I didn't mess with the "runaway bride" story at all, mainly because the evidence was too scanty. And when she turned up, I looked at my wife and commented that she had committed no crime in disappearing like that -- and held to that position until the police said that she reported a kidnapping when she did turn up.

Why talk about that now? Because of this case, which I vaguely remember from when it took place.

A Texas A&M University student who had been feared murdered after disappearing nearly seven years ago has been found alive and working in Kentucky, according to authorities.

Brandi Stahr went missing in October 1998, and police spent hours searching for her body in wooded areas. They questioned a serial rapist and murderer about her just hours before he was executed last year.

But a telephone tip led investigators to Florence, Ky., where Stahr has been working for the last five years at a Sam's Club, said Texas Ranger Frank Malinak.

"We thought we were dealing with a missing persons case," Malinak said. "But, in actuality, we were dealing with a person who did not want to be found and was in hiding."

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Posted by: Greg at 10:22 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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I really felt an incredible desire to be ill upon reading this article, for a whole bunch of different reasons.

Elva Hernández never imagined she'd give birth to a son in a medical helicopter flying over the Arizona desert.

The 29-year-old woman, who was seven months' pregnant, felt contractions and went into labor after walking in the heat, rain and in the cold of night for nearly 20 hours as she and her family tried to illegally enter the United States.

Hernández, her children and her husband were abandoned by a smuggler soon after she went into labor.

Last Sunday, she gave birth in the helicopter minutes after being rescued by U.S. Border Patrol agents.

She and the premature baby, Christian, a new U.S. citizen, were taken to Tucson's University Medical Center. The infant is stable, but remains in intensive care. Hernández left the hospital Tuesday.

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Posted by: Greg at 09:08 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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I keep hearing the Left claim that Bush lied about Iraq having the material to make WMDs. I keep hearing that no such material was ever found. Now it appears that the material that didn't exist has disappeared from its storage areas on Iraq.

U.N. satellite imagery experts have determined that material that could be used to make biological or chemical weapons and banned long-range missiles has been removed from 109 sites in Iraq, U.N. weapons inspectors said in a report obtained Thursday.

U.N. inspectors have been blocked from returning to Iraq since the U.S.-led war in 2003 so they have been using satellite photos to see what happened to the sites that were subject to U.N. monitoring because their equipment had both civilian and military uses.

In the report to the U.N. Security Council (search), acting chief weapons inspector Demetrius Perricos said he's reached no conclusions about who removed the items or where they went. He said it could have been moved elsewhere in Iraq, sold as scrap, melted down or purchased.

He said the missing material can be used for legitimate purposes. "However, they can also be utilized for prohibited purposes if in a good state of repair."

He said imagery analysts have identified 109 sites that have been emptied of equipment to varying degrees, up from 90 reported in March.

The report also provided much more detail about the percentage of items no longer at the places where U.N. inspectors monitored them.

So please let me understand -- things that folks claim never existed are now missing.

So which is it ?

Was Bush right about this material, or did it never exist in the first place?

I think we all know the answer -- as inconvenient as it may be for the Left to admit.

Posted by: Greg at 02:58 PM | Comments (31) | Add Comment
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1 FOX NEWS is not reliable.

R-

Posted by: Me is the Ridor at Sat Jun 4 15:44:24 2005 (nWmj6)

2 Hear ye, hear ye. "R"'s word is gold. Let's turn over the reign to Newsweek, cBS, BBC, and the lovely Diva Ms. Couric.

Key words that the great "R" missed:

"U.N. weapons inspectors said in a report obtained Thursday."

And surprise of surprises what France said!

France's U.N. Ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sabliere said Thursday the commission's expertise "should not be lost for the international community."


Kill the messenger, eh "R".

A typical facist liberalista response.

Posted by: mcconnell at Sat Jun 4 17:03:53 2005 (qzj0i)

3 They're saying that materials which could feasibly be used as WMD, but were not meant as such, disappeared and that they find it odd. They aren't themselves weapons however, nor are they any sort of proof that Iraq was pursuing WMD.

The whole of the U.N.'s point was that they were monitoring these materials, which they did not believe were being used illegally. Now that they've disappeared, the situation may have changed and the materials could be used to make weapons.

Posted by: N.J. at Sat Jun 4 18:17:04 2005 (FJAxe)

4 Fox News isn't reliable, but that's besides the point here.

Materials to make WMDs are not the same as ACTUAL WMDs. I'm no chemist but I bet I could make a bomb with ordinary materials that I have in my home, but that doesn't mean that I have a bomb!

Bush's claim wasn't that Iraq had the materials to make WMDs, Bush claim as that Iraq not only had WMDs but was an imminent threat to the USA, a claim his own hand-picked weapons inspector has declared false.

Posted by: dolphin at Sat Jun 4 19:37:20 2005 (MIt/1)

5 Bush claimed they had WMDs...and they actually did have *some*...though apparently not nearly as much as he'd originally thought.

Yaknow what though, France, Italy, Germany, and Russia thought Saddam had WMDs as well. Everyone who says Bush 'lied' is full of caca. Bush was 'wrong', and even then Saddam still had to be taken out.

The person we REALLY need to dust is Kim Jung Il.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Sun Jun 5 02:37:49 2005 (r/FBF)

6 A breaking story here...

Huge underground hideout uncovered in Iraq

Search in Anbar province yields large weapons cache
Sunday, June 5, 2005 Posted: 8:14 AM EDT (1214 GMT)

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- U.S. Marines and Iraqi soldiers have uncovered a 503,000 square-foot underground insurgent hideout in central Iraq containing large stores of weapons, ammunition and supplies.

The bunker -- the size of nine American football fields or six soccer pitches -- is the largest found in the past year, the U.S. military said Sunday.

No insurgents were in the bunker, but Marines found fully charged cell phones and fresh food in the kitchen, said 1st Lt. Kate VandenBossche, a spokeswoman for the 2nd Marine Division.

The bunker, which measured 902 feet (275 meters) by 558 feet (170 meters), also included furnished living spaces, two showers and an air conditioner, she said.

Other rooms contained machine guns, mortars, rockets, artillery rounds, black uniforms, ski masks, compasses, log books and night vision goggles, she said.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/06/05/iraq.main/index.html

Of course, maybe Commie News Network is unreliable as well.

But, an underground lair about the size of 9 football fields?!! Kind gives you a new perspective of how many types of weapons could be hidden or even manufactured or the storing of WMD.

Posted by: mcconnell at Sun Jun 5 05:22:49 2005 (jXhtw)

7 Everyone who says Bush 'lied' is full of caca. Bush was 'wrong'

Well what would you call it?

We now know that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." I'd call knowingly altering intelligence report to make them back your plans when they didn't in reality lying.

Posted by: dolphin at Sun Jun 5 11:04:49 2005 (SVh3K)

8 I'd not heard that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy"; what is the context in which that was presented? Also, did Bush - directly or indirectly - get people to change the intelligence? He could have told them he wants evidence that Saddam had WMDs. That's different than lying.

Also, did Bush somehow manage to convince all of the other world leaders to lie as well?

Posted by: Subjugator at Sun Jun 5 11:11:20 2005 (r/FBF)

9 I don't have much faith in the Downin Street memo -- and even if the thing is authentic, and that sentences is not a later addition, one does not need to read that as "altering intelligence". It is just as easy to read it as "selecting and using the evidence that best supported the case for war".

Think about it -- you have two bits of information -- one that supports your beliefs and one that doesn't. Which do you believe and use?

Posted by: Rhymes With Right at Sun Jun 5 12:15:31 2005 (lUWVO)

10 I stated it poorly. Thankfully RWR stated it better than I.

Posted by: Subjugator at Sun Jun 5 14:37:04 2005 (r/FBF)

11 Let's say your right and the memo actually only indicates that he was SELECTING evidence rather than ALTERING it. Isn't intentionally leaving out information that contradicts your claim and only offering what back it also lying? Didn't I just recently get attacked when it was percieved that I had done just what you're talking about?

Posted by: dolphin at Sun Jun 5 18:02:41 2005 (MIt/1)

12 *cough* Global warming, Dolphin?

You do have a good point though, in that if that's what he was doing, unless the evidence against was minimal or weak, it was intellectually dishonest and he should have given the whole story.

Not knowing what he did or said, I'd say there's at least evidence for suspicion. That said; my personal reasons for supporting our venture in Iraq are good - though I am being logically inconsistent in said support (I have serious difficulty reconciling it with my opposition to taxation) - and all I rely upon for actions I support are my reasons, not his.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Mon Jun 6 00:07:37 2005 (r/FBF)

13 Sub,

Your pet topic (global warming) has already been addressed in another post. Why don't you address it there instead of trying to make it the topic of EVERY post.

Posted by: dolphin at Mon Jun 6 05:03:02 2005 (fgsGh)

14 Indeed, every intel agency thought Saddam had WMD. Many prominent Democrats said this very thing, too (see here). So, how did Bush "lie?"

The Downing St. Memo, from I've seen, is as RWR says most likely -- that Bush and co. utilized [certain] evidence to make their case, not that they made up evidence. If Kerry and co. want to bring impeachment charges about this, good luck with the Repub. Congress!

Posted by: Hube at Mon Jun 6 10:41:40 2005 (WfW9j)

15 Most of those who believed that Iraq had WMDs believed so based on the evidence that Bush presented to them. Yet you still ask how Bush lied?

You got it spot on with that last line Hube. Bush cannot be impeached. He could single-handly kill every first born child in the US and as long as the GOP controls Congress he would happily sit there in office.

Posted by: dolphin at Mon Jun 6 12:04:12 2005 (hkQ+k)

16 I wasn't addressing the topic of global warming, I was addressing the topic of selective use of evidence. Global warming happens to be a very convenient example thereof.

As for the rest - they had their OWN intelligence agencies and believed that WMDs were possessed based on their own data. You can't possibly believe that Russia, England, et al do not have their own competent intelligence agencies.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 00:09:19 2005 (r/FBF)

17 And you can't possibly believe that the US wasn't offering them information to try to get them on board.

Posted by: dolphin at Tue Jun 7 04:19:37 2005 (fgsGh)

18 Competent Russian intelligence? Have you forgotten that Putin accused Bush for firing Dan Rather??


=========
'We didn't criticize you when you fired those reporters at CBS.'

Bush's aides have long feared that former KGB officers in Putin's inner circle are painting a twisted picture of U.S. policy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60098-2005Feb28.html
===========

Tell me again about how competent Russian intelligences are.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 06:46:36 2005 (LmcbS)

19 I can believe that we shared information with them. Can you believe that they also shared information with us?

I believe that it is entirely possible that Bush was intellectually dishonest. I just also believe it was possible that he wasn't intentionally so.

The reason I tend toward the second is because Bush has shown himself to be a fairly honest man, and I've not found proof of him ever having lied. In fact, when presented with the subject of past drug use, rather than lie, he refused to answer when he could have lied. Pretty tough thing to not lie about when he'd lie about something like this...ESPECIALLY since his request to congress for a use of force did NOT include mention of WMDs...it only included notation of Saddam's refusal to follow the basis of the cease fire.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 06:47:32 2005 (lkCzp)

20 Bush has shown himself to be a fairly honest man

I shouldn't have read that while eating. I almost choked. Funny stuff though, keep up the comedy!!

Posted by: dolphin at Tue Jun 7 07:43:18 2005 (fgsGh)

21 Most of those who believed that Iraq had WMDs believed so based on the evidence that Bush presented to them. Yet you still ask how Bush lied?

URRRNT!!
Completely incorrect. Wow, I know libs are paranoid about American power projection, but to say that Bush hoodwinked every Western (and some non-Western) intel agencies as well as the UN is, well, ultra paranoid!

Posted by: Hube at Tue Jun 7 07:54:20 2005 (hLmHh)

22 BTW dolphin, you guys still can't decide whether Bush is a dunce or insidiously smart! It's a riot! Hey, but based on today's news, we now know that "intellectual/nuanced" Kerry had the same GPA at Yale as the pres.! How 'bout that?

Posted by: Hube at Tue Jun 7 07:58:35 2005 (hLmHh)

23 Sub,

You're incorrect about "his request to congress for a use of force did NOT include mention of WMDs...it only included notation of Saddam's refusal to follow the basis of the cease fire."

Look at the text of Joint Resolution on Iraq passed by the U.S. Congress on October 11, 2002.

It mentions "weapons of mass destruction" 7 times. Not to mention the word "weapons" 17 times.
Congress voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as >>required

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 08:02:03 2005 (LmcbS)

24 forgot to add the link of the Joint Resolution on Iraq:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/july-dec02/joint_resolution_10-11-02.html

Posted by: at Tue Jun 7 08:02:58 2005 (LmcbS)

25 that was me who added the link.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 08:03:34 2005 (LmcbS)

26 Congress voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as >>required

Posted by: at Tue Jun 7 08:06:21 2005 (LmcbS)

27 Ok, one more time. It's picky about a certain symbol used here.

Congress voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as REQUIRED by the UN resolutions.
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/10/11/iraq.us/


It was an enforcement policy where the UN refused to address it after 12 years.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 08:48:50 2005 (LmcbS)

28 BTW dolphin, you guys still can't decide whether Bush is a dunce or insidiously smart! It's a riot! Hey, but based on today's news, we now know that "intellectual/nuanced" Kerry had the same GPA at Yale as the pres.! How 'bout that?

Bush is a moron. I've never said otherwise. If grades are so important to you, I personally scored higher than Bush on the SATs, and I didn't come from enough money to buy whatever grades I wanted. He's a moron, but a moron with an agenda, and a number of advisors.

Posted by: dolphin at Tue Jun 7 09:14:45 2005 (fgsGh)

29 Every U.S. President comes in with an agenda. Clinton's first agenda after eyeing Lewinsky was probably to try and bag her. He succeeded.

Posted by: mcconnell at Tue Jun 7 09:44:35 2005 (LmcbS)

30 I think the PBS article has the most relevant text. Looks like I was incorrect.

Mea culpa. Sorry.

Now that I've read the request, if you read the whole declaration and request for the use of force, you'll note that it's only a small part of it and that there are other things as well beyond the WMDs. That may have weighted the decision of the legislative branch, so it could be worse to be wrong about that than other things, but it's still got a strong potential for being wrong.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 09:58:09 2005 (lkCzp)

31 Bush has an agendum I am sure. So does everyone else on this planet...it's whether or not said agenda are harmful that is of concern.

What I believe about Bush is that he is sincere and wants to do the right thing. I kinda see him as being fairly similar to Carter as far as personality goes...I have vast respect for both, but disagree with many policies enacted by them.

Sub

Posted by: Subjugator at Tue Jun 7 10:00:58 2005 (lkCzp)

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Penn Jillette became a father on Friday. While I'm not a fan, and never have been, I offer my congratulations, since the birth of a healthy child is always a matter of great joy.

On the other hand, I don't think much of the name he and his wife selected.

Jillette, 50, and his wife Emily, 39, welcomed Moxie CrimeFighter Jillette on Friday, according to publicist Glenn Schwartz. It was the first child for the couple, who married last year.

"We chose her middle name because when she's pulled over for speeding she can say, `But officer, we're on the same side,'" Jillette explained. "`My middle name is CrimeFighter.'"

Frankly, I'm disappointed. After his recent show that dealt with Mother Teresa, I was hoping that the middle name would be "F*cking", since he kept referring to the Angel of Calcutta as "Mother F*cking Teresa." Or, if he wanted to combine two words into a middle name, perhaps he could have chosen "F*ckingC*nt", since he referred to the members of the Missionary Sisters of Charity as "f*cking c*nts" during the show.

Maybe they could have just named her after her daddy -- "BigottedHatemonger".

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Here is a man talking simple common sense about race in contemporary society. When are we going to do away with government-sponsored segregated graduation ceremonies at colleges and universities?

Because our daughter is African American, we had the dubious honor of attending two ceremonies — one for African Americans only, and then the next day, one for the general population of graduates. This was our third child to graduate from college, and all three universities — two in California and one in Washington — had these twin exercises.

Posted by: Greg at 01:57 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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Looks like a little bit of common sense might be injected into Texas school disciplinary proceedings if a bill recently passed by the Texas Legislature is signed.

A bill that would give school officials more discretion in discipline matters by allowing them to evaluate individual circumstances before expelling students for certain infractions is awaiting Gov. Rick Perry's approval.

The measure, House Bill 603, co-authored by Rep. Rob Eissler, R-The Woodlands, would have a significant effect on cases in which students unknowingly bring weapons to school.

"There are circumstances when students don't realize they have brought illegal items to school and this bill would offer them some protection," said bill supporter Lonnie Hollingsworth, director of governmental relations with Texas Classroom Teachers Association.

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If this were done to the Koran, people would die. But since it is only the Bible, some will click their tongues and liberals will call it another blow against "right-wing Christian theocrats."

A publisher is touting a new edition of the Gospels that identifies Christ as a woman named Judith Christ of Nazareth.

LBI Institute says its version, Judith Christ of Nazareth, The Gospels of the Bible, Corrected to Reflect that Christ Was a Woman, Extracted from Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, takes Thomas Jefferson's edited Gospel one step futher by "correcting" the gender of Christ and God.

"This long-awaited revised text of the Gospels makes the moral message of Christ more accessible to many, and more illuminating to all," says Billie Shakespeare, vice president for the publisher, in a statement. "It is empowering. We published this new Bible to acknowledge the rise of women in society."

And lest you think this is a joke, you can get confirmation here.

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Howard Dean, the son of wealth and privilege that heads the party of the wealthiest office-holders and political donors in America, now claims that Republicans are dishonest and don't work.

Asserting that some Florida voters stood in line for eight hours in November, Dean said that was a hardship for people who ''work all day and then pick up their kids at child care.''

But, he said, Republicans could stand in eight-hour lines ''because a lot of them have never made an honest living in their lives.''

I'v got a suggestion for you, Dr. Howard F*ing Dean. Come down here to Houston some day. Spend an afternoon with me in my classroom, and then follow me to my night job after dinner with my disabled wife. Come with me to a Harris County GOP meeting, and see how many of my fellow precinct chairs are hard-working Americans who are out there working their tails off to support their families.

And then you can hop on your chartered jet and go back to Washignton, where you can have dinner with John Kerry, the gigolo who is the richest member of the US Senate, Jon Corzine (the Goldman-Sach profiteer), Herb Kohl (heir to a retailing fortune), Jay Rockerfeller (we know where he got his cash), Ted Kennedy (still living off of Daddy's bootlegging bucks), Marc Dayton (another guy who inherited his money), and Dianne Feinstein (she earned her money the old-fashioned way -- she married a rich guy). Heck, maybe you can call up Warren Buffett (speculator) and Bill Gates (stole IBM's operating system and Apple's interface, and uses monopoly power to control the software industry) to join you.

So are you suure you want to talk about folks who have never done an honest day's work, Howard?

Posted by: Greg at 04:00 AM | Comments (16) | Add Comment
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. . . is even less balanced liberal reporting.

At least that's the prescription from a bunch of liberal MSM types at the "Take Back America" (from the real Americans, I guess) conference.

"The conservatives have got us, as a country, now believing that balance -- giving both sides -- is the same as truth, and there are some things that are just false," said Linda Foley, president of The Newspaper Guild, during a panel discussion on media reform at the "Take Back America" conference in Washington, D.C.

Funny, that sounds like she is complaining that conservatives VOLUNTARILY follow the dictates of the old "Fairness Doctrine". You know, the thing that the Left constantly demands be brought back as an antidote to conservative talk radio. Ms. Foley, though, seems to thing that presenting multiple sides to a controversy is a bad thing. After all, that might imply that the sides are equally legitimate and that reasonable, rational people can take either side.

Consider this controversial area.

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Bill Clinton has violated the deal made to avoid prosecution at the end of his term as president. As such, the agreement not to prosecute him for his crimes is no longer in effect, and federal authorities should pursue all appropriate charges against the former president. After all, there is no longer any basis for arguing that investigations or a trial interfere with his ability to carry out his official duties. I mean, he no longer has any.

Let's recall what the agreement required. Clinton had to admit that he did, in fact, lie in the Paula Jones case. Furthermore, he had to accept being disbarred. Now he has come back and made the claim that all charges against him were, in fact, false. These claims, in an interview with NBC's Brian Williams, seem to be a deal breaker to me.
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Well, the Texas Left has again demanded that Governor Rick Perry suspend the First Amendment to the US Constitution, insofar as it applies to those who object to the invasion of the United States by undocumented border-jumping criminals. This is the second such demand in the last month.

State Senator Juan "Chuy" Hinojosa and a group of Texas lawmakers attempted to pass a resolution insisting thet the governor prevent the Minutemen from monitoring the Texas-Mexico border for invading border-jumpers, as they did in Arizona this spring. The basis for the demand that the Constitutional right of Americans to peaceably assemble and petition their government for a redress of grievances be abridged was that allowing the exercise of those rights could "impede the traffic and negatively affect both tourism and trade along the border."

Governor Perry responded appropriately, though he failed to give support to the Minutemen as I had hoped he would.

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Forgive my language, but it seems like too many senior pranks this year revolved around shit. Cow manure, chicken feces, and, in one case, even elephant dung were spread around American high schools by graduating seniors, who were just trying to be funny. They weren't -- though the elephant manure did sort of raise the bar for originality.

That is why the senior prank at Montpelier High School in Vermont is such an exceptional one. A group of kids broke into school over the weekend and painted a mural on the lobby ceiling (a picture is included with the article). And the official reaction to the prank is one that demonstrates that administrators can exercise common sense and common decency in carrying out their responsibilities.

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I am generally warm in my attitude towards Jews. I have similar warm feelings for Israel. That is why I share some concerns with Rachel Neuwirth regarding the recent indictment of Larry Franklin on charges related to mishandling of classified documents, and the likely indictment of certain officials of AIPAC, the principle pro-Israel lobbying group in Washington. I don't want to see our relationship with Israel upset, and I would hate to see the stereotype that Jews are more loyal to Israel than the US reinforced.

But I think Neuwirth goes too far with this concern.
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