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Saturday, August 03, 2002
Belly laugh of the decade
During a speach in Toronto, former president Bill Clinton said he is willing to jump in the trenches and fight for Israel. Actually, he meant to say he was willing to send other men to fight all across the world, often with substandard equipment and no exit strategy whatsoever, for no other reason to suck up to powerful voting blocks. Oh shut the Hell up, Bill.
D.A.R.E. doesn't work
According to a scientific study, the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program does not, the Associated Press reported. Students who graduate from the program are not less likley to become drug users. Any idiot could have predicted this. Put police officers and other authority figures in a school to tell students that drug use is bad, and that just makes drug use cool. In fact, its quite hip for druggies to wear DARE t-shits. The Peoria County Sheriff's Department this year dropped it's D.A.R.E. program -- not because of studies that show it does not work, but because of a budget crunch. I asked the sheriff about it and he said he didn't care what the studies showed, parents like it, so he plannned to reinstate is as soon as funds became available. Friday, August 02, 2002
Palestinians whoop it up after Americans murdered
 Wed Jul 31, 4:33 PM ET: Young supporters of Hamas celebrate in Gaza Strip Wednesday night July 31, 2002, after a bomb was detonated in a crowded cafeteria at the Frank Sinatra International Student Center in Jerusalem during lunchtime, killing at least seven people and wounding more than 80. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber) Thursday, August 01, 2002
Was there any doubt?
Yes, Traficant wore a toup. It remains in custody. Actually, the toup explains a lot of Traficant's strange behavior. Perhaps the hairpiece contains a mind control device and the poor, defrocked congressman was acting under the the influence of aliens out to weaken our faith in our institutions. Either that, or the guy's an egotistical jerk.
Lack of food isn't the problems. Politics is the problem
Thanks to the environazis, the entire world "knows" that genetically enhanced food is bad for you -- eating it causes cancer dontcha know -- starving people in Zimbabwe will stay hungry. Thousands of tons of emergency food aid -- including bioengineered corn, was turned away. The government worries that the grain of corn could be planted, then the cross polinate local corn and cause "contamination." Big deal. There is no, none, nada, evidence that bioengineered corn is dangerous. None of the corn being grown for food now existed 200 years ago, thanks to ordinary agricultural processes.
Unethical journalists galore
Boston Globe reporter Bill Dedman recently wrote an article detailing how 19 working journalists donated money to the campaign of Robert Reich, Bill Clinton's Labor Secretary and Democratic candidate for Governor of Massachusetts. Another three gave money to other Democratic candidates. One lonely journalists gave money to a Republican. The article said: "Sandra Constantine, a general assignment reporter in the Holyoke bureau of the Springfield, Mass., Union-News, gave Reich $20 but said she wished she could contribute more. 'I'm just a liberal,' ' Constantine said. "Another one of those liberals in the media.'" Karla Hailer-Fidelman, one of the reporters caught in the controversy says she is being treated unfairly. It was perfectly acceptable for her to donate money to Robert Reich because she was only a "part-time" columnist for the Newton Tab's editorial page. Besides, she gave him the $85 to cover her expenses as a Reich delegate at the state convention, she said, demonstrating she is even more clueless about ethics than the original article implied. Also, she wrote that her editors gave her their OK, as long as she was upfront about her bias, demonstrating that editors can be equally clueless. Fire the lot of 'em, I say. Tuesday, July 30, 2002
Why other nations do not respect us
According to an Agence France-Presse report of a United Nations officials' meeting with Zimbabwe's president Robert Mugabe in April (concerning how undemocratic the country's last election was), Mugabe allegedly exploded when scolded by a U.S. representative: "Well," said Mugabe, "I don't think George Bush won the U.S. election, but I accept (it)."
Blogrolling is down
Otherwise, I would have a bunch of links to the the left. Sorry. Update It was up and running by noon. Monday, July 29, 2002
Coal mining is much safer: According to information I picked up at the Poynter Institute Web page, coal mining has becoming increasingly safe over the years. A decade-by-decade breakdown of coal mining deaths is as follows:
2000-2001: 80 This didn't come about because of good will on the part of mine operators. Unions like the United Moine Workers fought hard for laws and contract-required safety practices that have resulted in fewer deaths. Anyone who thinks that businesses would keep these expensive safety practices should unions go away is being foolish.
Backlash against the 9 miners begins: An investigation into what caused the accident will apparently focus on allegedly inaccurate maps. It sound's like their have already identified the cause, and now want to make it official. Look for the mining company to blame human error and the humans to blame the company.
Over at Curmudgeonly & Skeptical, Rodger Schultz made a snarky comment about hoping the miners use the profits from their books deals to reimburse taxpayers, who largess made the rescue possible. Hey, Rodger, if you fell into a hole, the taxpayers would gladly pay to rescue your sorry ass. There is something sick and disturbing in the human psyche that seeks to raise people to heroic stature, then seek to bring them down almost as quickly. Look at Pennsylvania Gov. Mark Schweiker. He was made out to be a hero because he gave good press conferences during the rescue effort. Politicians often have little to due during times of crisis, because they have professionals in place to do the work. I'm not trying to belittle Schweiker, he did fine. But all the news media could do in the aftermath was gush all over him about the great job he was doing and suggest to he reconsider his decision to not seek re-election, or seek "higher" office. Of course, the minute he does this, the media and the public will turn on him for "capitalizing" on the tragedy.
Update on the Clinton's Whitewater reimbursement: Today, MSNBC is conducting a poll: "SHOULD TAXPAYERS REIMBURSE THE CLINTONS FOR THEIR WHITEWATER LEGAL FEES?" Well, since the law requires they be paid (as were Ronald Reagan and George Bush Sr. when they were not indicted for their role in Iran-Contra), I would have to vote "yes." At 9:30 a.m., 22 percent of 308 people voted "yes" and 78 percent voted "no." Ten minutes later, 1,377 people had voted and there was only one percentage-point difference. The site posts a disclaimer that the poll is not scientifically valid. It would suggest is not logically valid, either. Why conduct a poll that asks a question about an issue that cannot and should not be affected by public sentiment? A better question would be "Should federal law require targets of grand jury investigations be reimbursed if there are no indictments?" Polling, which done scientifically, can be a great journalistic tool to measure public sentiment. This is great example of how online polling is worthless. I guarantee conservatives and liberals are *both* organizing to affect this poll's outcome.
No more teflon for George W: The events of September 11 happened nine unremarkable months into the presidency of George W. Bush. After the attacks, Bush was praised for his leadership. It seemed unpatriotic to criticize him. His "approval ratings" were as high as his father's had been in the aftermath of the Gulf War. 10 months later, the war drags on and no one nows for sure if Osama Bin Laden is alive or dead. We seem to be getting ready for an attack on Iraq, but there is no timetable. Worse, people are wising up to the fact that there is no exit strategy. Exactly how do we know when we win? A case could be made that the only "win" in a war with no clear enemy is to punish host nations so severely, that helping terrorists is unthinkable by any nation. Bush isn't prepared to do that and this nation isn't either. We make allies of nations like Saudi Arabia, who differ from the Taliban only in their willingness to pretend they like us
The news media is beginning to awaken to its responsibility to ask questions and demand answers.
I'm a KENNEDY dammit! Just shut up and vote for me!
 "You are $#@&%!* REQUIRED to vote for me! My father and my uncle got shot in the HEAD dammit! You owe it to their martyred memory to vote for every Kennedy who runs for office! Why are we even debating this! Kennedy's always win! It's the $#@&%!* LAW!" It's not quite that bad. The Democratic Party if rife with Kennedy idolators, and they are touting Kathleen Kennedy Townsend (Robert Kennedy's daughter, left) as the next Kennedy to run for president. The problem is, her only elected office is that of liutenant governor, and she may not even win her current race, for governor of Maryland. Says the Weekly Standard:"All these premature coronations have left many longtime Townsend-watchers in Maryland baffled. Says a reporter who's covered her for years, "There's a real disconnect between her national reputation and that in the state, where it's quite mixed." Indeed, many are asking a nagging question before Kennedy groupies are permitted to hand over the nation's car keys: Regardless of whether Townsend can fend off her Republican challenger, four-term congressman Bob Ehrlich, is she qualified to be governor?"I cannot discount Townsend's electibility. Several years ago, there was some speculation one of the Kennedys was considering establishing a residence Illinois for a future run for office. A family member who will remain nameless was all giddy over the prospect of voting for a a real, live Kennedy. I asked if it was the rapist Kennedy or the golf-club-wielding murder Kennedy. I cannot print her response
Stossel takes on the War on Drugs: John Stossell is the only out-of-the-closet libertarian in journalism. As such, he is the target of all sorts of attacks. He is sure to get it from both sides when he takes on the entrenched war-on-drugs crowd in his latest report, an hour-long which will air at 10 p.m. Eastern/9 p.m. Central on Tuesday, July 30, on ABC. I am not sure complete legalization is the answer, but I admire Stossel for asking the questions. I once watched several dozen National Guard members and a multi-county drug-fighting unit stage a raid on a corn field an informant said was rife with marijuana. They found ONE plant. I interviewed a county sheriff who said he didn't care if 100 studied show DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) programs did not reduce drug use among students, the parents liked it and he was going to fight a cut in its budget.
Sunday, July 28, 2002
Pat Sajak is my new hero
I support saying that runs contray to the theme of his speech at Hillsdale College. Thanks to Count De Money for supplying the link. It's not permanent, so click while it's hot.
Back up and running
For some unexplained reason, the site was down almost all day Sunday. It wasn't back up until 4 p.m. Central time. Please notice the "Hot or Not" score at left. I have noticed the rating goes up when the lead post says somethings conservatives would want to read, but drops if I say anything that could be perceived as liberal. hmmm. |
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Will it play in Peoria? I'll be the judge of that.
