February 28, 2004

The History Channel

"History vs. Hollywood" is on. It is looking at "The Passion" and whether it is true to the Gospels. But, the show starts out boldly saying that the Gospels contradict each other and "scholars are sure which, if any, of the versions is accurate."

Talk about revealing bias at the beginning.

Posted by Erick at 10:04 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Nightmare

If you are a guy, you may have a nightmare by clicking here. Otherwise, you'll laugh.

Posted by Erick at 04:55 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Would Make A Good Gumbo

Hat tip to John Derbyshire for this article:


Millions of giant Pacific crabs, whose ancestors were brought to Europe by Joseph Stalin in the 1930s, are marching south along Norway's coast, devouring everything in their path.

The monster crabs, which can weigh up to 25lb and have a claw-span of more than three feet, are proving so resilient that scientists fear they could end up as far south as Gibraltar.

As John says, "Stalin's revenge." And a delicious revenge at that!

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Offense

I hate to come even close to agreeing with Jesse Jackson. But, I hear I'm not the only one offended by the comparisons of gay marriage to interracial marriage.

Jesse apparently doesn't like the comparison either.

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Outsourcing The Tax Code

Hat tip to Econopundit for a link to this:


The Associated Press reports that some U.S. accounting firms have discovered a new accounting trick in filling out tax forms: Send them to India.

The subcontinent's chartered accountants will prepare between 150,000 and 200,000 returns for U.S. tax firms this year, up tenfold from last year.

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Passionate Popcorn

Matt Labash reviews his outing to see "The Passion." It's quite humorous:


Attending what is perhaps the most violent non-snuff film ever made, it seems inappropriate to down a greasy tub of popcorn while watching our Lord and Savior get tortured for two hours. (When I voiced this concern, a colleague slipped me a "Bible Bar," which contains "the seven foods of Deuteronomy," such as figs and pomegranates.) When I buy a Diet Coke, the concessions girl tells me business is way down for the aforementioned reason. But it doesn't bother Norm Linsky, happily munching popcorn in the lobby. "A movie without popcorn is not a movie," Linsky says, unapologetically.

You really ought to read the whole thing. Norm, the Jewish Cardiologist, and Matt Labash both liked the film.

My favorite line from the article is this:


We watch His mother, of Hail Mary/lawn statue fame, become a flesh-and-blood mother, unable to help her helpless boy, who's being tortured, as she's tortured herself by the knowledge that He's not helpless at all, that His death is by choice.

Will Matt go to hell for writing that or will I for findig it so funny?

Posted by Erick at 10:57 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Airport

In a never ending quest to buy as many Apple products as I can, Christy and drove the hour and a half to the Apple Store in Atlanta and purchased an Airport so we can set our house up wirelessly.

Christy is getting a laptop (non-Apple, but I guess that will be okay), so we really needed wireless at home, anyway.

Here's the interesting part. We have Cox Cable and their high speed internet. According to Cox, there is no way their internet access works with Apple's Airport and they don't have their system set up to work wirelessly with a Mac.

Well, I googled for days researching the issue and, I can now confirm, despite what Cox says, I am surfing the internet on my iMac wirelessly with the Airport.

The other cool thing with the Airport is that I can plug my printer into the Airport and plug in a modem and I can print wirelessly and have a wireless dial up connection too.

There may be a premium for Apple products, but they are so cool.

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February 27, 2004

Sunset On Mars

Quicktime required, but really cool.

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The Face Of Christ

National Review has on its website this picture of Christ (with apologies to K-Lo for pulling up a picture on their server):

Whenever we see pictures of Christ, paintings from long ago, to present depictions, he generally looks the same = long hair, a beard, etc.

There were no photographs back then. So, how did we develop this image? I have heard many people say the image comes from that on the Shroud of Turin. I'm one of those people who believes things like the shroud are possible, but I don't know for sure what to think of it -- though science has not effectively debunked its age.

So, dear readers, any thoughts on where we get the common image of Christ?

Posted by Erick at 04:15 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

Good

It was a dumb charge anyway:


A federal judge on Friday threw out the most serious charge against Martha Stewart, securities fraud, just before her trial goes to a jury.

The charge accused Stewart of deceiving investors in her company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, by lying about her sale of ImClone Systems Inc. stock.

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Gigolo John

I got this from Captain's Quarters and not Drudge. It would appear that Kerry is the leftist we all thought he was.

But, I still think the Bush tactic of portraying him as a waffler and not just a Dukaka liberal will work best.

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Reagan The Legend

This report from WaPo should reinspire your admiration for Ronald Reagan and his forward thinking:


In January 1982, President Ronald Reagan approved a CIA plan to sabotage the economy of the Soviet Union through covert transfers of technology that contained hidden malfunctions, including software that later triggered a huge explosion in a Siberian natural gas pipeline, according to a new memoir by a Reagan White House official.

The article goes on to say that:

The role that Reagan and the United States played in the collapse of the Soviet Union is still a matter of intense debate. Some argue that U.S. policy was the key factor -- Reagan's military buildup; the Strategic Defense Initiative, Reagan's proposed missile defense system; confronting the Soviets in regional conflicts; and rapid advances in U.S. high technology. But others say that internal Soviet factors were more important, including economic decline and President Mikhail Gorbachev's revolutionary policies of glasnost and perestroika.

What Reagan haters refuse to admit is that the the "internal Soviet factors . . . including economic decline and . . . glasnost and perestroika" were caused by Reagan's actions. The article itself goes a long way to showing how Reagan's policies caused the Soviet economic decline and collapse.

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Why I Like Professor Bainbridge

You just can't disllike a person who wants the Complete Animaniacs on DVD. They got me through college.

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Changing Lightbulbs

One of my wife's co-worker's emailed me this. I haven't stopped laughing.

CHANGING A LIGHT BULB THE CHRISTIAN WAY

How many Christians does it take to change a light bulb?

Charismatic : Only 1
Hands are already in the air.

Pentecostal : 10
One to change the bulb, and nine to pray against the spirit of darkness.

Presbyterians : None
Lights will go on and off at predestined times.

Roman Catholic : None
Candles only.

Baptists : At least 15.
One to change the light bulb, and three committees to approve the change and decide who brings the potato salad and fried chicken.

Episcopalians: 3
One to call the electrician, one to mix the drinks and one to talk about how much better the old one was.

Mormons : 5
One man to change the bulb, and four wives to tell him how to do it.

Unitarians :
We choose not to make a statement either in favor of or against the need for a light bulb. However, if in your own journey you have found that light bulbs work for you, you are invited to write a poem or compose a modern dance about your light bulb for the next Sunday service, in which we will explore a number of light bulb traditions, including incandescent, fluorescent, 3-way, long-life and tinted, all of which are equally valid paths to luminescence.

Methodists : Undetermined
Whether your light is bright, dull, or completely out, you are loved. You can be a light bulb, turnip bulb, or tulip bulb. Bring a bulb of your choice to the Sunday lighting service and a covered dish to pass.

Nazarene : 6
One woman to replace the bulb while five men review church lighting policy.

Lutherans: None
Lutherans don't believe in change.

Amish :
What's a light bulb?

Posted by Erick at 09:01 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

McAwful Watch

Terry McAwful will retire from the DNC after this, his first, term:


"I'm going to leave here in February of '05, finish my term, and the legacy that I will get to leave this party is this is a party that is in the best technological and financial shape in the history of our party," McAuliffe said Wednesday.

I'm rolling on the floor laughing. Notice how he left off the rest of that sentence. It should have concluded, "Of course we will have no office holders at the rate I'm going, but what the hell, I had a blast."

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February 26, 2004

This Is Funny

A reader of Little Green Footballs was investigated by the FBI because she sent a nasty letter to Paul Krugman of the New York Pravda. I guess Paul is thin skinned. Oh wait, he's a liberal, aren't "liberal" and "thin skinned" synonymous.

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Elegance In Tomfoolery

Tomfoolery Comments like this are why I like Brian over at Tomfoolery of the Highest Order.


To watch Jesus suffer like that, for our sins, was the most upsetting experience I had in a movie theatre since I saw Snoopy Come Home on re-release when I was 5. And, like Snoopy Come Home, I cried on the way home thinking about it.

Honesty, but in the words of Lewis Grizzard, "damn brother, I don't believe I'da told that one."

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The Ultimate Hurdle

NGD offers this:

Day one for the Passion: $26,556,573

Complete for Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine: $21,576,018

Life is sweet.

Posted by Erick at 09:27 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

BREAKING NEWS

The U.S. Supreme Court has denied an appeal by the Secretary of State in Georgia in the redistricting case. Based on the denial, the state legislature must redraw state legislative districts by March 1, 2004, or the 3 judge panel will redraw the lines.

The last rumor was that the Democrats would prefer this, but that is looking like a bluff this evening and the Democrats are getting prepared to concede the State Senate to save the State House.

Posted by Erick at 09:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Revolting Rosie

Most people I know are just a bit grossed out by gay marriage and gay subculture. If you are a red blooded heterosexual American male who didn't grow up in a liberal metropolis, admit. It may not seem offensive to you or morally wrong, but it probably just creeps you out a bit. It's not the person, but the act. Well, sometimes it is the person. When people read this, the numbers in favor of a Federal Marriage Amendment will probably skyrocket.


Former talk show host Rosie O'Donnell married her longtime girlfriend Thursday, taking what she called a proud stand for gay civil rights in the city where more than 3,300 other same-sex couples have tied the knot since Feb. 12.

I'd rather think about one of those disgusting pics guys in my dorm use to slide under doors as jokes when the internet was just taking off, than thinking of Rosie and her girlfriend -- gross. (You know the pictures -- they usually involve a naked woman and a well endowed horse.)

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Calblog On The Passion

Calblog will not be seeing the Passion for reasons that I completely understand.

One criticism Ramesh Ponnuru, Andrew Sullivan, and others have made of the movie is that it focuses so heavily on the human pain and suffering it almost ignores the divine grace and voluntary nature of the act.

Still, I plan to see it.

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Gigolo John

This cartoon is from Doonesbury, circa 1971. Hat tip to Jonah Goldberg.

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A Good Judge

A federal judge in Alexandria ruled yesterday that Virginia's colleges and universities may deny admission to illegal immigrants -- a ruling that experts said was the first of its kind in the nation. The decision by U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III came in a lawsuit filed against seven Virginia schools accused of violating the rights of the immigrants by refusing them entry.

"It is clear that denying illegal aliens admission to public colleges and universities simply removes another public incentive for illegal immigration," Ellis wrote. He stopped short of dismissing the case, however, ruling that it could proceed to trial because the plaintiffs have a right to try to prove whether the schools are using federal standards to identify applicants who are in the country illegally.

Posted by Erick at 11:44 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Apple vs. Apple

Interest battle across the pond:


Apple Computer and the Beatles' record company Apple Corps went to court in Britain on Wednesday over who gets to use the fruity name now that the computer company has entered the music business on the Internet.

The two companies reached a deal in 1991 after a fight over the trademark, signing an agreement that set out who could use the name and logo, and when.

But the British record company says the American computer company broke the deal by using the Apple name to market its new iTunes Internet music service.


Apple Computer is arguing that the 1991 agreement allows Apple to handle data, including music data.

Quite frankly, I think it is a silly lawsuit. Everyone knows the Apple Computer logo. It most likely won't get confused with the other Apple's logo or brand.

Posted by Erick at 10:05 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 25, 2004

Georgia Redistricting

I have started doing some light blogging for the Political State Report. You can find my first post, on Georgia redistricting, here.

Posted by Erick at 08:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

FMA

I'm trying not to write too much about gay marriage because everyone else is writing too much about it. But, I agree with Mary Ann Glendon on this:


Finally, there is the flagrant disregard shown by judges and local officials for the rights of citizens to have a say in setting the conditions under which we live, work and raise our children. Many Americans--however they feel about same-sex marriage--are rightly alarmed that local officials are defying state law, and that four judges in one state took it upon themselves to make the kind of decision that our Constitution says belongs to us, the people, and to our elected representatives. As one State House wag in Massachusetts put it, "We used to have government of the people, by the people and for the people, now we're getting government by four people!"

Whether one is for, against or undecided about same-sex marriage, a decision this important ought to be made in the ordinary democratic way--through full public deliberation in the light of day, not by four people behind closed doors. That deliberation can and must be conducted, as President Bush stated, "in a manner worthy of our country--without bitterness or anger."


The most democratic legislative process in America as a whole is the amendment process. Not only must the federal government vote, but the individual states must vote too.

This amendment won't happen unless people really want it. Of course, the odds are that it won't ever get passed the Senate.

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Shallow

That is how I find the New York Pravda's review of "The Passion." The review writes:


By rubbing our faces in the grisly reality of Jesus' death and fixing our eyes on every welt and gash on his body, this film means to make literal an event that the Gospels often treat with circumspection and that tends to be thought about somewhat abstractly. Look, the movie seems to insist, when we say he died for our sins, this is what we mean.

Well, that is what Mel was trying to do. Because so many people often treat this event not as something that happened, but as something abstract, we forget what burden Christ carried for us. By treating the crucifixtion as an abstraction, we open ourselves up to the touchy-feely religious notions that permeate other movies on the same topic.

On, there is from the review too:


On its own, apart from whatever beliefs a viewer might bring to it, "The Passion of the Christ" never provides a clear sense of what all of this bloodshed was for, an inconclusiveness that is Mr. Gibson's most serious artistic failure. The Gospels, at least in some interpretations, suggest that the story ends in forgiveness. But such an ending seems beyond Mr. Gibson's imaginative capacities. Perhaps he suspects that his public prefers terror, fury and gore. Maybe Homer Simpson was right after all.

I don't even know where to begin in responding to that. I guess the first place is that this review may answer the question about non-believers liking the movie. In this case, the reviewer didn't get it. Those of us who know the story understand what "all of this bloodshed was for." And don't you just love how the reviewer says "at least in some interpretations" the Gospels end in forgiveness.

Duh!

But of course you and I know that the forgiveness part of the story and the conclusion is not yet fully written. Maybe someone should have clued in the reviewer.

I stand by my earlier comment -- Pravda would like it better if Hollywood editors got to re-write the ending to better fit their sensibilities.

Posted by Erick at 09:21 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Anti-Semitism

George Will takes on the anti-semites of the left in a well written piece:


The appallingly brief eclipse of anti-Semitism after Auschwitz demonstrates how beguiling is the simplicity of pure stupidity. All of the left's prescriptions for curing what ails society -- socialism, communism, psychoanalysis, ``progressive'' education, etc. -- have been discarded, so now the left is reduced to adapting that hardy perennial of the right, anti-Semitism.

This is a new twist to the left's recipe for salvation through elimination: All will be well if we eliminate capitalists, or private property, or the ruling class, or ``special interests,'' or neuroses, or inhibitions. Now, let's try eliminating a people, starting with their nation, which is obnoxiously pro-American and insufferably Spartan.

Posted by Erick at 09:05 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 24, 2004

Gay Marriage

A lot of the professorial blogs are opposed to gay marriage. Most, I think, do so because of the particular professor's libertarian bent. Others take a John Kerry "I know better than you" tone.

Here, quite frankly, is why I support the FMA.

I'm opposed to gay marriage for traditional and religious reasons. Notwithstanding that, I'm prepared to accept the will of the majority. If I lose in the free marketplace of ideas, so be it.

But, there is no free marketplace of ideas. Judges are preempting legislatures and forcing legislatures to recognize gay marriage despite no historical pattern of gay marriage. Those who want things as they exist are left with no remedy other than amending the constitution to ban something that does not exist.

If courts would restrain themselves and allow the people's elected representatives to represent the people and make the decisions we elect them for, so be it if a legislature enacts gay marriage.

But there can be no debate when four black robe wearing holier than thous in Massamoscow legislate from the bench.

You let each state decide and let those states that disagree continue to not recognize gay marriage, and I'll back you 100%. But, you run to court and force my state to recognize something a very clear majority don't want to recognize, and it is time for an amendment. Just as I don't think I should be able to impose my religion on you through the courts, you should not be able to impose your religion on me in the courts -- and that is what this movement strikes me as -- a secular religious idea where those who disagree can only be labeled heretics, err . . . bigots.

When a majority is then ready to accept gay marriage, we can repeal the amendment. I'll oppose the effort, but I'll respect or effort to work through the democratic constitutional process.

The current court driven path to gay marriage is, in my opinion, unconstitutional and conducted in bad faith.

Posted by Erick at 10:48 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

My Solution To Gay Marriage

And a whole host of other constitutional issues is very simple. My solution will solve the problem of federalist arguments, states rights, the scope of the federal government and the state governments under the Bill of Rights, and lots of other Constitutional problems.

Let's repeal the fourteenth amendment.

Admit it, the amendment has outlived its usefulness. It has prevented the states from serving as experiments for various ideas while making them more uniform. It has prevented people from being able to move to state based on that state's social policy and required states to impose on the states' citizens homogenous social policies.

In short, the fourteenth amendment and judicial abuse of that amendment have destroyed the free market system of ideas in states.

If the fourteenth amendment did not exist, evangelicals who want to live in a state where abortion is banned could move to such a state. Liberals who want to live in a state where anything goes could live in such a state.

As it is, no one is happy. The Civil Rights Act relies on the Commerce Clause more than the 14th amendment, so it wouldn't be lost. The Voting Rights Act will expire anyway. State court judges are progressive enough to ensure civil liberties now.

Let's scrap the amendment. We'll all be better off.

Posted by Erick at 10:40 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

First Shots Fired At The Passion

In the release of movie reviews, that is. The Boston Globe, sister publication to the New York Pravda, slams Mel's movie:


It is, when all is said and done, only a movie.

A profoundly medieval movie, yes. Brutal almost beyond powers of description, yes. More obsessed with capturing every holy drop of martyr's blood and sacred gobbet of flesh than with any message of Christian love, yes. More than anything, "The Passion of the Christ," which opens tomorrow, seems to be exactly the movie Mel Gibson wanted to make as an abiding profession of his traditionalist Catholic faith. On that score it is a success.


Ty Burr drips with condescension and is clearly hostile to the movie. Now Drudge is reporting that the New York Pravda will be slamming the movie tomorrow.

Burr goes on to say:

It's not your Unitarian grandma's tea-cosy religion; for one thing, Christian forgiveness seems in short supply. Toward the end of "Passion," the surreal touches that the director has salted throughout the film -- evil dwarf children and Bosch-ian extras, mostly -- come together in an earth-shattering big bang of cracking temples, bursts of flame, and torrents of blood out of a samurai movie. It's what tent-show revivalists used to call a Grand Finale, and while the faithful stand to be awed, as filmmaking it's somewhat silly.

As if he wanted to prove himself outside the mainstream of American culture, how many of you have Unitarian grandmothers? Oh, and Ty, that Grand Finale may seem silly, but sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.

Last point: Ty and the New York Pravda would no doubt enjoy the movie had Hollywood given it a more "traditional rewrite," i.e. Jesus has a sidekick and they all live happily ever after.

Posted by Erick at 10:14 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Non Sequitur

The AP photo on Yahoo for the headline that Bush backs a Federal Marriage Amendment uses this picture:

Shouldn't they be showing a picture of a same sex couple getting married?

Posted by Erick at 05:22 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Disagreeing With Andrew

Andrew Sullivan says:


The president launched a war today against the civil rights of gay citizens and their families. And just as importantly, he launched a war to defile the most sacred document in the land. Rather than allow the contentious and difficult issue of equal marriage rights to be fought over in the states, rather than let politics and the law take their course, rather than keep the Constitution out of the culture wars, this president wants to drag the very founding document into his re-election campaign.

My response is that (1) the President didn't start it and (2) the President is not seeking to "defile the most sacred document in the land;" the President is seeking to preserve the document and protect it from activist judges.

The President was willing to let this "difficult issue of equal marriage rights be fought over in the states," but Courts decided they knew better than the elected representatives of the people. The courts decided to legislate.

It is a sad day when the people wanting to keep the status quo have to amend the constitution to preserve what already exists. Shouldn't it be the progressives who have to amend the constitution? Or, shouldn't they at least have to go the democratic route through the elected representatives of all the people?

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Nice


(Hat tip: PrestoPundit)

Posted by Erick at 01:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Exercise

Alrighty, I got up at 6:30 and hit the treadmill for 30 minutes. After a diet heavy on beer and junk food in the last week, I decided I better get my act together or pretty soon my wife will really be able to kick my butt. (Yeah, yeah, I know, you think you already can).

Posted by Erick at 07:29 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

February 23, 2004

Finally

Bush kicks off his campaign:


"The other party's nomination battle is still playing out. The candidates are an interesting group with diverse opinions," Bush said. "They're for tax cuts and against them. They're for NAFTA and against NAFTA. They're for the Patriot Act and against the Patriot Act. They're in favor of liberating Iraq, and opposed to it. And that's just one senator from Massachusetts." His supportive audience erupted in laughter and applause.

Posted by Erick at 09:07 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Underwear At Work

Will Baude has the transcript of oral arguments in front of Judge Posner (one of my heros) who had the audacity to rightly accuse a "victim" of assisting in the creation of her own hostile work environment.

Posted by Erick at 05:52 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Been There

Calblog comments that she's somewhat tired with people making comments to her that because she is a lawyer she should agree with them.

I'm in the same boat. I get so tired of people presuming that because I am a lawyer I should agree with their usually sorry non-lawyer selves.

Posted by Erick at 05:36 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Only In America

A US entrepreneur has outraged some Americans by producing a film showing men hunting naked women through forests with paintball guns.

Michael Burdick, founder of Real Men Outdoor Productions, is selling his Hunting for Bambi videotapes and DVDs depicting paintball hunts for around £13.

"If you think about it, what I'm providing is an adult comedy of hunting. The reason they're naked is deer don't wear Levis out in the woods," Mr Burdick said.

Posted by Erick at 12:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Campaign Ad

Jonah, over at National Review, came up with an ad for the Bush re-election campaign a while back. With their ads going up soon, I wanted to preview mine. Some of you have been solicited for your thoughts and those of you who responded liked the idea. I'm working with a few friends to find a good 527 to do this with.

Here's the script:


(Iraqi 20-something male standing in front of a plain backdrop)
Iraqi: My name is [insert name]. My family fled from Iraq when Saddam Hussein killed my [insert family members killed]. We have not been able to go back to our homeland.

(Show scenes of the mass graves and jails in Iraq with Iraqi's voice over)
Iraqi: Saddam Hussein murdered and tortured and gassed men, women, and children. Many people fled. But now it is different.

(Show scene of Saddam statue coming down and American troops in Baghdad)
(Show Iraqi)
Iraqi: Now my family can return to our homeland. We can walk the streets of Baghdad. Our people are free. Thank you America. Thank you President Bush.

(Cue the "paid for" text)
END


If this idea works, we'll get some from Afghanistan too.

Posted by Erick at 10:47 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

It's About Time

Expectations are high for a speech President Bush is to make today before the Republican members of the National Governors Association meeting in Washington. The speech is expected to be the rollout of the Bush campaign stump speech he will use over the next few months in the lead up to the fall run for re-election.

"He's primed. Perhaps we're a few weeks earlier than we planned," says a Bush campaign adviser. "But the polls, the public are telling us its time to get moving and get this campaign up and running."

At the same time that Bush will be making his speech, the Bush campaign is expected to start running TV and radio time in selected cities around the country. The image ads are again the first real Republican salvo in the 2004 race. "John Kerry and Terry McAuliffe have been getting a free ride at our expense long enough," says the campaign adviser. "Now they are going to have to start playing a little defense."

Posted by Erick at 09:42 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Marriage

John Fund looks at the issue of gay marriage and, at the end of his piece, seems to endorse privatization of marriage -- a libertarian pipe dream:


The Wall Street Journal's Paul Gigot likes to say that on the politics of gay rights, the loser will be whichever side raises the issue first.

For many years, Republicans came up losers because media outlets portrayed them as intolerant, as indeed many of them were. The score evened last year when a 4-3 majority of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court demanded the state recognize same-sex marriage. Republicans probably nudged a little ahead last week when San Francisco's Mayor Gavin Newsom decided to throw away the rule of law and declare it was his duty to recognize marriages between gay couples, despite a 2000 voter initiative codifying the traditional definition of marriage. As courts refuse to issue injunctions to stop San Francisco from issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, many Democrats are running scared. In the words of Peter Schrag, former editorial page editor of the liberal Sacramento Bee, they know Mr. Newsom has committed an act of "monumental political stupidity."

Posted by Erick at 09:31 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 22, 2004

If It Ain't Broke, Don't Fix It

See here:


Arnold Schwarzenegger, making his Sunday talk show debut as governor, said that he and other foreign-born citizens should be eligible to run for the White House and that President Bush can carry California in November if he does more to help the state.

We already have enough prima donnas who want to be President. See e.g., Democratic Presidential Primary. I realize that it is the popular thing to say now, given Arnold's position and Jennifer Granholm's positions. But, the fear that caused the prohibition to go into the Constitution still exists. See e.g., the hijackers on 9/11 and the reports we keep getting of a fifth column living in the country as naturalized citizens waiting to be awakened by orders from Osama.

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Blogging Nader

Captain's Quarters has been patrolling the Democrat blogs for reaction to Nader jumping in.

It ain't that pretty.

Posted by Erick at 08:41 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Where's The Outrage?!

Jonah Goldberg has the details on President Clinton's library outsourcing cabinet making to Scotland.

Where's the liberal outrage over that?! Isn't American furniture making one of the hallmarks of this country? Will John Edwards, Senator from the furniture capital of the world, be outraged?

I won't hold my breath waiting for rage.

Posted by Erick at 06:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Recycling Times

Instapundit takes on the New York Times for recycling quotes.

Posted by Erick at 03:13 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Haiti

The New York Times has a report on this week's activities in Haiti. I have a hard time having any concern over this -- one of the last pieces of the Bush 41/Clinton foreign policy dominoes to fall. Read the whole thing here:


Anti-government rebels today attacked this city, the government's last major stronghold in the north, commandeered the police station inside the city, witnesses said. They were also reported to be battling forces loyal to President Jean-Bertrand Aristide at the airport.

Smoke billowed from the Cap-Haitien airport, where a manager with Tropical Airways said rebels had commandeered a plane, The Associated Press reported.

In the disorder, armed civilians broke into a prison, where they freed about 200 prisoners, said a witness, Odril Jean, who lives across the street from the facility.

Mr. Jean said he had seen about 10 armed men raid the prison. The freed prisoners picked up shotguns and pistols that had been abandoned by fleeing police officers and ran through the streets brandishing the weapons.

As a violent rebellion has spread throughout Haiti in the past two weeks, Cap-Haitien, the country's second-largest city, has remained in the hands of the government and its loyalists. But as the armed groups seeking to topple President Aristide have wrested control of a swath of territory from the coastal city of Gonives across the Central Plateau to the border with the Dominican Republic, they have vowed to bring their uprising to this city, as well.


We returned Aristide, an unrepentant Communist, to power and he promptly ran the country into the ground. I think we ought to let them fight it out. What the people get will probably be no worse than they already have. There is a good chance the people would be better off.

At this time I'll add a caveat. As I have taken little interest in the subject, I don't know who the rebels are. But, I do know Aristide should have be thrown out long ago.

Posted by Erick at 02:49 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack