What keeps my skin so young-looking?

Well, not mine, personally, since I keep mine looking wrinkle-free by filling it internally with another double-chocolate doughnut and a scoop of frozen custard... but, if this particular piece is true, then some folks are making their skins all pretty in a truly disturbing fashion:

Neocutis’ key ingredient known as “Processed Skin Proteins” was developed at the University of Luasanne from the skin tissue of a 14-week gestation electively-aborted male baby donated by the University Hospital in Switzerland. Subsequently, a working cell bank was established, containing several billion cultured skin cells to produce the human growth factor needed to restore aging skin. The list of products using the cell line include: Bio-Gel, Journee, Bio-Serum, Prevedem, Bio Restorative Skin Cream and Lumiere.

The very idea that somebody took fetal tissue to turn it into a cosmetic treatment is seriously abhorrent. I can hear the justifications, already, though: "The thing was already dead, so what's the big deal? It would have gone to waste, otherwise."

Well, the thing is, the thing was a human being. It did not die a natural death, but was taken untimely. And now it's being used not to save lives, but to make somebody feel pretty. It's not entirely unlike like putting grandma out of our misery because her medical care is inconvenient to us, and then saying, "As long as she's not using them, can I have her teeth for a necklace and matching earrings?"

Granted, the article says the tissue sample from the aborted fetus was (a) donated willingly and (b) very small, and granted, most of the stuff (the "human growth factor") used in the cosmetic product is grown in a laboratory from said small sample. And, I'm sure people have built great medicines from small samples of stuff I don't really want to know about. I acknowledge that wonders come from unlikely and unseemly sources. Bread mold, pond scum, bee stings, snake bites -- who knows what unsavory thing will help cure the next big disease? Still, it seems to me this is an ugly little foot in the door to much more sinister possibilities -- and no, I don't necessarily mean "Soylent Green." Once we have a marketable product to be made from something only grown from aborted babies, how do we restrict the trafficking of the unborn for such a business? How do we prevent poor young girls from virtually reducing themselves to slaves of a new, modern sex trade? What other "unwanted" lives do we throw away to satisfy the unending hungers of hedonists?

Where is the line drawn on the value of life? What dollar amount marks the end of humanity?

What if Obama wins, and wins only by fraud?

What happens if, first, Obama were to win this election, and second, it is proven at some not-too-much-later date that he won by dint of election fraud (thank you, the exportation of Chicago-style politics of ACORN, et al)? Does the nation have to live through an impeachment proper, or does he simply get removed? Does the country have to go through another election to replace him, or does McCain get the office by default? How does our Constitution cover that? How do our courts deal with such a possibility? What would that do to the two-party system we have? How will our nation survive such an assault from within?

In light of all the cases now coming up in the pivotal states, where investigations have been launched, where Obama-allied ACORN offices have been raided, where evidence is already clear that there is fraud, I don't think this is an entirely unreasonable set of questions.

Question of the day

Remember when there was a fuss over John F'ing Kerry's military record having not been released, even after he promised we'd have it, pronto? And we're still waiting, four years later...

Well, so far, most of the information on Barack Obama's background lies buried, still. Everything from his birth certificate (in my mind, a non-starter, but tinder for the bigger, more burning questions, nonetheless) to his academic record to his deeper financial connections (how does he afford that house, Mr. Rezko?) to his history with his employers' law firm in Chicago is singularly unavailable to the general public. And members of the public have actually asked why we don't get to see all this, when it's standard practice for candidates to provide transparency. And, then there's the question of hows come the media haven't gone a-huntin' this stuff...

This morning, the Bat asked, "Why is it that Chicago's press could go digging around in sealed court records to find out about the non-scandalous 'scandal' of Jack Ryan's divorce, and could ruin one of Obama's opponents by doing the same, but can't seem to dredge up basic – even public – records about Obama?"

About my luggage...

With the announcement all over the news that American Airlines is going to start charging for each and every checked bag on flights, I started to wonder: when they lose my bags next time, will I get reimbursed merely for the $15 they charged me for getting it there, or will they do the honorable thing and give me enough to replace what they lost? Shouldn't some of that gas money for shipping a bag go into a real insurance policy, too? Or is that too much incentive for the to hire competent baggage handlers?


The decision to bill folks for extra weight is completely understandable and logical, with fuel prices increasing. Nevertheless, if you itemize costs, the company becomes directly accountable for the items. Just adding a general increase in ticket costs for everybody would, I imagine, have been safer for them in the long run.

I am the nerd thy god

And this test says so.



As if I needed to take a test to find out... much less run it twice, as John Palmer did (HT his way). Of course, I'm only the second-born child of a proudly-and-pragmatically-pocket-protector-wearing, slide-rule-using retired particle physicist/astronomy-physics-math-and-computer-sciences professor – a man who took a similar (albeit more extensive) nerd test with his colleagues at a nuclear research facility a decade and more ago, and, having no knowledge of Star Trek, Star Wars, or any sci fi movies/series, still managed to come out with the highest score among nuclear physicists and engineers. They say it was the pocket protector which put him over the top.

My Pop is a god among gods of Geekdom. I am but a lowly nerdworm, by comparison.

How do you rate?

I wonder how many points one gets for prolonged celibacy? Hmmmm.

I'm shopping for a new paper

I've been published in the local dinomedia for nearly six years, now. More than two hundred eighty columns have I submitted, and, except for a couple of occasions when electronic communications faltered, the paper has run my column each time, at no cost to me.

I've done this work largely as my inexpensive version of psychotherapy (it keeps me focused on something other than my being depressed or manic or whichever), and as a sort of salute to the community, I guess. The powers that be know I'm not in it for the money, or the glory, or any such nonsense. In the first year or two, every day I'd read some far-left character trying to convince himself and the world that he was a centrist, when, in fact, that person would think the Daily Kos was a conservative site. Mostly, I started it because there didn't seem to be a regular conservative voice published in the region -- only the occasional letter from a member of the college's business department and the not-quite-so-rare piece by another faculty member (this time, from the history department), leaning heavily toward book reviews, not so much the political and regional commentary.

I rather considered myself a "townie," offering a separate perspective for the community to agree with or pick apart, as it saw fit.

I still do.

Unfortunately, for two weeks in a row, the paper has failed to run my words, and has offered me no reason, no excuse, no apologies for ignoring my work. Did I write something they felt was too offensive to be printed in small-town press? Perhaps it was the mention of a commode, in the header? Perhaps somebody threatened them with a lawsuit if they allowed me to continue to point out hypocrisy in the enforcement of unconstitutional laws? I really don't know. Nobody has bothered to reply to my inquiries.

Therefore, if you know of a print -- or internet -- news outlet in search of a moderately conservative columnist who works cheap, please let me know, or let the editors know I'm available.

One thing, though: I don't do Windows.

I hang my head in abject shame as I ask...

I realize that certain thoughts are beneath me, are, in fact, very, very wrong, but, in light of recent weather reports, I still caught myself wondering this:

All the towns in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and other points Middle-American only a couple of years ago made room for evacuees from New Orleans, and now they're getting deluged. Is there a message in all of this flood water?

I should give credit where due: this painting is by Edward
Hicks, and the image was sticky-fingered into my p-shop,
from Wikipedia

What's the difference?

Ed Morrissey asks the question of "what difference exists between this and the hate-crimes legislation that I opposed two weeks ago."

The case in question is of Jonathan Paul, member of the Earth Liberation Front and the Animal Liberation Front -- a radical anti-scientific-research, anti-development, generally anti-human organization connected to PETA -- standing trial for arson terrorism. This is, right here and now, different from plain arson due to the intent to force the majority population, by fear, to follow the radicals' agenda.

The acts of which Paul stands accused are attempts to undermine this constitutional democratic republic's rule of law. His action isn't aimed at anybody special -- it's aimed at everybody. This is a deliberate threat to our entire free nation, in much the same way as any other treason, petty or grand.

But in a later post, Morrissey says

I'm starting to think that hate crimes and terrorism designators both take us down a dangerous road. If the criminal act doesn't carry enough deterrent through normal penalties, then increase the penalties for everyone who commits them -- whether it be battery, arson, or murder. Let the motivation prove the crime rather than become a crime in itself. Otherwise, we invite a thought-police mentality that will ensnare American liberty more than it does evil.

Ed is right. It is a dangerous road to start down -- having special laws for intent... but then, isn't that always the case? After all, the difference between plain old manslaughter and murder is often one of intent. "I didn't mean to kill him," can get a person out of jail (well, maybe with a fine and probation) nine times out of ten, if the argument is well presented. But if your intent was to kill and leave his body parts across seventeen states so he'll find it hard to rise again on Judgment Day, well, heck, see you in Marion, eh? The difference between prosecution for shoplifting and going home embarrassed is, did you really mean to run out from Victoria's Secret into the Mall's Food Court with that unpaid-for bra draped across your arm? (And, no, it didn't happen to me. It's hypothetical, okay?) Did he really need those 300 kilos of heroin for his own use, or is he a dealer? Did she drive over her ex-husband thirty-seven times because she hoped to teach him a lesson or did she just think there was something goofy going on with her left rear tire? The whole issue in most criminal cases involves intent.

A young man I once knew burned down a building in a town quite far from here, because he liked to watch those sexy fires. He is a danger to anybody who owns a flammable structure, but, by and large, that's the extent of his threat.

Jonathan Paul, on the other hand, was networking to do damage far beyond just watching the pretty colors of the flames. Intent matters.


"Hate crime" laws, on the other hand, are designed to declare or create one or more protected classes, and an act against one of those classes is not necessarily an act against the entire nation. There is often no crime other than expressing an ugly opinion -- as in the case of the Illinois high school girls.

In some ways, I see the laws describing and limiting "hate speech" and the like, as much of an assault on our free nation as Paul's fires are. It is again the tyranny of the few, and in both cases, it's done in all arrogance, by others who in reality don't give a rat's patootie about any of us, "for our own good" and for their own gain.

And, sadly, the latter of Ed's two posts rather nicely reinforces our apparently very similar opinion of those "hate crime" laws.

More about free speech case in Finland

Baron Bodissey has posted an update or five on the Mikko Ellilä case as it comes up before the long arm of the law...

The one thing to point out is that few, so far, actually like the sort of thing that Ellilä says -- it is silly, offensive, even racist. What this is about is a person's right to speak (or blog) his mind.

How do simple statements of belief suddenly morph into a threat to the public? There is no evidence that, in his blog -- anywhere -- Ellilä did anything more than say some things which many rational people would deem impolite. There seems to be no call to rise up in violence against others, there is no finger-pointing or crying "fire" in a crowded theater.

If the decision goes against people like Mikko Ellilä, when will they start globally tracking down and arresting those who truly do incite people to violence?

As a free, educated American, I do not understand the drive of a portion of any nation -- especially those whose histories are chock-full of liberties -- to limit freedoms. Do the people who press for speech codes, who press for "hate crimes" laws, who press for special treatment for certain categories of citizens not understand that, eventually, the legislation will backfire on them? Do they not understand these laws as genuinely hypocritical, as well as, over the long run, indefensible and unenforceable?

How does plain, ordinary, brutal violence become something "special" when it comes accompanied by a racial or sexist slur? How does one gauge whether a savage "spree" killer is worse because he was motivated by racial hatred or by a perceived social slight? Don't results count for anything, these days?

And where is it written that free people have the right to be protected, by law, from having their feelings hurt by some arrogant or spiteful nonsense? I guess we're approaching the day and age when, in the freest nations, sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will get you twenty years in Marion.

Will somebody please stop Pelosi?

Nancy Pelosi was made Speaker of the House last year. She does not merely represent a small constituency -- she is supposed to be a leader of the electorate. Why, then, is she consistently meeting with enemies of the people of the United States of America while she refuses to meet with our leader and the leaders of allied nations? Why does she refuse to support aid to our allies based upon rumors, but encourage continued aid to enemies of all civilization, regardless of cold, hard facts? This woman even voted against her own country, last year, on a bill stating that we had the right to continue to defend ourselves and our best interests as a nation, in the Global War on Terror.

Why has this woman not yet been charged with treason? Or, at the very least, sent up for violation of the Logan Act?

Is America Ready?

John Hinderaker, at Power Line, asks of this Yahoo! 60 Minutes ad

if he might rephrase that, so I took the liberty of applying his question to a new version of the graphic:



It's small, and yet not too humble, I think.

A poser on Presidential/Congressional Powers

Mom asked a really good one, today: How long, exactly, has it been required of the POTUS that he gain approval of Congress for the appointment of field commanders? Isn't he the Commander In Chief? Doesn't that, ostensibly, grant him the power of promotion at the highest levels? How's come Petraeus had to be approved by Congress in order to replace Casey?

I understand that Casey need Congressional consent to be made Chief of Staff... but isn 't the rest of this business the President's Constitutional turf? Or does it fall under the Legislative section by virtue of the following section of Article 1? :

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

Has this really been the standard practice all along, and we've just never noticed it until Dubya took command and the rancor got turned to "eleven"? Or is it relatively new?

Wow, I really haven't been paying attention, have I?