Pope Likely To Receive Feeding Tube

It appears the Pope John Paul II is likely to return to the hospital to have a feeding tube inserted into his stomach due to difficulties swallowing.

Pope John Paul II may have to return to the hospital to have a feeding tube inserted, an Italian news agency reported today. It stressed that no decision had been made.

The APcom news agency, citing an unidentified source, said the 84-year-old pope might have to have the tube inserted to improve his nutrition since he is having difficulty swallowing with the breathing tube that was inserted Feb. 24.

APcom said the idea of inserting a feeding tube was a hypothesis that was being considered. The procedure involves inserting a tube into the stomach to allow for artificial feeding.

Earlier today, the Italian daily Corriere della Sera reported that the pope's doctors were considering a new hospitalization next week both to perform tests on the breathing tube and to adjust his diet because of problems swallowing.

There was no comment from the Vatican. Nicola Cerbino, a spokesman at Polyclinic Gemelli hospital where John Paul was rushed twice last month, called it media speculation.

Another newspaper, La Repubblica, quoted the pope's Vatican physician, Dr. Renato Buzzonetti, as saying doctors are "reasonably calm" about the frail pope's condition.

This does not sound unlikely to me, given the problems the Pope has had with speaking and swallowing. Inserting the tube is very much in keeping with Catholic teaching on medical ethics, which does not hold feeding tubess to be extraordinary treatment, but rather views the provision of nutrition and hydration as ordinary care which is mandatory unless it causes medical harm to the patient.

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Once Again, Prayers For Falwell

As I said when he was hospotalized some weeks ago, I have a number of points on which I disagree with Rev. Jerry Falwell. That said, my prayers are with him during this new period of critical illness.

The Rev. Jerry Falwell is critically ill but "clinically stable" after being admitted to Lynchburg General Hospital shortly before midnight Monday with respiratory arrest, hospital officials said yesterday.

Falwell, 71, one of the nation's leading religious conservatives, was driven to the hospital by his wife, Macel, after complaining of shortness of breath.

"He lost consciousness just as they got to the hospital," spokesman Ron Godwin said. "He slumped over as they were getting there."

He was immediately placed on a ventilator and quickly stabilized, according to the hospital's statement. Doctors expect more details on his condition today.

A hospital spokesman said physicians are trying to determine if Falwell had a relapse of pneumonia.

Falwell was said to be alert and responding to questions, at times by eye contact or nodding.

May God reach out and touch His son, Jerry, and restore him to health; and may He provide a spirit of peace and comfort to the Falwell family.

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Johnnie Cochran -- RIP

I was shocked to hear the news.

Johnnie L. Cochran Jr., the masterful attorney who gained prominence as an early advocate for victims of police abuse, then achieved worldwide fame for successfully defending football star OJ. Simpson on murder charges, died this afternoon. He was 67.

Cochran died at his home in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles of an inoperable brain tumor, according to his brother-in-law Bill Baker. His wife and his two sisters were with him at the time of his death.

My prayers are, of course, with the Cochran family at this time. Whatever disagreements I had with the man (and they were many), I still feel a touch of sadness at his death.

It is also my hope that the US Supreme Court does not use his death as a reason not to decide the case it heard involving an injunction on free speech against one of his critics. While the injunction died with Mr. Cochran, the issue of a complete ban on speech is too important to allow it to be buried with him.

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Muslim Group Seeks To Muzzle Critics Of Islam

CAIR, the Council on American Islamic Relations, is seeking to punish National Review for daring to publicize and promote books critical of Islam.

A Muslim civil rights group is urging the Boeing Company to stop running ads in the conservative National Review magazine. The Council on American-Islamic Relations objects to the National Review's promotion of books that "attack Islam and the Prophet Muhammad." Those books include "The Life and Religion of Mohammed," which, according to the magazine's review, exposes the "ugly truth about the founder of the world's most violent religion"; and "The Sword of the Prophet," which "gives the unvarnished, 'politically incorrect' truth about Islam -- including the shocking facts about its founder, Mohammed; its rise through bloody conquest; its sanctioning of theft, deceit, lust and murder." In a letter to Boeing CEO James A. Bell, CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad "respectfully" requested that Boeing "address the concerns of Muslims worldwide by withdrawing its advertising support from a magazine that actively promotes anti-Muslim hate." Awad said a copy of the letter would be sent to ambassadors of Muslim and Arab nations in Washington, D.C. Boeing does business with Arab-owned airlines.

I've got a better idea. In light of certain unpleasantness in the fall of 2001, why don't we demand that Boeing cease doing business with all airlines in the Arab world. Better yet, why not stop doing business with all airlines based in predominantly Muslim countries. And while you are at it, stop selling military technology to those countries, too. At least until followers of Islam stop engaging in anti-American terrorism.

And while we are at it, when will the IRS, DOJ, and Homeland Security conduct a thorough investigation of CAIR, an organization with numerous documented connections to terrorist supporters, terrorist groups, and individual terrorists?

And as for Muhammad, from what I can tell from my reading of the Koran and various historical material drawing upon Islamic sources it sounds to me like the books have characterized him correctly.

UPDATE: I put something in whilte typing and forgot to delete it before posting. I was politely asked to fix it. Due to the extremely nice manner in which I was asked, I removed it.

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Whose Side Are Presidents Bush And Fox On?

I have to ask that question in loght of recent statements calling the members of the Minuteman Project "vigilantes" and "racist migtant-hunters."

And I have to ask whether they are comfortable with the fact that they are on the same side as these folks in opposing what is little more than a glorified neighborhood watch group?

Members of a violent Central America-based gang have been sent to Arizona to target Minuteman Project volunteers, who will begin a monthlong border vigil this weekend to find and report foreigner sneaking into the United States, project officials say.

James Gilchrist, a Vietnam veteran who helped organize the vigil to protest the federal government's failure to control illegal immigration, said he has been told that California and Texas leaders of Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, have issued orders to teach "a lesson" to the Minuteman volunteers.

Where is the concern about these real vigilantes, gentlemen? You know, the vicious predatory gang-members who are out to injure and kill Americans who just want their nation's laws enforced and their nation's border respected.

The MS-13 gang has established major smuggling operations in several areas along the U.S.-Mexico border and have transported hundreds of Central and South Americans -- including gang members -- into the United States in the past two years. The gang also is involved in drug and weapons smuggling.

Gang members in America have been tied to numerous killings, robberies, burglaries, carjackings, extortion, rapes and aggravated assaults. Authorities said that the gang has earned a reputation from the other street gangs as being particularly ruthless and that it will retaliate violently when challenged.

On the otherhand, the Minutemen are going to great lengths to avoid violence -- not that the public an tell that from the overblown statements comming from the two presidents.

"We're not worried because half of our recruits are retired trained combat soldiers," Mr. Gilchrist said. "And those guys are just a bunch of punks."

More than 1,000 volunteers are expected to take part in the Minuteman vigil, which will include civilian patrols along a 20-mile section of the San Pedro River Valley, which has become a frequent entry point to the United States for foreigner headed north.

About 40 percent of the 1.15 million foreign nationals caught last year by the U.S. Border Patrol trying to gain illegal entry to the United States were apprehended along a 260-mile stretch of the Arizona border here known as the Tucson sector.

Many of the Minuteman volunteers are expected to be armed, although organizers of the border vigil have prohibited them from carrying rifles. Only those people with a license to carry a handgun will be allowed to do so, Mr. Gilchrist said.

An operational plan calls for teams of four to eight volunteers to be deployed along the targeted 20-mile stretch of border at intervals of 200 to 300 yards, along with observation posts and a command center.

Mr. Gilchrist said some of the patrols and posts will be right on the U.S.-Mexico border, while others will be located farther north. The volunteers also have been told to "make lots of noise and burn campfires at night to be very visible."

According to guidelines issued to the volunteers earlier this month, organizers said they expect that they will be targeted by various protest groups and others and that some protesters would try to provoke confrontations.

"If we are to send the message loud and clear to President Bush and Congress, it is imperative we stay within the law," Mr. Gilchrist said.

"If one single person steps over the line for their personal gratification, we are all stained with that irresponsible behavior and labeled forever as a fringe element that embarrasses all who are counting on us to make this historic statement," he said.

In other words, the Minutemen are taking precaustions to avoid violence, while these street-thugs and the usual band of left-wing malcontents are outstop them from engaging in legal activity. And yet somehow the two presidents see the Minutemen as the bad guys in all this, and are united in their opposition to their lawful activities.

Sadly, someone is likely to die during the month of April along the Arizona/Mexico border. Even more sadly, it might be one of the Minutemen, folks out there trying to do the right thing for their country. And the blame will belong on the shoulders of two presidents who have done little to stop the flow of border-jumpers into this country, and have defamed those who think they should.

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War On Foie Gras?

You can abort a baby until birth. You can starve a family member to death. But if legislators in Oregon, New York, Illinois and Massachusetts get their way, it will be illegal to possess foie gras. Laws on the books will already ban the food in 2012 if the industry cannot prove its practices humane.

At issue: the force feeding technique used to produce fattened duck liver.

For the final two weeks of their lives, a stainless steel tube is inserted into the throat of waterfowl twice a day and a measured amount of partially cooked corn is pumped down the esophagus. The technique packs on the pounds quickly, creating a fatty liver.

Some say the protesters -- and now legislators -- are clueless, and scoff at the idea that birds whose livers alone are worth $75 a pound are mistreated.

Now I don't eat the stuff -- it is too expensive and sounds nauseating. Maybe it is just a matter of my having a pedestrian palate. I mean, I have no interest in sushi, either. And my consumptionof veal is rare because of the price tag, not because of any concern about the conditions in which the calves are raised. We are, after all, talking about animals. But others disagree with me.

But Gene Bauston, co-founder of the animal rights group Farm Sanctuary, says the pictures and videos of foie gras farms show force-feeding is a "cruel and unnecessary practice" that should not be legal.

"There are certain things that are beyond the bounds of acceptable," Bauston said.

Yeah, there are, Mr. Bauston, and the force feeding of ducks doesn't even cause a blip on the moral radear-screen for me. How can your moral compass be so out of whack that you would spend one minute on this misguided crusade of yours?

Genocide in the Sudan.

The horrors of abortion.

The starvation of Terry Schiavo.

Those are things that are beyond the bounds of acceptable.

So while I don't like how the ducks are treated and would never consume foie gras myself, I won't be joining your campaign.

But don't call me pro-cruelty-to-animals.

Call me pro-choice.

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The Silencing Of A Blogger

I didn't agree with GayPatriot on many things, and only wandered on to his website from time to time as a way of seeing what a different type of Republican thought about current issues. Last week, he made a post that may have been ill-advised, referring to two prominent homosexual activists as terrorists due to their outing campaign against Republican homosexuals and their staffers (both are partisan Democrats who conspicuously protect homosexual Democrats and their staffers).

Within hours, the post was gone and GayPatriot disassociated himself from his own site, which he turned over to heis blog-partner, GayPatriotWest.

For the full story, which I will not recount here (because Christian Grantham does a better job than I would), go to this link at Outlet Radio Network. Suffice it to say that one of those he criticized began harrassing GayPatriot, his secretary, and his boss, threatening a national boycott of GayPatriot's corporate employer.

And these people claim they are all about freedom -- I guess that is only the freedom to agree with them.

(Hat Tip: The Central Front)

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You Can't Argue With Some People

I had a conversation recently about the Schiavo case. It went something like this.

"I can't believe how disgusting all you conservatives are! How can you people believe that this is right? The stuff that you and that woman's family are puttingher and her poor husband through! You should all be ashamed. It's just wrong."

"Well,y--"

"Stop it! Don't say another word! You people are just sick!"

Needless to say, it was over at that point. No place for discussion, debate, or rational presentation of views in any of it. Just a set of exclamations and declarative sentences, and a command that I not even attempt to speak a word on behalf of those who might oppose Michael Shciavo's decision.

Sadly, that is reflective of the state of public dialogue today. Pat Sajak comments on that phenomenon in a column in Human Events.

Recently, for example, I was discussing the United Sates Supreme Court with one of my many Liberal friends out in Los Angeles when she said, without any discernable embarrassment, that Justice Anton Scalia was “worse than Hitler.” Realizing she wasn’t alive during World War II and perhaps she may have been absent on those days when her schoolmates were studying Nazism, I reminded her of some of Hitler’s more egregious crimes against humanity, suggesting she may have overstated the case. She had not; Scalia was worse. As I often did when my parents threatened to send me to my room, I let the conversation die.

Aside from being rhetorically hysterical -- and demeaning to the memory of those who suffered so terribly as a result of Hitler and the Nazis -- it served to remind me of how difficult it is to have serious discussions about politics or social issues with committed members of the Left. They tend to do things like accusing members of the Right of sowing the seeds of hatred while, at the same time, comparing them to mass murderers. And they do this while completely missing the irony.

The moral superiority they bring to the table allows them to alter the playing field and the rules in their favor. They can say and do things the other side can’t because, after all, they have the greater good on their side. If a Conservative -- one of the bad guys -- complains about the content of music, films or television shows aimed at children, he is being a prude who wants to tell other people what to read or listen to or watch; he is a censor determined to legislate morality. If, however, a Liberal complains about speech and, in fact, supports laws against certain kinds of speech, it is right and good because we must be protected from this “hate speech” or “politically incorrect” speech. (Of course, they -- being the good guys -- will decide exactly what that is.)

Now I will grant that there is plenty of self-righteous superiority on the Right as well as teh Left. I know certain folks on my side of the political fence with whom one cannot have a discussion without being presumend to be morally and mentally defective for disagreeing with them on some point or other. But this characteristic, dating back to the 1960s, seems particularly common among the radical Left -- and it is that segment of the Left that often seems to develop the political memes that dominate debate on the Left. The result is an impoverished public discussion.

The rhetoric has become so super-heated that, sadly, I find myself having fewer and fewer political discussions these days. And while I miss the spirited give-and-take, when Supreme Court Justices become worse than Hitler and when those who vote a certain way do so because theyÂ’re idiots, itÂ’s time to talk about the weather.

I miss that spirited give-and-take as well. Not just because I love a good argument, but because I think it ultimately harms the country as a whole.

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Outcry Essays

For over half of my teaching career, I taught English. Even now, when I get a summer school assignment I usually end up teaching an English class. That means grading a lot of student writing. It also means learning a lot about your students that you never do in another subject. That is what they are finding as they grade this year's TAKS essay.

Each year, hundreds of students use the essay portion of the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills test to write about being abused, neglected or raped, education officials say.

Others write about being depressed, or wanting to die or hurt themselves or others.

Such essays fall under the state's definition of an outcry, and school officials have a legal and ethical obligation to report the revelations to law-enforcement officials.

You get those in the classroom, too. One term each year I had students writing about "an event that changed your life." Over the years I was flabbergasted by what I got from my students. I was also heartbroken.

One sweet young lady wrote about being molested by her youth pastor several years before, and I had to report it to the school and CPS. I never did hear what happened to the guy. I lost track of her after she graduated.

Another girl wrote about the death of her father and how she blamed herself for it. She had her best friend over one night for a sleep-over, and her father offered to wait for them to ride along to KFC for a bucket of chicken. They preferred to stay swimming in the pool, and her father was killed by a speeding truck on the way home with dinner. Last I heard, she should finish college this spring, majoring in elementary education. I hope she comes back to the district.

One of my boys told the tale of going straight while being robbed of his drug money. When I challenged him on the veracity, he lifted up his shirt and showed me two entry and two exit wounds. He later became the first kid I wrote a college letter of recommendation for, and the first in his family to attend and graduate.

One guy wrote a chilling paper entitled "The Night I Killed A Man." His father had heard a sound in the living room and had gone to check it out. When the student heard a fight between his dad and a robber, he ran into the kitchen, grabbed a knife from the butcher block, and plunged it through the robbers back, killing him before they could even call the police. He was 16-years old. I know he talked about joining the Marines, to get away from the folks who were threatening revenge.

I read papers about drug rehab, crushing personal losses, and becoming a parent-too-soon in the ninth grade. I learned about the thrill of victory, first kisses, and getting saved one Sunday at church. I exulted in the glories that these kids experienced, and bled over the many hurts they had experienced. It was the assignment I dreaded most, and which took the most out of me. Mandated by my district, it was one of the things that was steadily pushing me to the point of burnout and reinforced my desire to teach in my major field, history. And yet, I sometimes miss that chance to really know my students, something that I don't always get to do now.

That a child or teen would write about something so personal or traumatic on a state test "isn't logical at all when you look at it from the outside," said Catherine Ayoub, an associate professor at Harvard University's Medical School and Graduate School of Education.

But "this is the most anonymous way that you can tell," so it's "absolutely what you would expect," Ayoub said.

And it is also because they know that the essays are going to be read. It is unfortunately way too easy to tell a kid you don't have time for them, even if you want to talk to them about a situation -- the bell just rang and you've got 28 other kids in class to attend to, you've got duty in the cafeteria, or there is a faculty meeting after school that you can't miss. The counselors at my school are nothing more than glorified (at best semi-competent) schedule-makers, each with a case-load of 400 students who they might never meet. The administrative team is made up of some really great people, but their one of their major issues is discipline and so some of the kids who most need them tend to avoid them. But that essay is a chance for them to say their piece and be heard -- they hope -- and so they spill their hearts out on those lines and hope that what is there will be taken seriously. It is true in the classroom, and true on the TAKS test.

You might wonder, how old are the kids who give these "outcry" responses on the tests? How common are they? What are the prompts that give them such freedom?

Texas labeled 688 essays as "outcry" last year and 592 in 2003, a fraction of the pool of more than a million essays.

The writing section of the 3-year-old TAKS is designed to give students flexibility — opening the door for personal essays.

"There are so many things that children are bringing to school" nowadays, said Chuck Hoffman, executive director of student and social services for the Fort Worth school district.

Students in Texas must write an essay for the TAKS in grades 4, 7, 10 and 11. Although the TEA flags outcry essays at all grade levels, most appear at the seventh-grade level.

Students are free to express themselves on the TAKS because the writing instructions are less formulaic than on past achievement tests, including the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills.

The essay instructions are broad: "Write an essay explaining the importance of accepting others as they are" or "Write a composition about an adventure you had."

Students can use any writing approach, such as cause and effect, or problem and solution. Essays can be narrative or philosophical.

The TAKS gives students more latitude in their essay writing than other state tests. For example, last year's test included this instruction for 10th-graders: Write an essay about the impact another person can have on your life.

Frankly, I don't know whether to be shocked by how many such essays the state gets, or how few. In a classroom setting, there is at least a relationship that exists and a level of trust between student and teacher. That doesn't exist on the test, which might be a good thing for some kids or inhibit others.

Do we, as teachers, listen closely enough to what our kids say? Do we take their writing seriously enough? They need us to do so. They have a lot to say. There's so much that they need to have heard. We need to give them a chance to get their message through.

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Welcome To The Conservativehome.com Blog

The Conservative Party in the UK is starting to get into blogging. One new entry is conservativehome.com, which has a very good blog.

The website — conservativehome.com — is being started today by Tim Montgomerie, who was political secretary to Iain Duncan Smith when he was Tory leader and was head of the Conservative Renewing One Nation unit under William Hague.

It is independent of the Tory party, though supportive of it, but the website will inevitably be seen as the start of a fresh debate about where the party should move in the event of a third successive election defeat.

The website combines the concepts of a think-tank and online newspaper and its aim is to provide a forum for the revival of Conservative thinking and policies. Mr Montgomerie is an expert on American politics and the way that the Right has used websites to bypass the mainstream media, which is felt to be broadly hostile to conservative ideas. It is funded by donations from private individuals.

I've been, I like, and I'm linking.

Take this entry, for example, just from the first day of operation. It is a tranlation guide from Leftish to English.

As an occasional feature, this blog will bring extracts from the Leftish Phrasebook. Leftish is a confusing and complex language with many variants. It is widely used amongst the political and media classes in Britain and other countries. In recent years Modern Leftish has emerged as the dominant dialect and is the main language of administration, however Old Leftish still lingers on -- especially among the cultural elites. Of course, many terms are common to both forms of the language.

Leftish -- English

Foetus -- Baby

Let Terri Schiavo die -- Starve Terri Schiavo to death

The right to die -- The right of someone else to kill you

A woman's right to choose -- I'm not listening anymore

This shouldn't be an election issue -- This might lose us votes

Investment -- Spending

Tory cuts -- A marginally slower rate of growth in government expenditure

Society -- The state

The community -- The state

Our so-called democracy -- Democracy

You can't impose democracy -- We wish you wouldn't remove dictators by force

International law -- Whatever's fine by Russia, China and France

Secular -- Atheist

Multifaith -- Everything/nothing is true

Rational -- The stuff we believe.

Conservative brothers and sisters in the UK, we welcome you! If this is a sample of what we can expect (along with the much more serious pieces that I just loved), you are a welcome addition to the blogosphere.

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What Next -- The Return Of Pogroms?

Anti-Semitism has a long, unsavory history in Russia. Sadly, it looks like it may be back.

About 5,000 people, including former world chess champion Boris Spassky, have signed a letter asking prosecutors to ban Jewish organizations because they believe one of the basic Judaic books professes religious hatred, said a center that monitors religious freedom.

The group sent the letter to the Prosecutor General's Office last Monday, the Sova center said last week.

The signatories claim that "Kizur Shulkhan Arukh," an abbreviated version of a 16th-century book that lays out daily rules for Jews, teaches hatred toward non-Jews, Sova said.

Moscow sculptor and head of the obscure nationalist All-Russian Cathedral Movement Vyacheslav Klykov, a signatory of the petition, confirmed the report, Interfax said.

A Prosecutor General's Office spokeswoman could not immediately confirm Friday that the petition had been received.

You can find what you want in various books about faith and spirituality in any religion. I somehow doubt that these folks are interested in considering things from their own Russian Orthodox religious heritage.

Would they dare to be consistent and support banning the Russian Orthodox Church? I didn't think so.

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Sex-Offenders In The Classroom

And no, I'm not talking about the teachers. I'm talking about the students.

Police across the state often fail to inform schools officials about young sex offenders in their classrooms because of confusion about Illinois law - confusion that could put students at risk, according to a published report.

An Illinois registry with the names of about 1,100 juvenile sex offenders is largely kept secret, unlike lists of adult offenders that are readily accessible via the Internet, the Chicago Tribune reported in its Sunday editions.

A law adopted in the 1990s requires sheriff's police to inform schools when a juvenile sex offender enrolls. However, with some police interpreting the law differently, that doesn't always happen.

Even when school principals ask some police departments for the names of juvenile offenders who might be attending their schools, the information is not given.

Fortunately we don't face that problem down here in Texas. Juvenile sex-offenders end up on the statewide list that you can access from the Internet. Sadly, I've found former students there. And when a student is charged with such an offense (as with violent felonies), the kid is immediately removed from the classroom pending adjudication and placed in a highly-structured alternative setting where they are under constant supervision.

Sounds like the Illinois situation is absolutely out of control. Take this case.

One East Peoria woman, who was not identified by the Tribune, saw first hand how the notification law on juveniles does not seem to be working as intended. She learned that a boy who was found guilty of molesting her 7-year-old son ended up in a class with her older teenage son.

The 16-year-old was registered as a sex offender. Because of the disarray surrounding the notification rules, however, that information never got to the school.

East Peoria Community High School officials said later that they were thankful the student's mother brought the matter to their attention. They say they are now more vigilant.

Scary, isn't it, that we now have to watch the kids, not just the adults, for convicted sex-offenders.

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Dangerous Voters

Well, conservative Christians of various stripes are organizing in Ohio. The movement is non-denominational, grass-roots, and based on social issues. GOP leaders are keeping close tabs, and activists in other states are waiting to see if the model is successful. So reports The New York Times.

But my favorite quote comes from one of the most conspicuous voices for "religious liberty" in the country.

Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said the Restoration Project might have greater impact because it was more homegrown and had ties to a wider array of denominations than previous groups like the Moral Majority.

"This represents a new wave in organizing on the part of conservative evangelicals," Mr. Lynn said. "From my standpoint, as someone who doesn't agree with their conclusions, this is a more dangerous model."

So, citizens getting organized, active and voting is dangerous if you don't agree with where they stand on the issues? Would your preferred model be that of Cuba or the people's Republic of China, where such people know their place is in the catacombs?

Posted by: Greg at 11:23 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Widow And Children Soldier On

In time of war, we often see the name of a soldier, dead too soon, in the local paper. Perhaps we get funeral coverage if it is a local hero. But rarely to we hear more, about the struggles of those left behind. Today's Houston Chronicle shares one such story.


Karren Warren / Chronicle
Patty Mora Guereca, whose husband, Jose Guereca Jr.,
was killed in Iraq in November, is left with four children,
from left, 5-year-old twins Angel and Nathan, Jose, 2
months, and Rolando, 7.

MISSOURI CITY - Her daily dreams are vivid and always include her husband, Sgt. Jose Guereca. The dreams always end with Guereca not coming home.

The 24-year-old Army sergeant died Nov. 30 in Iraq during his second tour of duty to the war-torn nation. He was the 25th Houston-area service member to die in the war.

"I miss him so much. The kids miss him, too," said Patty Mora Guereca, 23, who was left a widow with four boys younger than 7. When her husband died, Patty Guereca was seven months pregnant with the couple's fourth child.

The past few months for Guereca have been trying, to say the least. The young mother had to bury her husband, move herself and her then three children from Fort Hood to her mother's Missouri City home. She gave birth to her fourth child — Jose Alejandro Guereca III — on Jan. 11.

A month after the baby was born, Guereca headed to Fort Hood to tend to moving issues while her mother-in-law kept the newborn. Guereca ended up rushing back to Houston when the baby's congestion turned into a respiratory infection and pneumonia, and landed him at Texas Children's Hospital for four days.

For now, Guereca and the four children are living with her mother and a younger sister,although she intends to purchase a home in nearby Stafford soon. Life-insurance benefits, aid from the Veterans Administration and generous donations from the public have allowed her to stay home with her children and not have to work.

Even with the generosity of strangers, it won't be easy for Mrs. Guereca. Widowed at 23 with four young children. But she has an outlook that can only be admired -- an outlook she learned from her husband.

Normalcy for Guereca means getting up at 6 a.m. to get 7-year-old Rolando ready for first grade and at his bus stop by 7:10 a.m. She has a little down time in the afternoon after she drops off her 5-year-old twins, Nathan and Angel, for afternoon kindergarten.

"It's been hard," Guereca told the Chronicle. "But I just keep thinking of my husband. He was so positive. He'd say, 'For every problem, there's a solution.'

We have lost over 1500 soldiers in Iraq. I've not been able to locate a figure for those who have died in Afghanistan. I won't even pretend to be able to tabulate the number of those seriously wounded and left disabled in those theaters of war. We owe them and their families a debt of gratitude. And we owe it to them to do what we can to help their families.

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No "Reporter's Privilege" For Bloggers -- Or Reporters

David Shaw takes up one of the more vexing questions facing the blogosphere today – “Are bloggers entitled to the same constitutional protection as traditional print and broadcast journalists?”

His response? As one might expect from a card carrying member of old media, the answer is an emphatic NO!

BLOGGERS require no journalistic experience. All they need is computer access and the desire to blog. There are other, even important differences between bloggers and mainstream journalists, perhaps the most significant being that bloggers pride themselves on being part of an unmediated medium, giving their readers unfiltered information. And therein lies the problem.

Shaw then goes on to explain how the various and sundry levels of filtration his writing is required to pass through before percolating into print entitles him to protections that others, members of an unmediated medium, don’t deserve. Yes, he argues, folks like him in the mainstream media make mistakes, but there are consequences to those errors. We are members of a “solipsistic, self-aggrandizing journalist-wannabe genre” that doesn’t deserve the same sort of protections and deference that Shaw and his fellows believe is theirs by virtue of their special status as journalists.

And therein lies the problem with Shaw’s analysis. He believes that he and his fellow “journalists” are some sort of anointed high-priesthood, granted special exemption from the rules that apply to we mere mortals due to a single clause in the First Amendment. The problem is that he is fundamentally wrong. The Constitution confers upon journalists NO SPECIAL RIGHTS OR PRIVILEGES.

Consider the words of the First Amendment

“Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press...."


Do you see some special status for journalists there? I donÂ’t. I see no greater deference given to a reporter or an author that is not there for every person who engages in speech. It isnÂ’t there, unless one wishes to engage in penumbra hunting among the emanations of shadows of the text of the Amendment. But a special status for the press is simply not there in the plain meaning of the text. Thus, any special status exists by statute, not by right. And if this special status exists by statute, it strikes me that it is a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, in that it creates an inequality in the protection of the laws. Thus, any special status conferred by law is constitutionally suspect.

So I will take my stand right here and right now – no, bloggers are not entitled to any special status reserved for journalists, or any exemptions carved out for them under the law.

But then again, neither are the journalists themselves.

Either the First Amendment provides a right to speak and publish freely to all of us, or it does not. Any other view is at odds with the spirit of the Constitution itself.

Posted by: Greg at 10:54 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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An Abortion Outrage

I've hesitated to comment on the this story, but I think it may be time to say something. I've seen it several different places, so I guess I'll add my voice to it.

GRANITE CITY - A southern Illinois woman was arrested last week (March 17) after trying to intervene on behalf of her 14-year old daughter's effort to have an abortion. The girl was allegedly taken to an abortion clinic by the mother of the man allegedly to have impregnated the 14-year old.

According to the girl's mother, her 14-year old daughter was called off from school in Madison County by a woman posing as the girl's “grandmother.” The woman took the girl from her home only minutes before the girl’s mother returned home from work.

It was later determined that the woman who had posed as the "grandmother" to the school authorities was the mother of the male who had fathered the unborn child the 14-year old girl was carrying. The age of the male has not been released.

When the parents were notified their pregnant daughter was not at school, they suspected she had been taken to the Hope Abortion Clinic in Granite City. The parents and grandfather were the only persons authorized to request school absence for the fourteen year old female.

So what we have here is an outrage. Mom and dad were denied the right to even speak to their daughter, despite the fact that the daughter heard her mother AND ASKED TO SPEAK TO HER while waiting for the "procedure".

This is in keeping with stories I have heard from folks who have dealt with Hopeless "Clinic" in the past. The individuals involved in these stories have become active in the prolife movement, and have told them at public events, so I am not violating any confidences in telling them. You see, Hopeless "Clinic" was the facility that "served" the diocese I studied for and the school I taught at when I lived in the area.

One of my friends, whose pro-life activism came after her underage daughter was "treated" at the facility, told me the story of her family. It seems the daughter went to prom, and she agreed to allow her daughter to spend the night at her boyfriend's house because (she assumed) that the kids would sleep in separate rooms. Wrong -- mom and did let the kids share a bedroom, with the not terribly surprising result. The daughter missed two periods, and didn't tell mom because she was afraid and ashamed (sin does that to a person -- read Genesis). Also, boyfriend and his mother were "encouraging" and abortion -- and on what was supposed to be an outing to St. Louis took her instead to the clinic while browbeating her to abort. She was 30 miles from home, sitting in the cab of a pickup between mom and boyfriend, and was driven to the "clinic" for the "procedure." She was coerced into signing and going through with the abortion, and then dumped home when it was all over.

Mom and Dad found out that after noon what happened. They (mom, dad, and daughter) requested the medical records, and Hopeless "Clinic" refused to produce them, then claimed they could not be found. It took a court order to get the records -- and it turned out that the daughter was never pregnant in the first place! That was why Hopeless had fought to hard to "protect a woman's right to privacy" from her own attempts to gain information about her own medical treatment!

And then there was one of my own students. She was pregnant, and wanted to talk to her boyfriend, another one of my students. She wanted to keep the baby, but the boyfriend didn't want the responsibility, and was afraid of losing the chance to go play baseball at a major midwestern university (I hear he is still in the minor leagues). He persuaded her that an abortion was the best thing, though she still wanted the baby. He got her as far as the Hopeless "Clinic" parking lot before she said no. He parked against the fence around the lot, told her she wasn't getting out of the car or going home until she was no longer pregnant. Hopeless "Clinic" staff came out and supported the boyfriend, telling her it was normal to be nervous and doubtful. She went in and was aborted -- even though before the procedure started she told the abortionist that she didn't want the procedure. She tells me the abortionist simply sedated her said "Just you hush, now, you'll feel much better about this when it is all over."

Several months later, during the Senior Class retreat, I mentioned something in passing about the pain of losing a wanted child (my wife and I had our first miscarriage two weeks before). She came to me a while later to talk -- and we talked for a very long time as she poured out her heart. I helped her get counseling, and put her in touch with someone who helped her get legal aid. But it seems that Hopeless "Clinic" and other facilities are immune from liability for performing a surgical procedure once you sign the consent form, because they do not record oral revocations of consent to protect themselves.

So as you might imagine, I am not surprised to read about the case in the story. Hopeless "Clinic" is in it for the money, not to help girls and women. They don't care is consent is real or coerced, so long as they get paid.

Posted by: Greg at 10:49 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The Easter Proclamation

EXSULTET
(RealAudio)

Rejoice, heavenly powers! Sing choirs of angels!
Exult, all creation around God's throne!
Jesus Christ, our King is risen!
Sound the trumpet of salvation!

Rejoice, O earth, in shining splendor,
radiant in the brightness of your King!
Christ has conquered! Glory fills you!
Darkness vanishes for ever!

Rejoice, O Mother Church! Exult in glory!
The risen Savior shines upon you!
Let this place resound with joy,
echoing the mighty song of all God's people!

My dearest friends,
standing with me in this holy light,
join me in asking God for mercy,
that he may give his unworthy minister
grace to sing his Easter praises.

The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give him thanks and praise.

It is truly right that with full hearts and minds and voices
we should praise the unseen God, the all-powerful Father,
and his only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

For Christ has ransomed us with his blood,
and paid for us the price of Adam's sin to our eternal Father!

This is our passover feast,
When Christ, the true Lamb, is slain,
whose blood consecrates the homes of all believers.

This is the night,
when first you saved our fathers:
you freed the people of Israel from their slav'ry,
and led them dry-shod through the sea.

This is the night,
when the pillar of fire destroyed the darkness of sin.

This is night,
when Christians ev'rywhere,
washed clean of sin and freed from all defilement,
are restored to grace and grow together in holiness.

This is the night,
when Jesus broke the chains of death
and rose triumphant from the grave.

What good would life have been to us,
had Christ not come as our Redeemer?

Father, how wonderful your care for us!
How boundless your merciful love!
To ransom a slave you gave away your Son.

O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam,
which gained for us so great a Redeemer!

Most blessed of all nights,
chosen by God to see Christ rising from the dead!

Of this night scripture says:
"The night will be as clear as day:
it will become my light, my joy."

The power of this holy night dispels all evil,
washes guilt away, restores lost innocence,
brings mourners joy;
it casts out hatred, brings us peace,
and humbles earthly pride.

Night truly blessed,
when heaven is wedded to earth
and we are reconciled to God!

Therefore, heavenly Father, in the joy of this night,
receive our evening sacrifice of praise,
your Church's solemn offering.

Accept this Easter candle,
a flame divided but undimmed,
a pillar of fire that glows to the honor of God.

Let it mingle with the lights of heaven
and continue bravely burning
to dispel the darkness of this night!

May the Morning Star which never sets
find this flame still burning:
Christ, that Morning Star,
who came back from the dead,
and shed his peaceful light on all mankind,
your Son, who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

Posted by: Greg at 10:21 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Stuff The Starbucks Cup

I don't drink Starbuck's coffee. Heck, if I drink a half-dozen cups of coffee in a year, my consumption is way up. Not that I'm not a caffeine-freak -- my blood is carbonated and if I'm ever hospitalized they'll need to hang a two-liter bottle of Coke Classic from the IV stand.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I don't necessarily have a dog in this fight.

But it seems that some folks are bothered by Starbuck's "The Way I See It" campaign. They've taken quotes from several dozen scholars, athletes, activists, and other "celebrities" and placed them on their coffee cups. Personally, I think it is a really neat idea. Anyway, the issue that has been raised is that the selectees and quotes, where they have an ideological bent, skew Left.

The quotes aren't all that inflammatory, though several mirror Starbucks' hallmark tall-grande-venti pretentiousness. Take this one from film critic Roger Ebert: "A movie is not about what it is about. It is about how it is about it."

The problem, critics say, is the company's list of overwhelmingly liberal contributors, including Al Franken, Melissa Etheridge, Quincy Jones, Chuck D. Of the 31 contributors listed on Starbucks' Web site, only one, National Review editor Jonah Goldberg, offers a conservative viewpoint.

Considering Starbucks sells millions of cups of coffee each day - some specialty drinks at $4 and up - it's no surprise some customers have complained to Starbucks' Web site, labeling the campaign "offensive" and the company a proponent of "the destruction of family values and virtues."

"I want to enjoy your product without having Earth Day Network propaganda thrust at me," wrote Malachi Salcido of East Wenatchee, Wash.

Yvette Nunez, a 27-year-old Republican from Tampa, said she hadn't noticed the quotes on her weekly caramel machiattos. On "tall" cups, the text is obscured by a cardboard sleeve.

"There are a lot of great conservative quotes, but oh well," she said. "I'm not surprised. I'm used to being under-represented."

Now Starbucks claims it is not out to be ideological.

Company spokeswoman Valerie Hwang said the goal is not to stir up controversy. She said the company has lined up 60 contributors with "varying points of view, experiences and priorities" in an effort to promote "open, respectful conversation among a wide variety of individuals."

Each cup also bears a caveat letting customers know that the quote is "the author's opinion, not necessarily that of Starbucks."

"The program is such that we're not requiring our customers to read," Hwang said, "but rather the quotes are there for our customers to discover and enjoy."

Now the company claims it is open to suggestions from the public for future quotes. Let's take them at their word. My challenge to you is to find your favorite quote from a living individual, preferably conservative, and submit it to Starbucks. Don't be radical or outrageous -- give them something thoughtful. After all, these are liberals who have never encountered a thoughtful conservative other than Jonah Goldberg. I've got at least two individuals in mind (one conservative, one libertarian) who I think merit inclusion. And yes, liberals, you can play along as well. After all, a good quote that makes one think is always a good thing, no matter what the source. I mean, one of my favorites in the program comes from Al Franken.

"Mistakes are a part of being human. Appreciate your mistakes for what they are: precious life lessons that can only be learned the hard way. Unless itÂ’s a fatal mistake, which, at least, others can learn from."

-- Al Franken

It will probably end up being used in my classroom. And why not? We conservatives don't have the monopoly on good ideas.

Posted by: Greg at 07:48 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Tainted Honor

Being AWOL is a serious charge for a Marine. So why did Harpers place a group of Marine recruits reporting for basic training on the cover of their magazine for a story about military deserters?

The cover photo, taken at Parris Island, S.C., shows seven Marines lined up in their T-shirts, shorts and socks. They are not identified in photo credits or in the article. In fact, Harper's says the Marines are not meant to depict people in the article.

"We are decorating pages," said Giulia Melucci, the magazine's vice president for public relations. "We are not saying the soldiers are AWOL. Our covers are not necessarily representative."

A media observer said using real people as "decorations" for a story about deserters might go too far.

"Going AWOL is not a favorable or positive thing," said Kenny Irby, visual journalism group leader at the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, which owns the St. Petersburg Times.

Another issue is that the photograph was altered. One recruit's image appears lighter than the others, as if he were disappearing.

Gee, would you "decorate pages" with random photos for a story about sexual predators? Come on, people, think about what you are doing. You are implicitly charging them with a crime on the cover of your magazine. You are accusing them of cowardice in time of war and the betrayal of their oath "to uphold protect and defend the Constitution of the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic."

And consider how one Marine in particular feels about being depicted as "fading away" from his comrades in arms.

Lance Cpl. Britian Kinder, an active Marine who asked that his base not be identified, is upset.

"It does make me pretty angry that they would do something like this. I'm pretty much upset that they would do this without my consent."

Kinder's father believes the magazine should correct the impression it has made of his son.

"People recognize this picture," said Mickey Kinder of Pinch, W.Va. "Put another picture of him in the magazine and do a retraction. He's not AWOL."

It is bad enough that the magazine decided to publish an article painting cowards and malcontents as sympathetic, even heroic, figures. What is worse is that they decided to tar smear the honorable in the process -- for not one Marine on the cover of that magazine is a deserter.

UPDATE (3/29/05): It appears that Harper's has been stung by the criticism their way. They plan on running a "clarification"
about the cover.

"We're going to print a clarification in our next issue," said Giulia Melucci, a vice president at New York-based Harper's. "We feel it needs to be clarified that these are respectable soldiers defending our country honorably. We regret any confusion it may have caused."

Note, of course, that this isn't quite an apology for defaming those pictured. Nor does it deal with the blatantly anti-military (some would say anti-American) article that the cover promoted. Maybe Harper's would consider doing an article about what is right witht he American military, along with an actual apology for their maligning the good names of "a few good men."

Posted by: Greg at 07:20 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Conflict Of Interest

Ward Churchill is now to be investigated for academic dishonesty. But will it be a fair investigation? That is open to question, since three of the twelve panel members have already publicly defended Churchill, and refuse to recuse themselves in the investigation.

Records and news stories show at least three of the 12 members of the committee have come out publicly supporting Churchill's rights or questioning the university's ability to discipline him after he made statements likening 9/11 victims to a top Nazi and calling for other attacks on the United States.

Steven Guberman, associate professor in education, was one of nearly 200 Boulder faculty members who signed a petition last month defending Churchill's right to speak and protesting the preliminary investigation that ended Thursday. The faculty then took out an ad in a local newspaper with the faculty names.

Guberman said he will not recuse himself because he believes he can be independent in judging Churchill's work.

"They are two separate issues," said Guberman, who was appointed two weeks ago to the misconduct committee. "One is about freedom of speech. The other is about research misconduct."

Two other committee members, law professor Richard Collins and physics professor Uriel Nauenberg, were quoted in articles about Churchill.

How biased are the committee members? Collins has already made it clear that only the most outrageous incompetence will do.

Collins recently told the CU faculty newspaper that the university would have to prove that Churchill was unfit for his job. For comparison, Collins said it would take evidence comparable to the hypothetical case of a math professor who repeatedly declared two plus two equals five.

"It's tough to sack him," Collins said.

Not, of course, that it is likely that action will be taken. No one at the university can recall a case in the last 20 years in which the standing committee has disciplined a professor. Given the statements of the members, it is unlikely that there will be any action taken now, despite the overwhelming evidence of academic misconduct that has emerged.

Posted by: Greg at 07:01 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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First The Verdict, Then The Testimony

Remember the whole Wilson/Plame affair? Remember how we were ASURED that there was a crime there somewhere in the administration -- talk of Karl Rove being frog-marched out of the White House and Robert Novak rotting in prison?

Looks like the media has changed its mind on the matter. Funny what holding a couple of reporters in contempt for withholding evidence from a grand jury will do.

A federal court should first determine whether a crime has been committed in the disclosure of an undercover CIA operative's name before prosecutors are allowed to continue seeking testimony from journalists about their confidential sources, the nation's largest news organizations and journalism groups asserted in a court filing yesterday.

The 40-page brief, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, argues that there is "ample evidence . . . to doubt that a crime has been committed" in the case, which centers on the question of whether Bush administration officials knowingly revealed the identity of undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame in the summer of 2003. Plame's name was published first by syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak and later by other publications.

The friend-of-the-court brief was filed by 36 news organizations, including The Washington Post and major broadcast and cable television news networks, in support of reporters at the New York Times and Time magazine who face possible jail time for refusing to cooperate with a grand jury investigating the allegations. Those two organizations filed a petition Tuesday asking the full appeals court to review the case.

Let's get this straight -- now they are not sure whether or not there is a crime even though they told us there was? And they want the court to determine whether or not there was a crime BEFORE they will give the evidence necessary to indict someone? Seems to me they have the whole process ass-backwards. The testimony in question is necessary to possibly secure an indictment so that a trial can be held to determine if anyone is guilty of anything in the release of Ms. Plame's name.

Posted by: Greg at 10:04 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Quid Pro Quo Leads To School Board Member's Arrest

Leigh Heavin's husband needed a lawyer to represent him in his criminal trial. She called Steven C. Copenhaver, a Round Rock ISD school board member, and told him she didn't have much money but needed someone to represent her husband.

Most lawyers will reduce fees, do pro bono work, or otherwise help a client out. Copenhaver offered Heavin a deal.

Copenhaver told Heavin that they could work something out and asked her if she had any good-looking friends, according to the warrant. He told her that he had fantasized about two women having sex together, according to the warrant.

The next day, Copenhaver came to Heavin's apartment shortly after her sister-in-law, Malinda Tilley, had dropped in, the warrant said. Unknown to Copenhaver, it said, Heavin's mental health caseworker, her mother and her husband were in a back bedroom.

Copenhaver asked Tilley and Heavin to perform sexual favors for him, according to the warrant. When the women asked "what they would get out of this," Copenhaver said he would represent Heavin's husband, the warrant said.

Uhhhhh -- yeeee-ah. Words just fail me. As I'm sure words failed Copenhaver when Heavin's husband, mental heath caseworker and other relatives came out of the back bedroom and called the police.

And you've gotta love the wahoo who is the head of the school board. I imagine he was stunned, but surely he could have come up with something more than a statement that he didn't know how the arrest would impact Copenhaver's service on the school board. Isn't there a zero tolerance policy out there somewhere that might cover this situation?

And then there is this from the state bar association.

Dawn Miller, chief disciplinary counsel for the State Bar of Texas, said exchanging legal services for sexual favors could constitute a violation of rules barring "illegal or unconscionable" fees. Punishment could range from a reprimand to disbarment, Miller said.

Could constitute a violation of the rules barring "illegal or unconscionable" fees? COULD? Ya think?

Copenhaver has been charged with prostitution, and released on $750 bail.

Posted by: Greg at 09:37 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Anybody Else Troubled By This?

I loved chocolate-bunnies when I was a kid. And when i was in seminary, I raised a few eyebrows by giving some of my buddies a humorous product called "Just the Ears" -- a set of molded bunny-ears -- since they are usually eaten first while much of the rest goes to waste (the ears go to waste). I was accused of being disturbed by several of my humor-impaired classmates.

This product, on the other hand, is a bit more disturbing to me.

A symbol of Christianity that sits atop church steeples, dangles from necks and hangs on walls is now ending up in the mouths of the faithful, over the objections of some religious officials.

A mass-produced chocolate cross is being sold this Easter by Russell Stover Candies Inc. in about 5,000 stores nationwide, which experts say is apparently a first for a major American company.

"Obviously they've seen that there's a market for chocolate crosses at Easter," said Lisbeth Echeandia, a consultant for Candy Information Service, which monitors candy industry trends. "I don't see it growing tremendously but I think there would be growth in the Christian market."

However, not all Christians are happy about it. Chomping on a chocolate cross can be offensive to some, said Joseph McAleer, a spokesman for the Roman Catholic diocese in Bridgeport, Conn.

"The cross should be venerated, not eaten, nor tossed casually in an Easter basket beside the jelly beans and marshmallow Peeps," he said. "It's insulting."

They claim to be targetting the Hispanic market. The crosses are decorated with a floral bouquet and are filled with caramel made from goat's milk, a popular Latin America treat.

My initial reaction was "what's next -- a chocolate Jesus?" Not to worry, though.

Ward said Russell Stover considered making other traditional images out of chocolate but eventually opted not to.

"A molded Jesus, for example, would not be a good call and a cross with Jesus on it wouldn't be a good idea either," Ward said.

Am I being overly sensitive on this? Or is there really something "not quite right" about this product?

Posted by: Greg at 06:18 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Felons Purged -- After Their Votes Elect Democrat

More proof of vote fraud and election irregularities in the Washington gubernatorial election. It further raises the question of the legitimacy of the Gregoire administration, after Christine Gregoire won in November (on the third count of the ballots) by 129 votes statewide.

King County election officials purged 99 felons from the voter rolls yesterday as prosecutors announced they would challenge an additional 93 felons they claim are illegally registered to vote.

Officials said they will continue to scour the voter rolls for felons. They're acting in light of a Republican lawsuit challenging the validity of the razor-thin election of Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire and in response to a Seattle Times investigation that found at least 129 felons in King and Pierce counties had voted in the 2004 general election.

Earlier this month, Republicans released a list of 1,135 registered voters statewide who they said were felons who had not had their right to vote restored by a judge. Hundreds of those felons, however, appear to have been juveniles who did not lose their right to vote once they turned 18. Republicans said they are modifying their list.

Dan Donohoe, a spokesman for the county prosecutor's office, said his office is investigating nearly 800 alleged felon voters named by the Republicans.

The 93 challenges announced yesterday came from that list, and additional challenges are likely, Donohoe said.

Prosecutors mailed certified letters to the last known address of each of the 93 yesterday, alerting them to an administrative hearing March 31.

"This represents phase two of our ongoing efforts to remove the names of ineligible voters from the list that was referred to my office," King County Prosecuting Attorney Norm Maleng said in a news release. "We will continue this effort until all unqualified voters are removed from the list."

Democrats, of course, don't have anything to say about this clearly fraudulent election, while raising false claims and baseless allegation about the reelection of President George W. Bush. I've not seen Jesse Jackass Jackson out there talking about the disenfranchisement of legitimate voters and stolen elections. But then again, his girl (who worked to keep blacks out of her sorority as a college student during the 1960s civil rights movement) won -- and that's all that counts.

Count every vote -- but only count the legal ones.

Posted by: Greg at 06:00 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Kay Bailey Hutchison -- Break The Term-Limit Pledge

Let me say it -- I think term limits are a bad idea. While some argue that the current system deprives us of new blood and new ideas in government, I see term limit as depriving us of experienced leaders. I find voluntary term limits to be an even worse idea -- they force a politician to either break his or her word and appear hypocritical, or to abide by it even if that is detrimental to the best interests of their constituents. And that is the situation faced by the senior Senator from Texas, the Honorable Kay Bailey Hutchison.

Hutchison, back in 1994, promised not to run for a third full term in the Senate.

Hutchison made her promise in television ads and personal statements in 1994, and on election night she said:

"I've always said that I would serve no more than two full terms. This may be my last term, or I could run for one more. But no more after that. I firmly believe in term limitations and I plan to adhere to that."

Seems pretty unambiguous to me. I suspect that she may now recognize the problem of that simplistic scheme. She is now in the best position to benefit her Texas constituents and the nation as a whole with her relatively senior position in the Senate, but her own commitment will deprive the state of her services in the Senate, an institution in which seniority is critical. It's not that she is indispensable (no politician is), but rather than unless the term-limits apply across the board they are an act of unilateral disarmament.

The result is that she may run for governor. That means an ugly primary fight against the incumbent, Rick Perry, and comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, a GOP maverick (and mother of White House spokesman Scott McClellan). The winner will face an undetermined Democrat (possibly former Houston Congressman Chris Bell) and an independent, singer and author Kinky Friedman. A difficult GOP primary could mean trouble for the winner. And that would also leave open the possibility of a Democrat winning a Senate seat that would be secure if Hutchison seeks reelection. Currently only San Antonio Republican Congressman Henry Bonilla has publicly indicated interest in running in the event that the incumbent steps down, while no Democrat has stepped forward. That will change by the January 2006 filing deadline.

How ugly might the primary be?

Perry's campaign has been skirmishing with Hutchison and Strayhorn in recent weeks, releasing lists of endorsements and supporters around Texas.

Perry's campaign this week also admitted to having video taped Hutchison with U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton at a Washington speaking engagement in which the Democrat called Hutchison "my partner on so many important fronts."

"Any potential opponent, we're going to research, we're going to follow. Any good campaign would do the same," said Perry campaign manager Luis Saenz. "Any potential opponent should not expect a free ride."

Saenz declined to comment on Hutchison's term limit pledge, saying that was for "her to decide."

Perry is a scrapper, and I don't doubt that he would pull out all the stops to win. He doesn't seem interested in a "seat-swap' with Hutchison, either, running for her current job while she seeks his, in part because Bonilla would be a difficult candidate for him to beat in the primary. Besides, he knows that if he does not seek reelection, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst will file for the gubernatorial nomination, leaving that very powerful position (the Lieutenant Governor makes all appointments to committees in the state senate, including designating the committee chairperson) open for a Democrat challenger.

My preference is to see the Senator stay right where she is. I'd like to see the Governor and Lt. Governor stay right where they are. Jerry Patterson has already said he is staying put as Land Commissioner (a pretty powerful job in Texas, and one elected statewide), and I think the incumbent Railroad Commissioners (again, statewide elected positions with a fair amount of clout) are all staying put. The only person looking to move is Strayhorn, who would likely face a primary challenge after angering most everyone in the GOP the last couple years with her public criticism of budgets and fellow Republicans.

And so I'll say it right now -- Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison should break the two-term pledge. I believe that Texans will ratify that decision if she does by overwhelmingly reelecting her to the US Senate. I know this Harris County Precinct Chairman would do so even without the political disarray a decision to step down would engender. Kay Bailey Hutchison is good for Texas and good for America. She deserves another term.

Posted by: Greg at 05:14 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Left's Tainted Money

We hear all the time about the big businesss money that allegedly bankrolls the Right in this country. Now it is true that many entrepreneurs support the side that favors capitalism over the side that favors socialism. It's in their best interest. And it is folks on the Left (who favor socialism) who constantly decry the sins of those evil capitalists.

Unless the money is coming, for whatever reason, into the coffers of the Left.

Which brings me to the major funding source for last year's attacks on George W. Bush -- George Soros. Soros bankrolls Media matters, MoveOn.org, and a host of other leftwing groups. That's his right. But what happened to the principles of the left? Why are they not condemning Soros for his illegal and/or immoral financial dealings? Why are they still taking his money, when they insist that the Right forego any such "tainted" money?

The conviction of George Soros, the billionaire investor and former fund manager, on insider trading charges was upheld on Thursday by a French appeals court, which rejected his argument that his investment in a French bank in 1988 was not based on confidential information.

Soros, 74, now retired from money management but active as a management but active as a philanthropist and author, was ordered to pay a fine of €2.2 million, or $2.9 million, representing the money made by funds he managed from an investment in Société Générale. He said the purchase had been part of a strategy to invest in a group of companies that had been privatized by the French government.

Soros, of course, expresses no remorse over his crimes, and plans on keeping it different levels of the French and European court systems until well after his death. But the Leftis financier immediately went into political spin mode.

The ruling upheld a conviction in 2002 and followed an appeals court hearing last month at which the financier testified, saying he wanted the sentence overturned because "my reputation is at stake." While the fine is small relative to his assets, Soros testified then, the conviction is "a gift to my enemies."

See, its all about the politics. He'd gladly pay the money (equal to several times more than most of us will make in our lifetimes) if it were not for the impact on his reputation giving ammunition to his critics.

But this isn't the only time he's been involved in shady dealings.

In 1992, he became known as the man who broke the Bank of England, when his funds were said to have made a billion dollars betting that the British government would be forced to devalue its currency. By contrast, the investment in Société Générale was a very small one for him, a fact his lawyers argued indicated he did not think he had inside information.

This is the first criminal charge he has faced, but not his first run-in with regulators. In 1979, Soros signed a consent decree with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which had claimed he manipulated a company's stock by selling shares in advance of a planned public offering.

But as long as the money keeps flowing to the right Left activist groups, all is forgiven and covered up by the left-wing watchdogs of political donations.

UPDATE: This appeared in The Hill the other day.

House Republicans are taking the offensive in the burgeoning ethics war on Capitol Hill by circulating research that details links among Democrats, George Soros and government watchdog groups that have criticized Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) and the House ethics process.

The research shows that members of these groupsÂ’ boards have contributed tens of thousands of dollars to Democratic candidates and political organizations and several of their staff members have previously worked for Democrats. The groups have also accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Open Society Institute, an organization founded by Soros, who spent millions trying to defeat President Bush in last yearÂ’s election.

How independent are all these watcher taking tainted cash from a partisan criminal like Soros?

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Why A National AIDS Memorial?

I probably sound insensitive by asking the above question. It isn't meant to discount the tragedy and horror brought about by the disease, nor is it a slam at those who have been its victims or who have triumphed over it. But I have to ask why we have a memorial to a disease?

A design by two New York architects was declared the winner Wednesday in a competition to create a centerpiece for a 7-acre garden in Golden Gate Park, the only federally recognized AIDS memorial in the country.

"Living Memorial," by Janette Kim and Chloe Town, features a stand of black carbon fiber trees, a charred wood deck and a burned, bark-like walkway that in time will sprout greenery - elements borrowed from a fire-scarred forest to evoke a sense of loss and renewal.

"While the design is at first frightening, it is also rich with the eventual triumph of life," said Ken Ruebush, who co-chaired the international contest that drew 201 submissions from 24 countries.

Conceived in 1989 by a group of residents, the National AIDS Memorial Grove originally was designed as a living memorial that relied more on its natural setting than man-made features to send a message.

Its board of directors started talking about installing a more imposing structure once Congress gave the grove national memorial status in 1996, a designation shared by American icons ranging from the USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor to Mt. Rushmore, according to Ruebush.

Why not a National Polio Park next? Or a Malaria Monument? Why AIDS? Why ANY disease?

Posted by: Greg at 01:58 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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An Honor For The Pope

This is just a neat story -- one about an appropriate honor for one of the most beloved men of my lifetime.

The Italian region of Abruzzo said on Wednesday it will name a mountain peak after Pope John Paul II on the pontiff's 85th birthday in May.

The 2 424m peak in the Gran Sasso, a region of jagged mountains in central Italy often visited by the pope, will be named "John Paul's Peak" on May 18th, the committee organising the ceremony said.

"We decided on the Gran Sasso because the pope visited it many times, in order to get some rest as well as to pray," said Monsignor Luigi Casolini, a member of the committee.

"John Paul II chose these mountains not only because they reminded him of Poland," but also because a nearby church often visited by the pope in his stronger days - Saint Peter of the Ienca - "is a place where spirituality is in the air", said Casolini.

"This place always had a special place in the pope's heart. He likes to walk on the paths surrounding the mountains, and therefore a path will also be named in his honour," he added.

Posted by: Greg at 01:51 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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This Is Scary!

I pity the children who have been in this manÂ’s classroom.

A Bronx teacher who repeatedly flunked his state certification exam paid a formerly homeless man with a developmental disorder $2 to take the test for him, authorities said yesterday.

The illegal stand-in - who looks nothing like teacher Wayne Brightly - not only passed the high-stakes test, he scored so much better than the teacher had previously that the state knew something was wrong, officials said.

"I was pressured into it. He threatened me," the bogus test-taker Rubin Leitner told the Daily News yesterday after Special Schools Investigator Richard Condon revealed the scam.

"I gave him my all," said Leitner, 58, who suffers from Asperger's syndrome, a disorder similar to autism. "He gave me what he thought I was worth."

Brightly, 38, a teacher at one of the city's worst schools, Middle School 142, allegedly concocted the plot to swap identities with Leitner last summer. If he failed the state exam again, Brightly risked losing his $59,000-a-year job.

LetÂ’s see if you can tell the difference between the two men.

HereÂ’s Bright. HeÂ’s the teacher.



HereÂ’s Leitner. HeÂ’s the ex-homeless guy with a developmental disability.



Uh – yeah, they could be twins. Just add two decades, 100 pounds and a truck-load of skin-bleaching cream. I guess Bright really is stupid.

And if that didnÂ’t get you to draw the conclusion, try this part of the article out for size.

When The News went to Brightly's Mount Vernon home yesterday, a man who strongly resembled him insisted Leitner took the test on his own. The man, who appeared to be in his late 30s, denied being Brightly - saying he was the teacher's son.

Yep, he sounds like a real winner to me.

Posted by: Greg at 01:38 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Angry At The Presidents -- Bush and Fox

Quit sucking up to Pendejo Presidente Vincete Fox, Mr. Bush. You are close to losing the respect of this Texas Republican.

President Bush yesterday said he opposes a civilian project to monitor illegal aliens crossing the border, characterizing them as "vigilantes."

He said he would pressure Congress to further loosen immigration law.
More than 1,000 people — including 30 pilots and their private planes — have volunteered for the Minuteman Project, beginning next month along the Arizona-Mexico border. Civilians will monitor the movement of illegal aliens for the month of April and report them to the Border Patrol.

Mr. Bush said after yesterday's continental summit, with Mexican President Vicente Fox and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin at Baylor University, that he finds such actions unacceptable.

"I'm against vigilantes in the United States of America," Mr. Bush said at a joint press conference. "I'm for enforcing the law in a rational way."

The Minutemen are not vigilantes, they are much more closely akin to the neighborhood watch groups around the country. How dare you suggest otherwise! They are doing nothing more than looking for lawbreakers and reporting them to the Border Patrol. If that does make them vigilantes, we need more just like them.

And just who does the Mexican Pendejo Presidente think he is trying to kid with his threats against Americans? Does his country protect “migrants” who cross its borders in violation of Mexican law?

The State Department says that the Mexican government, angry that a thousand American volunteers will begin an Arizona border vigil next month, consistently violates the rights of illegal immigrants crossing its southern border into Mexico.

Many of the illegals in Mexico, who emigrate from Central and South America, complain of "double dangers" of extortion by Mexican authorities and robbery and killings by organized gangs.

The State Department's Human Rights Practices report, released only last month, cites abuses at all levels of the Mexican government, and charges that Mexican police and immigration officials not only violate the rights of illegal immigrants, but traffic in illegal aliens.

Although Mexico demands that its citizens' rights be protected when they illegally enter the United States, immigrants who cross illegally into Mexico "are often ripped off six ways until sundown," says George Grayson, a professor at the College of William & Mary and a fellow at the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies (CIS).

Mr. Grayson, who wrote a report for the center on Mexico's abuses of aliens, says "very little" is being done by Mexico to protect the welfare of the Central Americans and the others who cross into Mexico.

So, cabron Presidente Fox, whatÂ’s the deal here? Americans insist that their border be protected and seek to assist the proper authorities, and you make threats. Folks cross the Mexican border illegally and you stand by passively as they face extortion and violence at the hands of both Mexican criminals and Mexican law enforcement personnel. Yet you demand that your citizens have the red carpet rolled out for them, with more rights and better treatment than American citizens. Why donÂ’t you deal with the problems in your own backyard before dealing with the solutions to the problems in ours, hijo de puta Your Excellency? Until you do, this American would prefer that you and the rest of your chihuahuas chingadas government officials quit interfering in our internal affairs.

And President Bush – drop the immigration plan designed to appeal more to the Mexicans than it is to the Americans until after Vincete Fox has fixed Mexico’s problems with illegal immigrants.

UPDATE: The Washington Times went after President Bush's mischaracterization of the Minutemen as "vigilantes" prior to the visit of Mexican hijo de puta President Vincente Fox.

'Vigilantes'

We've reached a very strange moment in the immigration debate. On Wednesday President Bush condemned a group of good American citizens worried about the breaking of U.S. immigration law. He condemned the organizers of Project Minuteman as "vigilantes" even though they have broken no law and pledge not to do so. An hour or two later, Mr. Bush welcomed to his Texas ranch a man who insults the United States for its immigration policy and leads a government that routinely flouts U.S. immigration law.

Mexican President Vicente Fox hit a trifecta of contempt for the United States and its laws over the past week. First, he accused Americans of taking no pride in their country because the government is building fences in San Diego to keep out those who try to enter the country in defiance of the law. Next, he scoffed at the concern of U.S. authorities that terrorists may be crossing the U.S. border. Then, he vowed to stamp out the work of Project Minuteman and other efforts by Americans to protect their country. When Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona told Mr. Fox to show "a little less disdain for the rule of law north of the border," he was being only too polite. Nevertheless, Mr. Bush welcomed Mr. Fox to his home.

It's worth reviewing how we got here. First, the Bush administration has failed to do all it could do, and should do, to curtail illegal immigration. The most recent analysis, out this week from the Pew Hispanic Center, suggests that 10.3 million undocumented aliens live in the United States, up 23 percent from the estimated 8.4 million who were here only four years ago. Most are Mexicans. This has happened in large part because Mr. Bush seems not to be concerned about the growing tide of illegal immigration. He declined to provide in his 2006 budget for hiring the 2,000 additional border agents he promised in the intelligence bill he signed in December. Mr. Bush wants to hire only 210.

Meanwhile, the Mexican government has engaged in an unprecedented campaign to encourage the breaking of U.S. law. As we pointed out in January, the Mexican government publishes and distributes pamphlets instructing would-be illegals on how to evade detection at the border, and how to lie low once they're here. All the while, Mr. Fox continues a high-decibel campaign of rhetorical contempt for U.S. law.

Amid this chaos, states, local governments and citizen groups have responded. In Arizona, whose illegal population has grown fastest, a citizen initiative called Proposition 200 passed with a solid majority in November to place curbs on the distribution of public benefits to illegals. Many Hispanic citizens voted for it. Now, Project Minuteman -- a border-monitoring effort slated to begin April 1 -- has swollen to more than a thousand volunteers with 30 private planes to monitor activity on the border 24 hours a day, reporting what they find to the Border Patrol.

Mr. Bush's description of the Minutemen as vigilantes is a misreading of American history. The vigilantes were a lynch mob. The Minutemen are an expanded version of the Neighborhood Watch programs popular in many American cities. It's sad to see an American president roll out a royal welcome to a foreign dignitary so openly contemptuous of U.S. law, while simultaneously condemning Americans who are trying to help duly constituted authorities enforce the law.

Exactly right -- quit pandering to the Mexicans, Mr. President, and start doing the job demanded by the American people -- stop the flow of illegal immigrants into the United States.

Posted by: Greg at 01:33 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Refinery Explosion

The BP refinery in Texas City, Texas, suffered a serious explosion today. Fourteen are known dead, and at least 100 were treated at area hospitals. Crewa are still searching for other victims at the site, and some plant workers remain unaccounted for.



The refinery, which accounts for about 3% of the nation's gasoline supply, is about 15 miles from my home, and I could make the straight shot down 146 to the site of the explosion in 20-30 minutes, depending on whether or not I made all the lights.



Please offer prayers for the injured and dead, for the missing, for the families, and for all the workers and community members touched by this tragedy.

Posted by: Greg at 04:17 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Four Plead Guilty To Democrat Vote Fraud In East St. Louis

I've worked elections in St. Clair County. As a graduate student I worked closely with both Gaffner for Congress campaigns in 1988 (special election and general election). We were up on Jerry Costello both times until the East St. Louis vote came in. It was taken for granted that the city vote was not clean.

Some things never change -- except now they are getting caught and prosecuted.

Leroy Scott Jr., 46; Lillie Nichols, 51; Terrance R. Stitch, 43; and his wife, Sandra Stith, 54; pleaded guilty Tuesday to one count each of vote-buying before U.S. District Judge David Herndon on Tuesday morning.

The East St. Louis Democratic Committee held organizational meetings on Oct. 13, 20 and 27, headed by Committee Chairman Charlie Powell and discussed strategy for maximizing the Democratic vote for president, Illinois Supreme Court justice and the St. Clair County Board chairman in the Nov. 2 election, according to the charges.

"During these organizational meeting, the need to pay voters for voting the 'Democratic ticket' during the Nov. 2 general election, and the amount which said voters should be paid, was discussed by Charles Powell and other precinct committeemen," the charges stated.

Powell denied Tuesday he ordered anyone to buy votes, but only to get voters to the polls on Election Day. He also acknowledged there was a chance he could face an indictment.

"Everything is possible," Powell said. "I don't have any judgment on it whatsoever."

Robert Sprague, who heads the St. Clair County Central Democratic Committee, could not be reached for comment.

Two days before the election, the charges allege Scott, Precinct 38 committeeman, received $1,200; Nichols, Precinct 29 committeeman, received $1,500; and Terrance Stith, Precinct 23 committeeman, received $2,000 from the St. Clair County Democratic Committee.

Sandra Stith worked the polls for her friend, Edna Mayes, Precinct 11th committeeman, and received $500, the charges stated.

The Stiths, Nichols and Scott admitted Tuesday that they paid voters between $5 and $10 for favorably casts ballots during the Nov. 2 election.

Here's hoping that this will encourage an honest vote and an honest count in one of the most dishonest election venues in the country.

UPDATE: Looks like there is even more.

The head of the East St. Louis Central Democratic Committee and others bought votes in a 2004 election that included hotly contested races for Illinois Supreme Court justice and St. Clair County Board chairman, according to federal indictments made public Wednesday.

Besides committee Chairman Charles Powell, the accused include Kelvin Ellis, director of regulatory affairs for the city, who was named in an earlier indictment that among other things accused him of trying to arrange the murder of a witness against him in a vote fraud investigation.

U.S. Attorney Ron Tenpas said some of the money used to sway the vote came from the St. Clair County Democratic Party, but he stressed that the indictments didn't indicate that county Democrats were aware the money was used for vote buying.

Wrong thing to say, Ron. The East St. Louis Democrat Party apparatus is almost exclusively black, while the St. Clair County Democrat party is mostly white. You are certainly going to have people start shouting "racism" over the failure to indict folks from the county Democrats, since you've implicitly cleared the white folks while indicting the black folks.

The indicted Democrats are:

The five charged in the indictment with conspiracy to commit election fraud are committeemen [Charles] Powell, 61; Jesse Lewis, 56; Sheila Thomas, 31; Kelvin Ellis, 55; and precinct worker Yvette Johnson, 46. Lewis, Thomas, Ellis and Johnson also are charged with election fraud.

Please note -- Powell is the chairman of the East St. Louis Democrats. The truly sad thing is that, for all their work subborning vote fraud, only one of the favored candidate won.

Only one of the "favored candidates" identified in the indictment was elected. That was County Board Chairman Mark Kern, who trailed Republican rival Steve Reeb by about 4,000 votes in the rest of the county but won by about the same number when ballots in East St. Louis were counted. The city has a separate election authority from the rest of the county.

Talk about your gang that couldn't shoot straight.

And that "down by 4000/up by 4000" move when the votes were counted looks really familiar to me -- the first Gaffner campaign I worked on went into East St. Louis up by 2500 votes and came out down by the same margin, costing us the election.

Posted by: Greg at 03:46 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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So Long, Dolphin!

As some folks who venture into the comment threads might note, dolphin has decided to swim away from my site for good after posting one more of his ever-so-superior comments directing insults my direction. I'm sorry to see him go and feel a certain loss over the sundering of what was once a very respectful and cordial relationship. At the same time, I cannot say I am surprised. Given the accusations made, I feel obliged to respond, and given the limits of Haloscan, I believe it to be prudent to post it here.

If you peruse the comment thread (and others), you will see that the thread in question was somewhat heated right from the beginning. Dolphin, you see, does not like to have anyone question his assertions on homosexual rights (or much else), and took immediate offense at my response to him. He was hostile to anyone who dared to do so, and refused to deal with the assertion that what he proposed in that initial post was nothing short of a eugenics program of the sort implemented and carried out by Southern Democrats and German Nazis during the 20th century. Having set out an untenable position, he simply refused to dialogue with me from that point forward, and spent time insulting folks who dared to characterize his position in a way that he disliked and telling folks to shut up, pouting because I questioned his veracity on an assertion about Justice Scalia (and refusing to back his assertion up), and discussing animal sex with Deb.

In the midst of this, dolphin chose to make a post on his site ridiculing Deb for a statement that she had made. There was no attribution and no linkage. My comment pointing that out (and taking him to task on some issues from my site) was deleted. He also responded to my Gmail account. I post the entire exchange that followed.

dolphin Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 7:33PM
To: PrecinctChair@gmail.com

I wanted to make sure you had my email address so next time you wanted
to address a comment specifically to me instead of in response to a
particular post and can't find the "email me" link on side bar of my
site, you will not have to waste my bandwidth with comments unrelated to
my posts.

Thanks

dolphin
=====================================================================================

The Precinct Chair Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 9:35PM
To: dolphin

Actually, dolphin, it was related to your post -- in particular your
uncited use of material from my site.

Link it or remove it.
=====================================================================================

dolphin Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 10:35PM
To: The Precinct Chair

I will not link to your site. I do not link to websites that frequently post anti-gay hate literature. If you so desire, I will place the name of your site in the post and people can google it if they care to. As for citing you for the quote, I don't see where I'm under any obligation to do so. The quote is not your writing and is not stored on your server so I don't see how you can claim any rights to it. At best, it's simply property of HaloScan.com which you have linked to from your site. Let me know if you'd like your site's title added to the post. It would be prudent to note that you authorized my comments to be used on another site without permission, yet I sent you no demands.

dolphin
=====================================================================================

The Precinct Chair Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 11:04PM
To: dolphin

I authorized the use of a comment thread from my site, which is well
within my rights, after authorization was requested.

I did not authorize your use of the comment thread because you did not
even have the courtesy to ask.

And I do not post ANY anti-gay hate literature. I challenge you to
find ANY anti-gay hate literature. Unless, of course, you view
disagreement with gay marriage as "anti-gay hate literature," which is
an absurd position. What I have come to discover is that, in your
eyes, "anti-gay hate" means "disagrees with dolphin on an issue
related to homosexuality."

I repeat -- link or delete. The choice is yours.

And yes, the name of my site is expected to be associated with any
material taken from my site or associated comment threads.
=====================================================================================

dolphin Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 11:20PM
To: The Precinct Chair

I will add your site's name to the post. As for linking, I will not do so, I do NOT link to hate sites (as determined by me), PERIOD. It's not a new policy instituted exclusively against you. It's been policy since I started my blog. The choice is indeed mine, and I will add your site name (though I am not under obligation to do so) however that is the extent of it. Having reviewed the HaloScan.com TOS, I am under no obligation to bow to your threats.
=====================================================================================

The Precinct Chair Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 11:35PM
To: dolphin

Where was there a threat?

And what on my site makes me a hate site -- other than the fact you
disagree with me?

Or will you avoid these questions, too, as you have the inconvenient
ones in the discussions on my so-called "hate site"?

At that point all communication ended -- and I removed the link to dolphin's website. I mean hey, why would I link to someone in my list of favored sites if they refuse to even link to me when they are taking information from my site on the basis that I run an anti-gay hate site? His conduct and position on the issue made that decision a perfectly reasonable one. Even in his private emails he was condescending and insulting, and made additional false accusations (would someone please point out the threat I am accused of making?). I had planned on leaving it at that, but I wanted to clarify for Amy's benefit that the questions were directed at dolphin and not Ridor. The rest simply flowed out of my frustration over the situation, and I decided that I would post it all as a way of dealing with that frustration and explaining dolphin's absence.

By the way, does anyone note the irony of dolphin stating that "it takes a small man to bash someone on a public website instead of taking his problems up with the individual involved in a polite and non-threatening or confrontational way"? What were most of his comments on that thread but bashing? For that matter, what would you call the item from his site which I objected to? For the record, I am following his precedent by making a conscious decision to neither link nor cite his blog -- I hope he has no objection.

While visiting the neo-con site (yes sometimes it's fun to see what they're up to), I came across this gem of a quote in the comments section and thought I'd share it here.

News Flash. Same sex marriage is not an invention of the gay community. -Deb S

.

Now she failed to mention WHO invented it, but if it was not gay individuals, the clear implication is that it was straight individuals who first decided they'd like to marry members of the same-sex. I think this is an example of "I just hate gay people so bad that I can't even handle the thought that THEY could want to get married so it must be a decision straight people made for them."

He bashed both Deb and I on his site (calling me a neo-con and not even having the integrity to identify me) on his public site, and tried to do it in a way that she would never know that she had been bashed -- and refused to allow me to respond on his site. So we can add "hypocrite" to the list of titles that he has earned here.

Dolphin says he isn't coming back here again, so I shouldn't respond to him. This isn't a response to him, but merely an explanation of his parting comment. If he does respond, I hope he does so in a "polite and non-threatening or confrontational way." After all, we wouldn't want him to act like a "small man" again.

Posted by: Greg at 01:53 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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But They Are Just Hard Workers Who Want Jobs

Like we donÂ’t have to worry about enough with the regular border jumpers, now we have to look out for these guys.

Law enforcement authorities in Arizona were on alert yesterday for six convicts who escaped from a prison in Nogales, Mexico, and may have tried to cross the border.

Mexican officials notified U.S. law enforcement agencies after the men overpowered guards at the prison Friday night, U.S. Border Patrol spokesman Jose Garza said yesterday.

Garza and Santa Cruz County Sheriff Tony Estrada said that none of the six had been apprehended as of Monday. Estrada said he had been told that two of the inmates had planned to escape and four others "piggybacked" along.

Guns may have been smuggled in to the prisoners, and Mexican officials arrested some guards at the prison and were questioning them to determine possible involvement, he said.

After the men escaped, "They went on a rampage, robbed a bank, carjacked a couple of vehicles, all on the Mexican side, and apparently injured the husband" of an American consular official in Nogales, Mexico, Estrada said.

They are, of course, fine upstanding Mexican citizens who are just in search of work, whose crimes include robbery, assault, narcotics sale/trafficking and the murder of law enforcement officers. Maybe the Minutemen will spot them, since we've seen how well the Border Patrol and other law enforcement agencies in the region do with handling border jumpers.

Posted by: Greg at 11:45 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Ban The Sport, Not Good Sportsmanship

The traditional post-game handshake has been banned at high school girls soccer games in San Francisco. It seems that harsh words, insults and hard handslaps and even blows have been exchanged. So now the following rule has been put in place.

Not only that, but "all soccer players will be barred from saying a single word to their opponents, opposing coaches or officials upon the conclusion of every soccer game,'' Donald Collins, the school district's high school athletic commissioner, decreed in an e-mail to all coaches and referees Monday.

So instead of winners and losers exchanging friendly or even perfunctory high-fives, "all soccer players will immediately proceed to their respective sidelines upon the conclusion of every soccer game,'' Collins commanded.

This is precisely the wrong decision. This rule even punishes a student who thanks a referee or tells compliments an opposing player. If there is a problem, the offenders need to be disciplined, including suspensions or even bans. If it is so severe that displays of good sportsmanship need to be banned, then the teams need to be disbanded and the season cancelled. You donÂ’t implement another zero tolerance rule that fails to distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate conduct.

Posted by: Greg at 11:43 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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City Recalls Pledge-Sitter

The people of Estes Park, Colorado, have recalled a city councilman who refused to stand for or say the Pledge of Allegiance at the start of council meetings. The final vote tally was 905-603.

Habecker has been a trustee for 12 years, but the issue didn't arise until last year when the town board began reciting the Pledge before meetings. Habecker chose to sit out these sessions, calling the "under God" clause unconstitutional.

The recall election was original scheduled for Feb. 15, but Habecker went to court and had it blocked. Earlier this month, a federal judge lifted the injunction.

"I don't think it's a sad day for me," said Habecker after the votes were counted. "I stood ...or sat.for what I believed in and I still believe that way and the vote of the town of Estes Park isn't going to change my mind."

Habecker said he still plans to attend board meetings and express his opinions. He says he'll probably file a lawsuit over the outcome, claiming he's being denied his "political capacity" because of his religious beliefs.

"What it means is that the people have a voice in their government and that's what the state statute was set up for," said Richard Clark, the recall organizer.

Now I have to tell you that while I understand and agree with the ide of getting him off the council I find the whole situation unsettling. I don’t dispute that Habecker has every right to refuse to stand for or say the pledge. If this were a regularly scheduled election, I know I would vote against him if he disclosed his objection to standing for the pledge. But I don’t know that I would vote to recall him over this issue, preferring instead to wait for his term to end. The reason is simple – Habecker is already threatening to sue over the recall, and it is possible that some judge could find a religious freedom violation in the recall. Waiting for the term to end would eliminate that option, because there is no way that he could challenge a general election.

Posted by: Greg at 11:40 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Double Standard

Chuck Colson offers this anecdote that raises the issue of a double standard regarding religious expression in the public square.

Ironically, while the Supreme Court was debating the role of religion in American public life and whether the monuments of the Ten Commandments could stand on public property, one group of Americans has settled the question for themselves. Medical students in Boca Raton, Florida, recently filled their classroom with the smell of incense and the sound of ancient chants. They lit candles and spoke about the body being the “temple of the soul.” And they did it all “on a state university campus, in facilities funded with . . . tax dollars.”

Did I mention that all this chanting and candle-lighting was in accordance with Buddhist ritual? You didnÂ’t really think that it would be Christian, did you?
The rites followed the final exam in Gross Anatomy on the Florida Atlantic University campus. Students, led by a professor, used them to pay their respects to the four cadavers they had used in class. What the Palm Beach Post called a “solemn closing ritual” ended with the exhortation to “go out and make a new world.”

The obvious question here is: What if Christian, not Buddhist, rites had been used? As columnist Terry Mattingly asked, how would the university have reacted if “rose incense” and “Byzantine” or “Gregorian” chant had filled the air? What if students had been told to “go in peace to love and serve the Lord”?

Where are the ACLU and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State? Why is a non-Christian religious activity, led by a professor, acceptable in a classroom at a state university if identical Christian activity is not?

Colson posits that it is because Christianity demands that society be confronted and changed. It demands that people make a choice to live morally and seek to improve the world. Buddhism, especially in America, makes no such demand. As such, the public expression of “diverse” Buddhism is acceptable, while the public practice if “intolerant” Christianity is not.

Posted by: Greg at 11:39 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Supremes Likely To Slap Down Johhnie

Celebrity lawyer Johhnie Cockroach Cochran appears likely to lose a case before the Supreme Court involving an injunction ordering former client Ulysses Tory to stop picketing him and forbidding Tory (or people acting on his behalf) from even speaking publicly about Cochran.

The Supreme Court appeared roundly unsympathetic yesterday as a lawyer for Cochran tried to defend an injunction issued by a California judge against Ulysses Tory, a disgruntled former client who picketed outside Cochran's Los Angeles office with signs describing him as a liar, cheat and worse.

The injunction bars Tory, along with his agents and representatives, from picketing or even speaking about Cochran in any public forum, apparently forever. A California appeals court upheld the injunction and Tory, backed by numerous press and free-speech organizations, asked the Supreme Court to strike it down in Tory v. Cochran.

Cochran's lawyer, Jonathan Cole, portrayed the injunction as Cochran's only possible remedy for years of verbal abuse and attempted extortion by Tory. Suing Tory for defamation afterward would yield little in damages from Tory, who has few assets.

This injunction is very broad. No speech. Forever and ever. No matter what the context. As Justice Breyer noted, the injunction could be construed in such a way as to prohibit ToryÂ’s attorney, Erwin Chemerinsky, from even mentioning Johnnie Cochran during the course of oral arguments.

The good news is that no justice seemed sympathetic towards CochranÂ’s position. In light of previous case law, it is almost unthinkable that the justices will uphold the injunction. But that a judge would ever consider such an expansive limitation on speech is pretty scary.

Posted by: Greg at 11:33 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Too Bad It’s Not The End Of A Rope

I’m glad to hear his fight for freedom is nearing the end of the line. If you sell-out the US, you deserve no mercy. I don’t care how noble you allege your aims to be.

Jonathan Pollard is running out of options in his fight for freedom, with his lawyers telling The Jerusalem Post that their current appeal is essentially their last legal venue of challenging his life sentence.

Should the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia reject the appeal – a likely event, if the court's chilly reception so far is any indication – Pollard's lawyers would probably petition the Supreme Court. But there is no guarantee that the Supreme Court would even agree to hear their case, much less overturn 20 years' worth of legal and governmental opposition to Pollard's release.

"Once we are out of the judicial system, our only remedy would be political relief in the form of a presidential pardon," said Jacques Semmelman, who is representing Pollard together with Eliot Lauer.

Semmelman and Lauer are trying to convince the court that Pollard's original defense counsel, Richard Hibey, was unacceptably ineffective. Hibey inexplicably failed to appeal the life sentence requested by the prosecution, and imposed by the court, despite the plea agreement that stipulated no life sentence be sought for Pollard.
Hibey and Joseph DiGenova, the lead prosecutor in the original case, refused requests to discuss the case.

And I’ll say it now – any president, Republican or Democrat, who pardons a spy deserves to be impeached.

UPDATE: Pollard's wife writes a vitriolic anti-American piece claiming anti-Semitism is behind her husband's treatment. Mrs. Pollard, who lives off a pension supplied to her by the Israeli government as payment for her husband's treason, insists that justice requires her husband's release.

Maybe I could go along with that.

Release Jonathan Pollard.

From the belly of a bomber flying over the Knesset at 30,000 feet.

I have no patience for those who support Americans who betray their country.

Posted by: Greg at 11:32 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Too Bad ItÂ’s Not The End Of A Rope

IÂ’m glad to hear his fight for freedom is nearing the end of the line. If you sell-out the US, you deserve no mercy. I donÂ’t care how noble you allege your aims to be.

Jonathan Pollard is running out of options in his fight for freedom, with his lawyers telling The Jerusalem Post that their current appeal is essentially their last legal venue of challenging his life sentence.

Should the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia reject the appeal – a likely event, if the court's chilly reception so far is any indication – Pollard's lawyers would probably petition the Supreme Court. But there is no guarantee that the Supreme Court would even agree to hear their case, much less overturn 20 years' worth of legal and governmental opposition to Pollard's release.

"Once we are out of the judicial system, our only remedy would be political relief in the form of a presidential pardon," said Jacques Semmelman, who is representing Pollard together with Eliot Lauer.

Semmelman and Lauer are trying to convince the court that Pollard's original defense counsel, Richard Hibey, was unacceptably ineffective. Hibey inexplicably failed to appeal the life sentence requested by the prosecution, and imposed by the court, despite the plea agreement that stipulated no life sentence be sought for Pollard.
Hibey and Joseph DiGenova, the lead prosecutor in the original case, refused requests to discuss the case.

And I’ll say it now – any president, Republican or Democrat, who pardons a spy deserves to be impeached.

UPDATE: Pollard's wife writes a vitriolic anti-American piece claiming anti-Semitism is behind her husband's treatment. Mrs. Pollard, who lives off a pension supplied to her by the Israeli government as payment for her husband's treason, insists that justice requires her husband's release.

Maybe I could go along with that.

Release Jonathan Pollard.

From the belly of a bomber flying over the Knesset at 30,000 feet.

I have no patience for those who support Americans who betray their country.

Posted by: Greg at 11:32 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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