Taking a Deep Breath

And trying to decide how to proceed.

What is to become, in the event of a withdrawal, of the many Arab and Kurdish Iraqis who do want to live in a secular and democratic and federal country? We have acquired this responsibility not since 2003, or in the sideshow debate over prewar propaganda, but over decades of intervention in Iraq's affairs, starting with the 1968 Baathist coup endorsed by the CIA, stretching through Jimmy Carter's unforgivable permission for Saddam Hussein to invade Iran, continuing through the decades of genocide in Kurdistan and the uneasy compromise that ended the Kuwait war, and extending through 12 years of sanctions and half-measures, including the "no-fly" zones and the Iraq Liberation Act, which passed the Senate without a dissenting vote. It is not a responsibility from which we can walk away when, or if, it seems to suit us.

"Cut and Run" and "Stay the Course" are equally bankrupt. The solution doesn't lie between the two, but more likely outside and beyond those parameters.

Happy (?) Haloween, I Guess . . .

Monumental

All that is magnificent about the NHL on Saturday night in Montreal. Souray ties the game at 16:16 of the third, and after the OT, we gotta shootout:

TOR -Kaberle shootout goal
MON - Samsonov shootout goal
TOR - Sundin shootout saved
MON - Kovalev shootout saved
TOR - Tucker shootout saved
MON - Ryder shootout saved
TOR - Steen shootout saved
MON - Streit shootout miss
TOR - Stajan shootout saved
MON - Koivu shootout saved
TOR - Ponikarovsky shootout saved
MON - Higgins shootout saved
TOR - Wellwood shootout goal
MON - Perezhogin shootout saved

Just about ran out of bodies. The video highlights are worth the time.

Wind Out of the Sails

File under the Undeniable Power of Karl Rove, I guess . . .

DETROIT - The American Civil Liberties Union on Friday dropped a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the USA Patriot Act.

The ACLU said it was withdrawing the lawsuit filed more than three years ago because of "improvements to the law." The Justice Department argued last month that amendments approved by Congress in March 2006 had corrected any constitutional flaws in the Patriot Act.

By Any Means Necessary

You bought it, you wear it: Minnesota's 5th Congressional District might just get themselves exactly what they asked for:

1. 2005-2006 Legislative Session he authored a bill that would remove the state's ability to crack down on people who are delinquent in paying child support. ... SEE HF 1288: Driver's license suspension for nonpayment of support repealed.

2. 2005-2006 Legislative Session he authored a bill that would decriminalize making false reports of police brutality. SEE HF 2951 False information relating to police misconduct criminal provision repealed.

3. 2003-2004 Legislative Session he authored a bill that would allow alcoholic drinks to be inside a moving vehicle. ...SEE HF 2875 Driver's license; specified misdemeanor traffic offenses provided that do not constitute grounds for driver's license revocation or suspension.

How that place is going from Martin Olav Sabo to Keith X Hakim Ellison Muhammed is beyond me.

Saint Paul Streetfight

Some collection of goons, cheap-shot artistes and sniveling crybabies arrived in Saint Paul to soil our pond. They and their foul (fowl?) demeanor have been beaten back by freindly forces who reamain undefeated at home.

Not only were the Ducks lacking flair and class, they took dumb and dumber penalties, including two different jackholes who not only both got instigating (2), fighting (5) and game misconducts (10), but both had their asses handed to them in short order by Derek Boogaard.

Good guys win in the shootout; ice packs all around.

Please Stop Being Worthless on My Dime

Under the awning of No Outrage = No Attention Paid, you may be shocked to hear that Big Education is rife with disfunction and full of screwheads:

(Audrey) Johnson and Colleen Moriarty, both lame ducks whose terms conclude Dec. 31, have missed six and nine, respectively, out of about 30 public meetings since January, records indicate. Mid-termer Sharon Henry-Blythe has missed seven. Responding via e-mail from her cabin, Johnson said she has spent substantial time at her cabin for family reasons (and) said she keeps in touch with constituents mostly by e-mail but also by phone.

You know, when you ask people to vote for you and send you to the school board, you really owe it to the people who sent you there to show up a the bloody meetings.

Other board members say the absences are frustrating, one factor in the perception that the board has lost steam this year. There's plenty to deal with: falling enrollment, tight money, an achievement gap, reforming middle and high schools. The board sets policy in these areas, hires a superintendent and oversees finances. The board adopted a budget in June with only four of seven members present; the numbers were the same on Aug. 22 and Sept. 26, when the board got state testing results. Minutes indicate that the board hasn't met at full strength since July 11.

Show up to the meetings. Just show up. Do the job. How tough can this be?

(Audrey) Johnson's neighbor Bert Robinson estimates she spends 90 to 95 percent of her time at Deer Lake. "She's living up here," he said.

Deer lake isn't even vaguely near Minneapolis.

(Chairman Joseph) Erickson last spring listed three priorities for the board before the terms of four members expire Dec. 31. The board has completed one. The lame-duck status of Johnson, Moriarty, Erickson and Judy Farmer prompted the board to delay a search for a superintendent until the new board is seated. The board also didn't follow through on plans for office hours in the community and formal school visits.

There's lots to do. What is supposed to be accomplished is important. You are throwing around serious taxpayer coin. Don't give the public some lame excuses for your behavior.

Moriarty cited a busy season at the nonprofit agency she heads, an ear infection and surgery. Henry-Blythe listed recent trouble keeping track of board meeting times (HOLY SHIT!), a family trip, and out-of-town travel or work conflicts. Johnson said she was sick for two meetings, and out of town or on vacation for others.

Liars. Lazy-ass liars; all of them.

Asked about the board's pace this year, (Johnson) wrote in an e-mail: "I feel that we should allow the meatier decisions to be made by the new board."

You are on the board. You are taking money fo being on the board. PARTICIPATE AS A MEMBER OF THE BOARD YOU CHILDISH FRAUD!

Johnson expressed interest in chairing the board for 2005, but members chose Erickson.

Thank God for that.

Johnson has yet to pay more than $29,000 in health-insurance premiums she owes the district. Johnson has said that she can't afford to pay until she finds a job after her term ends.

So she's happy to accept and use the far-better-than-typical health insurance, but she's just not going to pay for until she's no longer on the board that she only participates in when it doesn't inconvenience her from her place on the lake.

What a collection of self-important idiots.

Calling Out Mid-East Islam

Victor Davis Hanson puts down his drink, unplugs the jukebox, and asks Middle-East Muslims, in front of the whole crowd, when they might ever consider helping themselves.

(Mid-East) Islamists are entirely parasitical on the West: They want our material products, but only to use them for destructive purposes. And if they employ televisions and videos to further the spread of Islam, they never pause for a second of self-critical analysis. It is not just that the world of the 7th century does produce what a Mullah Omar or Dr. Zawhri prefers to use, but that the Islamic Dark Ages ensure that such appurtenances could never be discovered or improved by fundamentalist cultures that adjudicate scientific research by Koranic purity, subjugate half the population, invest in scapegoating rather than in confident self-reliance, and predicate merit on blood ties and religious zeal.

Don't miss the ten-point list that really gets down to brass tax, for example:

#7 - We must at all times talk of anti-Americanism and why we want you out of the Middle East; you must never become anti-Arab or anti-Muslim, much less close your borders to our immigrants and students.

Another Capital Crime Goes Underpunished

I would volunteer to pull the switch on this guy:

(T)he president of a company and an associate have pleaded no contest to charges that they broke the law in seizing vehicles and demanding payments on the street.

The case against the president of Quick Lift Towing and an associate was built from a sting operation by the Los Angeles Police Department in which a tow truck driver put an undercover police car on the truck's rack and a representative of the firm demanded $180 to release the vehicle immediately.

Checking in With Ranger Bob

He knows alliteration:

So Shawn shoots Sheena, Shelby, and Shayne, and the sheriff shrugs?

he knows poetry:

(T)here's no way he'd have the time, either to read poetry or even sift casually through volumes current and old, to choose an appropriate poem. He not only has his weekly radio show, he's busy producing rotten books on what seems an almost seasonal basis...

and he knows quality marine archetecture.

Banned in Eagan!

Not only has this luddite been breeding, she's out to make sure you life sucks as much as her's does.

After a parent complained about the "sex, death and general mayhem" in newspapers, a suburban elementary school here decided to cut off students' access to free copies provided by the St. Paul Pioneer Press.

One idiot freaks out, and an entire school administration, staff and enrollment immediately steps in line behind her. We really can't accommodate sociopaths fast enough in the government schools, can we?

The Pioneer Press had been available to students for several years at Deerwood Elementary School in Eagan through its Newspapers in Education program. All kids had to do was pick up one of the 30 copies left daily on a counter in the media
center.

When I went to school and if I wanted a paper I needed to buy my own.

The parent of a 7-year old sent the school an e-mail last week complaining that the newspaper is "not appropriate reading material for elementary-aged kids."

What kind of demented small-minded putz is this? Anyway; tell you what - we'll just keep the newspaper away from YOUR kid . . .

Deerwood Elementary's media director offered to not make the paper available to her child, but continue allowing other students ready access to the newspaper. The parent rejected that, saying it "would silently endorse the kids reading them. It's like leaving a loaded gun on the table."

Stop. Right. There.

#1 - Not only does this idiot not want her own kid to be exposed to this terrible newspaper,
#2 - She is also demanding no one else's kid has access to the Saint Paul Pioneer Press,
#3 - Futhermore (and I mean WAY further) she's equating access to a newspaper with access to a firearm.

So, with 1-3, you'd figure she should be put in a rubber room, but no; 1-3 equals a very logical pattern of thought, so naturally,

#4 - Big education obeys they delusional whims of this fool, and propagates the charade of privacy by not naming this moron, yet making her schizms into school-wide policy.

Colleen Kingsbury, who has two daughters at Deerwood Elementary, said she intended to go there Friday to object. "I really resent this decision that the principal has made, especially given the fact that it's based on the opinion of one parent," she said.

Bless you, Colleen, you and I seem to be in the minority.

One More From the Hospital

That's Lil on the right.

It's Sad To Say Goodnight

Lillian S. Long 1912-2006

Mother's Day, River Falls, Wisconsin

1965

Up is Down, Down is Up

Remember when journalists tried to get the truth OUT?

The BBC has spent thousands of pounds of licence payers' money trying to block the release of a report which is believed to be highly critical of its Middle East coverage. The corporation is mounting a landmark High Court action to prevent the release of The Balen Report under the Freedom of Information Act, despite the fact that BBC reporters often use the Act to pursue their journalism.

The action will increase suspicions that the report, which is believed to run to 20,000 words, includes evidence of anti-Israeli bias in news programming.

(Steven) Sugar said: "This is a serious report about a serious issue and has been compiled with public money. I lodged the request because I was concerned that the BBC's reporting of the second intifada was seriously unbalanced against Israel, but I think there are other issues at stake now in the light of the BBC's reaction."

Clean Dog Mouths and Other Crap Science

Don't believe everything you know.

Not only is the Earth's rotation too weak to affect the direction of water flowing in a drain, tests you can easily perform in a few washrooms will show that water whirlpools both ways depending on the sink's structure, not the hemisphere.

Beware of the Future

You'll know when there's danger, for there will be signs.

Anonymity Can Set You Free

PostSecret:

Bravo for Muhammad Yunus

Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. There's not much better than someone whose mouse trap is really better:

To ensure repayment, the bank uses a system of "solidarity groups." These small informal groups apply together for loans and its members act as co-guarantors of repayment and support one another's efforts at economic self-advancement. As it has grown, the Grameen Bank has also developed other systems of alternate credit that serve the poor. In addition to microcredit, it offers housing loans as well as financing for fisheries and irrigation projects, venture capital, textiles, and other activities, along with other banking services such as savings.

Many, but not all, microcredit projects also retain its emphasis on lending specifically to women. More than 96% of Grameen loans have gone to women, who suffer disproportionately from poverty and who are more likely than men to devote their earnings to their families.

Five Oh!

Guess who's unbeaten?

The Wild played Columbus so tight Saturday that Nash, Zherdev, Westcott & Vyborny had nowhere to go and they got no soup. The Jacket's frustration boiled over in the 3rd peroid as they took stupid penalty after stupid penalty.

How bad was it for Columbus? Derek Boogaard played on two different power plays for the Wild in the 3rd period. It really became a good old-fashioned county ass-whuppin.'

High Crimes and Misdemeanors

Front Page News by Any Other Name:

Imagine for a moment that Bush National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley or, say, Scooter Libby, had intentionally exploited his security clearance to steal top-secret documents out of the national archives. Is there any chance that would not be daily front-page fodder for the New York Times? Would the broadcast networks, CNN, the Washington Post, and the rest of the mainstream media give us five seconds of peace if all of America had not yet been shown every jot and tittle of what any high-ranking Bush official had been caught red-handed trying to hide?

Of course, as it turns out, (Sandy) Berger was not content merely to conceal the drafts of the after-action report. He has admitted deliberately destroying some of the documents he took. Unauthorized destruction of classified information, it bears noting, is yet another felony violation of federal law, carrying a potential ten-year penalty.

Maybe if Big Media didn't go so breathless on the story/non-story of Scooter Libby, there would have bee some time/energy/attention left for Sandy Berger.

No, you're right: If Scooter Libby had never existed, they still wouldn't report on Berger.

Photo du Jour

Dearborn meets Maranello.

"Shut Up!" They Explained

Peggy Noonan on dissent:

Students, stars, media movers, academics: They are always saying they want debate, but they don't. They want their vision imposed. They want to win. And if the win doesn't come quickly, they'll rush the stage, curse you out, attempt to intimidate.
And they don't always recognize themselves to be bullying. So full of their righteousness are they that they have lost the ability to judge themselves and their manner. And all this continues to come more from the left than the right in America.

Read it all for contextual examples.

Take My Money . . . Please.

In case you aren't mad enough already at all 535 of them:

Behind closed doors, the GOP's King of Pork dressed down the party's leading foe of earmarks. In the open, the last bill passed before the election was filled with carefully hidden pork.In a caucus of Republican senators, 82-year-old, six-term Sen. Ted Stevens charged that freshman Sen. Tom Coburn's anti-pork crusade hurts the party. Stevens then removed from the final version of the Defense Department appropriations bill Coburn's "report card" requiring the Pentagon to grade earmarks. The House passed, 394 to 22, the bill, stripped of this reform and containing some 2,800 earmarks worth $11 billion. That made a mockery of a "transparency" rule passed by the House earlier this year, supposedly intended to discourage earmarks.

"You would think that with a war and all the controversy surrounding earmarks that the appropriators would hold back a little," said Steve Ellis of the non-partisan Taxpayers for Common Sense. "But with an election just weeks away, they dug into the trough to find pearls to send home to their districts." Ellis located unauthorized spending embedded in the bill that was harder to find than ever. Republicans in Congress seem unaffected by their conservative base's anger over pork.

Would You Like to Support Public Radio?

Turns out you already ARE supporting public radio:

The Department of Education's National Institute of Disability Rehabilitation and Research has awarded a grant to NPR and WGBH's National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM) to develop accessible radio technology for people who are deaf, hard of hearing, blind or visually impaired.

Radio for the deaf . . . maybe public television can get a government grant to develop Tee Vee for the blind . . .

The Accessible Digital Radio Broadcast Services grant - in the amount of $150,000 for the first year - will help fund an anticipated three-year research and development project to prototype, field test and assess the cutting-edge radio technologies to serve the needs of people with sensory disabilities.

Why public radio? Why radio at all? Is radio the only means of communication? Can information come to those with sensory disability any other way that already exists?

"Thanks to the Department of Education's support through this grant, NPR and our WGBH partner will leverage our shared abilities to deliver on this promise."

Thanks to the asshats on Capitol Hill for delivering on the promise of perpetual pork spending toward this nonsense.

The project's total budget for the first year is $227,810. The Department of Education grant will cover 65 percent of the project costs for the first year, while NPR will fund the remaining 35 percent. Additional federal funding after the first year is dependent on congressional appropriations.

Who could possibly believe that $227K will even come close?

Now in the Club

That really nice, forward, clean, thriving, shining beacon of worldly neighborness has the bomb.

Unlike Secretary Albright, I'm reserving my toasts and handshakes, but it does take me a while to warm up to people.

I'll Have Another . . . One of Those . . .

Another OctaneBoy endorsement - pronounced zhi-VEE-eck.

They Stomp and Eat Their Own

And it just backfires.

CONNECTICUT - Sen. Joseph Lieberman, running as an independent, has a 53 percent to 33 percent lead on Democratic anti-war challenger Ned Lamont. Lieberman, a three-term Democratic incumbent, lost the party primary in August after Lamont attacked his support for the Iraq war.

It'll be intersting to see what happens to Liebermann's committee seats when he's returned to Washington as an independent and not a Democrat.

Selective Outrage

Sunrise, Sunset

It was a fun opening night at the X Thursday as the Wild beat the Feet in overtime.

For the entire time the Wild have been competing, Colorado has always had the better team. We'd eek out wins here and there, and we did beat them in the Western Coference playoffs a few years ago, but it was evident that the Avs always had experience and talent on their side.

Until Thursday.

The Wild have the better team now. We had to play with 5 defencemen for most of the game, and we did let a 2-goal lead go, but it was reassuring to see more composure and more attack from our guys. The Wild are 'all growed up.'

Hockey's back. Bring on rest of the Northwest Division.

On the other side of the sports page, the curtain fell quick on the go-go Twins. They really ran out of go-go. The pitching was not so hot, especially the bullpen, and the bats had run dry. The A's were certainly the better team. A guy can always look forward to next year, but the way they played since the All Star break and the the way they chased down the Tigers to win the division certainly flirted with 'magical,' and makes the wait all the tougher.

I'll be rooting for and Oakland/St. Louis series, but I'll take the Tigers/Mets as well.

So Long, Buck

John Jordan "Buck" O'Neil 1911-2006

Taking Home my 70%

Did you notice that the federal budget deficit estimate for 2007 is down to $250 billion, about $50 billion less than even the White House was predicting as recently as July? Well, you didn't read it in the Mainstream Media, why you'd think it's 1930.

Since today is payday; here's some economic news.

The main cause of the deficit decline is a tidal wave of tax revenue. Tax collections have increased by $521 billion in the last two fiscal years, the largest two-year revenue increase -- even after adjusting for inflation -- in American history.

If you're surprised to hear that, it's probably because inside Washington this is treated as the only secret no one wants to print. On the few occasions when the media pay attention to the rise in tax collections, they scratch their heads and wonder where this "surprising" and "unexpected windfall" came from.

The IRS tax-return data just released last month indicates that a near-record 37% of those income tax payments are received from the top 1% of earners -- "the rich," who are derided regularly in Washington for not paying their "fair share."

I'm pretty sure that this is more of President Bush personally manipulating the entire national economy prior to the election. Like he did with the gas prices.

By the way, ever notice that all the folks who claim Bush is controlling the gas price also thinks Bush is stupid? What do they call their hero Clinton? Must he have been even more stupid since he never manipulated the cost of energy to benefit the public. Obviously that's a power that naturally comes with the office, right?

Fun with Technology

So much technology seeks to make things more authentic and real. Surround sound processing gives dimension to audio. Widescreen TV more closely mimics the shape of the field of vision that people have naturally.

You use technology to go the other way, too. In this case, using tilt and shift techniques to make the real world look fake, like the aformentioned model railroad.

Here's some more: Tel Aviv - Positano - Puerto Rico

Mr. Warmth Goes to Texas

Jacquielynn Floyd wonders what happended:

People who were present said the event went swimmingly. Mr. Keillor charmed the audience, they said, then answered questions and signed copies of his book. "He was very well-received," said one Keillor fan who was present. "The crowd adored him, laughing and applauding throughout the hour." So how to explain his blistering tirade against that same crowd a few days later in a syndicated column published Wednesday in the Chicago Tribune?

In his wrap-up, Mr. Keiller makes a direct correlation between the Methodists of Dallas (supporters, he says, of the torture employed against Guantánamo detainees) and Nazi sympathizers who looked blithely away while Hitler's storm troopers dragged their neighbors to their deaths. ...why should they worry? It's only the Jews who are in danger, and the homosexuals and the gypsies. Good God, where to begin?

Simply put, he doesn't like Dallas, or Texas, or what he views as the pervasive political climate here. Fair enough. But why come here in the first place? Why accept a standing ovation from people he contemptuously believes "support torture"? Why sign books for readers he believes are in collusion with fascists?

I can only suppose that Mr. Keillor came to Dallas and found what he was looking for – even if no one else could see it.

Here's Keillor's column from the Chicago Tribune.

Having Everything Your Way

It's big business, and, sadly, a growth industry:

For Jim McGreevey, the truth was always whatever he could get away with. That is, until he appointed a former lover to a high level position who later tried to blackmail him. To preempt that circus--and some say other swirling scandals in his administration--McGreevey held a press conference declaring both his homosexuality and his resignation.

For McGreevey, it was integral that he get his truthiness--a term reintroduced into popular usage by Stephen Colbert--out as soon as possible. Mr. Colbert announced last year on The Colbert Report that "we are divided between those who think with their head, and those who know with their hearts." And McGreevey is clearly on the side of truthiness. He says in his memoir that many of his early memories are "spotty," as are myriad political decisions that might have been related to corruption scandals during his tenure. "In place of hard facts are sharply detailed feelings," he writes, "moments of elation and pride; large doses of hope; ultimately discouragement, pain, and a soulracking fear."

The idea of authenticity and truth are a large component of McGreevey's memoirs, prompting Oprah to declare: "I really do think what former governor McGreevey has done in being so open about his sexual activities is going to be a watershed moment. It is going to be as important to the culture as Demi Moore going on the cover of Vanity Fair with her pregnant belly."

For a man who spent his entire life positioning himself for a life in the public eye, McGreevey's grievous miscalculation in hiring his foreign lover to a homeland security position seems an uncharacteristic misstep, but depending on how the public decides to interpret "his truth," it may yet be the best thing he ever did for his image.

What Happen When Model Railroads Grow Up?

Hopefully they don't stop playing with trains, but sometimes the building gets pretty thorough.

Grand Larceny, Obstruction, and Forgery.

And that's just the morning drive on AirAmerica!

Two former executives at a government-funded youth organization whose finances were scrutinized after it diverted money to the liberal radio network Air America were charged Thursday with misappropriating $1.2 million of the non-profit's funds.

New York City's Department of Investigation, which investigated the nonprofit for two years, said the men improperly took more than $290,000 from the organization for their personal use, on top of their already unusually large salaries. The money -- described in the non-profit's books as business expenses -- went to pay for home renovations and furnishings and new cars, among other things, according to a Department of Investigation report released Thursday.

City investigators said the pair also improperly transferred $875,000 to Air America, which was co-founded by one of Gloria Wise's executives. At the time, the Gloria Wise center ran a school and youth programs in the Bronx, and was affiliated with the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, but most of its money came from government grants and contracts.

If Fox News had stolen money from poor kids, their buildings would be burned to the ground by an enraged public, but when it's Al Franken stealing money from poor kids, it takes federal indictments just to make news.

Considering Message and Messenger

Fox News is 10 years old this week. You needn't buy a gift, but it may be a good time for some to reconsider their prejudices.

Fox's real ethos is not Republican but anti-elitist — a major reason it connects with so many Americans and annoys so many coastal elites. "There's a whole country that elitists will never acknowledge," (Roger) Ailes once observed. "What people resent deeply out there are those in the "blue states' thinking they're smarter."

Fox's opinion-driven programming gives conservatives and liberals a chance to get a hearing for their ideas. But Democratic politicians and activists who go on Fox also must defend their views, often against tough questioning, something that happens less often on the networks, where most journalists are left-of-center, survey after survey has shown.

Nothing would please liberals more than to drag the nation back to the days when The New York Times and CBS News determined what was newsworthy. A group of congressional Democrats has warned Fox to end its supposed anti-Democratic bias — or else. Should Democrats retake Congress, an effort to shut down, or at least muzzle, Fox, is far from inconceivable, creepy and illiberal as that sounds.

Asked to Disbelieve Your Own Eyes

Two opposing views of record closings of the DJIA; both from the Chicago Tribune via SensibleMom.

From the Chicago Tribune here's a Debbie Downer article about the stock market surge headlined, "As Dow Surges, Many Left Behind." Get your kleenexes ready:

"Joblessness still is low at 4.7 percent. But much has changed about the U.S. economy since the boom and the subsequent bust. Inequality within American society has grown. The budget deficit is looming as a major problem as the Baby Boomers begin to retire. Health-care costs have skyrocketed. The savings rate is negative as people go deeper in debt or use home equity loans to pay for purchases. Energy costs have surged until recent weeks. At the same time, the housing market developed a bubble of its own in the past six years as the Federal Reserve kept interest rates low to prop up the economy. Now, home construction has tumbled, and prices generally have softened. Some fear the end of this bubble could sink the economy. Others disagree. Whatever the case, the economy is slowing down."

I decided to do a Lexis Nexis search of the Chicago Tribune for January 2000 to see if the paper also put a negative spin on the previous stock market surge (remember that surge occurred while Clinton was president). And guess what I found? An article with a very different tone. Starting with the exciting headline titled, "Bull Market Spreading The Wealth In America" and continuing through the many paragraphs touting the growth in wealth and the number of people investing in the stock market the article is remarkably different from today's.

More Self Pants-Wetting for Islam

Sadly, this time it's not Big Establishment Media.

I'm Against Whatshisname!

Michael Chertoff, as you know, is the Secretary of Homeland Security. His predecessor was Tom Ridge. Amy's clear confusion and Arabian horse reference is perhaps (who can tell what she's trying to do?) a swipe at Michael D. Brown, who was once Undersecretary of Emergency Preparedness and Response for FEMA, and, therefore some half-assed swipe at Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Frist, Hastert, Fox News, etc., etc., etc.

It can be so confusing when you want to be a senator. I mean, when a staff-fed punchline is that critical to your message, who's got time for the facts?

Unstable Muslim Update

Part 1

A man described by police as a Turkish-born Muslim was charged yesterday with destroying a Queens memorial to a fallen 9/11 cop while screaming, "This is political!" Adnan Emre, 26, tore down a portion of Officer Paul Talty's tribute attached to a light post at 50th Avenue and Vernon Boulevard in Long Island City, police sources said.

Talty, 40, rushed to the World Trade Center's south tower as it fell. He left behind a preteen boy and girl - and a pregnant wife, who gave birth to a girl two weeks after the attacks.

Emre is a native of Turkey but now lives in Long Island City, police said. Local residents were outraged by the destruction. "If I caught him, he'd be dead, the bastard!" fumed Tom Ledden, 71, a long-time Long Island City resident and military veteran.

Part 2

A French high school philosophy teacher and author who carried out a scathing attack against the Prophet Muhammad and Islam in a newspaper commentary says he has gone into hiding under police protection after receiving a series of death threats, including one disseminated on an online radical Islamist forum.

Mr. Redeker, who teaches in a public high school near Toulouse and is the author of several books on philosophy, began to receive death threats by telephone, e-mail and through the online Islamist Web site known as Al Hesbah, a password-protected forum with ties to Al Qaeda. The forum published photos of him and what it said was his home address, directions to his home and his cellphone number, according to the
SITE Institute, which tracks violent Islamist groups.

Mr. Redeker, who has kept in contact with news agencies by cellphone and e-mail, said that his wife and their children had also been threatened with death.

Part 3

Interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy was warned of an 'intifada's the interior ministry said that nearly 2,500 officers had been wounded this year, a police union declared that its members were "in a state of civil war" with Muslims in the most depressed "banlieue" estates which are heavily populated by unemployed youths of north African origin.

As if to prove that point, there were angry reactions in the western Paris suburb of Les Mureaux following dawn raids in search of youths who attacked a police unit on Sunday. The raids led to one arrest. They followed clashes on Sunday night when scores of youths attacked seven officers who had tried to arrest a man for not wearing his seat belt while driving. That driver refused to stop, and later rammed a police car trying to block his path.

Unable to Bask in Baseball Joy, Democrats Seek to Manufacture Equality Rainout

A glorious season capper for the local 9, as seen throught the eyes of the nanny-state "government make it all better" idiots.

Minnesotans are being misled about the Twins’ succes. “Sure, the right-wing media publishes pictures of celebrating players and publishes a lot of statistics, but they spin them just to make look good,” he added. When asked for an example Melendez noted that both Twin Cities’ newspaper report Joe Mauer is “hitting .349.”

“Not one paper is accurately reporting that he is ‘not hitting’ at a .651 clip, almost 100 percent worse than we are being told,” he said. “The fact that he may become the first American League catcher to win a batting title is indicative of the poor quality of catchers being produced by under-funded public schools.” Melendez noted that Mauer went to a “religious school,” depriving the St. Paul public schools of its deserved state payments.

Melendez also cited the quagmire that is the Twins starting rotation and the loss of Francisco Liriano for the playoffs, which he said was the result of stress on the Dominican rookie resulting from his uncertainty about Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s immigration policies.

It's Not Tasteless; I'm a Democrat!

Amy Klobuchar has decided to use a dead girl as a pole to vault herself into a higher elected office. This might be the sickest thing I've ever seen. I can only imagine what Amy's handlers told those poor people to get them to say "shame on Mark Kennedy."

Shame on Mark Kennedy for what exactly?

Amy?

Anyone?

By the way, does anyone remember how well the prosecution went when it came time to lock up the shit that shot Tyesha Edwards?

19-year-old will get a new trial for allegedly killing an 11-year-old girl, after the state Supreme Court threw out his conviction, ruling that investigators improperly denied his requests to talk to his mother.

The court also said Thursday that Burrell, of Bemidji, should have been given information about plea bargains his two co-defendants received. Edwards' father said Thursday's ruling forced the family back to square one. "It's been tough as it is, and then to get some bad information about the possibility of this guy squeezing through the cracks, it's very hard to deal with," Jimmie Edwards said. "My daughter is sadly missed every single day and we love her. We don't want her to be mistreated anymore."

This is the same Jimmy Edwards that's now in Amy Klobuchar's tee vee commercial shaming Mark Kennedy? Now that takes some gall.

Reina Did NOT Handle Outside the Area

"The problem with referees is that they know the rules . . . but they don't know the game" - Bill Shankley

The robbery was even on TV.

Liverpool's pain was further increased when they fell behind in controversial circumstances. Reina was penalised for handling outside of his area, though television replays showed the Spaniard released the ball when he was clearly inside in his box.

Reina was made to pay for linesman Andy Halliday's mistake as Speed's low left-footed shot flew into the corner of the net.

What a load of crap. Oh well, chin up boys; there's time to right the ship before Blackburn and Bordeaux.