Question:
How many men would do this if they thought it was the only way to get laid?
Answer:
All of them.
Before Conservative Was Cool
Inspired by a discussion at Tim Blair’s site, the Shotgun contributors are laying bare their souls and confessing to their leftist youth.
I didn’t have a leftist youth. Though, when I was 12, I had a friend who had to repeat grade 6, and I remember announcing that exams weren’t a good way to evaluate learning because failing made kids feel so badly and separated them from classmates.
Then I got distracted because school was out and I had an impatient .22 and 40 acres of gopher town whistling my name.
911 Comedy Commission
In the unlikely event that you are still under the impression that the 911 commission is comprised of representatives who are earnestly and soberly examining shortcomings in intelligence leading up to the attacks on New York and Washington… I direct your attention to commission panelist Bob Kerrey [D] and his appearance on the “Daily Show with Jon Stewart.” a couple of nights ago.
Michelle Malkin
Now, it would be one thing if Kerrey used his privileged position to inform Stewart’s younger audience of the gravity of the 9/11 panel’s task. But instead, Kerrey yukked it up. First, he dished with Stewart about President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney’s upcoming private meeting with the commission. When Stewart mocked the president’s “buddy system,” Kerrey guffawed: “He is bringing his buddy, that’s exactly right, for safety.” Emboldened by audience applause, Kerrey riffed that it was more like “Screw you, buddy.” Asked by Stewart whether people were really blaming each other over the terrorist attacks during closed hearings, Kerrey snorted: “Oh, Jee-zus, yeah.” More audience approval. (Taking the Lord’s name in vain is always good for a few cheap laughs.)
Next, echoing a profanity uttered earlier in the show, Kerrey blurted out with a clownish grin: “Life is [expletive bleeped].” When Stewart proposed that Kerrey ask the vice president, “What the [expletive bleeped] is wrong with you people?” Kerrey cracked up and promised to use the question. And when Stewart called Attorney General John Ashcroft a “big [expletive bleeped],” Kerrey chortled some more.
After nearly ten minutes of knee-slapping hilarity, it was time for Kerrey to wrap things up. Instead of paying lip service to those who died in the terrorist attacks, Kerrey used his last moments on the program to suck up to Stewart. The Daily Show, Kerrey cooed, was one of the few shows he TiVo’ed. The other, he joked, was [the PBS kids’ show] Boohbah. Ho-ho-ho.
House Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R., Mo.) was spot on Tuesday in his reaction to Kerrey’s performance: “His appearance on a program designed to satirize current events proves that Kerrey lacks the seriousness of purpose that this Commission requires and the American people deserve. This is not a laughing matter.”
I saw the show. It was pretty disgraceful, all round. But Stewart stopped being funny a long time ago too. Somewhere in his rabid partisanship, Stewart has forgotten that satire based upon false premises or misinformation isn’t satire anymore – or funny.
In the episode last night, Stewart lobbed his jokes at Bush and Cheney’s interview with commission members yesterday. Yet, he didn’t mention that his guest of a few nights earlier had left before it was over. I wonder why – there’s ripe opportunity for satire there, don’t you think?
“Kerrey explained to reporters: “Yeah, it’s a little awkward to leave early. But the president certainly understood what we were doing.”
Globe & Mail: Hacked
Oh, and before I forget… would someone please alert the Globe And Mail’s sysadmin?
Their website has been hacked by giggling, drunken first year poli-sci students, writing under the identity of one “John Doyle”.
Slow Posting Zone
I’m going to be rather busy over the next 3 days, so blogging will be infrequent.
But there’s lots on the sidebar to keep you entertained. Check out our underappreciated Canadian bloggers, and don’t miss the Iraqis, either. Here’s a roundup at “Carnival Of The Liberated”.
Be sure to visit the auction, though. At time of writing, someone has a very good deal on a pet portrait. (Proceeds to Spirit Of America. )
Rest In Peace
Vote For Don Cherry
It has been decided.
Vote for Don Cherry for the Greatest Canadian Ever and watch the CBC squirm.
Now, go forth and spread the word. One vote per Canadian.
Unexpected Honesty
Damien Penny at the Shotgun has this:
…this British cartoonist tries to explain why the members of his association voted the “Sharon eating Palestinian babies” editorial cartoon the best of the year.
The interviewer asked him why no one draws the same sort of thing about Arafat.
“Because Jews don’t issue fatwas,” he says, sheepishly.
When You Buy A High School Raffle Ticket
and first prize is a side of Bison…
You might be in Saskatchewan.
Say What?
L. Ian MacDonald – Montreal Gazette, on Martin’s upcoming visit to the White House;
What Bush doesn’t need to hear from Martin is a lecture on why Canada stayed out of the war or hectoring over weapons of mass destruction that have never been found. If there’s one thing that drives Americans to distraction, it’s the insufferable Canadian sense of moral superiority. Nor does Bush need an offer of Canadian troops to help with the occupation in a time of murderous insurgency. Not that we have any soldiers to spare.
The insufferable Canadian press, reporting directly from BBC and CNN headlines and Ted Kennedy quotes, doesn’t help our credibility either.
What Bush could use is help from Canada in institution building, assuming the U.S. ever gets the insurrection under control and truepolitical and economic reconstruction underway. Martin will apparently offer such assistance, as did his predecessor, Jean Chretien, at last fall’s Madrid Donors’ Conference on Iraq.
Uh, yeah. Like the institutions Canada has built in other modern war-torn former dictatorships, liberated at the cost of American blood …. eh …. where was that again?
The Canadians talk about a smart border. They want trade crossing it. The Americans talk about a secure border. They don’t want terrorists crossing it.
The problem is that the Liberals keep forgetting where the smart border problems exist – at the shoreline of the Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic oceans. Fix that, Mr Martin, and the one to the south will take care of itself.
Both men face elections this year. Both are in more trouble than they expected to be a year ago when Bush landed on an aircraft carrier and announced the end of military engagement in Iraq. In this cruel month of April alone, more American soldiers have been killed there than during the war itself.
Hmmmm…
Both men face elections this year. Both are in more trouble than they expected to be a year ago when Martin was quietly serving as a regular MP, the Liberal party in a peaceful transition period, and before the auditor-general revealed explosive details of Liberal corruption with the “Adscam” Scandal, with tentacles reaching into his very office during his tenure as Finance Minister.
There, that’s better. And so much more Canadian content than MacDonald’s version.
What it does involve is land-based systems with a command at NORAD, North American Air Defence, in which Canada has been the junior partner since 1958. Since we’re already at this table, all Martin has to do is announce we’re staying there. And since the U.S. is going to build NMD with or without us, it’s in our national interest to be there
reading on….
But Martin really shouldn’t worry about being seen with Bush. The Oval Office visit, a day after Bush’s secret testimony to the 9/11 commission, will feature waves of photographers and reporters wanting to know what the president said there. The other guy in the shot will be lucky to get a question, unless it’s about the Khadrs, Canada’s first family of terror.
And, the headline for this piece?
“Martin can help Bush and defend Canada’s aovereignty”
Steal-A-Thon
Activists planning to shoplift ‘en masse’
Sean at Pol:Spy:
If there’s any good news to be found here, it’s that these “activists” are taking the initiative and stealing for themselves, rather than relying on the government to do it for them. I suppose that’s something.
Today’s Top Stories
And while the local and national news affiliates were giving us items on the new Kentucky Fried Chicken menu, another investigation into the world’s best known case of Death By Rich Playboy and the disappearance of world champion mule deer antlers….
SUDAN ORDERS SYRIAN WMD OUT OF COUNTRY
LONDON [MENL] — Sudan has ordered the removal of Syrian missiles and weapons of mass destruction out of the African country. Arab diplomatic and Sudanese government sources said the regime of Sudanese President Omar Bashir has ordered that Syria remove its Scud C and
Scud D medium-range ballistic missiles as well as components for chemical weapons stored in warehouses in Khartoum. The sources said the Sudanese demand was issued after the Defense Ministry and Interior Ministry confirmed a report published earlier this month that Syria has been secretly flying Scud-class missiles and WMD components to Khartoum. The sources said the Bashir regime has been alarmed over the prospect that the United States would discover the Syrian arsenal and conclude that Damascus and Khartoum were cooperating in the area of missiles and WMD. They said this would have delayed or dashed U.S. plans to lift sanctions from Sudan. A U.S. official confirmed the Syrian missile shipments to Sudan, saying they were meant for use against rebels in the south. But the official said the U.S. intelligence community has not determined that Syria sent WMD systems to Khartoum.
hat tip Instapundit
And, via Dr. Joyner this related article, on the ongoing and unreported discoveries of prohibited WMD and precursor weaponry in Iraq.
(Cross-posted at the Shotgun.)
Newcleotides
For reasons unknown, Jeff Goldstein has announced he’s overhauling his blog. He’s made an open call for submission of logo designs. First prize is the privilage of saying you designed the Protein Wisdom logo. The type of opportunity professional designers lie awake at night hoping for….
You get what you pay for, Jeff.
Good Morning America
That’s A Lot Of Footprints
From The Future of Life (2002), by Harvard professor Edward O. Wilson, a “leading voice for the preservation of biodiversity and the founder of a field of study relating social behavior to genetic advantage.”
Consider that with the global population past six billion and on its way to eight billion or more by midcentury, per capita freshwater and arable land are descending to levels resource experts agree are risky. The ecological footprint-the average amount of productive land and shallow sea appropriated by each person in bits and pieces from around the world for food, water, housing, energy, transportation, commerce, and waste absorption – is about one hectare (2.5 acres) in developing nations but about 9.6 hectares (24 acres) in the U.S. The footprint for the total human population is 2.1 hectares (5.2 acres)
There are about 291 million people in the US, according to the census bureau.
291 milllion people @ 24 acres each is 6,984,000,000 acres
640 acres in a square mile = 10.9 million square miles. That is more than the total area of the US, Canada and Brazil combined, including bodies of water, deserts, mountains, rain forests, tundra, high arctic….
Now, taking Dr.Wilson’s estimate that the rest of the world’s population of averages a “footprint” of 5.2 acres each…
and there are over 5.7 billion of them…
That’s an additional 29.6 billion acres, or 46.3 million square miles.
Total dry land on the planet? 57.5 million miles. 4.5 million of that is in Antarctica.
His bio does offer this disclaimer;
[Dr. Wilson] has received numerous awards, including the National Medal of Science awarded by President Jimmy Carter and the Craaford Prize issued by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. His confidence with words and his love of nature enabled two Pulitzer Prizes, one for On Human Nature and the other for The Ants. Writing comes easy to him, far easier than mathematics.
Apparently.
It gets worse…�the FAO estimates that 5.6 million square miles of this is arable land.
If the rest of the world’s human “footprint” already uses 900% of the world’s arable land – where the hell are the Americans getting theirs?
hat tip – Dad
Added to the Beltway Traffic Jam
Forgotten Sacrifice
This week marks the anniversary of an WWII tragedy that remained secret for nearly 50 years.
On April 28 1944 a total of 749 US soldiers and sailors died after three ships involved in a training exercise were ambushed by German torpedo boats just off Slapton Sands near Stokenham on the Devon coast.
The full scale of the tragedy remained hidden for almost 50 years because of a secrecy order issued by General Dwight D Eisenhower, the supreme commander of the allied expeditionary force, who feared news of the disaster could destroy morale or tip off the Germans.
A full-scale rehearsal with all 23,000 US soldiers, in preparation for D-Day, the operation was named “Exercise Tiger”.
Shortly before 2am on April 28, disaster struck when the convoy was discovered by nine German E-boats. One of them fired off two torpedoes which hit the landing ship LST 507. As it started to sink, the 447 soldiers and sailors on board struggled to survive in the cold channel waters.
Fifteen minutes later LST 531 was hit, leaving injured men screaming for help after they were thrown into the burning oil floating on the water.
At 2.30am LST 289 was hit in the stern, but the crew managed to keep it afloat.
The commander responsible for the six surviving ships ordered them back to port, but the skipper of Mr McCann’s ship refused to abandon the 1,000 survivors in the freezing waters, and the 15-year-old coxswain was ordered to mount a rescue.
With orders to pick up only the living, he set off into the darkness, moving through a sea of bodies and wreckage.
“There were just so many bodies in the water,” he told the Guardian this week from his home in Washington state. “Everything was happening so fast, but it was quite a while before any other boats were put into the water to look for survivors. When I found out we had picked up 45 men I was astounded.”
But there was nothing Mr McCann and his crew could do for the other men, a number of whom drowned because they had not been given proper instructions on how to wear their lifejackets. Most were found with their heads in the water and their feet in the air, top heavy from not putting the belts around their chests before inflating the jackets.
When reports of the attack reached the Eisenhower’s headquarters an order – never rescinded – was sent out that it should remain secret. Doctors were told to ask no questions as a stream of burnt and injured soldiers arrived at military hospitals, while the men who survived the exercise were held in sealed camps until D-day six weeks later.
The 60th anniversary of D-Day will be commemorated later this year. The full story continues to emerge piecemeal, as many documents have only been released recently.
Projections And Perceptions
Sarah Mills, 650 CKOM radio news announcer, earlier today [paraphrasing]:
“Organizers say up to 750 thousand are expected to march in Washington in support of abortion rights today!”
Just now, and with the same breathless emphasis:
“Tens of thousands rallied in Washington in support of abortion rights today!”
Losing The Game Of Gotcha
Via Instapundit – a very good article on the media disconnect with the public they serve, and how the Bush administration has capitalized on that weakness.
As a first step out of this trap, journalists need to ask themselves: how did we become so predictable? Is it possisble to go back, and pull the wire that made this so? The game of Gotcha does exist. Auletta, a liberal journalist, can recognize it as easily as Karl Rove. Knock him off stride. Get him off the talking points.
But instead of rolling our eyes, we ought to realize that Gotcha has been incorporated into a new thesis, now in power in the White House. Behold the basics of President Bush’s press think. You don’t represent the public. You’re not a part of the checks and balances. I don’t have to answer your questions. And you don’t have that kind of muscle anymore.
Read the whole thing.The comment section is as good as the article.
Richard Clarke’s Long Debate on Terrorism
Richard Clarke has a piece in the New York Times for those who would like further insight into why he was demoted by the Bush Administration. He offers that Islamic terrorism is a battle “chiefly of ideas”, while admitting “I do not pretend to know the formula for winning that ideological war.” Two decades in counter-terrorism, and 21/2 years after 9-11, and that’s the best he can offer? Not that it holds him back from criticizing the formula now under trial. After dismissing a liberal western style media and democracy “at the end of an American bayonnet” , he regrets the fall of the shah of Iran.
We must also be careful, while advocating democracy in the region, that we do not undermine the existing regimes without having a game plan for what should follow them and how to get there. The lesson of President Jimmy Carter’s abandonment of the shah of Iran in 1979 should be a warning.
In practical terms – an American invasion of Iran and dictatorship at the end of an American bayonnet.
Other parts of the war of ideas include making real progress on the Israel-Palestinian issue, while safe-guarding Israeli security, and finding ideological and religious counter-weights to Osama bin Laden and the radical imams. Fashioning a comprehensive strategy to win the battle of ideas should be given as much attention as any other aspect of the war on terrorists, or else we will fight this war for the foreseeable future.
Strange that no one’s noticed that Israeli-Palestinian thing before now. This is what they paid him the big bucks for.
The second major lesson of the last month of controversy is that the organizations entrusted with law enforcement and intelligence in the United States had not fully accepted the gravity of the threat prior to 9/11. Because this is now so clear, there will be a tendency to overemphasize organizational fixes.
His next six paragraphs are devoted to organizational fixes.
And Richard Clarke’s ultimate solution for militant Islam? Public discourse.
We all want to defeat the jihadists. To do that, we need to encourage an active, critical and analytical debate in America about how that will best be done. And if there is another major terrorist attack in this country, we must not panic or stifle debate as we did for too long after 9/11.
There you have it. While the enemy straps on their suicide belts, hijacks airplanes and calls for the destruction of Israel, we must all gather round and debate one another.
(Oh, in a non-partisan way. He was careful to mention that.)
Cross posted at The Shotgun
Life Of Glamour
Winds have been gusting to 50 mph, and we’ve been suffering through a dust storm all day. This region has been through three years of drought, and if conditions this spring are any indication, we’re heading full tilt into a fourth.
So, what’s a girl to do to get her mind off the grit and the depression of a cold, miserable day?