedian said as her 5-year-old Mountain View kindergartner happily practiced a song about Native Americans in the background. "I'm not a professor and I'm not a historian, but I can put the dots together."

The debate is far from over. Some parents plan to send their children to school in costume Tuesday -- doubting that administrators will force them to take them off. The following day, some plan to keep their children home, costing the district attendance funds to punish them for modifying the event.

"She's not going to tell us what we can and cannot wear," said Dena Murphy, whose 5-year-old son attends Mountain View. "We're tired of [district officials] cowing down to people. It's not right."

But others hoped that tempers would calm over the long holiday weekend, and the community could come together to have a fruitful discussion about Thanksgiving and its meaning.

"Its always a good thing to think about, critically, how we teach kids, even from very young ages, the message we want them to learn, and the respect for the diversity of the American experiences," said Jennifer Tilton, an assistant professor of race and ethnic studies at the University of Redlands and a Claremont parent who opposes the costumes.

Mehta is a Times staff writer.

seema.mehta@latimes.com

Uh-Oh

This is sure to get some folks all in a tizzy. ... This was the alert on Drudge this a.m.:



SHEEEEE'S BACK! COULTER DELIVERS BOOK EXPOSING 'GUILTY' OBAMA MEDIA
Tue Nov 25 2008 10:52:15 ET



Bestselling author and controversialist Ann Coulter plans to crash Obama's inauguration party with her new work, GUILTY.

Set for release first week of January, the book exposes and mocks, in graphic detail, the media's love affair with all things Democrat and Obama. Coulter presents exhibits A through Z.

"GUILTY is a much-needed reality check on a Left gone wild," declares the book's jacket.

"When it comes to bullying, no one outdoes the Left. Citing case after case, ranging from the hilariously absurd to the shockingly vicious, Coulter dissects so-called victims who are invariably the oppressors. For instance: While B. Hussein Obama piously condemned attacks on candidates' families, his media and campaign surrogates ripped open the court-sealed divorce records of his two principal opponents in his Senate race in Illinois."

Developing...

Palin: First They Trashed Her, Now They Want Her

Here's an interesting story from the Associated Press about the huge number of requests Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is receiving to appear on TV shows, write books, etc.

The part that really floors me is that some of the requests are from shows David Letterman, The Daily Show and Leno.

During the campaign, these people and others railed against her so unfairly, devoting more time to mocking her than any other candidate, spreading misinformation and nasty remarks.

Now they want her to appear on the shows, because they know people will watch, and the shows will make money.

I think she should ignore the outlets that were unfair to her. At the same time, I would love to see her sit down on Leno's show and tell him, point blank, 'Screw you, Jay, you panty-waisted liberal jagoff."

I'd tape that.

Anyway, here's the story:

By MICHAEL R. BLOOD
Associated Press Writer
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Sarah
Palin is juggling offers to write books, appear in films and sit on dozens of
interview couches at a rate astonishing for most Hollywood stars, let alone a
first-term governor.
Oprah wants her. So do Letterman and Leno.
The failed
Republican vice presidential candidate crunched state budget numbers this past
week in her 17th-floor office as tumbling oil prices hit Alaska’s revenues. Her
staff, meanwhile, fielded television requests seeking the 44-year-old Palin for
late-night banter and Sunday morning Washington policy.
Agents from the
William Morris Agency and elsewhere, have come knocking. There even has been an
offer to host a TV show.
"Tomorrow, Governor Palin could do an interview with
any news media on the planet," said her spokesman, Bill McAllister. "Tomorrow,
she could probably sign any one of a dozen book deals. She could start talking
to people about a documentary or a movie on her life. That’s the level we are at
here."
"Barbara Walters called me. George Stephanopoulos called me,"
McAllister said. "I’ve had multiple conversations with producers for Oprah,
Letterman, Leno and ’The Daily Show."’
Asked whether Winfrey was pursuing
Palin for a sit-down, Michelle McIntyre, a spokeswoman for Winfrey’s
Chicago-based Harpo Productions Inc., said she was "unable to confirm any future
plans" for the show.
Palin may have emerged from the campaign politically
wounded, with questions about her preparedness for higher office and reports of
an expensive wardrobe. But she has returned to Alaska with an expanded, if
unofficial, title — international celebrity.
John McCain plucked Palin out of
relative obscurity in late August and put her on the national GOP ticket. Now,
she has to decide how and where to spend her time, which could have implications
for her political future and her bank account, with possible land mines of legal
and ethical rules.
Palin is considering about 800 requests for appearances
from December through 2009, with 75 percent coming from out of state. A year
ago, just a sprinkle of requests came from beyond Alaska’s borders. They range
from invitations to speak at The Chief Executives’ Club of Boston to attend a
5-year-old’s birthday party, from a prayer breakfast in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to a
business conference in Britain.
Michael Steele, the former Maryland
lieutenant governor who wants to be the next chairman of the Republican National
Committee, is seeking face time.
She has invitations to make appearances in
20 foreign countries, typically with all expenses paid, McAllister said. She has
more than 200 requests for media interviews, again from around the
globe.
"She has to pace herself," suggested veteran Hollywood publicist
Howard Bragman. "She wants a career made in a Crock-Pot, not a microwave."
In
her two months on the national stage, Palin energized the Republican base but
turned off moderates and independents, according to some surveys. Flubbed
answers in national television interviews raised questions about her competence.
She was embarrassed by the disclosure the RNC spent at least $150,000 for
designer clothing, accessories and beauty services for her and her
family.
The right book or movie deal could help Palin reintroduce herself to
the nation, on terms she could dictate.
While books and movie deals could be
worth millions of dollars, it’s not clear if Palin would be able to legally earn
it. State rules say she cannot accept outside employment for compensation. But
there appears to be little in the way of precedent left by former governors to
judge if book deals or lucrative speaking appearances amount to
"employment."
Palin has sent unmistakable signals she is open to running for
president in 2012, but to advance her political ambitions she must stay in the
public eye in the lower 48 states. As with any celebrity, there is the risk of
overexposure. At the same time, she’ll be under pressure to attend to governing
her home state, which is thousands of miles from the rest of the nation.
"She
has to deal with the perception that she bobbled her debut," said Claremont
McKenna College political scientist John Pitney. "She needs to stay home for a
while. If she wants a future in national politics, her No. 1 job is doing a good
job as governor."
Just this past week, shortly after conducting a string of
national TV interviews and skipping a state education conference, she was
scolded by the Anchorage Daily News. "There are ... low graduation rates,
plummeting North Slope oil prices, proposals to build alternative energy
projects, the gas pipeline," the paper said in an editorial. "It’s time for the
governor to refocus on Alaska’s needs."

The Funniest Thing I've Seen In A While

I get a lot of mega-forwarded e-mail "jokes" -- half are crap and the rest are so-so, with one or two gems in the mix.

This is one of the funniest I've seen in a long time. It's called ...

How To Fail A Test With Dignity

Election 2008

I'm still not ready to offer my opinions on the recent election -- still trying to cope with all the nagging issues -- but in the meantime, here's some interesting reading for you. It's pretty funny, actually, as it showed hundreds of Obama supporters that really didn't know much about the election, just that they supported who the media told them to support.

http://www.howobamagotelected.com/

Here's a link to the actual results of the poll: http://www.zogby.com/news/wf-dfs.pdf

This really disturbs me. If you look at the poll results, it's just disgusting. It showed that many Obama supporters have no idea what the hell is going on. Here are some highlights of the poll:

• Only 43% of these people knew which party controls Congress.
• 87% of Obama voters attributed Tina Fey's "SNL" comments to Gov. Sarah Palin.
• Only 28% were aware of Biden's plagiarism problem, and only 17% knew about Obama's political history, but 87% knew about Palin's clothing tab, and 94% knew about her pregnant daughter.
• 33% of people wrongly attributed Obama's "coal industry" theory to McCain-Palin, while only 12% knew it was Obama.
• Only 44% knew of Obama's connection to members of the Weather Underground.
• 55% of these idiots graduated from college.
  

Something is really wrong here. How did these people make "intelligent" ballot decisions when they don't even know who is in charge? If they think things are bad now, and they're wrong about who's making it that way ... ?

This election was such a joke.

Yeah, the liberals' candidate won, but why? Because the libs rounded up every dope they could find and got them to vote based on misinformation and outright lies.

But, you know what? I don't even care. The libs are in charge, and they're going to screw things up SO badly, and there's no one for them to blame. Although I'm sure everything will somehow still be linked to Bush. That's just the way the libs work -- take credit for others' achievements and push blame for their mistakes on other people. It's awful, and deceitful, but it's the only way liberals can hope to look good at all as they continue to turn this country into the hole that it's become.

Puppies!

Go here, watch puppies!

http://cdn1.ustream.tv/swf/4/viewer.45.swf?cid=317016

Woman Gets KKK-illed

Here's a story from Breitbart about a woman who wanted to join a KKK group:

A woman who tried to flee a Ku Klux Klan initiation rite was shot to death by the group's leader in a remote campsite on a sandbar in the swamps of Louisiana, officials told local media.

The woman had found the Sons of Dixie group on the Internet and taken a bus down from her home in Tulsa, Oklahoma so she could be initiated into the secretive white supremacist group and then recruit others in Oklahoma.

She arrived on Friday and underwent several rites, including having her head shaved, St. Tammany Sheriff Jack Strain said at a press conference Tuesday.

She was then taken to the campsite that was accessible only by boat where the rituals continued, consisting mainly of lighting torches "running around in the woods," the New Orleans Times Picayune quoted Strain as saying.

At some point on Sunday evening, the woman decided she wanted to leave and got into an argument with group leader Raymond "Chuck" Foster, 44 who pulled out a .40 caliber handgun and shot her.

"We believe he then rolled her over and began a process of removing the bullet from her body" with a knife, Strain told reporters as he stood before the Ku Klux Klan costumes recovered from the campsite.

"That shows you to some extent the callousness of this individual."

Foster then ordered his followers to burn the woman's belongings and dump her body by the side of a nearby road.

"It's kind of impressive for a group with a pretty small IQ to be able to cleanse that site so well," Strain told reporters.

The group was discovered after Foster's son and another member went to a local convenience store on Monday and asked the clerk how they could remove bloodstains from their clothes.

The clerk recognized the men and contacted the sheriff's office, who soon found them and then raided the campsite.

Five of the remaining Klan members were caught in the woods and Foster later turned himself in.

Strain called the group a bunch of "kooks" and said he did not believe they had posed a serious threat to the public prior to this slaying.

He said no crimes more serious than some racist graffiti had linked to white supremacists in the area.

Officials from the St. Tammany sheriff's department and district attorney's office did not immediately return calls for comment.

However, local television stations and the Times Picayune reported that Foster was charged with second degree murder and the seven others were charged with obstruction of justice.

---------------------------------

I know I'll get some e-mails griping because I said this is a funny story. I think's it is funny because this woman wanted to be a part of a hate group, and then fell victim to that hate. It's called karma, and it's a bitch.

Militant Gays Are Such a Turn-Off

Here's a story about some "radical queers," as they call themselves, who figure that disrupting a church service and blaspheming in someone else's house of worship will somehow make people more accepting:

DELTA TWP. - A radical gay rights group is claiming responsibility for a protest Sunday at Mount Hope Church in Delta Township.

Protesters who entered the Creyts Road church along with worshippers surprised the congregation when they stood up during the service, threw fliers at churchgoers and shouted slogans such as "It's OK to be gay," and "Jesus was a homo," according to David Williams, communications director at the church. His father, Dave Williams, is the church's longtime pastor. He was not preaching at the church Sunday.

Another group of protesters demonstrated outside the church at the same time as the indoor protest.

The Eaton County Sheriff's Department responded to the scene Sunday but no arrests were made.

In a released statement, David Williams said churchgoers were unclear as to the purpose of the demonstration.

A Lansing group affiliated with a radical gay organization known as Bash Back, formed to protest the Republican and Democratic national conventions earlier this year, put out a call on the Internet on Oct. 7 for activists to come to a "radical queer convergence" in Lansing on Nov. 7-9.

A posting on its MySpace page declared the convergence a "fierce success."

Fire alarm pulled

According to a report on the Bash Back group's news site, protesters inside the church pulled a fire alarm, unfurled a banner from the church balcony, shouted and threw fliers to the worshippers.

Outside the church, protesters carried picket signs and an upside-down, pink cross.

The conservative RightMichigan Web site posted an account of the incident Monday, and a number of conservative bloggers had picked up on the item by Tuesday.

Williams said the church had received 80 to 85 e-mails and phone calls by Tuesday, "from churches and individuals around the country to express their concern and general disgust for what happened on Sunday."

Nick De Leeuw of RightMichigan said he got his account of the incident from a church member who was there.

However, he said, the photo along with his report - of protesters dressed in black with their faces covered by pink, Middle-Eastern style headcoverings - was not from the protest at the church but from an earlier Bash Back protest elsewhere.

No arrests made

Mount Hope Church, affiliated with the Assemblies of God denomination, teaches followers that homosexuality is a sin.

However, "Mount Hope Church strives to follow Jesus' example of loving the sinner but not the sin," Williams said.

The Eaton County Sheriff's Department got a call regarding the protest at about noon Sunday, said Lt. Jeff Warder.

Warder said protesters outside the church left peacefully when someone from the team of pastors came outside and told them they were not welcome on church property.

Warder said deputies did not handle the protest inside the building.

No arrests were made.

In New York City on Tuesday, the conservative Catholic League said it would ask Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox to investigate the protest.

Typically, the sheriff's investigation would be turned over to the county prosecutor if the sheriff felt charges were warranted, said Matt Frendewey, spokesman for the attorney general's office. He said it would be rare for the attorney general's office to get involved in such a case.

---------------------------------------------

So, am I the only one who thinks this is absolutely ridiculous?

This kind of behavior makes me cringe. Yeah, that'll make people more open to your beliefs, if you act like that.

It's one thing to protest, it's wholly another to aggressively confront someone in their house of worship.

Can you imagine if this same scene was played out in a mosque? There'd be a lot of headless gay folks soon afterward, I imagine.

But, as usual, the liberal American double-standard applies. It's somehow OK for gays to harass straight people, but if a straight person even whispers a word like "homo" it's a hate crime.

Personally, I think all these protesters should face hate crime arrests, because unless I misunderstand "harassment based on bigotry or bias," that's exactly what these protesters did.

Good luck with that one, though, because America today says it's perfectly acceptable to pick on straight white Christian folks -- and safe, too, because they're not allowed to fight back.

Things to Come

This was forwarded to me via e-mail.

I do not know if it is "true," as Snopes.com does not have an entry for it yet.

But, regardless, it is a plausible scenario, and a GREAT solution:

As owner of a business that employees 140 people, I have resigned myself to the fact that Barack Obama will be our next president, and that our taxes and government fees will increase in a BIG way.

I figure that my clients will have to see an increase in our fees of about 8 percent but since we cannot increase our fees due to the poor state of the economy, we
will have to lay off 8 of our employees instead.

This has really been eating at me for a while, as I believe we are family here and I didn't know how to choose who will have to go.

So, this is what I did. I strolled through our parking lot and found eight Obama bumper stickers on our employees' cars and have decided these folks will be the first to be laid off.

I can't think of a more fair way to approach this problem. These folks wanted change; I'll be giving it to them.

---------------------------

Here's a funny cartoon:

--------------------------------------

And, finally, just something the Democrats should think about, from Ann Coulter:

"For now, we have a new president-elect. In the spirit of reaching across the aisle, we owe it to the Democrats to show their president the exact same kind of respect and loyalty that they have shown our recent Republican president. "

Some Words

If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed;
If you do read the newspaper you are misinformed.'

-Mark Twain

Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress....But then I repeat myself.

-Mark Twain


I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.

-Winston Churchill

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.

- George Bernard Shaw

A liberal is someone who feels a great debt to his fellow man which debt he proposes to pay off with your money.

-G. Gordon Liddy

Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.

-James Bovard , Civil Libertarian (1994)

Foreign aid might be defined as a transfer of money from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.

-Douglas Casey

Giving money and power to the government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.

-P.J. O'Rourke , Civil Libertarian

Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.

-Frederic Bastiat, French Economist (1801-1850)

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases:
If it moves, tax it.
If it keeps moving, regulate it.
And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

-Ronald Reagan (1986)

I don't make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.

-Will Rogers

If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free!

- P.J. O'Rourke

In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other.

-Voltaire (1764)

Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you!

-Pericles (430 B.C.)


No man's life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session.

-Mark Twain (1866 )

Talk is cheap...except when Congress does it.

-Unknown

The government is like a baby's alimentary canal: a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.

-Ronald Reagan

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.

-Winston Churchill

The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin.

-Mark Twain

The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.

-Herbert Spencer , English Philosopher (1820-1903)

There is no distinctly Native American criminal class ... save Congress.

-Mark Twain

What this country needs are more unemployed politicians.

-Edward Langley, Artist (1928 - 1995)

A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have.

-Thomas Jefferson

Election Day Reading

Happy Election Day!

Here are a few articles to read before you set out to cast your ballot today:

• The Fairness Doctrine - Chuck Schumer says it could make a comeback. Goodbye, conservative talk radio, welcome to the liberal dictatorship.
• Voter registration forms on the side of the road in Tampa. What the f**k is wrong with Florida? Bad enough the people there can't figure out how the hell to vote, now they can't be trusted to drive papers from one place to another?
• Some active military votes may not count, because someone forgot to mail them to the soldiers in time. Active military votes should count, period.
• Black Panthers intimidating voters in Philly, with a nightstick. Very nice. I guess if you can't achieve, you can still get ahead by force.
• An independent investigation has cleared Sarah Palin in the ridiculous 'Troopergate' non-issue.
• Professor who bragged about stealing campaign signs has resigned. Hahaha!
• GOP workers tossed from the polls in Philly. What's up with Philly?

• 
  

Get Your Tissues

OK, this story and video made me start bawling like a 10-year-old girl.

http://videos.komando.com/2008/06/26/christian-the-lion/

On the Street in North Branford

I received a link to this essay today. It's a good read, looking at what people on the street there think about the looming election.

You can read it here.

Biden Interview, Angry Liberals

As the election draws near, I thought I would post some videos ....



And after you watch that video, read about the fallout from the interview, in a story from the Orlando Sentinel:

Obama campaign cuts off WFTV after interview with Joe Biden

WFTV-Channel 9's Barbara West conducted a satellite interview with Sen. Joe Biden on Thursday. A friend says it's some of the best entertainment he's seen recently. What do you think?

West wondered about Sen. Barack Obama's comment, to Joe the Plumber, about spreading the wealth. She quoted Karl Marx and asked how Obama isn't being a Marxist with the "spreading the wealth" comment.

"Are you joking?" said Biden, who is Obama's running mate. "No," West said.

West later asked Biden about his comments that Obama could be tested early on as president. She wondered if the Delaware senator was saying America's days as the world's leading power were over.

"I don't know who's writing your questions," Biden shot back.

Biden so disliked West's line of questioning that the Obama campaign canceled a WFTV interview with Jill Biden, the candidate's wife.

"This cancellation is non-negotiable, and further opportunities for your station to interview with this campaign are unlikely, at best for the duration of the remaining days until the election," wrote Laura K. McGinnis, Central Florida communications director for the Obama campaign.

McGinnis said the Biden cancellation was "a result of her husband's experience yesterday during the satellite interview with Barbara West."

Here's a link to the interview: http://www.wftv.com/video/17790025/index.html.

WFTV news director Bob Jordan said, "When you get a shot to ask these candidates, you want to make the most of it. They usually give you five minutes."

Jordan said political campaigns in general pick and choose the stations they like. And stations often pose softball questions during the satellite interviews.

"Mr. Biden didn't like the questions," Jordan said. "We choose not to ask softball questions."

Jordan added, "I'm crying foul on this one."

--------------------------------

Hm. Some folks seem real friendly until you ask them about things they don't want to talk about.

Spooky, Very Spooky

Here, read this:

Halloween Palin Prop Sparks Controversy

WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. (AP) ― A Halloween decoration showing a mannequin dressed as vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin hanging by a noose from the roof of a West Hollywood home is drawing giggles from some passers-by and gasps of outrage from others.

The mannequin is dressed in brunet wig, glasses and a red business suit. Another mannequin dressed as John McCain emerges from a flaming chimney.

Chad Michael Morisette, who lives in the house, told CBS 2 News that drivers and bus passengers have been stopping to snap pictures of the macabre scene.

Morisette says the effigy would be out of bounds at any other time of year, but it's within the spirit of Halloween.

He says "it should be seen as art, and as within the month of October. It's Halloween, it's time to be scary it's time to be spooky."

--------------------------------------------

So, outside of the fact that this display is not really appropriate -- come on, hanging an actual person in effigy is a little much; how would you feel if it was made to look like you -- is it odd that the guy who made this anti-Republican display is named 'Chad' ... ?

Some Election Reading

Here are some interesting stories coming across the Net:

• Pat Buchanan makes a good point about double-standards in the media.
• Does the market fear Obama's economic policies? This NY Post piece thinks it might.
• Rapper Jay-Z criticizes McCain and Palin in a concert. Aren't you glad he's shown you the light?
• Charles Krauthammer says he will be supporting McCain for president -- and he makes some good points.
  

The Fairness Doctrine

Updated

I've been interested in the Fairness Doctrine for a long time -- because it's simply such a bad idea.

It would mandate that broadcasters offer time to opposing viewpoints to any controversial issues it may air, or face the FCC.

It was taken out of commission during the Reagan administration, but, over the past several years, it has gotten support from many lawmakers, mostly on the left, especially from Nancy Pelosi.

It's a good idea, in theory. In practice, it would be virtually impossible to regulate the regulators.

You see, while it requires equal representation of opposing views, I can't seem to find out for certain whether there was discretion on the part of the FCC to determine if enough time had been devoted to the opposing views.

Note: There is an "equal time" mandate, but that applies to political campaigns -- if a broadcaster gives time to one candidate, it has to offer the same time to other candidates.

I'm trying to find the actual text of the mandate, but it seems all I can find are summaries and commentaries, so all I've been able to find so far are vague references to the representation -- I've found summaries that state "equal time" and others that say the alternate views can be presented in different formats than the original (e.g., a station could run 2 hours of one view in a news show, and then 5 minutes of opposition in an editorial), but without specifically mentioning actual time requirements.

And that's where it starts to become a bad idea.

Without really concrete, detailed requirements, there are elements of "fairness" that are quite subjective. So, depending on who's evaluating the fairness of something could easily manipulate the system.

Here's where it gets politically ugly.

Consider this:

The calls for implementing the Fairness Doctrine on talk radio is coming from the left.

Right-wing talk radio is very successful, while left-wing talk radio is not. Radio stations that carry conservative talk radio make a lot of money from it.

If a station that plays conservative talk radio is forced, by law, to play something that has proven unsuccessful, they would be being forced to do something that goes completely opposite the concept of market demand.

They might stand for it and do it to a point, if there is no time requirement -- so they could play 4 hours of conservative talk and then 20 minutes of money-losing liberal radio and just accept it. But, if there is no specific time requirement, then whoever is deciding whether it's fair or not could just say, "No, that's not enough," and fine the station until it plays what that evaluator considers fair.

The fear is that a station, if faced with having to play 4 hours of conservative and then 4 hours of liberal and knowing that that means they make money for 4 hours and then lose money for 4 hours, the station would just opt to play something completely different and make money for all 8 hours, thereby shutting down successful, popular talk conservative talk radio.

Even if there are detailed specific rules so there could be no room for interpretation, those rules have to put the power on the side of the station, because they are the business end -- if they are going to be forced to play money-losing programming, they should be able to decide when and how much to play. Even then, some stations may put profit before principal and just drop political talk radio anyway, just to spare themselves the headache.

And it's not a far-fetched fear, when you consider that the left constantly refers to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Bill O'Reilly, Larry Elder and Mike Savage as racist haters that should not be allowed to taint the airwaves. If they saw a legal opportunity to silence those people without having to actually compete against them, can you honestly say they wouldn't do it?

You know they would. And I can be objective enough to say that I know the GOP would do the same damn thing if the roles were reversed. That's why it's a bad idea, because it can -- and would be -- corrupted by whoever is in power.

Here are some links with more information about this, and the equal time rule:

http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/E/htmlE/equaltimeru/equaltimeru.htm
http://www.ims.ccsu.edu/Radio.htm
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/47/315.notes.html
http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/F/htmlF/fairnessdoct/fairnessdoct.htm

The Most Convincing Argument For Obama So Far

Up until a few minutes ago, I had not yet heard anything that really made me think about voting for Obama next month.

Then I came across this interview, with Bernard-Henri Lévy, and I really liked much of what he had to say.

He looks at the race in an interesting way. To me, he explains how the good ideas of the Democratic Party have gone too far, to a point that has become dangerous and unappealing to people that may have liked the original idea.

I feel that way very often.

So, read the interview, it's really good.

From WSJ: The Liberal Supermajority

From WSJ:

A Liberal Supermajority

Get ready for 'change' we haven't seen since 1965, or 1933.

If the current polls hold, Barack Obama will win the White House on November 4 and Democrats will consolidate their Congressional majorities, probably with a filibuster-proof Senate or very close to it. Without the ability to filibuster, the Senate would become like the House, able to pass whatever the majority wants.

Though we doubt most Americans realize it, this would be one of the most profound political and ideological shifts in U.S. history. Liberals would dominate the entire government in a way they haven't since 1965, or 1933. In other words, the election would mark the restoration of the activist government that fell out of public favor in the 1970s. If the U.S. really is entering a period of unchecked left-wing ascendancy, Americans at least ought to understand what they will be getting, especially with the media cheering it all on.

The nearby table shows the major bills that passed the House this year or last before being stopped by the Senate minority. Keep in mind that the most important power of the filibuster is to shape legislation, not merely to block it. The threat of 41 committed Senators can cause the House to modify its desires even before legislation comes to a vote. Without that restraining power, all of the following have very good chances of becoming law in 2009 or 2010.

- Medicare for all. When HillaryCare cratered in 1994, the Democrats concluded they had overreached, so they carved up the old agenda into smaller incremental steps, such as Schip for children. A strongly Democratic Congress is now likely to lay the final flagstones on the path to government-run health insurance from cradle to grave.

Mr. Obama wants to build a public insurance program, modeled after Medicare and open to everyone of any income. According to the Lewin Group, the gold standard of health policy analysis, the Obama plan would shift between 32 million and 52 million from private coverage to the huge new entitlement. Like Medicare or the Canadian system, this would never be repealed.

The commitments would start slow, so as not to cause immediate alarm. But as U.S. health-care spending flowed into the default government options, taxes would have to rise or services would be rationed, or both. Single payer is the inevitable next step, as Mr. Obama has already said is his ultimate ideal.

- The business climate. "We have some harsh decisions to make," Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned recently, speaking about retribution for the financial panic. Look for a replay of the Pecora hearings of the 1930s, with Henry Waxman, John Conyers and Ed Markey sponsoring ritual hangings to further their agenda to control more of the private economy. The financial industry will get an overhaul in any case, but telecom, biotech and drug makers, among many others, can expect to be investigated and face new, more onerous rules. See the "Issues and Legislation" tab on Mr. Waxman's Web site for a not-so-brief target list.

The danger is that Democrats could cause the economic downturn to last longer than it otherwise will by enacting regulatory overkill like Sarbanes-Oxley. Something more punitive is likely as well, for instance a windfall profits tax on oil, and maybe other industries.

- Union supremacy. One program certain to be given right of way is "card check." Unions have been in decline for decades, now claiming only 7.4% of the private-sector work force, so Big Labor wants to trash the secret-ballot elections that have been in place since the 1930s. The "Employee Free Choice Act" would convert workplaces into union shops merely by gathering signatures from a majority of employees, which means organizers could strongarm those who opposed such a petition.

The bill also imposes a compulsory arbitration regime that results in an automatic two-year union "contract" after 130 days of failed negotiation. The point is to force businesses to recognize a union whether the workers support it or not. This would be the biggest pro-union shift in the balance of labor-management power since the Wagner Act of 1935.

- Taxes. Taxes will rise substantially, the only question being how high. Mr. Obama would raise the top income, dividend and capital-gains rates for "the rich," substantially increasing the cost of new investment in the U.S. More radically, he wants to lift or eliminate the cap on income subject to payroll taxes that fund Medicare and Social Security. This would convert what was meant to be a pension insurance program into an overt income redistribution program. It would also impose a probably unrepealable increase in marginal tax rates, and a permanent shift upward in the federal tax share of GDP.

- The green revolution. A tax-and-regulation scheme in the name of climate change is a top left-wing priority. Cap and trade would hand Congress trillions of dollars in new spending from the auction of carbon credits, which it would use to pick winners and losers in the energy business and across the economy. Huge chunks of GDP and millions of jobs would be at the mercy of Congress and a vast new global-warming bureaucracy. Without the GOP votes to help stage a filibuster, Senators from carbon-intensive states would have less ability to temper coastal liberals who answer to the green elites.

- Free speech and voting rights. A liberal supermajority would move quickly to impose procedural advantages that could cement Democratic rule for years to come. One early effort would be national, election-day voter registration. This is a long-time goal of Acorn and others on the "community organizer" left and would make it far easier to stack the voter rolls. The District of Columbia would also get votes in Congress -- Democratic, naturally.

Felons may also get the right to vote nationwide, while the Fairness Doctrine is likely to be reimposed either by Congress or the Obama FCC. A major goal of the supermajority left would be to shut down talk radio and other voices of political opposition.

- Special-interest potpourri. Look for the watering down of No Child Left Behind testing standards, as a favor to the National Education Association. The tort bar's ship would also come in, including limits on arbitration to settle disputes and watering down the 1995 law limiting strike suits. New causes of legal action would be sprinkled throughout most legislation. The anti-antiterror lobby would be rewarded with the end of Guantanamo and military commissions, which probably means trying terrorists in civilian courts. Google and MoveOn.org would get "net neutrality" rules, subjecting the Internet to intrusive regulation for the first time.

It's always possible that events -- such as a recession -- would temper some of these ambitions. Republicans also feared the worst in 1993 when Democrats ran the entire government, but it didn't turn out that way. On the other hand, Bob Dole then had 43 GOP Senators to support a filibuster, and the entire Democratic Party has since moved sharply to the left. Mr. Obama's agenda is far more liberal than Bill Clinton's was in 1992, and the Southern Democrats who killed Al Gore's BTU tax and modified liberal ambitions are long gone.

In both 1933 and 1965, liberal majorities imposed vast expansions of government that have never been repealed, and the current financial panic may give today's left another pretext to return to those heydays of welfare-state liberalism. Americans voting for "change" should know they may get far more than they ever imagined.

The Truth About Gun Control

Here's a video that will explain the truth about gun control once and for all ....

Cultural Differences Lead to Jail Time

Here's an interesting story about a couple of Brits who wound up getting 3 months in prison for having sex on a public beach in Dubai.

Because Dubai has such a reliance on tourism, it was felt that a "lenient" sentence was called for.

Here's a quote from the story, from another British woman:

"Before I came here I read up on the dos and don'ts. I wouldn't dream of kissing my friend out on the street. This is an Islamic country. We have to respect their traditions. We expect the same in our country. You should dress and behave appropriately when you are somebody's guest."

Now that's interesting.

Murtha: Only Racists Don't Vote Obama

I knew it was coming, I just didn't know for sure when it would start.

The Dems are going to start the major race issue now, as in, "If you don't vote for Obama then your are a racist."

Here's the story. If you go to the site, read the comments afterward, they're fun.

PITTSBURGH (AP) - U.S. Rep. John Murtha says his home base of western
Pennsylvania is racist and that could reduce Barack Obama's victory margin in
the state by 4 percentage points.
The 17-term Democratic congressman tells
the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in a story posted Wednesday on its Web site that, as
he put it: "There is no question that western Pennsylvania is a racist area."
He says it's taken time for many Pennsylvania voters to come around to
liking Obama, but he should still win the state, though not in a runaway.
In a separate interview posted Wednesday on the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review's Web site, Murtha says Obama has a problem with the race issue in western
Pennsylvania that could shave 4 points off his lead in the state.

Political Thoughts From E-Mail

Just a couple of thoughts I received in various e-mails the past few days.

------------------------------------

Barack Obama put out an ad telling us how the simple-minded John McCain cannot use a computer.

The ad neglects to mention that Barack Obama cannot land a jet plane on an aircraft carrier at night!

------------------------------------


-------------------------------------------------

Neat video ....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxJ7t3U3TDg

-------------------------------------------------

Important 'Bailout' Reading

Here are two very important items concerning the so-called bailout plan. The first is a series of "60 Minutes" clips; the 2nd item is a brief concerning some more appalling behavior by AIG executives.

http://60minutes.yahoo.com/segment/197/credit_default_swaps

and

http://www.politico.com/blogs/thecrypt/1008/Waxman_probes_AIGs_postbailout_retreat.html

More Media Bias

Funny -- I see multiple stories about everything Sarah Palin says, picking it apart to show that she's "dumb," as wealthy actor Tim Robbins implied in an appearance Monday on The Daily Show.

But, when Biden just spouts off things that are incorrect, or outright falsehoods, it takes Google to find a mention.

So here's a story from National Review. It's pretty funny how much Biden just says whatever sounds good, and people eat it up like it's got gravy on it.

I Didn't Know Kenya Was Full of Liberals

Here's an interesting read about author Jerome Corsi -- he wrote a book, "The Obama Nation," where he looks at Obama in a light differently than the mainstream media.

It seems he was going to give a presentation about some of the things he found while investigating Obama, but magically, Kenyan authorities detained him and tossed him out of the country before he could do so.

Oh well. Obama's pretty popular, so I guess we should all get used to not being allowed to voice dissent. You should probably hide your guns, too, and anything religious in your house ... oh, and all your money.

Cindy Sheehan STILL around

Here's the latest on Cindy Sheehan and her run for Nancy Pelosi's House seat.

There are 3 things in this story that caught my eye:

1. "You know, it's not easy having most of the country hate you," Sheehan said. "I know ..."

Yes, you may know, but you obviously don't comprehend it. If most of the country thinks you're a whackaloon, except for a small circle of other whackaloons ... then maybe it's you that's screwed up.

2. Her office, lined with photos of her children, all in their 20s, and her 4-month-old grandson, Jonah, is full of awards for speaking out against the war when it was unpopular to do so.

Wow! I didn't realize that you could win awards for calling a sitting president a "bastard" and a "nazi" and "Hitler." I also didn't realize that it was unpopular to speak out against the war, seeing as every time someone speaks out against the war, the liberal media immediately gives them superstar status, they get TV time and, well, the power to run for the House of Representatives.

3. "I think it's OK to enjoy life again. My grandson has made me realize that."

Well, if anyone can talk sense into Cindy Sheehan, it's a 4-month-old, seeing as they're pretty much the same mental age.

Rounding Up The Sheep

Here's a neat little story about a group called Vote Today Ohio.

Volunteers supporting Barack Obama picked up hundreds of people at homeless shelters, soup kitchens and drug-rehab centers and drove them to a polling place yesterday on the last day that Ohioans could register and vote on the same day, almost no questions asked.

The huge effort by a pro-Obama group, Vote Today Ohio, takes advantage of a quirk in the state's elections laws that allows people to register and cast ballots at the same time without having to prove residency.

Isn't that wonderful?

See, that's why libs love the dregs of society -- if you keep people down in the dirt, you know where to find them when you need them.

I'm sure these 'voters' were told all about how Republican policy has caused their homelessness, drug addiction and such, and how the messiah Obama will turn them into millionaires and successful community citizens.

Which, for many of them, is something they could have done on their own, if they wanted to actually work for it. But this way, all they have to do is pull a certain lever, or mark a certain box on a ballot.

Barney Frank and the Housing Mess

This is interesting ...

WASHINGTON — Unqualified home buyers were not the only ones who benefitted from Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank’s efforts to deregulate Fannie Mae throughout the 1990s.

So did Frank’s partner, a Fannie Mae executive at the forefront of the agency’s push to relax lending restrictions.

Now that Fannie Mae is at the epicenter of a financial meltdown that threatens the U.S. economy, some are raising new questions about Frank's relationship with Herb Moses, who was Fannie’s assistant director for product initiatives. Moses worked at the government-sponsored enterprise from 1991 to 1998, while Frank was on the House Banking Committee, which had jurisdiction over Fannie.

Both Frank and Moses assured the Wall Street Journal in 1992 that they took pains to avoid any conflicts of interest. Critics, however, remain skeptical.

"It’s absolutely a conflict," said Dan Gainor, vice president of the Business & Media Institute. "He was voting on Fannie Mae at a time when he was involved with a Fannie Mae executive. How is that not germane?

"If this had been his ex-wife and he was Republican, I would bet every penny I have - or at least what’s not in the stock market - that this would be considered germane," added Gainor, a T. Boone Pickens Fellow. "But everybody wants to avoid it because he’s gay. It’s the quintessential double standard."

A top GOP House aide agreed.

"C’mon, he writes housing and banking laws and his boyfriend is a top exec at a firm that stands to gain from those laws?" the aide told FOX News. "No media ever takes note? Imagine what would happen if Frank’s political affiliation was R instead of D? Imagine what the media would say if [GOP former] Chairman [Mike] Oxley’s wife or [GOP presidential nominee John] McCain’s wife was a top exec at Fannie for a decade while they wrote the nation’s housing and banking laws."

Frank’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Frank met Moses in 1987, the same year he became the first openly gay member of Congress.

"I am the only member of the congressional gay spouse caucus," Moses wrote in the Washington Post in 1991. "On Capitol Hill, Barney always introduces me as his lover."

The two lived together in a Washington home until they broke up in 1998, a few months after Moses ended his seven-year tenure at Fannie Mae, where he was the assistant director of product initiatives. According to National Mortgage News, Moses "helped develop many of Fannie Mae’s affordable housing and home improvement lending programs."

Critics say such programs led to the mortgage meltdown that prompted last month’s government takeover of Fannie Mae and its financial cousin, Freddie Mac. The giant firms are blamed for spreading bad mortgages throughout the private financial sector.

Although Frank now blames Republicans for the failure of Fannie and Freddie, he spent years blocking GOP lawmakers from imposing tougher regulations on the mortgage giants. In 1991, the year Moses was hired by Fannie, the Boston Globe reported that Frank pushed the agency to loosen regulations on mortgages for two- and three-family homes, even though they were defaulting at twice and five times the rate of single homes, respectively.

Three years later, President Clinton’s Department of Housing and Urban Development tried to impose a new regulation on Fannie, but was thwarted by Frank. Clinton now blames such Democrats for planting the seeds of today’s economic crisis.

"I think the responsibility that the Democrats have may rest more in resisting any efforts by Republicans in the Congress or by me when I was president, to put some standards and tighten up a little on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac," Clinton said recently.

Seems odd, doesn't it?

Sandra Bernhard 'Jokes' About Palin, Gang Rape

This is interesting:

BOSTON - A women's shelter on Wednesday cut headliner Sandra Bernhard from its annual benefit after she said Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin
would be gang-raped if she ever visited New York.

Bernhard's made the remarks last month during her one-woman show in Washington before Palin visited New York to campaign. Bernhard said Palin would be "gang-raped by my big black brothers" during a diatribe in which she also criticized Palin for opposing abortion rights.

Many guests at Rosie's Place, a Boston shelter, have been victims of violence, public relations director Leemarie Mosca said. "In light of our mission, we don't think violence against women is a laughing matter," she said.

So ... first off, I commendRosie's Place for having sense.

Second, if Sarah Berhard is the only person on stage, how can that be called a "one-woman show"? Wouldn't there need to be a woman there?

I'm all for political discourse, but (a) I do not like rape, and (b) I do not like when people try to make political points through stupidity, because it only hampers debate.

But, I don't expect Bernhard to understand that, because she never really came across as all that intelligent -- it seems her big claim to fame was being nothing more than an absolutely hideous "woman" who used lots of dirty words.

Pelosi Family Enjoys the System

Here's an interesting article about Nancy Pelosi paying her husband with money from one of her PACs.

It's something that politicians from both sides of the aisle have done, and have been chastised for; However, according to this article, Pelosi last year supported legislation that would have banned such payments.

I'm telling you, all these people are thieves and liars.

Something to Look Out For

Here's a story about the moderator for tomorrow's vice presidential debate, Gwen Ifill.

The story talks about how Ifill has a book coming out about black politicians and the changing face of politics.

From some of the quotes in the story, at least, Ifill doesn't sound really partisan; I'm sure she has her own opinions, but she doesn't come across as biased in terms of reporting.

She said she is concerned only about getting straight answers from candidates.

"You do your best to get candidates to answer your question. But I also trust the viewers to understand when questions are not answered and reach their own conclusions," Ifill told BlackAmericaWeb.

"Four years ago, when neither John Edwards nor Dick Cheney proved capable of answering a question about the domestic epidemic of AIDS among African-American women, viewers flooded me with reaction," she said.

So, while I don't think it's anything that would taint a debate, it's still something to look out for while you're watching.

No Title Necessary

From a New Haven Register story:

Judge Earl Richards on Monday arraigned Akeem Gayle, 24, of Harding Place, New Haven, and Anthony Johnson, 19, of Highview Terrace, Hamden, on charges of felony murder, first-degree robbery and conspiracy to commit first-degree robbery. Richards increased Gayle’s bail to $2 million.

Gayle has eight years of jail time hanging over his head from two convictions in which he received suspended sentences for drug sales and arson. Johnson, who was held in lieu of $1 million bail, has a minor criminal record.

Through an open, second-floor window on Harding Place, Gayle’s mother said, “He’s a good boy,” but declined further comment. No one answered the door Monday at Johnson’s residence.

Politics, War, Hunger and Money

I really want to go live in Mayberry.

The Price of Oil

Here's a story from Breitbart:

NEW YORK (AP) - Oil prices tumbled more than $8 a barrel Monday, dropping below the $100 level as traders bet that global demand for petroleum products will keep falling despite a planned $700 billion U.S. financial bailout.

A stronger dollar also weighed on crude prices as investors who bought oil and other commodities as a hedge against inflation sold their contracts.

Light, sweet crude for November fell $8.24, or 7.71 percent, to $98.65 a barrel in midday trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after earlier dropping as low as $98.76.

The contract fell Friday $1.13 to settle at $106.89. Crude has now fallen 31 percent since surging to an all-time record of $147.27 on July 11.

Monday's sell-off was tied to anxiety over the pending U.S. rescue plan. Following a week of intense negotiations, lawmakers could hold a final vote on the emergency measure Wednesday. But investors are doubtful whether the plan will be enough to unfreeze global credit markets and restore calm to the financial system.

So. The traders' confidence that we'll buy expensive oil makes them invest more, and the price goes up. The traders' belief that we won't buy expensive oil makes the price go down? Then, why not just stop buying oil until it's affordable? Use as little heating oil and gas as you can, I say.

Good, Wholesome Non-Political Humor

I got these in my e-mail today. Nice, clean fun!

Pun Fun

1. The roundest knight at king Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference. He acquired his size from too much pi.

2. I thought I saw an eye doctor on an Alaskan island, but it turned out to be an optical Aleutian

3. She was only a whiskey maker, but he loved her still.

4. A rubber band was confiscated from algebra class because it was a weapon of math disruption.

5. The butcher backed into the meat grinder and got a little behind in his work.

6. No matter how much you push the envelope, it'll still be stationery.

7. A dog gave birth to puppies near the road and was cited for littering.

8. A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blown Apart.

9. Two silk worms had a race. They ended up in a tie.

10. Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

11. A hole has been found in the nudist camp wall. The police are looking into it.

12. Atheism is a non-prophet organization.

13. Two hats were hanging on a hat rack in the hallway. one hat said to the other, 'You stay here, I'll go on a head.'

14. I wondered why the baseball kept getting bigger. Then it hit me.

15. A sign on the lawn at a drug rehab center said: 'Keep off the Grass.'

16. A small boy swallowed some coins and was taken to a hospital. When his grandmother telephoned to ask how he was, a nurse said, 'No change yet.'

17. A chicken crossing the road is poultry in motion.

18. The short fortune-teller who escaped from prison was a small medium at large.

19. The man who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is now a seasoned veteran.

20. A backward poet writes inverse.

21. In democracy it's your vote that counts. In feudalism it's your count that votes.

22. When cannibals ate a missionary, they got a taste of religion.

23. Don't join dangerous cults: Practice safe sects!