So Bristol's having a baby

More power to the Palin family. They love Bristol and respect her enough to stand by her and the young man she loves, as the young couple choose to marry and raise their child together.

Whatever decision a young woman makes under such circumstances, it is never easy. No matter which way you turn, the consequences come back at you for the rest of your life.

There are still days when I regret my own choice -- not ever do I regret bringing a life into the world, but I will always, for the rest of my days, wish I had been capable of being a good enough mother to raise her myself.

I can hardly imagine a person regretting giving birth. If anything can be called a miracle, then the birth of a healthy child must be one. Life itself seems to run contrary to so many laws of the universe, so it is wondrous that it should still be happening on this little wet rock in the midst of nothingness.

To Bristol and her family (including those who will soon be added to it), I wish only the best and the most joyful future. To those who are scandalized, or who see this child as an opportunity to create a political wedge, I wish a clout to the side of the head with a maturity bat.


Morning Update: the Bat and I were discussing this, briefly, this morning, and the one thing which struck me as untouched in all the officious nonsense the media and other bloggers have spouted : Bristol's young man, Levi. I use the term intentionally. It reflects well on her that she has chosen to involve herself with a young man who, in the face of impending birth and the media storm which was bound to surround it, he has not shied away from his responsibility to her or to the baby. He is a man, where so many other baby's daddies are still boys, well into their dotage.

California & Bolivia: Separated at Birth?

Or on the same downward spiral?

As I wandered through the closely-groomed pathways that are Instapundit posts, I tripped over this piece by Christian Probasco, at New West, on the disturbing trend California has, of exporting their nanny-state assaults on liberty:

Hollywood has molded the image and the myths of the Rocky Mountain West for the entire world. Much of the technology that went into the computer on which you’re reading this article was developed in Silicon Valley. Much of the food in your refrigerator probably comes from the Central Valley. Much of the new population of the interior West’s cities emigrated from California.

California is a trendsetter state. Much like the weather, every Californian fad eventually makes its way over the Sierras and diffuses into the intermountain West. That’s wonderful, and it’s frightening, because there are some pretty disturbing things going on in the Golden State right now.

And, via Gateway Pundit, José Brechner has this to say about Bolivia:

For unknown reasons, this Andean country has a disproportionate influence on its neighbors' political conduct. Indeed even though it behaves in a totally unhinged manner, its geographical location in the center of the continent irradiates its energy to its surrounding nations. When it comes to liberty – or libertinism, which is more common in South America – Bolivia is number one. Everyone does what they want, when and where they want. But liberty is like water. If you do not put it into a vessel, it slips through your fingers until it is gone.

Either way, the tendency of each -- away from freedom and individual responsibility -- is troublesome, especially for the influence they seem to have on their neighbors and friends.

Bomb threat causes Amtrak to evacuate train

Last night, the California Zephyr -- the train which runs from San Francisco to Chicago via Denver, Burlington IA, and my neck of the woods, the train I have often had occasion to ride from Galesburg to the Big City (and one round trip from Denver to Galesburg) -- was stopped just after it left Denver on its way east. Some passengers expressed concerns over one man whose behavior was troubling, so the train held up in Arvada to be evacuated while the Arvada PD did a bomb search.

The individual who had caused the worries did not have an explosive, but he was carrying both a big-ass knife and a supply of crystal meth.

Wow. This isn't the first scare of the sort, either. When my folks were returning from their vacation last month, Mom related the story of their ride out of Flagstaff:

When we came back from having had supper in the dining car, we were pulling out of Trinidad [Colorado] and there was this guy sitting alone in our car, and he mumbled something at us. I didn't understand what he said, so I asked him to repeat himself. "All the way to the back. Go all the way to the back."

I quietly and firmly said, "No, these are our seats," and your dad and I sat back down in our regular seats. A couple of other passengers arrived back, as well, and then, a little bit later, one of the younger car attendants, who asked the man, "Is this your seat?" and, "Where's your seat? Where's your ticket?"

The man seemed quiet, calm, (it was really spooky) as he pronounced, "There's a bomb on this train." He told the attendant he had heard a couple of guys up in the observation car talking about blowing up the train, and they had a duffel bag with a bomb. They had already gotten off the train at the last stop, but they were going to blow up the train. When asked, he indicated he'd had a little to drink, but he didn't seem to be really drunk, just weird.

The attendant said, "Come on up to the observation car and show me what you saw."

The man refused. The attendant got more senior staff to help question the man, who continued to refuse to accompany them to the observation car. When the man was informed that he would either come with them to look for the bag or he would be removed from the train at the next stop, La Junta (his ticket was for the whole ride, all the way to Chicago). Without hesitation, the man said, "I'd love get off at La Junta."

Almost immediately, a crowd of passengers started arriving in the coach car, having been cleared out of the observation car. They were all aflutter, wondering what was going on, chattering and asking questions and such, but indicated that the conductor and attendants had simply said there was a little problem, and that they should take their regular seats.

I don't know how, but we arrived in La Junta forty-five minutes early. The city police were waiting at the station. After several minutes standing and talking with the police, the strange man shook hands with every member of the train staff still standing at the platform, shook hands with police officers, and was escorted to one of the police cars.

The cabin attendant came up to us and told us nothing was found, and asked your father and me if we were okay. We told him we were fine. Which we were.

The train waited at the station until its regular departure time, and then went on its way toward Denver, undisturbed by further incident.

I can't help but wonder why that one didn't get any news coverage... Friday, 20 April of this year... the week of VA Tech shootings.

21 32 dead in Virginia Tech shootings

I came to it a little late, but I've just spent the past hour and change watching the news on television. It's enough to have made this agnostic invoke a deity. Several times.

I don't know any more about the VA Tech shootings than anybody else does, which is to day I know nothing, really. Nobody has released the name of the shooter, nobody knows his motive (and it will likely be some time before anybody does). Nobody has answers, yet. We hear nothing.

Unfortunately, what's been going through my head has been the old Boomtown Rats' song, I Don't Like Mondays.

I remember.

It's worse, I think, when you grow up thinking that a school campus is your second home. As a child of a professor, with nearly all my friends being teachers' kids, I want to think that the schools and colleges are safe -- safer than my house. It just isn't so. Aside from the everyday savagery that kids develop and dish out, the large, lethal scale is not a one-time thing. And it isn't just Brenda Ann Spencer, or the boys at Columbine. It has happened repeatedly, over the years, and nothing we can do will prevent it from happening again someday. No matter what we do to try to protect the students and teachers, there is risk in everyday living.

I grieve for every life taken.

What media bias?

John Hinderaker at Power Line blog has the latest Global Warming bias piece from the AP. First, they interview the world's foremost scientific expert on hurricanes, then proceed to hold him up as an object of scorn for speaking out against Gore's shrill alarmism.

Further, they then cite the UN release as though it were scientific consensus, when it is, in fact -- like Gore's stuff -- political maneuvering. As John quotes and comments:

Gray's statements came the same day the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change approved a report that concludes the world will face dire consequences to food and water supplies, along with increased flooding and other dramatic weather events, unless nations adapt to climate change.

As we have noted elsewhere, the U.N.'s IPCC is a political body, not a scientific one, and its findings have been subject to withering criticism. But the AP implies that the U.N's report represents a scientific consensus. Next:

Rather than global warming, Gray believes a recent uptick in strong hurricanes is part of a multi-decade trend of alternating busy and slow periods related to ocean circulation patterns. Contrary to mainstream thinking, Gray believes ocean temperatures are going to drop in the next five to 10 years.

Now it's explicit. The elderly crank who "rails" and disagrees with the U.N. is not part of "mainstream thinking," notwithstanding the fact that, as the AP acknowledges, he is the world's foremost authority on hurricanes.

This is downright appalling, and far from honest journalism. Take this along with a spoonful of Carolyn O'Hara's TNR column handing gems from on high about how the new, independent, "citizen" sources for journalistic reports will never compare to the stuff that gets hashed out behind closed doors (the old "seeing sausages made" comparison crops up), and we have a not-at-all-surprising dose of arrogance from the High Priests of the Temple of "Knowledge" Sans Provable Data.

The more I see of this media sale of pseudo-consensus stuff, the more I am reminded of an old bumper sticker I saw when I was younger: "EAT SH*T. MILLIONS OF FLIES CAN'T ALL BE WRONG".

Exactly what are these people trying to feed us?

O'Reilly/Geraldo fight. News at 7. Nap at 7:05.

Gads! I thought once the morning newsy show was over, the discussion over Geraldo and his FoxNews compatriot Bill O'Reilly would die down a bit. After all, they were both concerned about the safety of American citizens.

It's just that each of them thought there was only one real issue at hand, in the case they were discussing: Geraldo says it's exclusively about drunk driving, and O'Reilly says it's about illegal immigration and border controls.

Guess what, fellers? It's about both. If the drunk who killed the two teens in Virginia had been deported when he had been first arrested many moons ago, the teens would likely still be alive. Yeah, that's about scofflaw illegal immigrants. And it's about drinking and driving (personally, I've lost too many who were near and dear to me to have much forbearance for the asswipe who drinks and then gets behind the wheel of a vehicle).

And, as a reminder, it's not the first or last time a drunk illegal immigrant has cost somebody's life.

There is no need to come to blows over which issue is greater, here. They're both huge.

And, there's really no news in these guys having shouted over the airwaves, any more than there is news when my seester and I debate. It's not the first stone falling from the edifice of Fox News, for crying out loud. That station will be around a long while, yet, unless the Left manages to outlaw free speech.

Boycotting the campaigns (until it really matters)

In case anybody missed my column following the interminable Oscars ceremony this past winter, there may be questions as to why I haven't really covered the current campaign for the '08 elections. Well, Anchoress has said it even better than I could:

I resent like hell that these politicians - all of them, but I seem to recall it was Hillary who started early, forcing everyone else to do so, as well - began their stumping and fund-raising two years before an election. Some of them - like Clinton - barely finished their re-election celebrations before reaching out their hands for ‘08 campaign funds.

They’ve decided to be in our faces for an excessive period of time, and the acquiescent media is allowing it by covering their every belch and hiccup, but that doesn’t mean I have to read it and get sucked into a pre-election vortex that has no business forming just now. Our “public servants,” duly elected to represent their states, are running back and forth across the country giving speeches, eating festival food and raising money, money, money instead of attending to the concerns of their constituents, voting on pending legislation, FUNDING OUR TROOPS and otherwise doing what they were hired to do.

I raise my can of Diet Coke to her, in salute to a woman who says what needed to be said. I'm with the Anchoress 100% on this.

I don't intend to discuss the campaign, either, until at least the primaries are actually upon us -- or unless something truly newsworthy occurs. Whichever comes first.




I forgot to give credit where credit is due -- hat tip to Gateway Pundit.

A Funny idea of "accountability"

I've been somewhat preoccupied this past few days, so I just got around to reading Michelle Malkin's roundup of useful info on the emergency budgets. What particularly caught my eye (after Mike Pence's "salad bar at Denny's" comparison) was this gem:

"Today, we are demanding accountability," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.

This from a guy who voted for a whopping

$500 million for emergency wildfires suppression; the Forest Service currently has $831 million for this purpose;

$400 million for rural schools;

$283 million for the Milk Income Loss Contract program;

$120 million to compensate for the effects of Hurricane Katrina on the shrimp and menhaden fishing industries;

$100 million for citrus assistance;

$74 million for peanut storage costs;

$60.4 million for salmon fisheries in the Klamath River region in California and Oregon;

$50 million for asbestos mitigation at the U.S. Capitol Plant;

$48 million in salaries and expenses for the Farm Service Agency;

$35 million for NASA risk mitigation projects in Gulf Coast;

$25 million for spinach growers;

$25 million for livestock;

$20 million for Emergency Conservation Program for farmland damaged by freezing temperatures;

$16 million for security upgrades to House of Representatives office buildings;

$10 million for the International Boundary and Water Commission for the Rio Grande Flood Control System Rehabilitation project;

$6.4 million for House of Representative’s Salaries and Expenses Account for business continuity and disaster recovery expenses;

$5 million for losses suffered by aquaculture businesses including breeding, rearing, or transporting live fish as a result of viral hemorrhagic septicemia;

$4 million for the Office of Women’s Health at the Food and Drug Administration; and

A minimum wage increase, which is the subject of separate legislation.

Wasn't this emergency bill supposed to be for the funding of our troops' needs in Iraq?


Yeah, I can see how there might be an emergency requirement that we rush through $16 million for security upgrades to House of Representatives office buildings. After this stunt, they will probably need more protection. They'll have to hire mercenaries for the job, too, since they're obviously not going to get much support from honest working soldiers or their friends and families. So I'll give 'em that.

But how do the bulk of these other items relate to Iraq, again? Account for that, please, Mister Van Hollen.

Gratuitous postcard: USPS offers a shockingly big deal

Okay, so it's not shocking, but it's still a big deal. Even though the postal service is going to increase their rate for a first-class stamp this summer from 39 to 41 cents, the big-ticket deals are coming down, especially for those of us who have no restraint and send great honking epistles to those who put up with us. The heavier letters will have a decrease in the add-on costs for "overweight" letters.

So, in the world of letter-sending, it pays to be a little tubby, I guess.

More interesting still, the USPS is introducing a "forever" stamp, which, if you go spend all your cash in May when they release these stamps and stock up on them, will be good for a standard letter, no matter how often or how much the rate increases in the future. I think I'll seriously consider hoarding a batch for when I have to send out my wedding invitations or my funeral announcements (more likely sooner than the wedding).

Of course, the way I keep my records and my office supplies, I'll have invested in a coupla hundred of the little blighters, only to have no clue the next day where I stashed them. Or, I'll end up trading them for a handful of magic beans. Some of us are like that.

Still, it's an interesting way to get people to invest in the future of hard copy communications.

This calls for a postcard. Maybe I'll even send one via USPS, this week.
Nah. This'll do.

new and shocking

Cukes dropped on Louisiana!

Mayhem came to Iberville Parish in Louisiana, Sunday, as somebody dropped a mess of cucumbers on their highway.

If only people understood the hidden dangers of a proliferation of cukes!

Dangerous rise of unrest in China

Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit has the news that there has been a massive riot in China, complete with torched police cars and injured citizens and police. The official excuse for the unrest is the "rising public transport costs", but commenter Jacksonian has a bit more background on the troubles:

The official corruption is, I believe, the cronyism being shown for handing out loans by the Beijing government, which has caused the rate of non-payment on those loans to skyrocket. Estimates place between 30-60% of China's GDP to be grounded on bad loans. If you start to foreclose on the loans people go out of work, if you don't foreclose the infrastructure collapses under debt load as investment dries up and the production capabilities are seen as unsustainable. Which they are. The rapid 'modernization' and 'capitalism' introduced in the 1980's has been funneled to those that are well connected with the Communist regime.

The surface affluence still does not address the vast number of rural poor, poor living conditions even in cities, the rapid overpopulation of cities, no pressure to repay on loans, no market pressure to use work-efficient equipment as there are so many unemployed as to make labor cheap, and a slow liquidation of civil society as the information revolution puts cheap, modern telecom and storage into the hands of the unemployed. This is a confluence of crony capitalism, at best, and State directed capitalism at worse, rapid decay of family structure, large movements of populations to anywhere good jobs might become available and the slow undermining of the agricultural base of China by that rapid movement of mostly young and educated Chinese to the cities.

Please, read the whole thing.


Of course, similar problems plague the state of IL, on a smaller, nonlethal scale (one hopes it will stay that way). Cronyism, corruption, half-a$$ed financial management, the collapse of family structure and values... who'd a thunk they might bring about chaos? Is there some way our own small problems can be solved? If so, could the solution for us be applied to China? or is it too late for both?

It does grow harder to remain optimistic about anything.

The Scooter Libby verdict

(Via Hugh Hewitt) Gabriel Schoenfeld has some cogent thoughts on special prosecutors and their results.

Most damning:

We obviously cannot know whether the feckless Clinton would have acted more vigorously abroad had he not gone to sleep every night that year thinking about how to escape from the legal consequences of his own tawdry conduct and lies, and been thinking instead about how to protect the country from its enemies. But all of us have paid a price for having a President distracted from his duties by an unbounded investigation of his private life in a year that his Secretary of State came to call “all Monica, all the time,” but should have been all counterterrorism, all the time. The bill for Clinton’s fun and frolic, and for our own, was only to come due on September 11, 2001.

Now, unlike in the 1990’s, we are at war. We do not yet know what the price tag will be for the Libby distraction, just as we do not know if his conviction will be tossed out on appeal or result in a presidential pardon. But in its broadest ramifications, the case, which arose out of an internecine dispute about the quality of foreign intelligence, augurs ill for any President’s ability to gather and evaluate the intelligence provided by subordinate agencies like the CIA, to formulate foreign policy, to defend what it has formulated from bureaucratic warfare waged by such subordinate agencies, and to keep our country secure.

So the results could very well be long-reaching outside the legal circles, if, indeed, this undermines the intelligence capabilities of the WH.

It still bothers me, too, that we have had a non-Constitutional witch-hunt going on during two consecutive president's stays in office, neither of which hunt did any genuine good for the nation or for the truth.

Libby lied. So did Clinton. So, it seems, did Patrick Fitzgerald -- who is not, so far, being prosecuted for obstruction of justice, for his part in concealing the truth that Armitage was the leak, and for concealing that he knew this long before he first questioned Libby.

I hope to all that is Holy and Constitutional that we will never see another special prosecutor again.

Scooter gets Martha'd

This just in from Fox News: Jury in I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby Guilty on Four of Five Counts in CIA Leak Trial

Yeah, I think the jury should have been found guilty, too. (I don't know if Fox plans to correct their punctuation on this headline).

This postcard is for Scooter, for what he got:

Railroaded!

He'd darn well better not get any jail time, unless the DOJ go back and get some real justice for Sandy Berger, too.

Dammit, we ordered legs!

A couple in Michigan opened up a package delivered to their home this week to find a human liver and part of a head. They had been expecting the parts to a table they had ordered, but instead found bubble-wrapped pieces of persons, intended for research:

"My husband started to unwrap one and said, 'This is strange, it looks like a liver,' " Ludivine Larmande said. "He started the second one, but stopped as soon as we saw the ear."

Now, that's the kind of delivery system I've grown to know and love.

Kent County sheriff's deputies determined the preserved body parts were for medical research. Authorities think 28 more bubble-wrapped human organs and body parts could be dispersed across the country.

I can't wait to see what I'm getting, instead of my birthday books (hint hint)...

We're gonna keep this train a-rollin'

The news and the bloggers have been all over the attack by as-yet-unnamed terrorists against the Friendship Express, the new train run between Pakistan and India commemorating their peace treaties.

I have a thing against people attacking trains, in general (except when I'm watching a good-old-fashioned western movie. It's all about context). Going after this one, though, gets me more than a bit steamed.

I have to admit, though, I like the Captain's perspective on the events: Hatred Fails To Derail Friendship Express.

Train kept a-rollin' ...

NBC to add another hour of newsiness to morning programming

According to the wires, NBC is promising to add a fourth hour to its morning show, "Today." I can hardly wait until September, now. They'll surely show "sad and pathetic" O'Reilly who is fair and balanced on the airwaves, won't they? After all, I've never heard a single word of political commentary or bias come from a news anchor on NBC... but then, who needs words?

Train kills woman -- where's the follow-up?

Last night, two of the late-night local television news programs reported that there had been an unidentified woman killed in a train-auto collision near Rio, IL.

Reports indicated that she had stopped by the tracks, then rolled onto them just as the freight train approached.

That is all.

There has been no follow-up from either station or their website, no coverage in the local papers.

It seems to me, no matter where it happens, when somebody gets killed, the event should be noted by the local newspapers, at least. This especially applies to communities in which the changing of a local restaurant's menu meets the standard for publication as "news". We're not a densely populated region. We don't have drive-by shootings as a common occurrence (there was one in Galesburg, last year, or so they say, and that about covers that).

We do, however, have lots and lots of trains. I'm listening to the Amtrak whistle as I type (yes, I can tell by the time, tone, speed, and direction that it's not one of BNSF's monster freight trains a-comin' thru'. It's the California Zephyr, bound for Denver, and on to San Francisco. What a great ride! sigh. but I digress).

It might be useful if the local media reminded people that we actually have lots and lots of trains a-comin' thru' each day and night, especially since there's a whole lot of rural landscape around those tracks, and not so many gates as there are crossings. The news of a death by locomotive impact should be front page material, around here, both because it is newsworthy, and because people need to know the dangers in the region.

My respects to the family of the unnamed woman lost last evening.


Update: An anonymous commenter shows me I missed a major source: The Galesburg Register-Mail ran a front-page article the day after the accident. I don't know how I skipped them, since they're the one reliable outlet among all the news media in the region. My repectful apologies to their staff, and my thanks to the commenter.

Carter: Left out in the cold

More and more of those who were once believers in Saint Jimmy are now apostates. This week, fourteen members of the Carter Center advisory board tendered their resignations, citing Carter's book as their prime reason for no longer wishing to affiliate themselves with his cause:

In their letter of resignation, the members of the Center's Board of Councilors wrote of Carter, "you have clearly abandoned your historic role of broker in favor of becoming an advocate for one side."

I have no doubt that this will influence fund-raising for the center, but am equally certain that it will not reverse the attitudes of the sanctimonious peanut farmer. It also will likely make some of Carter's leftist fans start spouting even more offensive remarks about Israel and the "Jewish Lobby".

I can only hope that the rational members of Western society are finally starting to get a clue about this man, and the damage he has done.

(link to article via Instapundit)

Gratuitous postcard: Cutting through the mountain...

After I watched the President's speech last night, I'm beginning to think the White House has actually started paying attention to polls, and the POTUS is getting ready to level a few neighborhoods in and around Baghdad.

Gateway Pundit has some nice stuff, too. And, he points out that, with Saddam gone, Iraq's economy is improving. That's one successful "surge" in Iraq... and one more to go.

As a follow-up, it seems, Condi Rice kicks butt.


Update: I've often wondered what it is that the Dems think they're accomplishing by kvetching nonstop, never offering any reasonable alternatives to the plans put forth by the Prez. I mean, Harry Reid, for example, spends hour upon hour of media time shrilly proclaiming that the President's plan is wrong, and, when asked how he would solve the problem of terrorism and Iraq, he says, in essence, "that's not my job, man!" In that, he's right. Foreign policy is the job of the Executive branch. But, if he's so sure he has all the answers, why doesn't he offer a few to the POTUS, just as a basic courtesy as an American citizen? He criticizes everything, and offers no useful advice. Can it possibly be that Reid has no plan except the nasty mother-in-law approach?

The plan, as I read it, is fairly simple: We're the hired help, there to clean house. We've been washing the floors constantly, and the animals keep tracking muck all over the house after we finish. Now, we send in a few extra troops to block the doors so the animals can't come back in, and they help scrub the dark corners. Plus, we get the homeowner trained to (a) keep the animals out on days when we're not coming in, and (b) clean up for themselves, so our services will soon be no longer required.

In theory, it could work. As long as the homeowners don't let in the neighbors to start peeing on the rugs.

A cause for worry: no prosecution of leakers

I've always had faith in our Constitutional system, that it applies to all citizens of this great country. Today, I'm facing a serious crisis of that faith.

As reported (via Power Line) by New York Sun's Josh Gerstein, the people who broke a multitude of laws in their partisan efforts to undermine the elected government and influence policy are not going to be prosecuted, because the investigations were blocked by those under investigation.

Guys like Sandy Burglar and half the sniggering would-be puppet masters can walk because there is no cooperation between the FBI and the CIA, and thus some people are apparently above the law.

The problem I have with the whole thing is that they labeled the CIA "the victim agency". Yes, the leaks were ostensibly CIA information, i.e., property stolen from the agency, but the victims here, it seems to me, are the general public, who have had their freedom, their elected government undermined by a handful of creeps who fancy themselves to be policymakers ahead of those who were actually officially hired by the public to do the job.

Sorry about the run-on sentences, but, by damn, I'm too angry to be concise.

These anal apertures think they can run our country! Well, I'm sorry, but I didn't vote them into the White House, and neither did any other loyal, true Americans. If they're planning their little coups, they can damned well be brought up on trial like any others who would make such an attempt, overtly or covertly.

I am sick and tired of the privileged few walking away laughing at the rest of us peons. It is time the Department of Justice got its act together and started living up to its name.

And, any agency which interferes in the honest seeking of justice ought to see itself defunded. Start with the CIA and whichever office(s) in the State Department has been playing footsie with the NY Times.


Update, 11 Jan: more from Scott Johnson at Power Line, well worth reading.