Inside Larry's Head

What is this.. a Post?

2008-08-11T17:04:00.003-04:00

Yes Larry has decided to post after a while. (and Wordpress and its Epic Fail is why I'm here.)

But the crisis in Georgia has given me a motive to post.

I have talked to people and said the future of the world was a rebirth of the pre-WWI era.

That new age has started today. If we let the Georgians die the war of the Sphere's of influences will occur.

The Level -1 Sphere of Influence of the US is now going to be challenged (and some times assisted) by some of these other Spheres of influence

Your Level 2's in China and Russia

your level 3 in Europe as the EU

Your level 4 with India, Brazil, Argentina, Germany, Chile, Japan, France, U.K., and Australia

and your level 5 with countries like Cuba, Venezuala, Turkey, Egypt, and Iran

These sphere's of influence will start to spread out and form alliances and patterns of alliances in the world.

if Georgia falls because the US and the EU won't stand up it means states like Georgia will start to gather other major States with them to form alliances and divide the world.

We may not be lucky to have a new Central powers or alliance. It may be more fissures and divisions in the world.

I blame George W. Bush and Bill Clinton for this

Yeah I know I closed buisness down here

2008-02-06T23:27:00.000-05:00

But wordpress was not letting me on for some reason. Since I got my new roomie my internet connection is whack

Why I am Not voting for John McCain Part I:

2008-02-06T23:24:00.000-05:00

Why I am Not voting for John McCain:
Part I:
By Larry Bernard

I am first going to put a caveat out there I like to call the John Kerry-Katherine Harris clause. While I hate to say this but if Hillary proves to be as Harris and Kerry were completely out of her mind and a danger to the public good I may swallow my statement and vote against Hillary and by process of elimination electing McCain. But I first want to spell out why I am not going to vote for John McCain

I ) Your party should earn your vote, not be entitled to your vote. and the Moral Hazard problem is key to why your party doesn't have an entitlement to your vote

Moral hazard is the prospect that a party insulated from risk may behave differently from the way it would behave if it were fully exposed to the risk. Moral hazard arises because an individual or institution does not bear the full consequences of its actions, and therefore has a tendency to act less carefully than it otherwise would, leaving another party to bear some responsibility for the consequences of those actions. For example, an individual with insurance against automobile theft may be less vigilant about locking his car, because the negative consequences of automobile theft are (partially) borne by the insurance company.

When we live in a country where our national political system makes incumbents basically protected from the consequences of their actions (a few exceptions exist but it is the rule) The Moral Hazard should be an important principle we keep in mind when we vote. Is this party/Candidate giving me something to vote for or something to vote against. And if the case is the latter it should only be done in the most extreme of cases. FDR transformed the electorate by saying to African American voters (primarily in the south) "What has the republican party done for you lately."

The answer lead to a calcification of Democrat voting in the south which lead to some of the worst of the Jim Crowe years. If we vote for a party just because we will not get our interests met at best, or at worse we can be like those who suffered during segregation empowering those who oppress us. And as the Republicans in the 20s and 30s expected the Party of Lincoln to maintain those votes they did nothing to keep them and so they deserved to lose. And if we keep voting for bad outcomes we will keep getting bad results.

II ) Trust:
When you vote for a Political figure they may have a record, they may have campaign promises but we live in a Representative Republic and by handing them your small power of citizenship your saying "I trust you to, for the most part, get done what I want done in Washington/Your state capital here." Most candidates do this by establishing an Identity.In this Presidential Primary of the candidates left over Mike Huckabee established himself as "The Hip Pastor". Huck plays the base and is concerned with the kind of issues the hip young pastor at your church would be into. Mitt has (to varying degrees of success) tried to sell himself as "Turnaround CEO Mitt." Hillary Clinton established a brand and Identity for herself that just is "Hillary" and Obama has established himself as the hope of a new Generation. But none of these is as bought into as "Maverick" John McCain.

mav·er·ick (mvr-k, mvrk)
n.
1. An unbranded range animal, especially a calf that has become separated from its mother, traditionally considered the property of the first person who brands it.
2. One that refuses to abide by the dictates of or resists adherence to a group; a dissenter.
adj. Being independent in thought and action or exhibiting such independence: maverick politicians; a maverick decision

But has John McCain went against the popular culture and its beliefs or has he went against the popular culture of the Republican party and its beliefs. One shows courage because it presents potential risk, whereas the other gets you political attention. Furthermore as an incumbent republican senator the weight of the party establishment would back him just as much as it would back Lincoln Chafee and Arlen Specter. And Democrats would be disinclined to run against him because he breaks with the Republican party to support their issues. So in being Maverick John McCain until today has put forward no risk and thus he is not being independent but he is being a follower of social norms dictated by popular culture. The closest he has come to rocking the boat is in his support for the Iraq war, but he has also talked about us torturing and brutalizing people (something which the evidence on is weak or lacking) and made it part of a central critique of attacking the Bush management of the War in Iraq and the Department of Defense. So even when he broke from his going with popular opinion he did so in a way that popular opinion could support him. When people have been concerned about violent video games, John McCain was there. When people have been concerned about Steroids in Sports John McCain was there. if John McCain could get himself a piece of popular discontent he does, and he does in a way that shows a lack of political principle or guiding Ideology. So John McCain isn't what he says he is and Isn't what people think of him as.

III ) Lack of political courage.
During the run up on the McCain-Kennedy amnesty package John McCain and his proxies made derogatory comments to those who disagreed with his bill. His proxies (including proxies for the president) went so far as to call those who disagree with the John McCain Bigots and promote fear of Hispanics voting for Democrats over Republicans if we don't do this. Their are good reasons, and noble reasons to oppose the plan Senator McCain championed. but the fact Senator McCain went forward with this shows a lack of political courage that has happened throughout his career. When Soldiers and sailors needed help with Agent Orange John McCain did not take the courage of fighting for them as a member of Congress fresh out of the DoD until he knew it would pass. When running in 2000 their was a controversy over Bob Jones University, the position of political courage in that race was taken by Alan Keyes who told them their positions restricting Inter racial dating was immoral and unchristian. John McCain could have made that speech but he didn't. After losing the 2000 election and seeing his key staffers not getting Bush White house jobs according to many Democrat sources John McCain considered Jumping parties. John McCain was even talked to about joining the Democratic party ticket in 2004. John McCain stood up for the Vietnamese government against the State Department (with John Kerry) enabling them to get a free trade agreement when they were abusive of human rights. He called people Frauds and con artists for advocating that POW's still remained in Vietnam without any evidence of such wrongdoing. When people disagree with him he either shrugs from political courage or makes derogatory comments about them. John McCain has used Bob Dole's war experience to insulate Bob Dole's criticism of attacks on him from the kind of scrutiny and debate they deserve.

I want to spell out first and foremost that these reasons are non-ideological. While I don't believe John McCain fits the mold of American political Conservatism even if John McCain fit that mold and Ideology we would still have problems.He is still promoting ignoring the Moral Hazard of identifying in party over beliefs. He still isn't trustworthy because he relies on a false identity as some one who rocks the boat when he has a political career of going with the flow. Its about character and Character matters a whole lot to me now when I look at who I select for President. I could go into other aspects of his general character that while they don't fit into this rubric they are none the less concerning. John McCain rails against those who are unduly influenced by money in politics yet if you ask the Senator to name names he cannot name one. If you look at the Senators legislative pursuits and you will find a wish list from his own major donors. He married a wife which helped him further his political career and left his sick wife who stood by him during the worst of the worst.

When we look at these character flaws however we will see them manifest in his policy and his ideological breaks from the republican party

We Have Moved

2007-05-31T10:40:00.000-04:00

The Blog is over here now

Need a new home and a new sense of direction.

Hey Singapore, Ireland, and Hong Kong

2007-03-20T11:10:00.000-04:00

I am going to be writing a research paper on you guys... I expect in the future as I put stuff up here to see more of you guys looking at my blog

and now a moment of Zen

2007-03-20T11:07:00.000-04:00

I get It

2007-03-20T11:03:00.000-04:00

I get my burn out now over politics. It all makes sense to me in a way I didn't have it before. While I am feeling a burn out over school right now, I especially get now Why I am having a burn out over politics. I have since I started blogging and started going into political sims and the like (to a lesser extent paying attention to issues of media bias) Started taking a more active focus on these things. Its a combination of my feeling Burned out but it is also now more about me having seen it all before and having said it all before

Been about a month and something pushed me to blog

2007-03-07T08:59:00.000-05:00

Last thing to make me blog was the Stupid Gay Snickers commercials.... Today is something else stupid.

Captain America is Dead...AGAIN

(Note the death referenced in Wikipedia is what happened in the storyline summary while his death was faked to get the cure)

the stupid part is bolded

Captain America killed!

Marvel comic book hero cut down by sniper

Captain America is dead. The Marvel Entertainment superhero, created in 1941 as a patriotic adversary for the Nazis, is killed off in Captain America #25, which hits the stands today.

As Captain America emerges from a courthouse building, he is struck by a sniper's bullet in the shoulder and then hit again in the stomach, blood seeping out of his star-spangled costume.

His death is sure to ignite controversy in the comic book world - still reeling from Superman's death in 1993 and resurrection the following year - and even political pundits, who may see Captain America's demise as an allegory for the United States.

"It's a hell of a time for him to go. We really need him now," said co-creator Joe Simon, 93, after being informed of his brainchild's death.

Simon and artist Jack Kirby came up with the character in 1941 as an adversary for Adolf Hitler, who was more evil than any villain the pair could dream up. Since then, the patriotic hero has appeared in an estimated 210 million copies sold in 75 countries.

Not bad for an imaginary sickly kid from the lower East Side named Steve Rogers, who volunteered to be injected with Super Soldier serum during World War II.

Part of Captain America's allure was that he had no true superpowers; the serum made him an example of a human being at his utmost potential.

He could bench-press 1,100 pounds, run a mile in about a minute and outsmart any spy.

Series writer Ed Brubaker - who grew up reading Captain America comics while his father, a naval intelligence officer, was stationed on Guantanamo Bay, Cuba - said it wasn't easy to kill off the character. The 40-year-old, however, wanted to explore what the hero meant to the country in these polarized times.

"What I found is that all the really hard-core left-wing fans want Cap to be standing out on and giving speeches on the streetcorner against the Bush administration, and all the really right-wing [fans] all want him to be over in the streets of Baghdad, punching out Saddam," Brubaker said.

Comic book deaths, however, are rarely final. Marvel's archrival, DC Comics, provoked a media frenzy when it killed off Superman in 1993, only to reanimate its prize creation a year later.

Joe Quesada, 43, Marvel Entertainment's editor in chief, said he wouldn't rule out the shield-throwing champion's eventual return. But for now, the Captain's fans are in mourning.

"I was shocked. I was not expecting it," said Gerry Gladston, co-owner of Midtown Comics in Manhattan. "I'd rather they didn't kill him - but it's going to mean great sales."

'LIFE' OF AN AMERICAN HERO

Created: March 1941

True Identity: Steve Rogers

Born: July 4, 1917

Birthplace: Lower East Side

Current Home: Red Hook, Brooklyn

Superpowers: None (Super Soldier serum makes him a "nearly perfect human being")

Weapon: His red,white and blue discus-like shield

Archenemy: Red Skull

Pop Culture Moment, Film: Easy Rider, Peter Fonda's character is nicknamed Captain America.

Pop Culture Moments, Music: The Kinks' song, Catch Me Now, I'm Falling, has this lyric: "This is Captain America calling." Guns N' Roses' Paradise City: "Captain America's been torn apart, now he's a court jester with a broken heart."

Originally published on March 7, 2007

The thing is last time... in you know the polarized 90s that stuff played out.... so how about oh I don't know a good storyline.

Captain America is part of the whole Marvel Civil War plotline I hate with firey passion. But what would have made a great story, a story consistent with Captain America is that he faked his own death and found the people who created the events that started the Civil war. That the whole thing was orchestrated to destroy the Superhuman community and have them fight each other until no one was left.

When he finds them the Patriot Captain America is comes out of hiding and lays it all out and the healing begins

You know you can get the stupid polarization angles out AND then you have a coming together

but as I have seen synopsis of the assassination story, I know nothing that well thought out is coming I hate marvel comics so much

Wow...

2007-02-06T08:03:00.000-05:00

I've been in Blogger lethargy for a while but lets me roll something out here. What I am posting may soon be yanked from Youtube but I will have commentary later. This was so stupid it made me come out of semi-retirement

(H/T to Ace)

Ok I want to ask something.......

How does two men kissing and then having a "quick lets not act gay" moment sell candy?

can anyone explain that to me

here are some reactions from NFL players

(with Marvin Harrison enjoying these a bit to much)

More Youtube while you wait

2006-12-20T13:18:00.000-05:00

Still have blogger lethargy so have some Youtube

2006-12-20T13:17:00.001-05:00

And this is the first anime I watch since I learned Japanese

2006-11-29T09:42:00.000-05:00

I do hope this hits the states

W0rd

2006-11-29T09:32:00.000-05:00

An editorial which gets to the heart of things in Iraq

The Bush administration disputes the "civil war" moniker. And it's not a semantic argument. Just Tuesday, The New York Times reported that "the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah had been training members of the Mahdi Army, the Iraqi Shiite militias led by Moktada al-Sadr." It's not the only outside influence.

Such a proxy war is not a civil war. Neither is it unreasonable or naive to believe that sans those proxies, Iraq might not be the hellhole it now is. Nonetheless, this remains a matter for the Iraqis to settle.

And yet we want IRAN to help us stop the conflict

and here is another

Such advice is worse than wrong-headed, it is a denial of reality. Iran and Syria have one primary interest — U.S. withdrawal from Iraq and ultimately out of the entire Middle East. So much is clear from the daily pronouncements of the Terhran Mullahs, led by the Iranian strongman Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and the long-standing refusal of the Baathist regime controlling Syria to stop expediting the inflow of foreign fighters to Iraq to kill Americans and foment civil unrest between Iraq’s Sunni minority and the Shiite majority. The only stability Iran seeks in Iraq is the kind made possible by the sort of puppet regime Ahmadinejad wants in Baghdad. This is why Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei told Iraq’s President Jalal Talibani yesterday that Iran will send troops if requested to do so by Iraq.

There is another crucially important denial of reality akin to the “managing defeat” syndrome. Evidence is rapidly accumulating that major Western media organizations are being had on a daily basis by the propaganda efforts of the Jihadist insurgency. A frequently appearing source in Iraq stories from AP, Reuters and other mainline news organizations is “Capt. Jemil Hussein” of the Iraqi police. Hussein was the main source in the Nov. 24 story claiming six Iraqi civilians were burned alive by insurgents outside a mosque. Hussein is one of 14 questionable sources with Middle Eastern names identified by the U.S. military in news stories from Baghdad reporting growing chaos and allegations of U.S. atrocities.

and we expect Iran and Syria to help us.

And some folks expect media accuracy

So will Bush sell out the Iraqi people?

Jim Webb.... Classy Guy

2006-11-29T07:33:00.000-05:00

Jim Webb shows that saying every southerner has dropped the N bomb,Make Derogatory comments about Women, maligning rape victimes, advocate being for the Scot-Irish people over non Scot-Irish people, and talking about little kids penis' in the mouths was not the height of his class.

The Hill is there

At a private reception held at the White House with newly elected lawmakers shortly after the election, Bush asked Webb how his son, a Marine lance corporal serving in Iraq, was doing.

Webb responded that he really wanted to see his son brought back home, said a person who heard about the exchange from Webb.

“I didn’t ask you that, I asked how he’s doing,” Bush retorted, according to the source.

Webb confessed that he was so angered by this that he was tempted to slug the commander-in-chief, reported the source, but of course didn’t. It’s safe to say, however, that Bush and Webb won’t be taking any overseas trips together anytime soon.

Forget politics for a moment. Webb is an Ass.

Bush was being polite and showing a legitimate intrest in his son. Webb first used his son as a political prop.... Which to my mind shows a lack of class, but when Bush tries to do the right thing -again- Webb wants to hit him.

And seriously.... Its a question who was the bigger deuchbag Webb or Allen. I think Webb just made that clear to me

More Stupidity from Europe Dept.

2006-11-27T11:36:00.000-05:00

BRITISH criminal psychologists are putting together a list of the 100 most dangerous murderers and rapists before they have committed any such crimes, The Times has reported.

Experts from London's Metropolitan Police's Homicide Prevention Unit are creating psychological profiles, compiled through statements from previous partners, information from mental health workers, and details of past complaints.

"My vision is that we know across London who the top 100 people are," Homicide Prevention Unit senior criminal psychologist Laura Richard said.

read the rest

Now I want to ask anyone out there who says that we should be more like Europe to PLEASE STFU~!
Now I want to ask anyone out there who says "O Noes Bush is the debil and stealing my civil rights..." to please STFU~!

Governments all over the world want more power.... its their thing, its why governments exist.

People need to stop government from doing stupid stuff like this

end of story

From the YOU CAN'T MAKE THIS UP Dept.

2006-11-27T09:32:00.000-05:00

Instead, it was the on-air unveiling of an official Raiders broadcast sponsor, as noted by PBP man Papa: "The two-minute warning is brought to you by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation".

The sponsorship is a win-win for the Raiders. The club collects the advertising revenue and with the two-minute headstart, is able to keep its season ticket base largely intact.

WOW

Character matters.... really

2006-11-27T09:16:00.000-05:00

The L. A. Slimes actually does a good job talking about why character matters when it comes to Senator John McCain

The first clue to McCain's philosophy lies in two seemingly irrelevant items of gossip: His father was a drunk, and his second wife battled addiction to pain pills. Neither would be worth mentioning except for the fact that McCain's books and speeches are shot through with the language and sentiment of 12-step recovery, especially Steps 1 (admitting the problem) and 2 (investing faith in a "Power greater than ourselves").

Like many alcoholics who haven't quite made it to Step 6 (becoming "entirely ready" to have these defects removed), McCain is disarmingly talented at admitting his narcissistic flaws. In his 2002 book "Worth the Fighting For," the senator is constantly confessing his problems of "selfishness," "immaturity," "ambition" and especially "temper," though he also makes clear that his outbreaks of anger can be justifiable and even laudable when channeled into "a cause greater than self-interest."

"A rebel without a cause is just a punk," he explains. "Whatever you're called — rebel, unorthodox, nonconformist, radical — it's all self-indulgence without a good cause to give your life meaning."

What is this higher power that ennobles McCain's crankiness? Just as it is for many soldiers, it's the belief that Americans "were meant to transform history" and that sublimating the individual in the service of that "common national cause" is the wellspring of honor and purpose. (But unlike most soldiers, McCain has been in a position to prod and even compel civilians to join his cause.)

George Bush's history of substance abuse is extremely formative on his thinking process. It lead him to his christian faith and his views on god-centered and faith-centered life. This leads him to the sense of calling he has had on National Security issues. Bill Clinton's life was formed by an alcoholic father in the analysis of Dick Morris (which I agreed with) his ability to have an almost elastic ability to be all things to all people. These are negatives which these men turned into positives. What did Senator John McCain do with a similar negative to Clintons? He surrendered himself to a higher and transformational power (the government) because of his background as a military man.

You could also say that John McCain's being in the Hanoi Hilton has also put him firmly at the alter of government power. Whereas many organizations (which he was later as a member of congress and the senate antagonistic towards) put pressure on the government to do right by folks like John McCain his mind still in that cell in Hanoi views the government as the source of his salvation.

Looking at Bill Clinton we see a similar negative trait which haunts his political destiny. Bill never served so he didn't have the spine to put boot on the ground in a war he might lose. Somalia early in his presidency assured him that his instincts are correct.

We have a man who formatively is cloaked in the tounge of the addict, and a man who still deep in his mind is formed and tested in a torture cage in vietnam. are these formative experiences a help or a hinderance to his views on the future?

"Our greatness," he wrote in "Worth the Fighting For," "depends upon our patriotism, and our patriotism is hardly encouraged when we cannot take pride in the highest public institutions." So, because steroids might be damaging the faith of young baseball fans, drug testing becomes a "transcendent issue," requiring threats of federal intervention unless pro sports leagues shape up. Hollywood's voluntary movie-rating system? A "smoke screen to provide cover for immoral and unconscionable business practices." Ultimate Fighting on Indian reservations? "Barbaric" and worthy of government pressure on cable TV companies. Negative political ads by citizen groups? They "do little to further beneficial debate and healthy political dialogue" and so must be banned for 60 days before an election if they mention a candidate by name.

and I think I will just end it as the L.A Times did... talking about my favorite Arizona political figure

Goldwater, a man who seemed to emanate from Arizona's dust, was the paragon of limited government, believing to his core that the feds shouldn't tell you how to run a business or whom you can sleep with. McCain, on the other hand, is a third-generation D.C. insider who carpetbagged his way into office, believing to his core that "national pride will not survive the people's contempt for government."

Passing the International Test?

2006-11-27T09:11:00.000-05:00

We here a lot of folks saying we need more International support for our actions in Iraq. Well Al-Reuters shows us why that might not be such a good idea

Nov 26 (Reuters) - NATO commanders in Afghanistan say the battle against Taliban insurgents is being held back by restrictions placed by alliance nations on what their troops can do on the ground........

GEOGRAPHICAL CAVEATS - Germany, Italy, Spain and others declined calls in September by NATO to move troops based in calm areas to the violent south to help with fighting. Berlin has insisted the parliamentary mandate covering its 2,900 troops stipulates they remain in the north, apart from one-off forays.

Another example concerns troops based in districts around the capital Kabul. Alliance sources complain that some refuse to go outside their assigned patches, reducing ISAF's ability to respond to incidents on the ground.

CONSULTATIONS - Most national forces can only do certain tasks after consultation with their capitals -- a process that slows down reaction times. At least one government insists on being consulted before its troops are despatched to within one km (half a mile) of the restive border with Pakistan.

OPERATIONAL RESTRICTIONS - National contingents may refuse to carry out operations above a specified altitude because they are not properly equipped: some helicopters, for example, cannot be used above a certain height; another's troops have limits on what tasks they can perform at night; one NATO source said some south European nations unused to tough Afghan winter conditions have a caveat against fighting in snow, while others ban theirs from riot control operations.

FLIGHT RESTRICTIONS - Nations have deployed aircraft to help NATO operations but in reality keep a tight grip on how such valuable assets are used, allied sources complain. An ally may pledge to allot a given number of hours per month to ISAF operations "subject to availability"; when alliance commanders seek to draw on that resource, they are all too frequently told the aircraft are not available, runs the complaint. At least one nation will not let troops from other nations travel in its aircraft, according to another alliance source.

Now next time you hear that we are on the cusp of losing afghanistan... here is part of the problem. And when you skim through old Iraq stories I want you to ask yourself this question: How, if NATO a unified organization can't operate security in Afghanistan could a lack of organization, a coalition of the willing, do it in Iraq without common organizational backbone.

I might go dig some of the posts and news articles I saw pointing to the problems of our allies. But I think in this age our country may stand alone at the gate.... though truthfully I am not certain we won't run either

I am Thankful

2006-11-23T07:42:00.000-05:00

Yes another irregular blog posting out of me.

I figured giving the holiday I'd put out what I am thankful about.

I am thankful for my Mother;

She and I have had difficult times in our relationship, I am thankful that since I have started going to USF and really struggling she has been there for me to the best of her ability (some times more then I thought she should have)

I am thankful for my Father;

After his marriage to his new wife a lot of things went sour between my Dad and I. But again now that I am living on my own and talking to him things have just seemed to have moved forward in my relationship with him.

I am thankful for my roomate Kevin;

If kevin hadn't moved down here going to USF would have been tougher for me and I'd probably been laboring and driving back and forth from Sarasota. It wouldn't have been good on my little car or on my pocket book.

I am thankful for Bonnie (Kevin's girlfriend);

Really while I have many loose friends up here I am thankful she is some one who has been in the closer orbit of friendship.

I am thankful for the Job I had(and will have again) at 7-11;

My first year up here my savings and student loan money got blown through real quick. The 7-11 provided me some money that slowed down that process this time. It made this year in some respects financially easier (though educationally a bit rougher)

I am thankful for Myspace (yes I said it);

I have found a whole lot of friends from my high school time on Myspace.... I am very thankful to have found and caught up with these people.

I am thankful for being in School;

I really am. As much as I just want this to be over, I am thankful that I am moving forward with my life

This is a cool Story for the Hebrews out there

2006-11-13T11:16:00.000-05:00

The following morning I entered his chambers. He was a gentleman who greeted everyone who came to see him. He bowed to me and offered me a seat. My words poured forth, as I told him that I saw truth and meaning in his religion and that I decided to adopt it if he would accept me.

"Where are you from," he asked me.

"Israel."

He looked at me. "Are you Jewish?"

"Yes," I replied.

His reaction surprised me. His expression turned from friendly to puzzled -- with even a tinge of anger. He told me that he did not understand my decision, and that he would not permit me to carry it out.

I was stunned. What did he mean?

"All religions are an imitation of Judaism," he stated. "I am sure that when you lived in Israel, your eyes were closed. Please take the first plane back to Israel and open your eyes. Why settle for an imitation when you can have the real thing?"

His words spun around in my head the whole day. I thought to myself: I am a Jew and an Israeli, but I know nothing about my own religion. Did I have to search and wander the whole world only to be told that I was blind and that the answers I was seeking were to be found on my own doorstep?

But this story has a double down even odder element to it

"You are quite right, but in this case I am not the matchmaker," she replied simply.

"What do you mean?"

"I'll tell you. Anat came to me and showed me a piece of paper with a name in it. She asked me to introduce her to the person whose name was written there. She knew nothing at all about that person, but said that she had been given his name by someone she trusts completely... It was your name."

After the engagement party, Anat and I went for a walk.

"Tell me," I said, "how did this shidduch come about? I want to know who gave you my name, so that I can pay him."

Anat smiled. "You will have to travel to India to pay him."
Before I had a chance to react, she continued, "I haven't told you yet that at the end of my wandering, I went to the Dalai Lama. I was very impressed by him and all he embodied and I decided to join his religion. When I told him he said, 'Anat, since you are Jewish you should not settle for silver if you can have gold.' He told me to return to my roots and then in a whisper, he asked one of his assistants to bring him a piece of paper. The Dalai Lama then copied the name that was there onto another piece of paper, and handed it to me. 'This is your soul mate,' he told me.

"When I returned to Israel, I joined a religious seminary. And you know the rest. You know, at first it was because of the Dalai Lama, and only later the much stronger light of Judaism that attracted me. And only after a year had gone by did I begin to search for you. I approached many shadchanim, matchmakers, but no one was able to discover you in the various yeshivas for ba'alei teshuvah. Finally someone contacted your yeshiva, and -- I found you!

"From the very first date I knew that the Dalai Lama was right."

Read the whole story here

A note

2006-11-08T16:58:00.000-05:00

I am told some of my rants are.... Well less then well edited.

I plan to fix these posts since I trusted my Spell Check when I shouldn't have.

This is really the rant spirit I am working on here

Post Election Post 2: Thanks Liddy

2006-11-08T16:14:00.000-05:00

My theme for these series of posts is going to be a simple one. And it may seem a bit hard but my perspective is very different. Their are two kinds of folks in this party those who view the party as their province and are part of its aristocracy and those of us who found ourselves at home in the GOP. The former is like some vestigial reptilian appendage to the days when a rich and privileged few ran this party and ran it without an ideological focus or purpose.

And the next person I want to thank for screwing this up for us is part of that establishment, part of that privileged elite of the party. Liddy Dole was part of the K-Street mob and worked her way up using her husband. She led one of the most moral branches of the most immoral organizations (The Red Cross). Liddy was not a person I liked, but Liddy is part of why we are where we are today. And like the President conventional wisdom will spare her.

With a party war chest all about the small to medium donors do we get an intellectual white knight? Do we get a passionate true believer? We get the wife of the boring, dogged... and pretty tied former leader of the Senate. We get a man who lost when he was on the national ticket twice, and lost a third time. Is this how you reach out to those folks who give you 20, 30, 50, or 100 dollars? Is this how you get to the people who can give just the legal limit and afford no more? Of course its not but the fire of the party had been overthrown in the senate so the leadership of Ice needed to try to bear its abominable fruit.

I will get to Bill Frist a bit later... but this is where I rake Liddy dole over the coals.

The truth came down to it that walking into the Pre-Election cycle at the end of 04 the Party had plenty of opportunities. I will focus on the one that I feel was most squandered as a very emblematic problem of where opportunities were blown and that's here in Florida.

Katherine Harris has quite simply a horrendous track record here in Florida. Long histories of Political corruption, long ties to dirty money... But Harris had a pass called the election of 2000..... And *Allegedly* a pass called her staying out of the Senate race for hand picked "Friend of George" Mel Martinez. Harris would have lost to Mel in 2004 and lost handily and if she did we would not be where we are today. But the President I don't know out of a sense of "owing" here or out of a sense of wanting a quiet anointing of Mel gave her a "06 is your year promise." Under the regime of Brother Lott I doubt that would have happened... but this was with the Eunuch guarding the harem of Bill Frist and his little pillow warmer liddy dole.

So because the Brahmin's had to have one of their own Harris came into the fray. It was clear some one needed to recruit some one to beat her. But Liddy did not have the ties to the money men that George Allen had or heck even George Allen’s street cred with the average republican. She wasn't one of us so what she got was well.... a bit sub par.

You look at the elections and we darn near had another Democrat shut out (the CFO race is a unique matter which didn't prove the rule) Harris had lots of negative baggage and that was before she said word one. If a competent republican was standing up for the Senate Seat the Democrats would have had to dump money into the Nelson campaign.... lots of money. That would be lots of money that couldn't crack the Nut in Virginia. Lots of money that couldn't kill some of the gains that were starting in Maryland. and that’s without a pickup.

The entire Dynamic of the race would have changed if Chuck Schummer had to fight it out on the airwaves of Miami, Tampa, Orlando, and Jacksonville. The lack of a credible Primary opponent for Harris meant that money could be used in better places. And we see with West Virginia and Nebraska a similar failure to get people on the board who can win.

They weren't playing to win... they were playing to keep the other guy from winning and that’s why they failed.

But if that was her only fatal flaw I could almost forgive her but things got worse. We have the fact she did (for good reasons) the detriment of our party in the Rhode Island Primary. I am not going to fight the case that Laffey could have won. But what I am going to roll out is this... when the Senate Campaign needed all its people ready to fight early and fight often Liddy Dole ordered these people to get a black eye. And we look at the Missing Link and we see the deepest Irony of all. A man whose wife bought in hook line and sinker to the Presidents foreign policy agenda says we have to remove one of the people who stood up to it to punish him. Link ran away from Bush and it was going to damn him. But by trying to save him from his damnation the party lost its money and lost some of the fire it needed in its belly.

The Senate ran to the left end of its own and some other issues I will lay out a bit later on. But when we needed a good Offensive Co-Ordinator we instead got a green rookie with no fire and no skills to fall back on

Thanks Liddy.... at least this means I won't see you waste your time running for President ever in my lifetime

The Post-Election Post #1 Thanks George

2006-11-08T14:08:00.000-05:00

Well folks I have been fighting my blogging doldrums but the election came up and so as some one who has talked a lot in the past (a lot) about the political system I need to say some stuff.

I really wanted to do more on this election but it felt like... it really felt like this election was a whole lot of nothing. Their were things that mattered to me at stake in this election but it really didn't seem to me like it mattered to the people who were running this election. My buddy Ken Kerns, as well as my Buddy Mark Griffis and I joke about how the people in charge don't know what their doing and really this election makes it feels almost like solid fact.

In the end it came down to this it’s very clear that to the American voter the Republicans didn't deserve to win.... and that's why the Democrats took control. In the weeks and months ahead that's not going to be how the tea leaves are read... indeed just today we see the white house failed to leave the mark of blood so it had to sacrifice one of its own.

This sacrifice makes me truly worry about my country. Don Rumsfeld was not a man who was brought on to lead a War on Terror. He was brought on to remodel the Military and he has had 6 years of progress on it.... which stop now I fear, and that's to our detriment down the road. We need to have a military that is ready for the wars we fight another 10 or 20 years from now... not have a military ready only for the conflicts that lay in our field of vision. He was sacrificed for political convenience and I fear for this country we will have other sacrifices to come.

The only salvation I think is the Democrats are going to want to keep the war festering for as long as they can to keep the door open on the anti-war vote for 2008 .... But, I truly fear even that notion because then they will know as our enemies did when we pull out of Saigon. And if we do to the Iraqi people what we did to the People of South Vietnam in the end our military might well be confirmed as a paper tiger. We ran from Somalia, We Ran far away from even trying in Rwanda, We ran from Lebanon, We ran from Indochina, and now perhaps running from Iraq. If this happens I fear for the world because the last time the strength of the United States withdrew like this we saw the rise of Hitler... and even that analogy has its flaws.

Rome began its fall when Rome built the gates to keep the barbarians out and focused on itself. As it did that soon it needed the Barbarians to man the gates against other Barbarians. We look to Europe and we see the Barbarians are at the gate there... are we going to repeat that folly and build our own gates now?

You look at it the election was not an endorsement on ending the policy in Iraq... yet that's what The President has now anointed it so.

Here are some more words on the oil our president is anointing his wounds with

On at least one Persian Gulf issue, Gates has been associated with a different approach than the one now being pursued. In the summer of 2004, Gates and former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski co-chaired a task force sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations that argued for opening a dialogue with Iran. The task forces report contended that the lack of American engagement with Iran had harmed American interests, and advocated direct talks with the Iranians. “Just as the United States has a constructive relationship with China (and earlier did so with the Soviet Union) while strongly opposing certain aspects of its internal and international policies, Washington should approach Iran with a readiness to explore areas of common interests while continuing to contest objectionable policy,” said the report, entitled “Iran: Time for a New Approach.”

China and the Soviets did not break international law in the way the Iranians are doing, yet the man who will be running our defense department now doesn't see it that way. A man who crafted this new approach with the architect of the Carter foreign policy..... Is this what we want? Do we want to bring Carterism into our government?

When the people of Iran cry out for new leadership, when they cry out for freedom and a western way of life we should not be breaking bread with the men who execute them. We should not be enabling the people who are destroying the economy. Because if engagement was truly the key the powers of Europe should have had the matter all settled.... engagement isn't a panacea.

And yet you look at the Ballot measures. Eminent Domain reform (which Pelosi does not favor) Passed, Bans on Gay marriage passed in almost all the states they came up on. Restrictions on Illegal aliens at a state level -even in states the democrats did well in- passed. Why did we lose? We lost because George W. Bush is not, and never was the heir to Ronald Reagan. He was not one of us and never was, but he mesmerized congress into following him.... and in the process lead them to their doom.

He sold us on prescription drug plans... plans we didn't like. In the election the plan that was better funded then the Democrat alternative was sold as a great evil to seniors who we were told only a few years earlier had to choose between eating and buying their medication. So clearly this plan did not bring us a more "compassionate" face to the public because the democrats would still find a way to crucify us for it. But the congress sold its soul and they sold it in the Bipartisan marketplace.

he told us we needed to interfere more into our school systems, but again instead of making an issue a plus like he said... instead of "softening" the image of the bad old evil conservatives we ended up being worse then before. Test scores were good in some areas but raw data isn't a comforting retort to the emotion of waging war on poor schools. He tried to take their issue and make it his through their methods and that simply isn't how you advance the issues.

Two issues used to attack his leadership, and to attack the competency of the congress he advanced because we needed to "unite" and be "bipartisan".... and a third McCain-Feingold laid out the tools we saw the Democrats use to gain parity with the GOP.... he also twisted the party into Supporting.

He tried to dip into that well a fourth time and give a bitter pill of an immigration bill, partnering again with Ted Kennedy.... but this time the Republicans in the house saw through it. They tried to reclaim its soul but it simply was too late.

George, we lost in large part due to the fact that you lead the Republican Party too far to the left. You were good at winning elections, and in 2000...2002...and 2004 you earned a lot of capital. But you do have to pay it all back and you failed at that George.

You failed to hold strong with intellectual firepower on the courts because the truth is that’s not what you believe in. You believe in micro-politics that has gotten you as far as you did.

George Winners want the ball. You can manage the clock but in the end if you can put it in for 6 you darn well do it.

George you flat out didn't want to win because winning involves working hard and potentially losing.

You picked Collin Powell to be Secretary of State during a war in which he was simply eaten alive by those who opposed our policy. When you could have brought an A game talent back into the picture or used Dr. Rice to seduce those who wished to derail what was right you stuck with what managed the clock... what you thought would earn you a couple of percentages in a couple of precincts.

You never fought this the right way, you never fought to win.

You kept Rumi in DoD when as soon as the war turned up you needed a War time conselegri.

You could have even saved Powell and slid him in

in the end George you didn't fight to win you fought to keep the other guy losing

and you saw how well just two years ago that worked for John Kerry

Thanks George.... thanks for showing what an Ivy League education produces

A moment of zen

2006-10-30T23:57:00.000-05:00

Green Lantern

Your stats:

Autonomy: 23%
Image: 30%
Ideology: 40%
Perspective: 40%

Name: Green Lantern

Alter Ego: Kyle Rayner, (previously Hal Jordan, John Stewart, Alan Scott & Guy Gardner).

Abilities: Has a Power Ring that has the ability to create literally anything, limited only by the will of the wearer.

Team Player. Introverted. Idealistic. Broad-minded.

Selected by the Guardians of the Universe, Green Lantern is everything a model superhero should be. He has initiative and leadership skills, but still feels subject to the people and the system he fights for. He has a strong sense of self and his own morality; He is compassionate, but still able to 'make the tough decisions' for the greater good. However, it is a heavy burden, and GL frequently finds himself at odds with his own feelings, his responsibilities to his friends and to the Corps.

My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 13% on Autonomy
You scored higher than 21% on Image
You scored higher than 83% on Ideology
You scored higher than 47% on Perspective

Link: The DC Comic Book Superhero Test written by Phil_Ken_Seben on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Rinosightings: Another Halloween in the neighborhood

2006-10-30T22:13:00.000-05:00

((If you didn't put up your costume and candy... I am putting it up for ya))

Another Halloween and more weird kids in my neighborhood, I really have to wonder what the heck is wrong with them.

one of the neighborhood kids came as General Jack Ripper and instead of asking for Candy he said "The only Candy I want is for the campaign commercials to end." I was with him on that but I still gave him some circus peanuts for his troubles.

Another kid came up to my door dressed as the Church Lady wearing a Nancy Pelosi Mask..... he muttered something about Values which made me think he would appreciate some pocket change more then Candy.

The Campbell kid came dressed up as some one from Tech Support raising money for Project Valour-IT so I gave him some money and a candy apple

Another kid came dressed as a roman seer and muttered "Beware of Habeaus Corpus" he ended up with a Milkway dark for his troubles.

Another of the Weird kids came to my door dressed as Ike Turner

As you might imagine, I have been closely watching the Sheikh Taj el-Din al-Hilali case in Australia unfold with bated breath. Not only do the Sheikh and I share many similar views on ho's, he also happens to have one of the most mackdaddyistic names that has ever been.

The kid did such a good Ike Turner impression I thought to give him a cotton swab... but I decided again to give him a blow pop instead

That swiss kid from down the road showed up and He didn't seem to be in a costume so I asked him "What are you little boy?" he replied somewhat creepily "I'm a Death Tourist. we look like everyone else." I felt he deserved a stale old peep I found laying in the fridge.

The Novak kid showed up wearing a white leather appron and leather gloves... but the dirt on her shoes made me think of Yemen and their problematic election. I gave the novak kid a super-jaw breaker and sent her on her way.

A kid came dressed as a Mullah with a little hand puppet looking like the Iranian President he came to me and said "Free your oppressed Candy from Gitmo" we discusssed if the Candy was held as a political prisoner or if it was all a bunch of fluff. I gave him an Almond Joy as he went off whistling "sometimes you feel like a nut..."

Then I got the Kid with the most grusome and intricate costume. He was dressed as a People's Republic of China soldier straight out of the P.L.A. He had in his hand the head of a Tibetan Monk with a bullet hole in the back. He had some kind of pajama's over his shoulder like he arrested some blogger or something. I was going to send him off with a fortune cookie but then I realized he was the kid who came before I was ready dressed up as the New Jersey Supreme Court. So I shooed him off with a free pocket copy of the constitution.

Chief Wahoo came to my door and I was scared, because I thought Baseball was over for the year but it turned out to be that weird Surber Kid again. I asked why he was haunting me with baseball but he said this was the nearest he could get to a "culture warrior" costume. So I subjected him to the worst thing I had.... Cleveland Browns tickets

and then a kid dressed as some horrid nightmarish wraith

"what do you want from me spirit?" I asked mockingly he told me he was the demon which punished Border Patrol Agents for doing their job I gave him some white Chocolate peanutbutter cups and sent him on his way.

And So I end another weird and scary halloween in Rino Sightings land.... so get off my lawn you darned kids

more amv

2006-10-28T00:38:00.001-04:00

Me on Dean on Islamaphobiamanaia

2006-10-27T13:05:00.000-04:00

Now that I am back into the swing of things with the blogging I am now going to start my first cross blog mojo Dean has been a big person on Islam -a- phobia

(Note...two posts are by Dean and one is a counter post by a counter voice on his own blog)

lets look at a definition of PHOBIA

1. A persistent, abnormal, and irrational fear of a specific thing or situation that compels one to avoid it, despite the awareness and reassurance that it is not dangerous.
2. A strong fear, dislike, or aversion.

Now, one would think the phobia in Islam-a-Phobia is valid with definition #2. I however don't agree as it applies to social constructs. One can dislike and have an aversion to things socially without having fear which is key to phobia (which is the classical definition) indeed disliking things is not fearful nor is (usually) aversion in and of itself it is the emotion which fuels the other two which is key. So we have to come down to the fact do people have to fear Muslims to dislike them and have an aversion to them.

Lets go with the wrong use of Phobia that was keyed in and created a sense of Validity that Islamaphobia crawled into.

ho·mo·pho·bi·a Pronunciation
1. Fear of or contempt for lesbians and gay men.
2. Behavior based on such a feeling.

Here we see again the root -Phobia being changed to mean something which isn't fear.

Dr. Drew of Loveline fame recounted his being involved in a study which got to the root of what Homophobia is all about. And the images of two men with errect penii responded to a anger center at a very primative sector of the ole brain.

Now we know in the animal world showing of genitals can be about dominance issues (and in the classical sexuality of Ancient Greece and rome it was as well.... and also we can argue is so in Prisons today. It could also be a threat to your mate

So is that the same as fear? Is protecting your place in society the same as fear? If it is then I weep for society.....

And let me also be clear, while the instinct is a good instinct... good instincts can be directed in very bad ways.

So lets go to those primal sectors of the ole human nogin and look back at whats going on in racial issues in the past.

Racial intolerance tends to happen against groups that show outward signs of their inability to become part of the larger national group. Is that in and of itself fear or is it an instinct which guides thoughts into horribly evil places? I can say some of the wonderful stuff in our nations history (Cocified Negros) lends to the fear hypothesis but I often times have to wonder if fear isn't used to gin up good and positive desires to protect your herd and your tribe. If fear isn't a more advanced form of thought used to manipulate our desire to protect. One only has to look to Rwanda, violence in Haiti, and of course our good buddy adolph to see that fear of other social groups tends to lead to violence when ginned up by people.

Now... if violence is part of a positive impulse to protect your tribe, how do we make sure that Muslim citizens in the US are percived as part of "us" and not part of the other?

-Taking part in protests against the violence of terrorists abroad.And standing up against said violence-

Now I say this as some one on a campus with a high muslim population (Immigrant and from abroad) and I have to say you don't see Muslims speaking out against that violence you see them excusing it. You see them speaking of historical wrongs and the like. The Historical wrongs may have a validity in the causation of the violence but in speaking up to excuse the people of their old home or their co-religionists they are percived as the other.

You can speak out against the violence and speak of what lead the mind to justify such violence. And that could be a very compeling argument (and is in the very small number of students I have heard it from) who lived in places like Syria. Places where you can go from one neighborhood and feel like your in western europe and go to another and feel like your barely in the 3rd world. Their is something to culture and personal experience leading into what creates our rational thought process but in so zealously defending others experience it sounds like (and to some case is) an excuse.

I also know religous authority is something which matters to some muslims, but being silent is something that is at the very least spiritually questionable

-Not making comments about how we are really feminists and not you-

I read an article the other day defending the Hijab as an empowered feminist article of clothing and how Feminists in todays culture are morally bankrupt. Both of those points are perfectly valid when done seperately, but when strung togther it tends to make one an outsider.

-Accept that just like your country their is good and bad hidden-

I remember an article about the men in Saudi Arabia waiting in long lines to buy booze for their good american friend "John Smith" or another about the Islamic theocrats finding theological justification for sex change operations. Or the way in Iran prostitution (or rather extremmmmmmmmmmely short term marriages) is done. The truth is that our outward signs of culture often hide these little nuggets. I don't believe every saudi man in that village had a friend named John Smith. And these rather harmeless nuggets also are nothing compaired to some of the vile things hidden in the cultures over there as well. Such as rumors of slave auctions in saudi arabia a good 20 years or more after its offical ban. Its natural for every culture to project its good and hide the bad and hypocritical but what does matter is how we deal with those things that are wrong in our internal culture. denial is the wrong way to deal with it.

Maybe violence-and discrimination- against Muslims comes from people who want to protect their tribe against all alien influence, not fear
Maybe violence-and discrimination- against muslims comes from misunderstanding
Maybe violence-and discrimination- against muslims comes from people who are black of heart and impure of soul.

Maybe we should ask those questions before making a new phobia which really doesn't have a lick to do with fear.

and more importantly

Maybe we should ask those questions to find a way to become better people

And now for a moment of AMV

2006-10-27T13:00:00.001-04:00

Thank you DNC blog trolls

2006-10-27T12:53:00.000-04:00

You may actually make me keep blogger comments in Blogger Beta

As for future democratic trolls... please before making cookie cutter political cracks try looking at some of my posts and get an idea of who you are making smarmy posts about.

Why can't the RNC do stuff like this

2006-10-27T12:43:00.000-04:00

From the Party that tried to Kill Santa

2006-10-26T12:06:00.000-04:00

so they tried to kill Santa, but the Republicans killed superman

(H/t to everyones favorite Hot Phillipino Republican blogging/media phenome)

Google Bomb, Sure why not

2006-10-26T11:54:00.000-04:00

The Democrats through this site have set us up the google bomb

i figured sure why not i'd return the favor

I feel very dirty now

Senate

Connecticut: HREF="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/02/AR2006080201655.html"
TARGET="_blank">Ned Lamont
Maryland: HREF="http://blogs.washingtontimes.com/insiderpolitics/?p=614"
TARGET="_blank">Ben Cardin
Michigan: TARGET="_blank">Debbie Stanbenow
Missouri: HREF="http://www.thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/072706/ethics.html"
TARGET="_blank">Claire McCaskill
Montana: HREF="http://www.helenair.com/articles/2006/09/28/montana/a08092806_04.txt"
TARGET="_blank">Jon Tester
New Jersey: HREF="http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/15624888.htm"
TARGET="_blank">Bob Menendez
Tennessee: TARGET="_blank">Harold Ford
Virginia: HREF="http://www.rightwingnews.com/archives/week_2006_10_15.PHP#006620"
TARGET="_blank">James Webb

Democrat Held Seats

(CO-03): HREF="http://breakingnews.redstate.com/blogs/colorado_cd_3/2006/sep/25/rep_john_salazar_d_co_employs_islamist_extremist"
TARGET="_blank">John Salazar
(GA-03): TARGET="_blank">Jim Marshall
(GA-12): TARGET="_blank">John Barrow
(IA-03): HREF="http://www.radioiowa.com/gestalt/go.cfm?objectid=374DEEF2-6775-46ED-83B29D7DF092C215"
TARGET="_blank">Leonard Boswell
(IL-08): HREF="http://www.rightwingnews.com/archives/week_2006_08_20.PHP#006292"
TARGET="_blank">Melissa Bean
(IL-17): HREF="http://zingaforcongress.blogspot.com/2006/10/zinga-earns-peoria-journal-star.html"
TARGET="_blank">Phil Hare
(IN-07): HREF="http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061020/COLUMNISTS19/610200417/-1/ZONES04"
TARGET="_blank">Julia Carson
(NC-13): HREF="http://www.yesweekly.com/main.asp?SectionID=49&SubSectionID=223&ArticleID=1739&TM=4430"
TARGET="_blank">Brad Miller
(PA-12): HREF="http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20060620-083859-8753r.htm"
TARGET="_blank">John Murtha
(WV-01): HREF="http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,218581,00.html"
TARGET="_blank">Alan Mollohan

Republican Held Seats

(AZ-08): TARGET="_blank">Gabrielle Giffords
(CT-04): HREF="http://www.shaysforcongress.org/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=18476"
TARGET="_blank">Diane Farrell
(CT-05): TARGET="_blank">Chris Murphy
(CO-07): HREF="http://www.rickodonnell.com/camprel092606taxspend.html"
TARGET="_blank">Ed Perlmutter
(IA-01): HREF="http://iowasfirst.blogspot.com/2006/05/i-think-unfortunately-mr-braley-may.html"
TARGET="_blank">Bruce Braley
(IL-06): TARGET="_blank">Tammy Duckworth
(IN-02): HREF="http://www.chocolaforcongress.com/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=18519"
TARGET="_blank">Joe Donnelly
(IN-08): HREF="http://www.courierpress.com/news/2006/oct/15/prosecutor-ellsworth-spar/"
TARGET="_blank">Brad Ellsworth
(IN-09): TARGET="_blank">Baron Hill
(FL-13): HREF="http://www.vernbuchananforcongress.com/news/Read.aspx?ID=54"
TARGET="_blank">Christine Jennings
(FL-16): HREF="http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/15776039.htm"
TARGET="_blank">Tim Mahoney
(FL-22): HREF="http://www.bocaratonnews.com/index.php?src=news&prid=17422&category=Local%20News"
TARGET="_blank">Ron Klein
(KY-03): HREF="http://www.northupforcongress.com/2006/10/19/click-here-to-watch-our-latest-television-ad-hypocrisy/"
TARGET="_blank">John Yarmuth
(NC-01): HREF="http://www.taylorforcongress.com/news/news_item.2006-10-02.6773768489"
TARGET="_blank">Heath Shuler
(MN-06): HREF="http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/15782120.htm"
TARGET="_blank">Patty Wetterling
(NM-01): HREF="http://youtube.com/watch?v=p5AJYcA5XzE&mode=related&search="
TARGET="_blank">Patricia Madrid
(NY-20): HREF="http://www.sweeneyforcongress2006.com/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=18416"
TARGET="_blank">Kirsten Gillibrand
(NY-24): TARGET="_blank">Michael Arcuri
(NY-26): HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Davis_(industrialist)"
TARGET="_blank">Jack Davis
(OH-15): HREF="http://www.worldmagblog.com/blog/archives/026885.html"
TARGET="_blank">Mary Jo Kilroy
(OH-18): HREF="http://www.noagenda.org/2006/04/zack_space_breaks_ethics_pledge.php"
TARGET="_blank">Zack Space
(PA-06): HREF="http://www.webcommentary.com/asp/ShowArticle.asp?id=phyrillast&date=060929"
TARGET="_blank">Lois Murphy
(PA-08): TARGET="_blank">Patrick Murphy
(PA-07): HREF="http://www.curtweldon.org/newsandpress/view_article.cfm?ID=148"
TARGET="_blank">Joe Sestak
(PA-10): HREF="http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=17337250&BRD=2259&PAG=461&dept_id=455154&rfi=6"
TARGET="_blank">Chris Carney
(VA-02): HREF="http://content.hamptonroads.com/story.cfm?story=111831&ran=245190&tref=po"
TARGET="_blank">Phil Kellam
(WI-08): TARGET="_blank">Steve Kagen

A videoblogger making fun of blogging

2006-10-26T11:28:00.000-04:00

Irony ahead

In the more election Stupidity Department

2006-10-26T11:22:00.000-04:00

On the campus of the good ole University of South Florida the Kathy Castor campaign was handing out some material... now, Kathy Castor is running in a district so democrat Osama Bin Laden could probably win if he had a D next to his name

Here is where the great fun and stupidity comes in. My friend noticed a date sticker over the Vote on paraphenelia

They have November 7th put over the Vote September 5th information from the Primary.

So in the Primary where MASSIVE GAS PRICES were a major issue, that is the info she has out to the voters today when MASSIVE GAS PRICES are less of an issue

good job Kathy we see congenital idiocy is a family trait for you Castors

and with the dates confused by the stickering how many Democrats may think their voting day is November 5th not November 7th

hooray for stupidity. And because of this stupidity I would suggest you give Eddie Adams Jr. (republican canidate for the 11th district) some votes because I am sure he would not try to crudely recycle old campaign materials

I want to hit things.......

2006-10-25T16:59:00.000-04:00

"Stay The Course" and "Cut and Run" are words that make me want to brutally hit people.

So I was watching the Florida Gubenatorial debates which I should have known right away was a big mistake and I heard stay the course used as a word that failed to retain any semblence of meaning.

So I first want to slay these dragons as they are used in the Iraq war debate. Now their is a small minority which may be literal "cut and runners" and "Stay the coursers" but I am not talking about them I am talking about everyone else.

Stay the Course:

From a political party which elected a man who debated what the meaning of *IS* is this should not be so counter intuitive.

In the context of the political debate Stay the Course ment sticking with the Iraqi march to democracy. That doesn't mean stick with just a military strategy since we worked on political systems related to the post war period (poorly in some serious ways) BEFORE we even had the war. And out political interactions and actions have evolved and changed and adapted. So its not like the government all Guns and no butter... its just that butter makes weaker press then guns

Likewise the guns part doesn't stay the same. It can't stay the same because folks who are making a lot of money and wearing cool uniforms make corrections (and outright shifts) based on the details that folks who say Stay the Course as if it means something else.

Cut and Run

This likewise has evolved into political gobbeldygook.Setting a goal of "we want to be out of Iraq by___" isn't cutting and running. Saying "We will leave Iraq by ___ turn out the lights when you leave." is.

now both positions are rather foolish for reasons which fuel the pejoritive use of Cut and Run

But in the genere of intellectual dishonesty We have people saying they want a more political and not military solution. To use the bogus term they are "cutting and running" from reality to sell to a certain animus in the American political culture. Instead of speaking to the conditions on the ground they say things like "The Iraqi's need to take responsibility" to cover for their ultimate logic "being against the war gets me political points" rather then "The Iraqi's aren't being helped enough to take more responsibility for their own defense."

The truth is both sides need to be more honest with how they cover the events of this war. While I am not in the "cut and run they are going to cut and run" camp its very clear that by blatantly misrepresenting whats happening to the American People for political gain they simply aren't trustworthy right now with handling a war. Nor is a administration that at an institutional level shuts down information and access (both good and bad) and doesn't likewise level with the American people. They don't talk about the pressures from outside countries (and for some good reasons). They don't talk about their political solutions in Iraq (nor the political solutions applied by the Iraqi leaders) with any of the voice they do when guns come into play. Wars are lead by adults, all we seem to have are adolescent children.

Bernie Sanders

2006-10-21T18:08:00.000-04:00

Radical Socialist and Democrat also canidate Bernie Sanders Claims that Usama is more popular then George W. Bush when asked about Club Gitmo

in some areas it may be a valid point but my problem is not that Bernie Sanders said something Anti-US but that it was utterly stupid...... which I think will lead to possible huberis there if things open up

Amusing blog post that was not what I intended it to be

2006-10-20T11:43:00.000-04:00

I saw over on Fark a post that directed me to this DKos page

DKos had an evil popup ad script trigger an add for this

yes thats right a pop up add for a movie that glamourizes the founding communist thinkers in the United States and doesn't mention till about the last 3rd of the movie "Oh wait... communism might be bad"

as an add on the DKos

O RLY

2006-10-20T10:55:00.000-04:00

The Orifice earns its nickname again

Demonstrators stage walkout in protest of Ann Coulter's lecture Thursday night at the Sun Dome

By Victoria Bekiempis, Staff Writer

Ali Hall and Ally Rhodes stood quietly. As they walked down the aisle at the Sun Dome, a hundred others in red shirts followed. Another hundred or so joined the exodus, some rising sporadically, others as groups or couples.

'according' to my roomate the speech had 400 attendies and at MOST 25 walked out joining 2 protesters outside.

Bill Clinton: a comment so stupid its given me cancer

2006-10-20T09:57:00.000-04:00

Bill Clinton in a speech about the illogicalness of conservative arguments has set standards of stupification so high I feel utterly brain dead after reading them.

"They favor unilateralism whenever possible and cooperation when it is inevitable," Clinton said without specifically mentioning members of the Bush administration.

"The problem with ideology is, if you've got an ideology, you've already got your mind made up. You know all the answers and that makes evidence irrelevant and arguments a waste of time. You tend to govern by assertion and attacks

I start out with this one first because it really is less insulting to the intelligence of the reader and the listener.

Every political leader has a foriegn policy ideology EVERY ONE. because foriegn affairs are (yes) a political science. And as such people have philisophical views about them. Now Bill could have argued that they are to ideological.... that would have at least been intellectually honest. But to attack some one for having an ideology in a speech about political logic and honest debate makes my brain explode because of just how blatantly idiotic the very notion is.

You have to have an ideology because of how we humans work. Our brains take complex situations togther and try to find rules/systems/philosophies that explain them. Its what we do as monkeys with pants. You even have ideologies that govern things in your day to day lives.

but, the MOST stupid and MOST intellectually insulting/dishonest part is right here.

"Most of us long for politics where we have genuine arguments, vigorous disagreements but we don't claim to have the whole truth and we don't demonize our opponents and we work for what's best for the American people," he said.

Bill, this comment is so insulting I am not even going to go make the basic cursory effort to find the instances where you have demonized your opponents just THIS YEAR. I am also not going to address the fact that you said because you don't have a world view your more right then some one who does is in fact a claim to the whole truth.

I won't point out the fact the chairman of the democratic party says its not the democrats job to have ideas to oppose republicans.

Bill as a former DeMolay state officer I am ashamed that a fellow former DeMolay politician can't form a better argument then this. I know that you didn't see the moral lessons in DeMolay as important and its very clear by this speech you don't even see keeping the same moral lesson in a single speech as even nessecary

While school has me down weird You Tube goodness

2006-10-09T02:00:00.001-04:00

Ok Links Phase I

2006-10-04T22:16:00.000-04:00

Got the links put on here

but it will take a while before I get all the stuff back up and right

AHA....

2006-10-04T17:46:00.000-04:00

Found my old stuff its under "Classic Template"

so that cuts down the work of restoring it

Missing Links and other site issues

2006-10-04T17:34:00.000-04:00

I hope to get those all fixed tonight after class. But I may have to prep for a Japanese test

Personal Life issue fading away

2006-10-04T17:32:00.001-04:00

I am no longer the sole wage earner in my apartment

My roomate is working for CompUSA which I will avoid for as long as I can calling Compusary

Ok......this is odd

2006-10-04T17:28:00.000-04:00

got this in the email from a HIGHLY dubious source but if true it puts a weird wrinkle in things going on in Iraq

note I say its HIGHLY dubious

Palestinians must leave in 72 hour
Roads to Iraq

Quds Press reported that Shiite militias threat Palestinian families living in Baghdad, a 72 hour to leave ” or to be subjected to burning and killing.”

Residents in the “Shia” neighborhood said that leaflets were distributed on the Palestinians homes, threaten them with death and burning unless they leave Baghdad within 72 hours. Sources confirmed that these leaflets distributed in curfew time, which was imposed on Baghdad since Friday evening until Sunday morning.

Also confirmed that these militias used for the first time, loudspeakers mounted on governmental cars, the Palestinians and threatens to kill them unless they leave Baghdad. reminding them that their fate would have been the fate of their fellow citizens in the municipalities located east of Baghdad.

According to the official statistics, the numbers of Palestinians who have been killed in Iraq by a Shiite militia are about 172 Palestinians, in addition to the tens of abductees and prisoners

Intresting info from Transperancy International

2006-10-04T17:06:00.000-04:00

BRUSSELS: Indian, Chinese and Russian exporters pay bribes more often than companies from other countries, according to a survey released Wednesday that ranked Italian businesses as the most inclined to pay bribes among European Union countries.

The findings, covering 30 leading exporting countries, were released by Transparency International, a nongovernmental monitoring group. The survey found that companies from Switzerland, Sweden, Australia, Austria and Canada bribed the least to win foreign business. Britain ranked 6th; Germany 7th; the United States 9th, along with Belgium; and Japan, 11th.

arrrr Bribe Me

What makes this intresting is countries with cultures that accept bribary happen to bribe more often then those that don't.....

Which should shock no one.

Ok this has Cajones

2006-10-04T17:03:00.000-04:00

Seems the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran has found a way to get good media coverage fir his side of the case

... "Let in the tourists"

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran’s hard-line president has ordered nuclear facilities opened to foreign tourists to prove that the nation’s disputed atomic program is peaceful, state-run television reported on Wednesday.

“After an order by the president ... foreign tourists can visit Iran’s nuclear facilities,” the head of Iran’s tourism division, Esfandiar Rahim Mashai, was quoted as saying.

Mashai said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad issued the order to show that Iran’s nuclear program it aims to generate fuel, not weapons.

Oh Honey... Lets go see the Nuclear Reactors in Iran.....

funny dodge of the issue, but not an effective ploy for long

While I am tinkering and Updating

2006-10-04T16:45:00.000-04:00

Lets listen to what Ben Bernanke Has to say

"Reform of our unsustainable entitlement programs" should be a priority, he said in prepared remarks to the Economics Club of Washington. "The imperative to undertake reform earlier rather than later is great," Bernanke added.

It marked the Fed chief's most extensive comments to date on the challenges facing the United States with the looming retirement of 78 million baby boomers.

In his remarks, Bernanke did not offer Congress and the Bush administration recommendations on how the massive entitlement programs should be changed. Efforts by the administration to overhaul the Social Security program _ once a centerpiece of President Bush's second-term agenda _ sputtered last year, meeting resistance from Republicans and Democrats alike.

As the population ages, the nation will have to choose among higher taxes, less non-entitlement spending by the government, a reduction in spending on entitlement programs, a sharply higher budget deficit or some combination thereof, Bernanke said.

Government spending on Social Security and Medicare alone will increase from about 7 percent of the total size of the U.S. economy to almost 13 percent by 2030 and to more than 15 percent by 2050, he said.

The Chairman of the Fed's big claim to fame is on how the US trade deficit doesn't matter because we can pay for it.

If he is telling us we can't pay for our social security and welfare state... WORRY

I like the new upgrade but........

2006-10-04T10:56:00.000-04:00

My links list got Ate. I lost my script stuff

so I have to go out and find new stuff

I may however have saved some of it elsewhere on my computer... so I will look for it

And the new stuff has ended my blogging Malaise

Ok then

2006-10-04T10:40:00.000-04:00

Upgraded to blogger BETA and it gremlinized my haloscan links

luckily I think I can fix that... after class

Larry Votes you should to

2006-10-04T09:56:00.001-04:00

Ok Kids Uncle Larry got his Absentee Ballot so its time for Larry telling you how he voted.

Federal Offices

United States Senate

I was Very torn on this one.

On the one hand, I *DO* oppose a lot of the positions Bill Nelson has taken as a senator, but I am against Katherine Harris even more.

So I decided to split the difference. Belinda Noah was a canidate for the primary before the deadline and I decided to give her my vote.

US CONGRESS

I also had some conflicts here. Vern was slimy and Jennings was a tool. This one was resolved by a coin flip

State of Florida Offices

Governor of Florida

This one was also difficult for me. Charlie Crist and I agreed on more issues, but a good friend John Wayne Smith is running and I have always voted for friends when electing people.... so I decided to go with Friendship because I think Crist is a lock at this point.

Cabinet of Florida

now for the state Cabinet officers. I picked the Republican for Attorney General (Bill McCollum) because I don't want to see any monkeyshines like we have out in California. I voted for the Republican for CFO (worst elected position name ever) -(Tom Lee)- just based off of the fact I haven't seen any reason not to. And for my most flippant vote Charles Bronson for Agriculture commissioner because.... Well, He's Charles Bronson

State Legislature

for Florida District 69 I am voting for a Republican Woman (Laura Benson) because I think the GOP has done a good job running our legislature and she hasn't done anything critically stupid.

Weird Local Offices

Charter Review Board

I voted for all the republicans.... just because I have decided as long as I am still a voter in sarasota County I am going to alternate each year the parties of the local board members I vote for

JUDGES

As I do every year I voted NO on all the judges. In the 12th circuit group 21 I eleced Preston DeVilbiss who IIRC did a good job last time he was a judge

CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS AND CHARTER AMENDMENTS

Constitutional Amendment #1

Amendment 1 was to limit the amount of non recurring general revenue for recurring reasons. That sounded fishy from the start... then it wanted to establish a joint committee to handle aspects of the budget process and then I grabbed my wallet and voted no.

To technical, taking power into a smaller groups hands.

Constitutional Amendment #3

The "No Whacky amendments" Amendment

I voted no because frankly I think simple majority vote to approve amendments is just fine

Constitutional Amendment #4

The Anti-Youth Smoking Class

yes it would palace a new class or program in our schools to teach kids about not smoking using the money that has been stolen from smokers via the annual tobacco settlement money.

We don't need issue education we need total education and this is a waste of state money so PASS.

SMOKING IS BAD FOR YOU. when you inhale smoke you feel sick

no one needs a class or program to learn that just have them inhale near a fire

Constitutional Amendment #6
Increased Homstead exemption for poor old people

I voted yes

Constitutional Amendment #7
Permenent Discount for Disabled Veterans Homestead Ad Valorem Tax

I voted yes

Constitutional Amendment #8

Eminent Domain Reform

I voted yes because it would mean that the State Legislature would have to by a 60% majority authorize takings of private property and transfers

Charter Amendment:
Paper Ballots

I figure Sure, why not

Watch this before You Tube takes it down

2006-09-27T01:17:00.000-04:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7u_HuqllpQw

Wii wins

2006-09-20T15:21:00.000-04:00

Flawless victory

First they came for the smokers

2006-09-20T14:37:00.000-04:00

And I did not say anything because I was not a smoker, then they came for the guns... and I said a little bit but not a lot, then they came for fastfood and i said "doode whats wrong with you" and now......

Sept. 20 (Bloomberg) -- General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and four other automakers were sued by California for making vehicles that contribute to global warming, causing pollution and erosion that costs the state millions of dollars.

The lawsuit filed today in U.S. District Court in Oakland said General Motors, Ford, Toyota Motor Corp., DaimlerChrysler AG, Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co., the six largest automakers in the U.S., have created a ``public nuisance'' by making millions of vehicles that emit huge quantities of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming.

This stuff should simply be laughed out of court

Ninja V Pirate

2006-09-20T12:51:00.000-04:00

this would have been more awesome if their was a Lumberjack run-in

I got some Comment spam of a strange sort

2006-09-16T00:49:00.000-04:00

I deleted it but if the person who posted this spam can email me... I would like to talk to you, please.

Alienating our Allies

2006-09-15T10:46:00.000-04:00

In a world thats much more thoughtful, and sensitive world our metrosexual priesthood tells us “Our allies would support us.... and in the world of unintentional ironies their words end up being as ignorant and foolish as the path they decry...

First we must define the word allies a bit, and I will get into some international relations theory here (but thats ok it will not be painful). The Realist school of International policy has one ultimately valid point, beyond all others. That point is nations do ultimately what is in their self interest, and best interest. During what we saw during the Second World War and the Cold War (up until the late 60s to early 80s) was keeping America part of the international system, and happy was in their best interest. Young men from Omaha to Nassau were ready to put their lives on the line to defend Belgium, Tokyo, And Sydney from Communist and Nazi death. But the problem is with best interest.... like any kind of interest the rates do change.

In the late 60s to the early 80s a school of thought came onto the stage which was known as Detente. In the world of detente getting huggly and snuggly with the Russian bear will protect us. Taking the red hordes and encouraging them to join the family of nations and then (later) peace and capitalism will come. Detente only worked because Nixon punched a wedge in the communist alliance by brining a strong relationship with the US to Mao's most self oriented self interest. And when the idea came that we should be thoughtful and sensitive when dealing with the red hordes did we find ourself in a problem that is most familiar.

With an unpopular war, and the costs of that war leading to a weakening American economic position the nations of the world found their best interests were not in aggression... indeed they felt aggression was the opposite of their best interest. These nations clothed themselves in Socialism, they challenged the rectitude of the US position. They called for Pacifism and engagement.

Then came some great titans. Folks like Pope John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, Margie Thatcher, and some heads of state who realized that communism was a moral evil. They realized that communism dehumanized and brutalized people who lived under it. And so they challenged communists and their proxies around the world. This shadow war through the prism of the cold war was very ugly, and many more problems were caused but in the end the other nations came along because it was in their best interest to.

Being a leader is hard. No one wanted to save Czechoslovakia when Hitler came. No one wanted to save Austria. A world tired of War did not want to stand up for the rights of the people under the Iron Curtain. The path of acceptance is very easy, the path of diplomacy is very easy. But diplomacy to have any meaning at all must have a final line that cannot be crossed.

Otherwise, how can we know our own interest, and make it the interest of others?

Our allies will not come until they see it is in their interest and they see some one will lead the fight. So lets put aside the metrosexual talk and lets talk like men who live in a real world.

More Democratic Electoral Doom

2006-09-14T12:34:00.000-04:00

Oil Speculators are going to soak it to the democrats by leading to low oil prices

Oil traders bet that such worrisome developments would drive up the future price of oil. Oil is traded in contracts for future delivery, and companies that take physical delivery of oil are just a small part of total trading. Large pension and commodities funds are the big traders and they're seeking profits. They've sunk $105 billion or more into oil futures in recent years, according to Verleger. Their bets that oil prices would rise in the future bid up the price of oil.

That, in turn, led users of oil to create stockpiles as cushions against supply disruptions and even higher future prices. Now inventories of oil are approaching 1990 levels.

But many of the conditions that drove investors to bid up oil prices are ebbing. Tensions over Israel, Lebanon and Nigeria are easing. The hurricane season has presented no threat so far to the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. peak summer driving season is over, so gasoline demand is falling.

With fear of supply disruptions ebbing, oil prices began sliding. With oil inventories high, refiners that turn oil into gasoline are expected to cut production. As refiners cut production, oil companies increasingly risk getting stuck with excess oil supplies. There's already anecdotal evidence of oil companies chartering tankers to store excess oil.
.....

This was all part of Bush's Master Plan

Should oil traders fear that this downward price spiral will get worse and run for the exits by selling off their futures contracts, Verleger said, it's not unthinkable that oil prices could return to $15 or less a barrel, at least temporarily. That could mean gasoline prices as low as $1.15 per gallon.

Other experts won't guess at a floor price, but they agree that a race to the bottom could break out.

"The market may test levels here that are too low to be sustained," said Clay Seigle, an analyst at Cambridge Energy Research Associates, a consultancy in Boston.
.....

"That takes six to nine months. If we don't have a really cold winter here [creating a demand for oil], prices will fall. Literally, you don't know where the floor is," Verleger said. "In a market like this, if things start falling ... prices could take you back to the 1999 levels. It has nothing to do with production."

2008 Elections, High Comedy

2006-09-14T12:25:00.000-04:00

The Iraqi information Minister gets channeled by John Kerry

Kerry says the only reason he didn’t compete in more states in 2004 was that he ran out of money. He says this was also the reason he did not adequately respond to a series of devastating TV ads by Swift Boat Veterans for the Truth, a group that questioned Kerry’s service in Vietnam and criticized his later opposition to the war.

“They had money behind the lies, and we did not have sufficient money behind the truth,” Kerry laments.

Asked if he dreads the prospect of being “Swift-Boated” all over again, Kerry counters that he would relish such a fight.

“I’m prepared to kick their ass from one end of America to the other,” he declares. “I am so confident of my abilities to address that and to demolish it and to even turn it into a positive.

2008 looks to be trainwrecktastic just on this alone.

and the mindnumbingly stupid response from Kerry that makes me eager as a Kid living in Cambodeia on Christmas to see Kerry 2.0

Eager to shed his image as an overly cautious politician, Kerry now prefers to “let it rip,” according to several of his closest advisers.

“I learned a lot of lessons in the campaign,” Kerry tells The Examiner. “And one of them is to keep it simple. Direct.”

Really John... you mean Campaigning for Congress, Lt. Governor, and Senator Multiple times Didn't teach you that?

glad to see your showing your ability to learn which is such an important presidential trait.

High Commedy thy name is the 08 Democratic presidential Primary

Oliver Stone

2006-09-12T12:40:00.000-04:00

Good Ole Oliver stone made a nice movie about the Heroism of 9-11 and it felt weird like aliens replaced Oliver

No no..... He's back

Moscow -- U.S. filmmaker Oliver Stone, who surprised many with the patriotic flavour of his new film World Trade Center, hinted in Moscow yesterday that he is considering a more controversial follow-up investigating the "conspiracy" around 9/11.

"There is a great story in a movie, a conspiracy by a group of people in the American administration who have an agenda and who used 9/11 to further that agenda," he told journalists in Russia.

You Tube needs A HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHEAlin

2006-09-11T19:46:00.000-04:00

The Revrend Gisher has been banned on YouTube, for showing the slutty and skanky content we see on the interweb and what big name companies sponsor it.

What the good Rev showed us was stuff that we see on You Tube, and he censored the objectionable material

yet... he gets banned.

Google Video has the Healin... which will soon be coming to MSNBC

silly silly Youtube.

Look at the Rev's content and look at his own response but I back the Rev for his abused free speech rights. Because all he was doing was showing the smut that is on YouTube right now

Hmmm this is intresting

2006-09-11T15:00:00.000-04:00

Reporters are always awesome when they tell you information inadvertantly

-observe-

The new measures took effect immediately upon being issued by the state Xinhua News Agency. The regulations give Xinhua broad authority over foreign news agencies, requiring them to distribute stories, photos and other services solely through Xinhua or entities authorized by Xinhua.

The rules would affect The Associated Press, Reuters and other foreign news agencies seeking wider access to the rapidly expanding Chinese market. It was unclear how other news organizations would be affected.

So China is Censoring things, so what I bet you say. But then you would not have learned the most important rule of Al-Press

the meat is always later in the article

Under a decade-old set of regulations, foreign news agencies were allowed limited distribution of financial data and other information — deals that the new rules appear to rule out

hmmm Financial Data

President
Hu Jintao's leadership has sought to rein in state-controlled media that have strayed from party dictates in search of profits and market share. Journalists and editors have been fired and arrested.

Hmmmm

As part of its new powers, Xinhua also will police the distribution of news in the mainland by agencies from Hong Kong, a former British colony now ruled by China but that operates under separate laws and with a free press. It also affects agencies in Taiwan, which Beijing claims but does not control.

Under the rules, any reports that disrupt "China's economic and social order or undermine China's social stability" will be banned as will news that undermines the country's "national unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity," Xinhua said.

hmmmmm

Other news banned by the rules includes information that may "endanger China's national security, reputation and interests," violate "China's religious policies or preach 'evil cults' or superstition," or "incite hatred and discrimination among ethnic groups" or undermine their unity.

Also forbidden is "other content banned by Chinese laws and administrative regulations," it said.

From an older post I found this gem

In 2003, a boom year, their median rate of return on assets was a measly 1.5 percent. More than 35 percent of state enterprises lose money and 1 in 6 has more debts than assets. China is the only country in history to have simultaneously achieved record economic growth and a record number of nonperforming bank loans.

In other words..... Their is bad economic news in China. Foriegn press not only can't report it internally in china this deal also effects their ability to get it internally from china and express it to the outside world.

I will see if when I get home I can dig up some of my other Red Dragon related posts

oooooooh Burn

2006-09-11T14:57:00.000-04:00

Mitt is a class A flip flopper

but this is awesome

As for McCain, Romney says he is delighted to see him anointed as the early front-runner by the mainstream media.

“There’s nothing I’d like better than seeing someone else out there as the front-runner,” he says. “Back in 1968, my dad was the front-runner and he lost.”

Indeed, former Michigan Gov. George Romney was the early favorite to capture the Republican presidential nomination nearly four decades ago. But he torpedoed his own campaign by remarking that his early support for the Vietnam war had been the result of “brainwashing.”

From the Speaker Pelosi file

2006-09-11T14:48:00.000-04:00

More defeat from the Jaws of Victory ahead

The Democrats’ inability to gain traction can be measured in the fund-raising disparity between them and Republicans, and is reflected in interviews with strategists in both parties and independent analysts. The national party assesses the strengths of a campaign according to several factors, including the ability of candidates to raise money on their own and their standing in polls.

Some Democrats argue that national party leaders are making a strategic mistake by not being more aggressive in contesting Congressional seats early in a heavily Democratic state like New York. This year in particular, strong campaigns by Eliot Spitzer and Mrs. Clinton, who are both expected to win primary races tomorrow by wide margins, could help generate a huge Democratic voter turnout on Election Day.

Dan Maffei, a Democrat running against Representative James T. Walsh, a Republican representing the Syracuse region, argued in a recent interview that the national party should do more to help him and other Democrats challenging potentially vulnerable incumbents in New York. He said that such support would, if nothing else, give Democrats a strategic advantage in the larger battle for the House and force national Republicans to allocate resources that they otherwise plan to use to defend Republicans elsewhere in the country.

The Congressional campaign committee “needs to be contesting in more districts,” Mr. Maffei said.

“If you open up this front,” he said, “the Republicans will have to defend it.”

Among the seats Democrats have hoped to capture is the Albany-area seat held by Mr. Sweeney, a four-term Republican who has come under criticism for his ties to lobbyists. Kirsten Gillibrand, the Democrat trying to unseat him, also argued that Democratic leaders in Washington ought to be aggressively expanding the map by stepping in with financial support for races like hers.

The Democrats have a slight advantage on their congressional committee side -YET- they are not giving out money this early when in races like this money could be critical.

When you hear the cheery predictions of Democratic power... you follow the money, and look at where it isn't being spent

New York has a chance of Spitzer having coat tails for local democrats... so why keep the money tight?

The answer is they expect to get hit hard in later innings...but they aren't closers (for the most part) which is what makes me scratch my head

I don't think the democratic leadership knows how to move the chess pieces

5 years later......

2006-09-11T14:37:00.000-04:00

This is the third time I have started this post over from scratch, though while this time occurred because of technical difficulties I think this was for the best as on my way to school the barrage of stuff hit me and gave me more fodder for thought.

Where was I 5 years ago….

5 years ago I was working at Sarasota Memorial Hospital. I was getting in about 9 o’clock then with my schedule (which was highly flexible at the time), I remember most the stream of wild and crazy news stories... Everyone at that time had a different rumor or story before the second plane hit. My first thought was when I heard that a small passenger plane hit that it simply was not right. It did not make sense. I heard some one else say they heard the small plane had a missile on it. In this world where we have instant 24 hour news what struck me (mutedly then) and still does today was how in this time of crisis it was like a giant game of telephone.

The President was in my town, reading my Pet goat in that famous picture we all seem to remember. I remember how after the visit he gave some encouraging words to the students and teachers at Booker Elementary before heading off. This speech really makes me to this day remember that Bush could speak well if he spoke to his strengths.

I was not afraid or even all that shocked, though I must admit I to was struck by the images and how they seemed so unreal, so much like some fancy movie special effect.

I made my choice about what I wanted to do with my life then, something I have modified somewhat and may modify again now that the wheels have turned. I had gotten myself on a decent financial footing and god knows when I will see that again with my re-entry as a college student.

People talk about the World Changing on 9-11… the world did not change and we as Americans did not really change all that seemed to happen was we hit a snooze alarm. We have had 5 years of searches of every passenger to try to restrict weapons, as numerous new acts have happened where spotting the suspect –not a suspect device- proved those ideas as faulty.

We got into the politics of the Islamic world, it seems by its nature Bin Laden, and his top echelons are now sitting comfortably in Pakistan in a region their government can’t control.

On Glenn Beck I heard a woman say that our freedom is why they are beating us. Glenn argued (and rightly so) it is not our freedom that holds us back but it is our fear…. The only fear I think I can find in this situation

…our fear of ourselves.

We have as a society done truly awful things to racial and ethnic minorities, and as such, we are unable to risk the possibility that we would do it again. And we have created through our politics a power in being the victim, a power that people lacking in a certain sense of ethic and morality exploit.

That’s not our freedom, that’s our folly.

In my college paper I see this folly again and again

The fact that 19 hijackers could alter American foreign policy so drastically is still a bit overwhelming. These attacks created a new era - a War on Terror that would root out terrorists and their appeasers.

But the nation's success in this endeavor is highly debatable. Violence in Afghanistan - you know, that place the United States originally invaded seeking to crush the Taliban and Osama bin Laden? - is escalating. The Iraq war has cost too much in terms of American lives and money, and the Iranians continue to defy calls to halt uranium enrichment (though a hefty dose of skepticism is warranted for intelligence estimates of anything).

Oh, and don't forget those North Koreans; they round out the "Axis of Evil" of unresolved crises.

Their is a critque that is legitimate in all these words

and yet look at those words. The kind of Marxist societal divisions which failed in Marx's time (as good socialists and communists fought and died for their country in WWI and WWII) seem to be born out in our own age.

-though in the authors defense he eventually gets to the point that "they are all bumbs" but thats not his lead and in the papers its the lead that matters not whats bellow the fold-

again from my school paper

Hundreds of millions of Americans will spend the rest of their lives coping with the havoc 19 determined individuals wreaked on this society five years ago. Remember the day's events as they happened, not as someone wants you to believe they happened. Everybody's experience on that day was unique.

Don't let anyone sell you your memories or manipulate them for personal or political gain.

These are the people who felt the world changed for them, yet they end up doing what they always did

9-11 was an awful thing because some 3000 people or so lost their lives, but what we saw in just a flicker for hardly a year... that is at the core of who we are as americans at our own deep level.

and sadly two so is what we see represented by the folks in my school paper.

I was a militia sympathizer back in the 90s but let me say this

When you focus to much on the wrongs of your country you lose the ability to see the big picture

You lose it to when you focus to much on the good

and this War on Terror, this generational war, is all about the Big Picture.

obligatory 9-11 post

2006-09-11T12:28:00.000-04:00

will come later...

A neat AMV

2006-09-11T10:28:00.000-04:00

instead of using actual movie style it flips through still kinds of images

Huh

2006-09-11T00:14:00.000-04:00

a 6.0 Quake hit 260 miles from here and I didn't feel it.

yet people in Pedro did

weird

To to funny

2006-09-11T00:09:00.000-04:00

Politics is often Theater

Lamont criticized Lieberman earlier this week for his handling of the Clinton matter, telling reporters and editors at The New York Times that Lieberman should have discussed the matter privately with the president rather than creating "a media spectacle."

"You go up there, you sit down with one of your oldest friends and say, 'You're embarrassing yourself, you're embarrassing your presidency, you're embarrassing your family, and it's got to stop,"' Lamont said.

O Rly

while Ned Lamont has been given a hot Clinton Support infusion he should remember that government officals tend to save documents

Lieberman's staff on Saturday called Lamont's recent criticisms hypocritical in light of a 1998 letter sent by e-mail. However, Lamont said he stands by his position that the public rebuke exacerbated the situation.

The Lieberman Senate office released copies of the letter, which Lamont sent to the senator shortly after Lieberman took to the Senate floor to chide Clinton in September 1998.

"I supported your statement because Clinton's behavior was outrageous: a Democrat had to stand up and state as much, and I hoped that your statement was the beginning of the end," Lamont wrote.

Lieberman's rebuke made him the first prominent Democratic lawmaker to openly criticize Clinton's conduct with Lewinsky, once a White House intern. The boost to Lieberman's national profile helped him to secure the party's nomination for vice president in 2000.

more intellectual vacancy

More snatching defeat from the jaws of victory department

2006-09-09T11:25:00.000-04:00

CBS ran a rather mean spirited "Dramatization" of the Reagan administration. Many angry letters from conservatives later and the movie went to show time.

Democrats however offered with a Dramatization of the clinton failures in dealing with terrorists handle it... just a little bit differently

The Democratic letter to ABC was more blunt than a monetary fine. There was an implied threat to ABC. The senators claim presenting such "a deeply flawed" film to the American public and to schoolchildren (Yes, have to put the children in there) would be a "gross miscarriage of your corporate and civil responsibility."

The letter goes on to remind ABC executives "The Communications Act of 1934 provides your network with a free broadcast license predicated on the fundamental understanding of your principle obligation to act as a trustee of the public airwaves in serving the public interest."

In other words, we gave you that license and, if you broadcast anything the government disagrees with, we can take it away.

What I have read about this documentary so far I think several events that happened in the Clinton administration got compressed and dramatized to fit into a 2hour movie

( I mean, lets face facts.... 8 years of events isn't going to fit purely into 2 hours)

Novak points out some more fun

WASHINGTON -- The unusual Democratic outrage over ABC-TV's "The Path to 9/11" film to be shown Sunday and Monday reflects private concern in the party that the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attack can reverse the political tide running against Republicans.

The highly partisan Rep. Louise Slaughter of New York composed a tough letter to Robert A. Iger, CEO of Walt Disney (ABC's parent company). The letter cites two scenes from the program casting doubt on the Clinton administration's legacy in fighting terrorism.

Slaughter added as co-signers of the letter three senior Democrats who would join her as committee chairmen if Democrats win control of the House. They were Rep. John Dingell of Michigan, senior member of the House; Rep. Jane Harman of California, a top party spokesman on national security; and Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, a left-wing leader.

Top Democrats are threatening a TV network when the real buisness of this country needs to be done, and beyond threats of boycotts and the like... serious threats

it puts what they take serious into perspective

You ever wonder

2006-09-07T12:14:00.000-04:00

Some mornings why you get up? when the frustration mounts and mounts and you just want to stay under the covers

today was one of those days, and after Wensday which was a very good day for me till i got home.

I have plenty of better job prospects lined up..... just not in enough guarenteed hours to help me pay the bills and suppliment what the government gives me.

Then I have my leasing office sending me a rent bill thats 60 dollars deficit the actual value of my rent....and then I get a fine over there mistake

I walking into school today see kids who are 18 and 19 with I-Pods and new cars, having bags which probably contain lap tops.

I work at a job where I see people who I know are illegal aliens (because they admit to it) with gold credit cards and cell phones.

Its moments like that where I feel like atlas and I shrug... because thats all I can afford to do

Things to do when I improve my income.....

2006-09-06T14:13:00.000-04:00

Getting off blogger. Now the school provides me with a chance to see what those of you with poor pop up blocking see

yick

Japan is good for my brain

2006-09-06T14:08:00.000-04:00

I am starting into Japanese I and I feel less alien t it then I did in Arabic 1

the writing system makes better sense but the use of Romanji in teaching makes me actually have a better feel for pronunciation

I missed out on voting in the Primary

2006-09-06T07:26:00.000-04:00

I missed my first election, and I feel somewhat bad about it.... But I did miss my first primary election. I've only been able to vote in a couple of those (02,04 Presidential Prefence-democrat, and 04 Republican) so I don't feel as bad about that as if I missed the General election

Base III, Establishment... less then III

2006-09-05T01:07:00.000-04:00

Looks like the Immigration Bill is D.O.A till after the election

WASHINGTON, Sept. 4 — As they prepare for a critical pre-election legislative stretch, Congressional Republican leaders have all but abandoned a broad overhaul of immigration laws and instead will concentrate on national security issues they believe play to their political strength.

With Congress reconvening Tuesday after an August break, Republicans in the House and Senate say they will focus on Pentagon and domestic security spending bills, port security legislation and measures that would authorize the administration’s terror surveillance program and create military tribunals to try terror suspects.

And I expect after the elections the will of the voters will be more clear

My question

2006-09-03T13:25:00.000-04:00

Is it better then the real thing?

He has smuggled fake artwork into Tate Britain, and sprayed a vision of paradise on the Palestinian side of Israel's "security wall".

Now, the "guerrilla graffiti" artist Banksy has taken aim at the cult of empty celebrity and its current poster child, Paris Hilton.

The secretive artist has smuggled 500 doctored copies of Paris Hilton's debut album into music stores throughout the UK, where they have sold without the shops' knowledge.

In place of Ms Hilton's bubble-gum pop songs, the CDs feature Banksy's own rudimentary compositions. On the cover of the doctored CD, Ms Hilton's dress has been digitally repositioned to reveal her bare breasts; on an inside photo, her head has been replaced with that of her dog.

On the back cover, the original song titles have been replaced with a list of questions: "Why am I famous?", "What have I done?" and "What am I for?"

Hildabeast Agnosticism Ho

2006-09-03T07:46:00.000-04:00

I've been on this Bandwagon before darned near anyone else so lets see what the Timesonline has to say...

The solution, insiders say, is for Clinton to take over as Senate minority leader in 2009 from the lacklustre Harry Reid, senator for Nevada. One well-respected blog, The Washington Note, recently claimed that Reid privately told Clinton the job was hers if she gave up her presidential ambitions.

Reid’s office denied it, but the claim made its way into the Los Angeles Times where it was suggested she would make a “superlative Senate leader” while keeping her options open for the 2012 presidential race.

If this is being considered by The Hildabeast its because she wants to have some more gravitas....

and thus if this plays out she will Cuomo herself.

fun times

2006-09-03T06:57:00.000-04:00

The School sent my money, but the Bank's computers are down so I don't know if I have my money

is this kinda like a tree falling in the woods?

I may owe rosie an apology

2006-09-01T00:54:00.000-04:00

She says it was photo-shop on her blog

so lets see how rosie handles this packaging...

HAHA

2006-08-30T23:30:00.000-04:00

Rosie attacked Star Jones for being fake about her weight

and now look what NBC has done

While CBS has done the same with Couric she hasn't -to my knowledge- attacked anyone for being dishonest about their weight.

International Issues and Actors

2006-08-30T23:23:00.000-04:00

Great class but the only political Bias I seem to see is towards some of the prophetic views of the 7th Day Adventists

Day By Day

2006-08-30T14:16:00.000-04:00

Seen some of my links and/or know me personally and you know I love Web Comics. The (imho) best Political Web Comic of a Republican nature is Day By Day But I think Chris misses out on some of what Makes Day By Day so awesome.

Chris has lots of republican mockery of stupidity (like our boy howard dean) But what makes his comic good is when he does stuff like the current story arch

We have the Minority Republican in love with the Archliberal of the regular cast and starting here begins a story arch about her being pregnant. And in this story she mentions the abortion stuff and mortifies him. But its not a motification so much over the issue of life but over the issue that it is his son. They have a fight born of their political misunderstandings (something which I imagine happens with lots of folks) Sage advice from a mutual female friend however puts the whole thing right.

I like the Republican styled jokes and all that, but this is the stuff which makes Day by Day so great. Chris really needs to do more of it

Mexican Civil War

2006-08-30T13:58:00.000-04:00

It could happen

MEXICO CITY -- Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, convinced he won't be named president, plans to create a parallel government and is urging Mexicans not to recognize the apparent victory of the ruling party's Felipe Calderon......

"Everything we do, from property taxes to permits to natural resources, will go through the 'legitimate government,' " said Severina Martinez, a teacher from Oaxaca. "We won't have anything to do with the official government."

Add in Mr. Obrador's chumminess with Hugo Chavez and the possible Tax revolt his parellel government could cause and we would see a Mexican civil war

this would in turn lead to more mexican refugees.... and if the illegals already in this country support one side, and we support the other... possible Terrorism like unto what the Israelis deal with on a regular basis

Isn't it amazing.....

2006-08-29T15:13:00.000-04:00

My professor in my Hot Spots around the globe has an American-Left Internationalist point of view and it was pretty clear in her class.... But thats not what I am going to tear on about right now cause she like most of the professors in the poli-sci related departments here i've had seems nice about it.

But what gets me about people from the Leftist-Internationalist wing of the Democratic party in the United States that they say things like this "Isn't it Amazing that their is still genocide going on in the world today?"

Pulling out the Ole Online Dictionary lets look at the word Amazing

–adjective
causing great surprise or sudden wonder.

So Surprise:

Ok I got to ask.... people who blow themselves up, cut off the heads of others, practice genital mutilation, creating multiple classes of second class citizens...... I am not sure this qualifies as something which would be Surprising.

So that leaves us with Wonder:

So what people are saying, is they are caught with sudden wonder that this utterly evil people commit an act which they and most right thinking folks define as the highest definition of evil. So they are really not saying that they are amazed this is happening in the world, they are saying that they do not turn their eyes in the direction of such human evil.

Because when you see the evil darkness in the souls of men, its not something that can leave one oft with Wonder.

its something obvious, naked, blatant, and raw.

She also spoke a lot about things that feel more like canards in how they are used about Geographical ignorance talking about how people just try to live their life and get by

these days informing yourself about another country isn't difficult... or even relatively time consuming but that fact combined with her "wonder" tells you what you need to know about the philisophic root of american leftism

Ok....

2006-08-29T15:05:00.000-04:00

Japanese Class went Ok. I bought my textbook and it was really helpful.

Walking around in the Florida sun in august is not my line of prefered travel....

But the rest of this will be in another Rant

Preview: Semester 2-Day 2

2006-08-29T09:09:00.000-04:00

I was actually able to get a decent parking spot arriving an hour early....

I think it comes down to the fact that these phantom and soon to be eliminated students don't show up in the morning like they do in the afternoon

More news as it happens....

I wonder if this made it on Fark

2006-08-29T08:57:00.000-04:00

But a farker comment about it would be "Useless without Pics"

Al-Press with the Low Down

By CHISAKI WATANABE

TOKYO (AP) - Japanese authorities reported Tuesday the first case in Japan of an Apple laptop catching fire and ordered the U.S. company to investigate the trouble involving the faulty Sony batteries and report back within a week.

A laptop made by Apple Computer Inc. (AAPL) overheated and caught fire in April, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said. The user sustained minor burns after the computer caught fire, according to Apple spokeswoman Michiko Matsumoto, who confirmed the case.

Of all the things that call out for faked pictures this should certainly be it

Semester 2 Day 1 Addendum

2006-08-29T08:55:00.000-04:00

My second class was with Dr. Peng.... Dr. Peng is awesome and he will be teaching on the subject of Asia, primarily focusing on India, China, and Japan.

While I think he like many scholars and investors is a tad to enamored with China I expect it to be an excellent course

After my first class today I will dive in to get my Japanese text books because ... well its the one class I know for certain I will be buying text books for

Crom (Semester 2 day1 )

2006-08-28T14:07:00.000-04:00

Crom.... a Yalpish word which gives me a good descriptor of just how I am feeling right now.

Funny thing on the way to the Forum today .... well last night Newt Gingrich was doing a special for Fox News about the High cost of education. The words of his speaking praise for community college and my own experience with community college where people actually were helpful as if (yes) you were why they had a job.

That was not what I experienced today coming into USF

I had that thought in the morning, the kind of thought that is some kind of latent human pre-cognition. that voice that tells you to do something good that you rarely listen to and almost immediately

and yeah... I forgot that voice. I thought "Two Hours... surely I don't need two hours prep time"

and, when I started the first time with early morning classes I didn't need to do that.

Sadly this is for a early afternoon/late morning class....

oh yeah I needed to do that.

I made multiple circuits of all the USF parking decks I knew and several I had only discovered today before finally finding a spot in the area around the Atheletics office... only finding that one because some one else was leaving. Gaining said parking spot approximately 30 minutes after class was over.

So far that was the high point of the day.

I went to one of the student information counselors located strategically about the campus on the first week

I explained the problem, and asked for their advice for a resolution because... I needed help.

My first stop was to a desk in yee old library computer lab. I sent a quick email throught he automated email system the school has.

I knew that was a 50/50 shot at reaching her... but I figured that was a good "if all else fails" move.

Then I went to hunt her down in her office. Which was locked for an hour lunch

now I don't mind the office folks taking an hour off for lunch. But i do know very basic things like access to the professors offices and maybe a mild help in the middle of lunch would seem like human decency

But then I don't administer a State Funded institution of higher learning.

Getting some bad info on where the teacher was I returned this time waiting for them to open up properly and dropped off a letter of much begging and a phone call.

Several more phone calls later and 2 trips to the registrars office I had to drop the class myself (before I was schedualed to be dropped) then register for another class

what a S.N.A.F.U

Joe R Smart

2006-08-28T09:21:00.000-04:00

What is Southern Republicanism about to Joe?

Slavery

"You don't know my state," he said. "My state was a slave state.

Even more amusing

My state has the eighth-largest black population in the country. My state is anything from a Northeast liberal state."

Isn't large Urban Black populations a halmark of.... Northeastern Liberalism

Joe Jolts out another

On the Cusp of returning to school....

2006-08-28T08:09:00.000-04:00

Its hard to describe it, but its like a vital energy is in me that I didn't have in the time between school. Like "finally". Maybe its just that i've gone a while without progress and now I am back to moving forward with my life.

More Democratic congerssional leadership on terror

2006-08-25T11:28:00.000-04:00

Just not the kind they should have

Davis said he first met Vinayagamoorthy, a 57-year-old London physician, at a Tamil cultural event in the Chicago suburbs at which both of them gave speeches "a few years ago." Vinayagamoorthy also participated in several of the meetings that Davis held while visiting Sri Lanka, the congressman said.

The Tamil supporter contacted the congressman's office again last week seeking a chance to brief Davis on events in Sri Lanka, where violence between the government and Tamil Tigers has flared anew. Vinayagamoorthy arranged to do so while walking alongside Davis Saturday for 10 blocks during the congressman's annual "Back to School" Parade in Chicago, Davis said.

The criminal complaint against Vinayagamoorthy asserts that he had "direct and frequent contact" with leaders of the rebel group and was "often dispatched" to facilitate Tamil Tiger projects around the world.

Without mentioning Davis or his aide by name, the complaint describes a series of transactions in which Vinayagamoorthy and others charged in the case allegedly laundered $13,150 in Tamil Tiger funds at the direction of a top guerilla leader to pay for travel of "two individuals" to Tamil-controlled Sri Lanka. The two individuals were Davis and Cantrell, law enforcement officials said.

Another person arrested in the case, Nachimuthu Socrates, was listed as a director in 2004 of the Tamil cultural organization which Davis listed in public disclosure forms as the trip's sponsor, the Federation of Tamil Sangams of North America. Representatives of the federation did not return phone messages on Wednesday.

Davis said he always assumed that the organization had a connection with the Tamil Tigers.

"I knew that they were associated with the Tamil Tigers, yes," he said.

Ok I am convinceed....

2006-08-23T03:57:00.000-04:00

After seeing the latest Pat Hynes $hill fest for McCain I found the Giuliani Blog. I never thought I would be on the same page as The Anchoress but Here I am

My A Canidate as of right now is Rudy with my two B Canidates being Condi and Newt

and after looking at Team McCain in this article by the NYTimes... Rudy will need the help. Johnny Mac has insiders and name recognition.

I guess folks need to remind him how well that worked for Nelson Rockefeller.

A Tragedy in Florida Freemasonry

2006-08-22T01:48:00.000-04:00

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
At about 2:30 a.m., 21 AUG, South Seminole Lodge No. 364 (Casselberry, FL)--120 Triplet Lake Drive--was almost totally destroyed by fire. Firefighters were on the scene within minutes. Cause of the fire and damage is expected to be officially reported by the Casselberry Fire Department within a week.

Roof and rafters including all electrical wiring was damaged beyond imagination. Channel 9 TV reported the high blazes. Past WM Frank Ellis was contacted and on the scene during the blazes. The SW Bill Dieringer was subsequently informed and on the scene around 3 a.m., for 2-3 hours.

best of luck to the brothers of South Seminole Lodge

FUn start to the morning

2006-08-21T13:05:00.000-04:00

I wish buercracies could know what they are doing... it would help my blood pressure

more on that after I get home from work

The Olmert Regime isn't long for this world.

2006-08-19T18:31:00.000-04:00

In Israel their was a sense of brotherhood and camaraderie about military service. Israel has drifted more towards a professional army but the Israeli citizen soldier ethic is still strong.

But Olmert unlike prior generations of Israeli leaders has not radiated with being one of them. And now things get even worse.

Senior Israel Defense Forces officers expressed dissatisfaction yesterday with the announcement by Chief of Staff Dan Halutz that he had recently instructed the Field Security Directorate at the General Staff to keep track of their telephone conversations.

According to a report in Haaretz yesterday, Halutz instructed the Field Security Directorate to provide him with the telephone logs of the generals, their department heads and their secretaries, in order to crosscheck whether they have had contacts with journalists.

after losing by doing a wrongheaded strategy the civilian leadership is now spying on the people they need to defend Israel.

I expect elections to be coming any day now

sigh

2006-08-19T17:37:00.000-04:00

3 or 4 days after the repair the dryer is down AGAIN. I guess i get to have a nice chat with the folks in the office

I retook the OKcupid Politics test

2006-08-18T08:11:00.000-04:00

You are a
Social Liberal
(65% permissive)

and an...
Economic Conservative
(73% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Libertarian

Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid
Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Liberate Athens

2006-08-18T07:32:00.000-04:00

I remember reading a great book called “The Cartoon History of The Universe”

In this book it recounts (in a very punctuated manner) some events of the early history of the city of Athens. Early in her history Athens had the ideas of the democracy it would become famous for proposed but Athens instead became a Tyranny. Various people of influence realized finally “We've tried everything else so lets give this democracy a go.” but Athens had a blood and rather paranoid tyrant running things. The solution was found in various oracles.

The oracles all spoke a word, they spoke the word unambiguously and clearly to every Spartan who came seeking the advice of the gods

“Liberate Athens” they spoke.

As this made its rounds about Sparta the Spartans being a good and faithful folk went, liberated Athens, and then went home.

As the events that went on post 9-11, to the Ceder Revolution, to the massive student protests in Iran, to the War in Iraq, The current situation in Lebanon, and the defiance of Iranian women at the World Cup I hear these words whispered on the winds

“Liberate Athens.”

Though I do not see an Athens in the Fertile Crescent but I do see a struggle of people being oppressed by the worst regimes in the world today wanting something better as an alternative. And like those people of olden Greece they had no ability to liberate themselves.

And in discussions with people I hear often asked “Why the United States?” or “ Why should we be the world's policeman?”

Well as events in Lebanon are showing us no one else will.

first over on Filibuster Cartoons a shot goes across the bow of Canada.

But our bragging hasn't really kept up with reality, sadly. Canada no longer actually contributes very much to UN peacekeeping missions around the globe. Today we rank lower than several countries in Africa and South America in terms of participation.

Now the UN is begining a new, ambitious peacekeeping operation in southern Lebanon; perhaps the most ambitious peacekeeping operation in decades. Prime Minister Harper has made it very clear Canada will not be contributing to the mission.

I'm sure there are legitimate reasons, but still... isn't it time we retired the myth of the Canadian peacekeeper already? You have to work hard to keep a reputation, and Canada simply isn't doing that.

Simply put in much of the world the case for Social Democracy had been won by the wrong guys. The canadians who were rough and ready are at least a generation gone from this world now. They have not the strength for what needs to be done.

and over on TMV a shot goes across the bow of France. What makes it worse is during the Cedar Revolution when the hot hot lebanese women were out protesting for Freedom the French pushed for Freedom in Lebanon. But when push comes to shove the French are not willing to help birth a free Lebanon.

The Freedom of Other nations today is in our intrest in most of the world, but has the spite our political community generated blinded us and rendered us deaf to the cry

"Liberate Athens"