And those caissons go rolling along
The Chief posted a comment yesterday, with a negative response to Bush’s proposal to federalize the responsibility for rapid if not first response in case of disasters.
It seems that my concerns about the further erosion of states’ soveriegnty have been noticed elsewhere. This DC Times OpEd by Tony Blankley goes further in exploring this issue. Check it out.
Media, blushing, takes a second look at Katrina
First was the priceless moment when General Honore told the assembled press “You’re stuck on stupid!”.
Later on, inaccuracy, sensationalism, and in effect rumor-mongering has been noted to be endemic in the coverage of the gulf coast hurricanes.
Several media organizations have examined, sometimes harshly, the work of newspapers and particularly cable-TV news networks.
The New Orleans Times-Picayune published a lengthy account Monday of errors, misrepresentations and wildly exaggerated claims of murder, rape and abuse of children at the New Orleans Superdome. The newspaper cited publication of “scores of myths about the dome and Convention Center treated as fact by evacuees, the media and even some of New Orleans’ top officials.”
Meanwhile, what’s that bit again about the alternative media such as the blogosphere not having responsible editorial and organizational control to insure factual reportage? Like the cases with the NYT reporters fabricating stories, and the TV networks doing the same, when not reporting forged information as fact, apparently they regard themselves as having transcended the standards they would impose on others.
A slight issue with hypocrisy here? Shocking behavior by elements of the (self)esteemed 4th estate!
Switch of Radio Stations Signals Cards’ Latest Break From Old St. Louis
The Chief grew up in St. Louis, and remembers laying in bed as a kid on hot muggy summer nights watching the glowing tubes of an old AM radio while listening to the Cardinals play on KMOX radio. Later on, while in college and working nights there were even more hours listening. Travel away from St. Louis, and even moving to South Dakota, KMOX and the Cardinals were an electromagnetic beacon carrying an emotional constant connection to the city on the river.
So now comes the word that the Cards are to bail out from the clear channel KMOX and go to a much smaller station. So much for listening to the games on the radio at night from the expatriate location up here on the northern plains.
This story in the WaPo does a truly excellent job of explaining the whole situation of the shift, and the response of St. Louis and the Cardinal fans to the changes. I suppose there is commercial wisdom, or at least advantage at work here, but it still leaves a hollow spot knowing that a life-long relationship is soon to become so much dust in the wind. Sic transit gloria mundi.
Face to face at last with Captain Nemo’s old foe
Attempts have been underway for some time to capture film of the legendary giant squid (star role in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea). This has finally been accomplished.
Click on image to enlarge.
Scientists have taken the first photographs of the giant squid in its natural habitat, providing a remarkable glimpse of one of the most mysterious creatures on the planet.
The leviathan has long been a creature of legend. In 1753 the bishop of Bergen, in Norway, referred to one that was big enough to crush the largest man-of-war. It has been, and remains, inspirational to script writers and authors, most famously Jules Verne, who described how giant squid attacked Capt Nemo’s submarine Nautilus.
Until now, our only glimpse has been when the creatures have been washed up or are hauled to the surface after becoming entangled in fishing gear. Adults have never been seen in their natural habitat and all the available information on them has been based on dead or dying animals.
A description of how the pictures of the squid were obtained is published today in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, B, by Dr Tsunemi Kubodera, of the National Science Museum in Tokyo, and Kyoichi Mori, of the Ogaswara Whale Watching Association. They used a digital camera and bait dangling at a depth of about 450 fathoms off the Ogasawara Islands in the north Pacific.
While it has nothing to do with the next SCOTUS appointment, or the next election cycle, it’s still interesting.
In earlier postings here and here, the Chief has heartily endorsed Gov. Mit Romney’s comments on the need for some constructive focus of resources (profiling!) to identify hot spots of Islamofascism in advance of bad things happening.
Jeff Jacoby at JWR echoes this common sense approach to homeland security and the terrorism threat.
I told you so!
Bush seeks to federalize emergencies
NUTS! The emperor has no clothes! Bush is NOT a conservative! Get it yet?
The So-called Republican President is rapidly demonstrating his true identity as a genuine FDR democrat: strong on national security, consistantly in pursuit of an expanded role for the Federal government in for example education, healthcare, and now THIS proposal for the Feds to trump the primary responsibility for emergency preparedness, and first-responder type services.
So much for federalism and the 10th amendment, as the MSM and assorted sheeple bleat for more feed from the Great Father in Washington, instead of looking to their own wits to maybe do some planning and preparation for expected natural (or un-natural) calamities.
Why is it too much to expect that a Republican leader could actually promote restraint of the growth of the Federal government, without turning our back on the apparent civilizational confrontation with Islamofascism.
What we need at this point in politics is SOMETHING that still believes in the attitude of the now thoroughly defunct Reagan Revolution: domestic restraint & a robust national security. Ronaldus Magnus has to be spinning in his grave.
Sheehan Arrested During Anti-War Protest
Cindy Sheehan, the California mother who became a leader of the anti-war movement after her son died in Iraq, was arrested Monday along with hundreds of others protesting outside the White House.
Obviously an example of the NYT’s “news that’s fit to print”. Hey – she had to do SOMETHING to get back on the MSM front pages after the hurricanes!
The whole Sheehan thing has gone beyond outrageousness, passed absurdity, and has now entered the realm of Cartoonville.
F.H.T.E. On second thought, NO! Just T.E.
UPDATE:
This coverage in the D.C. Times seems to offer some confirmation – if – as noted in the piece – C.S. is actually crying around on the Kos site.
Duelling Views of Hurricances
Here’s a bit of scientific fact vs. emotional assertions based on…?
First the moonbat envirowacko viewpoint, as expressed by no less than Brabra Steisand herself reported on Drudge: This summer’s back to back superstorms are proof positive we have entered a new period of “global warming emergency,” artist/citizen Barbra Streisand warns.
Streisand is back on the scene to promote her reunion disc with Barry Gibb. As hellstorm “Rita” churned in the Gulf, Streisand sat down for a promotional interview with ABCNEWS’s Diane Sawyer. “We are in a global warming emergency state, and these storms are going to become more frequent, more intense,” Streisand urgently declares.
On the other hand, comes Max Mayfield of the National Hurricane Center, who unambiguously states that the current spate of severe hurricanes is part of a previously noted and still active cycle of high vs low hurricane activity. If you want to know what’s going on, THIS is the guy to listen to!
‘Corpse Bride’ Stares Us Cold in the Face
The new movie “Corpse Bride” is getting great reviews. And it’s probably destined for a pretty good take at the box office. But it could have been much more. If it had been more faithful to its source material, it would have been a profound film, not just an entertaining diversion. Indeed, if “CB” had been truer to its cultural and sociobiological roots, the film would have also made a signal contribution to Western Civilization.
Hollywood stuff is not generally the type of thing that the Chief is inclined to pay a lot of attention to, but Jim Pinkerton’s comments concerning Tim Burton’s newest flick are worth reading and pondering.
Check it out.
Going Up?…all the way to Geosychronous Orbit
A couple of articles on a concept found in science fiction from Arthur C. Clarke and others: a tethered orbital elevator system! At first glance if one is unfamiliar with the concept it sounds like something from a hallucination – but the physics works, and with recent new developments in materials technology, the means are also now available.
The big advantage: CHEAP cost to orbit, especially compared to rocketry. Check these articles out: one from this weeks Sunday (London) Telegraph, and the other from none other than the big gorilla of the blogosphere hisself: Glenn “Instapundit” Reynolds writing on Tech Central Station.
Click on image to enlarge. (Image from liftport.com)
The race is on to build the first “space elevator’ – long dismissed as science fiction – to carry people and materials into orbit along a cable thousands of miles long.
In a significant step, American aviation regulators have just given permission for the opening trials of a prototype, while a competition to be launched next month follows in the wake of the $10 million (£5.6 million) “X Prize”, which led to the first privately developed craft leaving the Earth’s atmosphere, briefly, last year.
Folks, this isn’t pie in the sky conceptualizing – it’s going into the engineering phase – that’s about as concrete as it gets!
I’ve written here in the past about NASA’s work on space elevators, and on the new leaner, meaner, prize-oriented approach favored by NASA Administrator Mike Griffin. Now there are some signs of real progress on a number of fronts. As I noted earlier, NASA was offering prizes for space elevator research. That’s still going on, but there are some new studies suggesting that space elevators may be closer to practicality than previously thought.
Indeed!
Israel vows to crush militants inside Gaza
The Chief commented previously in a “lost” posting on wht he felt was the ultimate futility of the Sharon government’s hopes of a piece of peace after withdrawel from the Gaza strip.
The operative model here is like a small dog barking at the mailman every day. It barks to warn off the intruder – and sure enough, the mailman leaves! Triumphant success acheived…which also acts a powerful behavioral reinforcer for continued barking tomorrow when the ritual is repeated, etc.
Giving partial success to the terrs like Hamas only means that they come back again over and over with the same tactics as before. Good coverage here in the Sunday Telegraph illustrates the problem, and the inevitable Israeli response to continued attacks:
Israel mobilised thousands of troops for a potential re-entry to the Gaza Strip yesterday, vowing to “crush” Palestinian militants, less than two weeks after its last soldiers departed the territory in a historic withdrawal.
So much for Sharon’s version of “…peace in our time.”
Troops began to mass on the border with Gaza while others had their leave cancelled as Israeli jets carried out repeated air strikes on Palestinian militants. In the 24 hours before dozens of homemade rockets had been launched at southern Israel.
Yes, the face of Palestinian “peace”, and here’s the “barking dog syndrome” at work:
The new cycle of violence began later on Friday at a military-style Hamas rally to trumpet what the militant group sees as its achievement in driving Israelis from Gaza.
It seems that the terrs managed to blow themselves up:
Thousands of Palestinians had gathered around Hamas gunmen showing off their military hardware when an enormous explosion erupted, apparently in a vehicle carrying bomb-making equipment. The blast killed at least 15 and injured almost 150.
And they say there ain’t no justice! To save face Ham-ass blamed the Jews, and started shooting across the border with their cheap and cheesy little rockets, a product of the best of Palestinian military technology at work:
The Palestinian Authority, led by President Mahmoud Abbas, was quick to criticise Hamas, which will pose a powerful challenge at legislative elections due early next year, for the apparent accident. Hamas instead blamed an Israeli rocket strike, but Israel – usually quick to acknowledge such operations – denied involvement. Hamas stuck to its version of events, however, and dozens of often ineffectual Qassam rockets were launched at southern Israel. One landed in the town of Sderot, where five Israelis suffered shrapnel wounds. Palestinian authorities say three people were wounded in the air strikes.
If Ham-ass doesn’t watch out, they’ll discover that they have stuck their generative organs into a meat grinder. “Just think of it as evolution in action!”
Romney stands by comments about Muslims
A while back the Chief posted here about Governor Mit Romney (R-MA) calling for increased surveillance in radical mosques to nip terrorism in the bud.
The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee of Massachusetts delivered a letter, which was co-signed by 21 other organizations, saying that Romney’s comments characterized Muslims living in the U.S. as potential or actual terrorists.
Well, as expected the PC moonbat crowd from the ACLU to assorted Islamist groups got all hot and bothered and demanded retractions and an apology. So, what’s a pol to do when faced with this sort of criticism? Back down? Waffle?
Usually so, but not in this case! In a more recent press conference:
Romney told reporters that he stood by his comments. “When it comes to protecting our citizens, there is no place for political correctness. We should be doing more in terms of intelligence and counterterrorism in the state to protect ourselves from terrorists. We spend a lot of our resources thinking about response, but response can’t protect us. We have to be able to prevent attacks.”
Talk about saying the unspeakable ut true!
Romney said that if U.S. intelligence officials have information that a person is “preaching messages of hate and terror,” then there should be sufficient grounds to conduct surveillance on them in their places of worship. “Surely, we have to recognize that some of this has gone on in mosques in the past,” Romney said. “Most mosques are teaching doctrines of love and consideration, but there have been places of extremism where certain teachers have been identified as having been involved in or led to terrorist attacks. Let’s not pretend that’s not the case.”
This is really excellent, not only to highlight a potentially serious security issue, but then to NOT back down in the face of the usual barrage of politically correct complaints about having done so.
Better Living through Metallurgy?
Important scientific breakthrough linked above, er…. or is that scientific breakdown? Whatever.
This is especially for those who are alarmed about HAARP or some other secret device causing the hurricanes.
If you don’t think this is true, just check it out on Google. There’s LOTS of discussion from the Keepers Of Odd Knowledge Society (KOOKS) secret members.
H/T to the minions of The Rottweiler Empire.
UPDATE:
If you are amused by the conspiracy theories, there’s a great one here. This guy also got a write-up in USA Today, which based on this seems to be considering affiliation with Weekly World News. The black helicopters are close behind!
State, mine officials sign Homestake pact
Plans are moving ahead for conversion of the Homestake mine in the SD Black Hills to an underground laboratory. The mine is one of two sites being considered by the National Science Foundation for setting up a deep underground research lab. For the Homestate, this would be at around 7400 feet below ground. The mine is 8000 feet deep.
While the NSF plans are still pending, SD Gov. Mike Rounds is pursuing plans for a state-financed lab to be started sooner at the 4800 foot level. In addition to being a research asset in its own right, this would also give Homestake a leg up in the NSF selection process.
The agreement with the mining company opens the way for the state to complete financing and to start to implement plans for the intermediate level lab.
A good move for the state.
Mars getting warmer, orbiter data suggests
Well, here’s more evidence for global warming, only this time it is on Mars.
Let’s see now, Mars is getting warmer. Earth is getting warmer.
What do they have in common? Hmmmm. Oh, yeah, both are under the influence of the sun.
What DON’T they have in common? Don’t look now, but Mars seems to be missing out on human industrial pollution, unless the NASA rovers are somehow putting out a LOT of CO2. Oh, right – they run on solar power.
The inevitable and logical conclusion is that any global warming effect, since it is occurring on two planets in the same solar system , under the influence of the same somewhat variable star, are being warmed together by that star – our sun, Sol, or whatever you want to call it.
So much for Kyoto, etc.
This site was ref’ed in the previous post, and the Chief took a look at the rest of it, and saw several interesting posts there, and some good writing:
Like many tourists, I was drawn to the careless fantasy that was New Orleans, reveling in the booze, food, and jazz without a second thought for tomorrow. But tomorrow always came, and once the throbbing haze of Pat O’Brien’s finally subsided, I thankfully returned to my family, career, and responsibilities.
The problem with binge fantasies is that the devil eventually shows up like a back alley loan shark to collect his fee. For some it’s monetary, while others are crippled by something akin to metal pipe across the knees. For New Orleans, the devil came in the form of Katrina, who in her own big easy form, pirouetted lazily across the Caribbean and Florida to a city where today’s troubles could always wait for tomorrow. Striking an area the size of Great Britain, Katrina displaced or drowned a population long overdue for a cold shower.
This is one that you may want to check out, at least every now and then. I know it’s added to MY list – and besides, it’s nice to know that there are still some conservatives to carry the torch in the land of Ronaldus Magnus Reagan.
The American Public Is Tired Of Runaway Immigration
Here’s a great post with good content, as well as number of interesting links to related topics dealing with the border security/immigration issue.
Looks to the Chief like someone besides Tom Tancredo (R-CO) gets it. This issue is so clear it should be visible to a blind man, but apparently not to lots of assorted congresscritters, nor yet to the administration.
Again, if the GOP doesn’t get with it on this, they will be outflanked TO THE RIGHT on this issue by the likes of Hilary Clinton.
H/T to Bill Quick’s DAILY PUNDIT.
Nazi hunter dies at 96
It’s worth noting the passing of this man, who survived the Nazis to spend the rest of his life bringing members of the 3rd Reich Marching and Murder Club to justice.
Wiesenthal died in his sleep at his home in Vienna, said Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean and founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. “I think he’ll be remembered as the conscience of the Holocaust. In a way he became the permanent representative of the victims of the Holocaust, determined to bring the perpetrators of the greatest crime to justice,†Hier told The Associated Press.
He was a true mensch. ’nuff said.
Next high court pick anyone’s guess
The next appointment for the Supremes is going to be where the rubber meets the road. Bush will either waffle to try to ger along with the Donks, or he can apoint a red meat conservative and jab a finger in the Donkaey’s eye.
Hopefully it will be the latter, and one also hopes that the Senate GOP will have big enough cojones to make the appointment stick, whether or not it takes the “COnstitutional option” to shut down a filibuster, or whatever…
Time will tell, and this is one the Chief will be watching closely, along with many others from all sides of the political spectrum. On with the show!
H/T to the Chief’s Naval shipmate down around Houston on this one.
It’s always a treat to find some reason in unexpected quarters. David Warren posts from the Great White North, and like Gordon Sinclair in the 70’s, he has a very different perspective from that of the MSM, both theirs and ours.
There’s plenty wrong with America, since you asked. (Everybody’s asking.) I’m tempted to say, the only difference from Canada, is that they have a few things right. That would be unfair, of course — I am often pleased to discover things we still get right.
But one of them would not be disaster preparation. If something happened up here, on the scale of Katrina, we wouldn’t even have the resources to arrive late. We would be waiting for the Americans to come save us, the same way the government in Louisiana just waved and pointed at Washington, D.C. The theory being, that when you’re in real trouble, that’s where the adults live.
He goes on with a very positive account of the actual workings of the relief efforts, compared very favorably to what Canuckia would be able to do in similar circumstances.
It is also noted, as it was in the Chief’s blog here how the enervating effect of generations of welfare dependency renders people virtually unable to conceive of taking some responsibility for their own continued existance in the face of disaster:
From Democrats and the American Left — the U.S. equivalent to the people who run Canada — we are still hearing that the disaster in New Orleans showed a heartless, white Republican America had abandoned its underclass. This is garbage. The great majority of those not evacuated lived in assisted housing, receive food stamps and prescription medicine and government support through many other programmes. Many have, all their lives, expected someone to lift them to safety, sans input from themselves.
Yes, that was insensitive. But it is also the truth; and sooner or later we must acknowledge that welfare dependency creates exactly the sort of haplessness and social degeneration we saw on display, as the floodwaters rose. Many suffered terribly, and many died, and one’s heart goes out. But already the survivors are being put up in new accommodations, and their various entitlements have been directed to new locations.
The Bush-bashing, both down there and up here, has so far lost touch with reality, as to raise questions about the bashers’ state of mind.
There’s more worth noting, and DW concludes with appropriately applying the Kipling poem “If” to Bush. That about ices the cake for the Chief! Anyone who appreciates Kipling in this PC day and age enough to quote him, definitely has his ducks lined up in a row.
Check out the whole post – it’s worth it for sure!
The feckless usefulness of the UN once again is apparent as it failed agin to come to any agreement on condemning terrorism. The opposition came primarily from the 56 OIC (Organization of Isalmic Countries)members…surprise, surprise, surprise! Who woulda ever thunk it!
A proposed U.N. convention against terrorism has been stalled since 1997. The holdup? How to define terrorism. But this is nothing more than a semantic trick. The Islamic states insist that terrorism must be defined not by the nature of the act but by its purpose. Putting a bomb in a market or train or bus is not an act of terrorism, they say, if it is done for a righteous purpose; namely national liberation or resistance to occupation. To say there is a problem of definition is to focus on a word. The real question is whether it is ever legitimate to target women, children and other noncombatants. For the Islamic states, the answer is yes.(Emphasis added)
Not only did the OIC oppose any meaningful definition of terrorism, it proposed changing the resolution to approve attacks, but it sought a refaffirmation of language in a 1970 resolution: “reaffirm[ing] … the legitimacy of the struggle of the colonial peoples and peoples under alien domination to exercise their right to self-determination and independence by all the necessary means at their disposal.”
The final phrase is euphemistic language included to implicitly approve terrorism. In the current action, the US claimed a partial victory by stopping such a reaffirmation.
If this is the best that can be hoped for from the UN, then we would be well served to bail out, and then to send them all packing off to Geneva or somewhere, anywhere away from the U.S.
Outcome of Vote Still Pending
There’s been a fair amount of coverage of this, but the Chief’s impression is that it isn’t a very high level on the American interest meter.
Daily Demarche comments on this, with some reflections that seem to parallel the above. Since he is from the diplo-world, the Chief thinks that thee is some credibility there. He makes about as much sense out of the situation over there as anyone else could, with some suitable pithy comments comparing the situation to Florida in 2000.
It would be nice to see Schoder lose – but if not, things won’t get any worse than they already are. Deutschland uber alles? Nein!
Emperor Misha over at the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler has his inimitable invective in fine form as he compares Bubba to his apparent mentor, the Georgia Peanut-head, and Bubba’s comments complaining about President Bush for…almost everything in the Gulf of Mexico except the Aruba disappearace of Natalie Holloway.
If you can enjoy a dose of no-holds-barred, well-deserved vitriol, check him out.
A couple of postings on TCS both relate to this message:
Global Warming and Hurricanes: Still No Connection
A scientific team led by Peter Webster of the Georgia Institute of Technology today published findings in Science magazine. The team claimed to have found evidence in the historical record of both more tropical cyclones, such as Hurricane Katrina, but also a higher percentage of more intense ones….The conclusion many draw from papers such as these is that anthropogenic global warming from the burning of fossil fuels by humans is causing more lethal storms. A closer look, though, reveals not human action but rather natural cycles are the primary cause.
The piece goes on with the analysis of the findings that demonstrates that they CANNOT prove what is claimed.
The organization of a broad coalition of envirowacko groups is used here to focus on the lack of substantive scientific evidence in support of a human caused global warming catastrophe.
Claims that Katrina is due to global warming are not supported by scientific or historical evidence, but that doesn’t stop the hysteria. Beliefs that hurricanes have increased in frequency and severity are simply false. The only measurable increase is in the cost of repairing the damage. This is mostly explained by natural cost increases, exploitation of demand for materials and more people living in regions of climate hazards.
Claims of severe weather increasing in the future are also scientifically and historically wrong. More severe weather is associated with cooling not warming. Storms and tornadoes occur along the boundary between the warm subtropical air and the cold polar air known as the Polar Front. The power of the storms is a function of the temperature contrast across the Front known as the Zonal Index. Global warming theory says the polar air will warm more than the subtropical air thus reducing the temperature contrast and the potential for severe weather.
OK. If the science is really weak here, then what’s the agenda? Some other driving force?
Kyoto was an attempt to control, limit or even weaken industrialized nations built on capitalism, trade and democracy. Maurice Strong, principle architect of the Rio conference and it’s offspring Kyoto, reportedly said. “Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized nations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?” Now Kyoto is unmasked as unworkable because it pays very high economic cost for absolutely no gain. Even attempts to suggest it was about pollution failed. Charles Dumont of Lombard Street Research says it “would in no way prevent global warming” and puts the cost at 16 trillion dollars.
Of COURSE! It global warming, Kyoto et al makes a great Trojan Horse for the warmed over vomit of socialism. Shocking! Simply shocking!
Tony Blair Pulls the Plug on Kyoto at Clinton Summit
Virtually unreported from the Clinton Global Iniative meeting in New York, was Tony Blair virtually driving the final nails into the coffin of the (at best) ill-advised Kyoto Accord. Jim Pinkerton at Tech Central Station steps in where the MSM fears to tread.
Onstage with former president Bill Clinton at a midtown Manhattan hotel ballroom, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said he was going to speak with “brutal honesty” about Kyoto and global warming, and he did. And Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had some blunt talk, too. Blair, a longtime supporter of the Kyoto treaty, further prefaced his remarks by noting, “My thinking has changed in the past three or four years.” So what does he think now? “No country,” he declared, “is going to cut its growth.” That is, no country is going to allow the Kyoto treaty, or any other such global-warming treaty, to crimp — some say cripple — its economy.
Good riddance to bad rubbish! Theres more in this article worth taking a look at.
Daley scorns cabbie dress code idea
Chicago’s Democratic Mayor Daley has reached a point where he has decided that enough is enough – when it comes to the far-reaching hand of a would-be nanny approach to public policy.
A dress code for cabdrivers. A ban on the sale of foie gras in Chicago restaurants. To Mayor Daley, it’s all part of the same slippery slope: a Big Brother intrusion into the lives of Chicagoans that he wants no part of. “We’re trying to tell people they can’t eat certain foods. They can’t buy certain foods. They can’t ship certain foods in. Pretty soon, you can’t drink. Do you really want government to keep telling you every day what to do?” Daley said.
The Chief finds it encouraging that even a died-in-the-wool Democrat like the mayor still has enough reason to say STOP! Maybe there’s some hope for the Donks yet.
Architect offers to alter Flight 93 memorial to appease critics
The Flight 93 memorial design as a crescent (like the symbol of Islam, in memorial to victims of Islamofascism) was earlier noted by the Chief here. Agreeing with thos who declared that this design would be in the same spirit as planting flowers in a swastika pattern as a memorial at Auschwitz, the Chief strongly disliked this design.
It took approx. two and a half days for the National Park Service and the architects to recognize that they were spitting into the wind on this one, and announce that the design would be changed.
The architect of the memorial to a plane downed in western Pennsylvania on Sept. 11, 2001, said Wednesday he would work to satisfy critics who complained that it honors terrorists with its crescent-shaped design.
At least they weren’t as oblivious to the concerns about the design as those pushing the WTC memorial have been. Progress of a sort.
WIth Presidential approval of the BRAC report, it’s all over but the shouting & Ellsworth survived the process.
President Bush on Thursday endorsed a plan for closing 22 major military bases and reconfiguring 33 others, leaving their fate to Congress.
Bush had until Sept. 23 to either accept the entire report from an independent commission and send it to Congress, or return it to the commission for further work. The report will become final in 45 days unless Congress acts to reject it in full. In previous rounds, lawmakers never have rejected reports, meaning communities probably have little hope of a reprieve for their bases.
Likewise, bases left off the BRAC closure list, have little to fear at this point. Aside from the economics of the situation, the Chief believes that the strategic and military factors were the only ones that should have been significant in the final decisions. In the cases of Ellsworth, and the Naval bases in Maine and Connecticut at least, the Chief had NO doubt that this was the case, as did the commissioners, resulting in the positive outcome for South Dakota.
Two sides prepare for abortion fight
As was expected, the recently passed SD law regulating abortion has generated legal challenges and may well end up before the SCOTUS. From the sound of this, it sounds like both sides are pulling out all the stops.
Professionals with impressive credentials and experience in medicine and ethics are being lined up on both sides of a court case that will decide if doctors in South Dakota must tell women that abortions end lives.
In spite of having a sort of neo-libertarian orientation, the Chief, as a biologist, cannot see the logic in legalized pre-natal infanticide, absent a threat to the life of the mother – oh, yeah – also in cases of rape and incest. In THOSE cases, the scum who committed the crimes should not have the right to have their genes passed on as the result of these brutally coercive acts. (To quote SciFi writer Larry Niven: “Just think of it as evolution in action.”)
Another aspect of the abortion debate sometimes results in rather indiscriminate use of the concept of “pro-life” as being the touchstone for determining ultimate morality. This citation takes the commandment which in English reads “Thou shalt not kill” as a moral absolute.
The Chief notes the original Hebrew would be closer to “Thou shalt not murder” – or take INNOCENT life. What could be more innocent than an unborn infant. Likewise, what innocence is left in an individual who HAS shed innocent blood by murder, or committed that ultimate social betrayal known as treason. In those cases, hang ’em high…but save the babies!
Fighting Terrorism in the U.S.
Gov. Mit Romney (R-MA) has deGov. finitely poked the hornets’ nest of political correctness with a big stick in a speech before the Heritage Foundation. He reiterated in an interview with Gibson on Fox News:
And, in some cases, I’m sure the FBI infiltrates organizations they’re concerned about. If they have probable cause, they’re able to do wiretapping. And those are the tools that, of course, we use in protecting the homeland. What we need to do is more of that and have more resources devoted to the FBI in their effort to do intelligence work and counterintelligence work.
We don’t need different tools. We need to use the tools we have got under the Patriot Act (search) and under our current laws to assure that we really are following groups that are preaching terror, that we really are following people who come here from terror-sponsored states, where that’s appropriate, where we have concerns, that we have the resources necessary to prevent the bombs from going off, rather than just the resources to clean up afterwards.
In a later apppearance on O’Reilly Factor this evening, when asked what he thought of the ACLY complaining that his remarks and the policy advocated in them would have a “chilling effect” on foriegn students coming to the US. Romney’s reply? Words to the effect that he would hope that students from terrorist-supporting countries like Saudi Arabia and others WOULD stay away – that it would make our security problem that much better if they were not here!
HEAR, HEAR! Right on, Gov’nor!